What, Why & How do we Know ?
Continuing through Rebecca Goldstein’s Plato at the Googleplex and finding it sooooo good. In fact I’m loving it. Despite two previous mentions [here][and here], I failed to mention that Larry Krauss is set up as the archetypal scientistic philosophy-(and theology)-jeerer. So, so true, and given the order of events last week – the culmination (so … Continue reading “Friday I’m In Love @platobooktour @lkrauss1 #bhagoldstein”
Saw and met Rebecca Goldstein doing the @platobooktour to promote her Plato at the Googleplex – why philosphy won’t go away on Monday at Nunn Hall, London. A bit like her 36 Arguments it’s a fictional creation as a vehicle for bringing long-standing (but still very relevant) philosophical questions and ideas into topical mainstream debates. I’ve not … Continue reading “Rebecca Goldstein, modern day Plato @platobooktour @bhahumanists @andrewcopson #bhagoldstein”
[Posting a draft from 2017] As a rule of thumb, any headline phrased like that kinda question was almost certainly created by an editor as click-bait and invariably demands the obvious answer “No”. So despite being Tweeted by @AnitaLeirfall – generally a reliable source 😉 – I didn’t actually read it beyond a skim of the … Continue reading “Is Matter Conscious? No it isn’t, but …”
A review of: “How The World Thinks – A Global History of Philosophy” by Julian Baggini All my reviews are done in the context of my own philosophical journey and often, like this one, a review done very early on in the reading, so that my own prejudices are laid bare for later analysis and … Continue reading “Zen and the Art of Philosophy”
Interesting to see today’s news on standardisation of units of measure, that time, distance and mass are now to be unified through the Caesium clock with application of the speed of light (c) and Planck’s constant (h). (Hat tip to Jim Al-Khalili on Twitter). Fascinating article in itself, however yet more evidence that the accepted standard … Continue reading “Carlo Rovelli – A Fresh Spin on Fundamental Physics”
When it comes to Anthony Gottlieb’s “Dream of Enlightenment“, my anticipation would be an understatement. When in 2004 I read and loved his earlier “Dream of Reason” (Greeks to Renaissance) and noted a second volume was in the pipeline, I was on pre-order lists with the publisher, and retail outlets, I even followed-up with enquiries about forecast … Continue reading “Standing on the Shoulders of Giants – Dreaming of Enlightenment”
Interesting post from Morgan Giddings, with a Facebook response from Sabine Hossenfelder: Morgan I have mostly maintained a façade of being that “rational, materialist scientist” most of the time … … it was always unsettling to think that consciousness is just some byproduct of what is a random universe made up of a bunch of bouncy-balls. … Continue reading “Is there life beyond materialist science? @metamorgan says F*ck it.”
I promised a fuller review of Nick Spencer’s “Atheism – The Origin of the Species” when I’d completed it. It’s a rather long review with plenty of spoilers and quotes here, since I’m gutting it for content I find useful, but a recommended read for anyone from Mrs Angry Atheist to Mr Tolerant Apologist and all … Continue reading “Nothing New Under the Sun When it Comes to Atheism?”