Stephen Jay Gould

Sad given how good Dennett’s writing is, that he has to devote almost a third of “Darwin’s Dangreous Idea” to refuting doubts about Darwinism created by Gould and Lewontin’s original paper and Gould’s high profile public views on evolutionary mechanisms. Burgess Shale – the boy who cried wolf, etc. Gould was someone I read ten … Continue reading “Stephen Jay Gould”

It’s Now Illegal to Mock Fruit

We live in a world hemmed-in by PC rules. When I started this post about 5 tweets ago, it was about the latest “Sokal” prank poking satire at gender-based social-science research. Of course, being PC rules, they are broken ironically all the time, so the levels of irony – odd or even – become crucial … Continue reading “It’s Now Illegal to Mock Fruit”

A Useful Idiot Isn’t All Bad But He Ain’t Good

A Russian Take on Political Leadership In the heat of Trump’s Putin-Helsinki summit fall-out, I posted this cartoon from Twitter to Facebook: (Hat tip @NickBryantNY for tweeting it. A Brit journalist living in US.) I posted it bare, without comment, letting the cartoon speak for itself. A picture paints a thousand words, but ~998 of them … Continue reading “A Useful Idiot Isn’t All Bad But He Ain’t Good”

Are We Nearly There Yet? #htlgi18 #htlgi2018

So many intellectual inputs and opportunities for dialogue of which barely a tenth can be grasped over a weekend at Hay on Wye, at the How the Light Gets In HTLGI 2018 Festival. [Meta – specific sessions and update on the weekend experience here.] Below is my summary of the messages I heard in the … Continue reading “Are We Nearly There Yet? #htlgi18 #htlgi2018”

#HTLGI2018 Update Meta

Compiling my Hay-on-Wye 2018 How The Light Gets In report, starting with the meta stuff below, content report is here. Mid-day Friday to Mid-day Sunday this year. My third time. Last year being a fallow year for the event. Previous year weather was excellent, combined the event with some days walking in the Brecon Beacons … Continue reading “#HTLGI2018 Update Meta”

Retro Reading

Post before last, I indicated I was reading some histories and oldies in their original published forms. Last week I picked-up several more books. One new handful from a current reviewers’ copy list at the Rationalist Association, and another old handful of discard copies of the Rationalist Association library held by Conway Hall. Both the oldies … Continue reading “Retro Reading”

Panpsychic Alternative to Reductionism? Nagel’s latest recommended #mindandcosmos

I came to be reading Thomas Nagel’s Mind & Cosmos. because I came across this review, which was itself a balanced comparative review of Nagel alongside Max Tegmark’s mathematical take on reality, but it was clear Nagel had ruffled a few orthodox scientific feathers with his heretical ideas. Coincidentally when I ordered Mind and Cosmos … Continue reading “Panpsychic Alternative to Reductionism? Nagel’s latest recommended #mindandcosmos”

#Scientism in Heaven and Earth @tiffanyjenkins

I’ve adopted the term “scientism” for the subject – the problem topic – of my agenda here in maybe the last 5 years or so? Previously I’ve called it scientific fundamentalism, or maybe obsessive objective reductionism, Maxwell’s scientific neurosis, things of that ilk, since I started this blog 13 years ago. Before that I never … Continue reading “#Scientism in Heaven and Earth @tiffanyjenkins”