Deutsch over Rovelli and Carroll

Recent reads of Carlo Rovelli and Sean Carroll have been ultimately disappointing, but don’t get me wrong … Helgoland (2021) – by Carlo Rovelli Staggering Implications – Rovelli Without Whitehead (AJOwens Nov 2021) Mach, Bogdanov, Nagarjuna and Rovelli (May 2021) Classifying an Unread Book (May 2021) and, The Big Picture (2015) – by Sean Carroll … Continue reading “Deutsch over Rovelli and Carroll”

A Vienna Interlude

“Vienna Interlude” is a chapter title from Cheryl Misak’s biography of Frank Ramsey, which I’m reading slowly between diversions domestic and professional. Still a little less than half-way through the whole, it’s a wonderful sketch of Cambridge, Bloomsbury (and Vienna) circles of the 1920’s. As with the words of Rebecca Goldstein, Margaret Wertheim and Alice … Continue reading “A Vienna Interlude”

Is Matter Conscious? No it isn’t, but …

[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 Life of Maximum Mattering

In the previous post and the links within, it is pretty obvious that I love Rebecca Goldstein and her work. I’ve read (and loved) pretty much everything she’s published and I’ve seen her in person a couple of times. I watched a video of a second talk of hers at this year’s recent HTLGI2019 at … Continue reading “A Life of Maximum Mattering”

Navigating Tribal Truth

I’ve been a regular at the IAI’s “How The Light Gets In” (HTLGI) festival at Hay-on-Wye in recent years, but was unable to attend this year (though I may make it to the London event later in the year). They’ve started putting-up the video recorded sessions since the May bank holiday weekend event. As a … Continue reading “Navigating Tribal Truth”

Ramsey and Wittgenstein in Prospect

I’ve posted links to the two papers below, more than once before in various contexts, but I wanted to capture a couple of meta-thoughts when I ran across them again today. [Given the general state of link-rot on the web beyond a decade, or less in many cases, it is fascinating that an article from … Continue reading “Ramsey and Wittgenstein in Prospect”

Zen and the Art of Philosophy

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”

Well we never! PoPoMo Physics Again.

I’m reading my way through Carlo Rovelli’s “The Order of Time” (Finished Part 1 of 3) and finding it full of items that resonate. Not least because I already loved his “Reality is Not What it Seems” but also because I have been joining up the dots with the work of David Deutsch and Erik … Continue reading “Well we never! PoPoMo Physics Again.”