What, Why & How do we Know ?
Last week & weekend I followed two conferences via Twitter. HumanMind2017 and BreakingConvention. #HumanMind2017 I had originally intended to attend in Cambridge (partly because I have a nostalgic soft-spot for The Møller Centre where it was held), but diary log-jam meant I overlooked doing anything about it until they started Tweeting. I ended up following them very … Continue reading “Two “Mind” Conferences Storified”
At Hay on Wye HTLGI festival again for the final weekend: My late arrival and changes to programme meant Friday pm didn’t quite go according to my pre-planning, but got to see and hear; Denis Noble, Anne Bowcock and Rupert Sheldrake chaired by David Malone, talking on the promissory hype of the Human Genome project … Continue reading “How The Light Gets In 2016 #htlgi2016”
I’m reading and “reviewing” a lot, though if you’ve been following me closely over the years, the reviews are for my benefit not yours – to capture contributions to my own story. There’s a trope or meme that I often find myself reading something I wish I’d written – believe I could have written – … Continue reading “Excellent to Brilliant @theosthinktank”
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”
Sheldrake’s conception of socio-cultural & intellectual fields which influence and are influenced by the living things within them – and contain that socio-culturo-intellectual memory. Doesn’t seem in the slightest contentious – memes & memeplexes, Pirsigian levels of static patterns (of quality). Doesn’t seem in the slightest undermined by a holistic computer / machine / system … Continue reading “Morphogenetic Fields”
… is true, even though you cannot prove it ? The Edge 2005 Annual Question. All the usual suspects, mixed bag of answers though. Dennett, says language is a necessary pre-condition for consciousness, and interestingly, his reason concerns the need for “I”, a subject. Like that. Blackmore, says she believes that neither free-will nor herself … Continue reading “What Do You Believe …”