What, Why & How do we Know ?
Arthur Koestler’s (1959) “The Sleepwalkers“ proved to be an excellent read to the end. A slightly odd epilogue on the evolution of intelligence and knowledge; odd because it majors on the paradoxical thought that human mental brain power is too great for our current state of biological evolution. We have brains much bigger than we … Continue reading “Brain the size of the cosmos – is it too big?”
There is certainly a coming together of many related ideas which is very exciting, but there are some implicit assumptions in that “convergence” that blur some details that may not actually be right in any of the three fields. This post is to record a position. The linked paper …. “CONVERGENCE of Neuroscience, Biogenetics and Computing – a convergence … Continue reading “Convergence of Computation, Mind and Genetics?”
(Editorial Note : This paper was originally prepared for the 2005 Liverpool Conference on Robert Pirsig and his Metaphysics of Quality (MoQ). It is a personal non-technical view of the MoQ, and indeed the first part of paper is an entirely subjective and naive account of the author’s “thought journey” that led to reading Pirsig … Continue reading “It’s Evolutionary Psychology Stupid”
Fascinating piece from Errol Morris on NYT Opinionator today. Picked-up from a cross hit on Psybertron for David Deutsch. One of his quotes is used as an example, but in fact it is tangential to the subject of the article – why the experienced quality, value and truth in a text depends on the font … Continue reading “Font Credulity”
I have an adage that no-one ever seems to buy, that aiming to make oneself redundant is a primary driver (for me and quite a few people I know, at least). If something takes effort to explain and sell, implement and extract value, then there is work for consultants, sure, but boy it becomes boring … Continue reading “Success = Redundancy”
As a lay person trying to get to grips with any meaningful sense in the world of quantum physics, specifically because of its apparent relevance to cosmic creation and the development of the “life, the universe and everything” – I took a recommendation from Marsha (over on MoQ-Discuss) for David Lindley’s “Uncertainty – Einstein, Heisenberg, … Continue reading “The Soul of Science”
Mentioned to Island in the comment thread about the Multiverse below, the problem that otherwise credible stories in physics are accompanied by mathematical theory near incomprehensible to laymen such as myself. I had this feeling previously when trying to understand the “Dirac Nilpotent Rewrite” behind the Rowlands and Diaz work in quantum information theory. Reminded … Continue reading “Maths Leaves Me Trailing”
Thanks to Piers Young at Monkey Magic for the link to this article from Discover. A good summary of issues based on interviews by Tim Folger with working scientists in the field, many of whom I’ve quoted before on psybertron. Strange how the multiverse idea is still seen as the most convincing solution to the … Continue reading “Anthropics, Multiverses & Strings”