Author: Psybertron

Two interesting reads this morning.

Dan Dennett conversation in The Edge, on the co-evolution of culture with human individual mental capabilities. “De-Darwinizing” the presumed processes to recognise the chicken-and-egg of co-creativity.

Also today in Best Thinking is Alan Rayner’s piece “What Stops the Penny Dropping“, born of the frustration with “Abstract Mindedness” where we assume our reason is a thing apart from the world in which we (fail to) engage.

The common theme is receptivity as part of co-creativity.

[BTW still reading Terry Eagleton‘s “Culture and the Death of God”, reminded of course by Dennett’s cultural references. A slow read thanks to dense references and technical language, but still enjoying. Another case of if I had started taking detailed notes when I began reading, I’d have more notes than original text, but as it is I will have to read again if I am to have more than a few specific recollections. Good though.]

[Also this morning a plug from Amazon for Michael Tomasello’s A Natural History of Human Thinking – can’t help thinking reading the book description blurb – tell us something we don’t know?]

I was thinking this hearing the news stories around bitcoin going maintream, and noticed this post on LinkedIn today.

“the bitcoin industry embraces what it was built to avoid – rules and regulation”

Sooner or later every (would be) anarchist discovers “we” chose governance because it’s good for “us”. You listening Russell Brand?

As business advice – clearly comes across pretty cheesy to quote “Desiderata” as your inspiration – you only have to look at the comment thread in reaction to this LinkedIn post.

But as I’m always saying:

“What’s so funny ’bout peace, love and understanding?”

[No idea if Angela Ahrendts and her LinkedIn persona are for real – LinkedIn is a weird place, but who knows?]

London scenes blended from 1850’s / 1950’s to present day. Nice app.

Not sure about the “battleground” metaphor, but otherwise sounds about right. It’s a plug for tonight’s Horizon documentary featuring Daniel Kahneman on how we really make decisions. My governance agenda:

Post doc notes : Hmmm. Too much emphasis on “error and mistake”, too much emphasis on error relative to some “perfect” rational model – assumes perfect rational is best or right answer. Wrong, or wrong to assume necessarily right. Deviation from perfectly rational sure, but not “error”.

The loss aversion trait is only wrong if the “long term (mean) stats” are what really matter to the person making the decision as opposed to some hypothetical (non-existent) average rational agent. In practice we do NOT face an unmediated stream of repeat opportunities – all other things being equal (which they never will be).

Same comments I made when I read Kahneman originals.

Can’t believe no-one actually mentioned the bird-in-the-hand adage – it really is worth-two-in-the-bush. A loss DOES have negative worth two (or more) times greater than a prospective gain. Wisdom (and truth) in old wives rules of thumb. (Of course in some “perfect” markets, statistical long term population calcs do matter – but not in many real human situations. – Hence (macro) economics Nobel prize, but not individual human psychological.)

Kahneman’s work is very good in researching and understanding how the mind really does make decisions, but applied qualitative interpretations are as doubtful as the affects he documents. Come in Mr Quine.

One to watch later from IAI TV.
Now having watched:

Polly Higgins – all true, but mostly irrelevant, except the basic point “we” must take our responsibility for the planet, a duty of care.

Bjorn Lomborg – hits the point. A polarising debate between doomsayers and deniers is the last thing we need. Ultimately, like all anthropogenic activity, its technology-driven economic activity that changes things, laws and tax-funding regulate and incentivise but don’t solve.

Crispin Tickell – Anthropocene concept, OK. Climate change one issue amongst many – 20/20 hindsight – too non-committal (…. and why we never get anything done, says Bjorn).

Nigel Lawson – Climate change not the issue, it’s ever changing. Many of the warming effects, of emissions, greenhouse effects and conversion of fossil energy to low grade heat etc, are a reality, even if net global warming is an issue not worth debating. (Hmmm, Nigel vs Crispin enter into the gainsaying childish argument.)

Ho hum. No progress.

One for the “Everybody Wants a Revolution” pile.

The Limits of Non-Cooperation as a Strategy for Social Change

Civil disobedience is vital, but it is insufficient to transform society. A new science of cooperation illuminates the path ahead.

The strategy must be to achieve “solidarity” through collaboration. Resistance and revolution are mere tactics.

[Hat tip to Henry Gurr for the link.]

Reading Terry Eagleton’s Culture and the Death of God (2014)

Only read the first chapter The Limits of Enlightenment, but already finding lots of interest. In fact the style despite his usual sardonic wit is more academic paper (based on what was originally a lecture) with lots of referenced quotes to make his arguments. A couple of things to note for now:

For me, Gibbon’s “celebrated sentence”:

“The various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world, were all considered by the people as equally true; by the philosophers as equally false; and by the magistrates as equally useful.” (Quoted previously).

For the MoQists:

“The two camps, rational and experiential, are for the most part speaking past each other”

“In one sense, feeling is the most incontrovertible of grounds, while in another sense it is a notoriously slippery one.”

Well – decided to go for a standard theme, so the formatting bugs seem resolved, as do the social media links, but still cannot find 13 years worth of uploaded images and media anywhere on the server.

Only solution looks like progressively re-finding and re-uploading each important image – quite a time-consuming chore – ho hum. [Update – on a first 80/20 pass I’ve re-attached the top 20% with 80% of the value. That will have to do for now – if you find any interesting images missing, let me know.]

Other minor item is to organise the page links in the header, since the standard theme simply defaults the top level pages, whereas I had manually linked pages beyond the WordPress-managed blog pages previously.

Sometimes the young are too creditably laid back. I still can hardly believe Loudon was under 30 when he wrote this:

I am a full fledged, grown-up adult
I’m tryin’ make a dent, tryin’ to get a result
I’m holed up in a Hollywood hotel suite
Tequila to drink and avocado to eat

They got all kinds of victories and lots of downfalls
They got drugs in the rugs and ghosts in the walls
Starlets in the lobby that can make a man drool
Blood on the curtains and a phone by the pool

Well I never did see so many TV stars
And I never did see so many rented cars
I never did see so many desperate eyes
And never did I hear so many bold faced lies

When I was ten years old, I was alive
In Benedict Canyon down on Hutton Drive
Well now I’m right back in my old backyward
And I’m tryin’ to get a billboard on the boulevard
I’m tryin’ to get a billboard on _ the _ bou _ le _ vard

Well I never thought I’d see the age of twenty-five
And it’s been twenty-eight years now that I’ve been alive
And in a matter of months I will be thirty years old
And the apprehension that I feel can hardly be told

I am a full fledged, grown-up adult
I’m tryin’ make a dent, tryin’ to get a result
I’m hold up in a Hollywood hotel suite
Tequila to drink and avocado to eat
Tequila to drink and avocado to eat

“Hollywood Hopeful”
Loudon Wainwright III  (1975)

Everyone must have ambition to make a dent,
by whatever means they choose to measure it.
We live in hope, otherwise, why bother?