Author: Psybertron

Interesting, the full live Moshcam You-Tube video of PiL performing in Sydney 10th April includes Public Image amongst all the regulars from the recent tour sets. Starts riskily with the sparse and least accessible Four Enclosed Walls. The mix and visuals make a great record of a current PiL performance.

Not sure what the full running time is (two minutes shy of two hours) but even second track Albatross is a 14 minutes version! Interesting Flowers arrangement. Only regular missing so far as I can see is USLS1.  Whoa! no Religion either – weird. Thought they’d dropped old “hit” Public Image forever – fortunately not – a great 3 minutes “goodbye, you got what you wanted, goodbye” to end the main set, with Open Up as the regular final encore.

[Coincidentally, just finished reading John Lydon’s “Rotten – No Blacks, no Irish, no dogs.” Great inside story on the Pistols’ story from a 1992 perspective. Interesting on several levels – the historical content obviously if the musical events interest you, but the style – chapters in John’s voice with quote inserts from others, but also chapters entirely in the voice of others, with John’s inserts – and the players – including Chrissie Hynde and Richard Branson – the back story on New York Dolls, Johnny Thunders and the dreadful Nancy Spungen. Great use of language by John – yes, his arrogant over-confidence can make him a pain in the arse, but it’s “his” autobiography “and we don’t care, (reverb to fade)”. Love the Lydon vs McLaren court battle – simply presented as the written witness affidavits – honesty pays.]

One major reason why “democracy” by popular vote is the worst form of governance (apart from all the others).

(Consensus vs tyranny of the majority, etc. Concensus = Parker-Follett integrationism.)

Interesting review of David Graeber (Occupy Wall Street) book The Democracy Project by Dave Pollard.

Thought this was very interesting on several levels.

Gallipoli still seen as the day that defined Australians and New Zealanders.

How in that hell that they called Suvla Bay?

Another classic example from the football world. It is right that punishments for “unacceptable” transgressions of rules are in some sense arbitrary in their severity.

If there becomes a rule for the punishments against breaking the rule, then we have a game-changer where calculations based on the punishment become part of the rule-breaking decision. Pardew is wrong for this very reason, precisely because he wants clarity on the punishments. Liverpool in this example, but Chelski are the usual suspects in this morality play. I last highlighted this in the Hazard / Ballboy counter example here and the John Terry / “Professional” Foul case here.

Missed this last week on BBC World Service – Stephen Sackur interview with Daniel Dennett – introduced predictably as one of the “4 Horsemen of New Atheism“.

Much confirmation of my own view that Dennett is the most considered and sophisticated thinker in this space. The four I have before ranked Dennett > Harris > Hitchens > Dawkins (the first two are philosophers notice). The questioning by Sackur is typically caricatured in terms of the standard arguments, but Dennett always manages subtle qualification in his responses, though he pulls no punches with his final statement:

[Whatever theistic religion evolves into …]
“Love, faith, beauty and joy – I hope it lasts forever.”

[Note – the HardTalk link is only for one week. I have an offline copy if anyone wants to hear it.]

Just heard Dan Roam (Napkin Academy) speak at Fiatech2013.

Great use of Ian McGilchrist’s divided brain model,

… where objective analytical intellect has crowded out the more holistic visual aspect of experiencing the real world. The emissary having forgotten who is master. We need visual outlines before we express in written language. Excellent presentation by Dan.

Particularly impressive – the demonstration of recalling a couple of dozen images presented for only a second each – a 100% when given a visual choice, but barely a handful if asked to list from memory.

This has been banging around a few days, and today Larry tweeted the link to the story in the Telegraph.

I think there is an important point being missed. Voluntary (culturally conditioned) segregation is different from enforced segregation, even if you do disagree with both.

• With the former, you can disagree, in fact it’s a valid topic for the talk, given the title of the debate, but the people in the room are not having any human rights infringed here and now, so get over it.
• In the latter case, you can disagree and withdraw cooperation here and now, because rights are being denied here and now.

There was nothing in the context that pointed to Muslim radicalism or extremism any more than there was anything suggesting Larry was promoting incest – god forbid. Get a grip guys ‘n’ gals.

Yes, some of the cultural conditioning, creates intimidation that means the immediate voluntary segregation may not be straightforward – life’s just complicated enough. And, yes it was a “public” event, but in the context the fact that a significant part of the audience is actively Muslim is pretty fundamental, not some incidental factor.

So I do defend respect for, and sensitivity to, cultural differences if you want to start a dialogue where culture might evolve – mutually. Better than a display of rational arrogance.

[Post Note – another example from Leicester Uni on 20th Feb – reported by HuffPo on 16th April – of (non-enforced) segregation.]

Interesting conversation with Dawkins. (Hat tip to tweet from BHA.)

Law is a philosopher with an interest in the paranormal, so not surprisingly Sue Blackmore crops up. Love the “God helmet” passage. Also love the infinite regress argument on what counts as “evidence”. Must follow up with Law, and the argument around the value of philosophy (and theology) to scientists. (See previous Krauss reference.)

Law seems to have the patience to take his differences with Dawkins along in conversation. I’ve lost that.

Great first question too – where Dawkins doesn’t get it. The logical positivism and regress of scientific method not itself being amenable to scientific method. (See Maxwell’s Wisdom)

(Also the 4th question about prejudiced topics even in secular schools. Brilliant. Brilliant. The faith in “objective” peer review and the method, especially in highly specialised physics (Higgs Boson again). Objective standards of “expertise”, “concensus”, “independence”, etc, etc …. the “On The Road” continuous scroll myth …. believe in bullshit, go nuclear, tire of rationality …. lots there. The question at 1:24 ish … different sciences, different kinds of evidence, different things fixed / explained by that evidence.)