What, Why & How do we Know ?
This is just a placeholder for something I should write based on my reading of Sean Carroll’s “The Big Picture” particularly chapter 36 on Fine Tuning. I’m still reading and almost finished, having posted 2 or 3 reflections so far. Whether I ever do a full review or not, it is very good despite many … Continue reading “Poetic Naturalism Meets Fine Tuning”
A new overload of bookmarked pages to capture. Life remains complicated for reading and writing for domestic and work reasons, so I’ll dump most here without reading or reviewing in detail for now. Resources for later. Philip Goff on this old chestnut … Hacking, White and McGrath all referenced (but not Anthropics …) ‘Is the … Continue reading “Link Dump”
Been checking my previous references to “Epstein” but none seem to be the “Jeffrey Epstein”. I checked because it’s quite clear that the (convicted and now dead) billionaire who liked to party and throw his money around to win friends and influence people is clearly “connected” with many science types through Harvard / MIT / … Continue reading “Science and the Man”
Fundamentally – What do I know? Black holes ain’t so black, and science ain’t so different from the humanities. Singularities have horizons crammed with information. Nothing objective is more fundamental than the information available. This is a summary of recent work ostensibly on quantum gravity and the role of humans more generally in the science … Continue reading “Fundamentally – What do I know?”
Reading this piece today from 2012 on Larry Krauss’ “Something From Nothing”. I reviewed it myself and saw him talk on the topic at that time too. It was pretty disingenuous hype, even though much of the reality was acknowledged in the detail, if not the headings and headlines of his titles and talks. I … Continue reading “Educating the Poster Boys of New-Atheism”
Always seen the multiverse idea as nothing more than a thought experiment, a kludge, a total cop-out if seen as representing or explaining anything like reality, (pretty much the same as Schroedinger’s Cat in that respect). By adding a massively complex explanation – whole new universes of infinite posssibility – to answer simpler problems and … Continue reading “The Multiverse Kludge”
I came across a twitter thread of Free Thought Prophet (FTP, otherwise anon) recommending a blog post by John Hamill (Atheist Ireland National Committee) about Dennett’s position on free-will. FTP I know as a knockabout humorous commentator in the space occupied by the four horsemen. As a rationalist, atheist, humanist myself, “free-thought” is the traditional tag … Continue reading “Dennett and the “Little People””
Part of my agenda is being honest about the limits to science. Some parts of the Science-PR machine will defend to their death, that no such limits exist, but in fact such dogmatic defence in itself shows up these limits, is one of the limitations. I haven’t fully unpicked these recent stories yet, but wanted to capture … Continue reading “Let’s Get Metaphysical”