What, Why & How do we Know ?
“Digital Physics” is a “retro-nerd” film whose central character Khatchig is a penniless and frustrated maths & computing student set in the 1980’s (I think). The film itself was released in 2016. It crossed my path on Twitter in March 2019 when a dialogue with Chris Papavasilou ( @ChrisPapavasili ) led me through some questions … Continue reading “Digital Physics, Life, The Universe & Everything”
We were living in Oslo when Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, and turned out to wish him well at the balcony of The Grand Hotel along with the rest of the crowds on Stortingata. At that time he’d written a hopeful book and won and election and he was clearly one of … Continue reading “Suffer the Little Children”
A short follow-up to my more detailed post on discussions with Dr Mike Sutton, presenting on his “Nullius in Verba: Darwin’s Greatest Secret“.[Edit note: emphases added.] Firstly I’m NOT interested in arguing whether Darwin (and his bubble) told any untruths. (Quite possibly, they may have, but it’s irrelevant. Sutton is making no claims against Darwinian … Continue reading “Darwin’s Untruths”
Teesside Skeptics in the Pub had a talk from Dr Mike Sutton last night (6th Dec 2018). He presented the gist of his book “Nullius in Verba: Darwin’s Greatest Secret.” as a simple timeline of events and communications in the development, publication and promotion of “Darwin’s” theory of evolution by natural selection. Sutton is pretty … Continue reading “Was Darwin A Liar And So What If He Was?”
The first half of The Bard’s quote is an adage I use frequently – in thousands of posts over two decades. The point of Juliet’s words lies in the second half. Umberto Eco wrote a whole philosophical novel riffing on it. “A rose by any other name … … would smell as sweet.” One word … Continue reading “A Rose By Any Other Name”
We live in a world hemmed-in by PC rules. When I started this post about 5 tweets ago, it was about the latest “Sokal” prank poking satire at gender-based social-science research. Of course, being PC rules, they are broken ironically all the time, so the levels of irony – odd or even – become crucial … Continue reading “It’s Now Illegal to Mock Fruit”
Just a quickie, a hold-that-thought post (prompted by the US Glyphosate court verdict, but not specifically about that): Two things – herbicides and pesticides, and controlling vermin. Humans are an intelligent evolved species. We didn’t get where we are by allowing the environment to take over our lives – we legitimately manage our environment in … Continue reading “Poisoning the Environment”
Rarely was a program so well named. Exemplary dialogue handled by Evan Davis on BBC R4 Sweet Reason on “Offense”. The thesis being discussed was implicitly: Weaponised Offense Taking as part of Identity by Victimhood. Contentious topic on PC-Ness of free expression. With Jordan Peterson (white-male) and Dr Clare Chambers and Shaista Aziz (non-male / non-white) … Continue reading “Sweet Reason”