What, Why & How do we Know ?
Dave Snowden, of who I’m a big fan as you know, very kindly linked to a post of mine commenting on last year’s Annual Mike Jackson Lecture given by him at Hull University. [This year 2024 Mike Jackson lecture also attended by Dave Snowden] Preamble Turns out some of the things he included in last … Continue reading “The Holistic Mob”
Evolutionary psychology just is what happens to us. “Evolutionary Psychology” as a self-identified political “ought” interpretation of evolutionary reality and the political reaction to brand it pejoratively as “EvoPsych” are just that – identitarian political movements, not to be confused with reality. I said as much just in the title of the first long piece … Continue reading “Evolutionary Psychology – Again?”
I keep falling foul of my use of the word “computation” being taken as the formal “machine” kind intended by Turing, algorithmic at the level of interest with all the corollaries of computability and halting/decidability and Gödelian incompleteness. I just use it to mean processing (inc. communication) of information quite generally – however it’s done, … Continue reading “A Time for Reckoning?”
Preamble? How do I come to be writing this post right now? See the Background “Postamble” at the bottom if necessary 😉 Straight Down to Business: [START] The Assertion – In one Sentence – There are limits to science in the sense that some aspects of the world are beyond science. (Or alternative prior statements … Continue reading “The Limits to Science?”
For me, for decades, the idea that (even scientific) truths always have a political dimension has been central to my epistemic agenda. Not that science was my specific target, more the general orthodoxy that logically-positive objective-determinism presumes to fully explain the truths of real-world causation. And I’ve said so from my perspective as a science-educated … Continue reading “Wokeism and Critical Theory”
Progress on Priorities A strangely productive week since my previous “Resolution” post – I’m obviously focussed on the right priorities at last. Namely getting my “technical content” better organised for review. Started using free versions of Academia.edu and Orcid.org – posting some of my key (older and/or half-drafted pages and pdf’s – mostly just testing … Continue reading “Attention as a Moral Act”
Hat tip to Anita Leirfall – who, we discovered quite randomly, lived just a few doors away from where Sylvia and I lived in Oslo – quite randomly posting a link to a 2021 edition of BBC Radio 4 “In Our Time” on Kant. Kant’s Copernican Revolution | In Our Time Melvyn Bragg and guests … Continue reading “The Eyes in Kant’s Head”
I gave a presentation to Teesside Skeptics in the Pub on 15 December 22 Diana had asked us a question – on the Facebook Group Page in November 22 – about “whether we identified as scientific sceptics, and what that meant to us?” Back in August 22 Humanists UK had asked us to say if … Continue reading “#GoodFences – Is Scientific Skepticism Enough?”
One of my main agenda items is the demystification of consciousness, in order to make progress on more important and pressing issues for humanity. In fact, the meme “(Unlocking) The Mystery / Secrets of xxxx” is a pet hate – a click-bait meme to sell books, but not to enlighten or solve any problem. Consciousness … Continue reading “The Mystery of Physical / Materialism?”
This Karl Friston interview is long and wandering (almost 4 hours!) and a bit distorted by the somewhat affected (?) naïve “Theory of Everything” – everything including the kitchen sink – agenda of interviewer Curt Jaimungal, but anyway … some very rough mental notes: Deflationary view – hooray. The very point. Using / understanding general … Continue reading “Long Friston Interview”