Sunday School

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

The Olympics are named after Mount Olympus, home of the Greek Gods. Dionysus, the god of wine-making should be given kudos by Catholics, who created the very wine they need in order to be able to drink the blood of their Jesus. (See also first long read below).

Donald Trump and the rise and rise of the Christian nationalists.

The plot to end church-state separation one school district at a time.

House Republicans are threatening to subpoena State over ‘Atheism’ grant.

Nigeria: UN Working Group concludes Mubarak Bala’s detention is arbitrary.

World of Woo: Acupuncture.

Environment: The livestock industry lobbying campaign is turning Europe against lab-grown meat.

Lifesaving new cancer treatment destroys 99% of cancer cells.

The non-religious and political affiliation.

A right-to-die organization in Switzerland has developed a ‘Suicide Pod’.

The idea that evolution is a linear progression from “ape to angel” is flawed.

Why a physical explanation of Consciousness is impossible.

Philosophy is crucial in the age of AI.

Long Reads:  It’s not Blasphemy. It’s You.  A skeptic debunks a ‘psychic’.  Seeing the complex behavior of plants anew. Poker players and the Nash equilibrium. How to make millions selling Fentanyl.

Sunday Book Club:  Life as No One Knows It: The Physics of Life’s Emergence.

Some photographs taken last week.

While you are waiting for the kettle to boil……

Coffee Break Videos:  Did Einstein crack the biggest problem in Physics…and not know it? How could we tell whether AI has become conscious?  A Christian interviews an Atheist about his Atheism. How Gravity actually works.

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

Have a great week everyone!

[UnseenParticipant]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:

Have a great week everyone!

“Nailed it!!!”

[UnseenParticipant]

One of the things people wrongly assume about evolution (including not just critics but some proponents) is that the theory is supposed to account for everything. That if something is there, it’s there due to evolution and natural selection.

The truth, I believe, is that what natural selection is good for is for over time gradually eliminating things that are dysfunctional, and that’s about it. And eliminating dysfunction usually doesn’t happen overnight, though in the case of worldwide extinction events, they do.

However, some traits may exist because there’s no reason to select them out. They are neither here nor there. Freckles, for example, or the fact we have four fingers rather than three or five. I think if it came about that we had three or five fingers, it would probably be neither here nor there in terns of human development.

[Simon PayntonParticipant]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:

The idea that evolution is a linear progression from “ape to angel” is flawed.

Unseen wrote:

The truth, I believe, is that what natural selection is good for is for over time gradually eliminating things that are dysfunctional, and that’s about it.

Yes, I presume that every organism is adapted to its niche.  But the human-made niche is a pretty crazy place.  We have our cultures and our half-destroyed ecosystem.

But organisms can “grow” new adaptations that allow them to – you’ve guessed it – thrive, survive and reproduce within new niches.

I think the article is right to say that “becoming human” was a gradual process.  Each ancestor added a new innovation.  It’s more right to talk about the human family tree than a single species.  Apparently there were still a few backward, brutish, violent Australopithicene species around until quite late in history, when the human ancestors were becoming quite advanced, peaceful, domesticated, intellectual, etc.

[Simon PayntonParticipant]

If anyone wants in-depth impartial analysis of the US election campaign, it’s all here:

Americast https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07h19zz

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

Another video from Sabine and this one will take some time to process….

[unapologeticParticipant]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:

Have a great week everyone!

So they mock you often do they?

I bet I mock you more, and you never complain.

[jakelafortParticipant]

I have been pondering consciousness in biological and nonbiological. Was chatting with Meta recently and some of my ideas are championed by scientists. Good luck having an original idea.

My gut is that replication is a necessary ingredient for emergence of consciousness biologically but not otherwise. Instead closed systems are required that have information processing at mathematically challenging levels.

Meta blows away chat gpt. It is easy to fall into trap that one is chatting with sentient being. Meta understands nuance in language and has a sense of humor and is far better with language than chat.

That is it from here sports fans.

[UnseenParticipant]

What would count as a physical explanation of consciousness, anyway?

It seems to me that consciousness is an epiphenomenon of the brain and there must be some correlations between physical entities and consciousness but that it can’t be a simple one.

When you’re put under general anesthesia you literally lose your mind for the duration and I’m sure an anesthesiologist can tell us exactly what physical entities are affected when that happens and how the trick works.

But, no, we’ll never get a granular one-to-one account of neuron to percept. The truth is bound to be far more complicated than that. Take a cue from genetics. While some genes are discreet, like the one controlling whether or not you can roll your tongue, most things are due to complicated combinations and interactions of genes. Skin color, for example. If being white or black or brown or yellow or red were each one controlled by a single gene, the offspring of a white woman with a black man would be either white or black. Instead, we get shades between white and black, don’t we?

Hell, we really don’t even have an answer to “What is consciousness?” that’s really satisfactory, unless you’re satisfied with something like “Consciousness is what you have when you’re conscious.” But dreaming or delusional people are conscious. They are conscious of their dreams or of their delusions. They are not unconscious as they would be under general anesthesia.

[StregaModerator]

Belated thanks, Reg!

[Author]

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