I will now be deleting the files from my web space.

So, the same files are available at DropBox:

The third man syndrome

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0032s9x

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
What do you mean by “thorough and satisfactorily.” How do you determine it is satisfactory. What makes your interpretation of human behavior better than another? Those questions involve reasoning about evidence, explanatory adequacy and competing hypotheses.

A good example is conceptions of fairness, how it evo…[Read more]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
Will artificial intelligence change how philosophy is conducted?

I don’t believe that AI could ever do moral philosophy.  The moral philosophy that I do is descriptive (the only valid kind) and to do that, a person needs to know what it’s like to be a human being.

On top of that, why would we ever want AI to do our…[Read more]

Enco, that’s interesting.  I think you’re right.  It sometimes doesn’t take much to start hallucinating.

Left-click – play.  Right-click – download.

Here’s a BBC Radio 4 programme that was on yesterday, on the subject.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0032f9

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
If not, then it is merely freedom for whichever religion controls the State.

Or, whichever state controls a religion.

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
An interesting opinion piece on ethics and moral identity.

That’s a brilliant article that I agree with.  The author is saying that in order to get people to behave ethically, you have to teach them about ethics in general, or in other words, remind them of what they might already have known.  In any given s…[Read more]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
What happens when hostility to knowledge becomes policy.

I don’t get why anyone would believe in stuff because they want to, rather than because they think it’s true.  I feel we have some kind of duty to the truth to be open-minded, independent-minded and anti-authoritarian in our thinking, and to let facts speak…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:
Is this post even visible to the other members?

@unseen, I don’t know what you want people to say.  Are you asking rhetorical questions?

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
cooperative breeding is also evolving 🙂

The Homo erectus cooperative breeding was the culmination of a long process of peeling un-weaned infants away from their mothers, that might have taken 2-4 million years.  Great ape mothers do not like to give up their babies to anyone else.  It makes sense that the first p…[Read more]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
Humans are born as socially bootable apes

This level of infant care would have required a bit of social interaction, since it would have been difficult for new mothers to be the only one caring for and protecting a newborn from large predators and other dangers.

This ties in with what we already know about Homo…[Read more]

https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.13544

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
Of course, Einstein would have used AI. Using it does not mean outsourcing critical thought.

I think there is no way Einstein could have come up with his theories if he used AI to do his thinking.  AI summarises things well; but that means it only comes up with clichés.  It doesn’t do any original thinking, beyond su…[Read more]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
Occam’s Razor is not dead. It has been demoted. It is no longer the supreme judge of scientific truth as Nature may not owe us humans a simple explanation.

I would say that Nature is elegant but not necessarily simple.  I don’t believe the most simple explanation is the right one.

jakelafort wrote:
This gal got slammed by lefties. It was sexual harassment she committed!

Yes, I use “woke” to mean “ludicrous decisions taken in the name of equality”.  Progressive, I like.  Woke is ridiculous.

I knew of a school in the Washington DC area.  Many of the Black kids used to come in with their hoods up.  The teachers, inc…[Read more]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
Why Iran continues to choose war over peace.

Until then, the IRGC will pursue its “forever war,” threatening regional stability, the global economy, and U.S. national security.

I knew it – neither side wants to back down.  Trump doesn’t know how to cooperate, the IRGC just wants to keep doing its thing.

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
What physics gets wrong about the idea of “fundamental”.

Yes, I think a model should be “thorough” as well as “fundamental”.  Some fundamental elements are not just individisible particles – they’re also structural factors, for example, that form the fabric of reality.  So, the fundamental constants of the unive…[Read more]

Unseen wrote:
Don’t honeybees tell each other (reporting information) where to find newly-discovered nectar-hunting grounds, which then send other bees (behavior) to exploit them?

Apparently, when a bee goes to a flower, it leaves sweaty footprints on the petals.  Another bee can come along and smell the footprints and determine how long ago th…[Read more]

We t…[Read more]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
Why humans are not clever chimps. (interesting site)

Theophilus Painter was not a very rigorous thinker, he kept making mistakes, of assuming things when he didn’t know, sometimes rooted in racial bias it is probably true.

New data from the National Institutes of Health show the human genome varies from the chimp…

[Read more]

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
World of Woo: Facilitated communication.

Facilitated communication may possibly be woo sometimes, but it’s not always, and it provides a communication lifeline for people who can’t talk but can use their fingers.

I have a nephew who is severely autistic and non-verbal, and he now communicates on an i-pad.  He has…[Read more]

jakelafort wrote:
i did not notice anything about Islamic terorism.

Based on government and independent analyses, right-wing extremist violence has been responsible for the overwhelming majority of fatalities, amounting to approximately 75% to 80% of U.S. domestic terrorism deaths since 2001.

Illustrative cases include the 2015 Charleston church…

[Read more]

TheEncogitationer wrote:
Chimp ‘civil war’ breaks out between 200 great apes

I’m not sure it’s all that surprising.  The group got big and split into two.  Now, they do what chimps do and the two groups are fighting each other.

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
Since the Dobbs decision, Christians are becoming more aggressive.

I think “aggressive” sums up MAGA in general.  Aggressively stupid, aggressively selfish, aggressively unaccountable.  There was one on the radio today claiming that the Christian God is a God of war.  They’re aggressive.

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
What do Americans consider immoral? (turning left on red is not there).

This is very interesting.  “Marital infidelity” is way out in front by miles, with only 2% finding it morally acceptable.  That’s the only one that is on my list of evolved “moral domains” – sexual pair-bonding.  It would be interesting to see ho…[Read more]

jakelafort wrote:
If Lefty ideologue listens what does she say in response to this Iranian?

That video is from a UK “right wing dingbat” channel like Fox News: it’s an outrage machine.

“When we read Apollonius’ biography…[Read more]

https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a70223461/constant-universe-time/

Reg the Fronkey Farmer wrote:
How do some people go against the moral grain?

The article talks about wanting to please a “moral audience”, and this could be one way that we choose our moral principles.  Maybe this is true.  What about an audience of one – me?

I think this comes down to “subjective endorsement” – i.e., moral principles carry n…[Read more]

jakelafort wrote:
Only men. Women get a pass? Chimps, Kangaroos? Same deal?

“Men” = “people”.  We’re all men.