Marilyn vos Savant

I read this very interesting article on Marilyn vos Savant who, at least at one point, held the world's highest recorded IQ. The article says:

When vos Savant politely responded to a reader’s inquiry on the Monty Hall Problem, a then-relatively-unknown probability puzzle, she never could’ve imagined what would unfold: though her answer was correct, she received over 10,000 letters, many from noted scholars and Ph.Ds, informing her that she was a hare-brained idiot.

What ensued for vos Savant was a nightmarish journey, rife with name-calling, gender-based assumptions, and academic persecution.

One of the more polite responses said:

You made a mistake, but look at the positive side. If all those Ph.D.’s were wrong, the country would be in some very serious trouble.

Everett Harman, Ph.D.

U.S. Army Research Institute

I do admit, though, that when I first read the problem I thought, how the hell can the answer be 2/3rds?? Until I realised the host wasn't picking one of the 2 remaining doors arbitrarily but specifically choosing the door with the goat behind it (assuming the initial choice by the contestant was incorrect).

 

Reaching out instead of contacting

Companies nowadays never seem to say, "thank you for contacting us" or similar. Instead, they say, "thank you for reaching out to us" with the phrase "reaching out to us" replacing the word "contact".

I do not approve of this. If one is contacting a company, quite often this will be to make a complaint about the company concerned.  Addressing the complaint by initially saying, "thank you for reaching out to us" seems to be a tactic to try to establish a touchy-feely rapport between themselves and their customers.

"Reaching out" rather than "contact" connotes that the person is asking for help, maybe even after a great deal of hesitancy on their parts e.g. someone feeling suicidal and wanting help. Hence, it's not appropriate phrase to use for when someone is complaining about how unethical or incompetent that company is!

If "reaching out" is used for all forms of contact, then "reaching out" eventually replaces "contact" and presumably if someone feels distressed for whatever reason, then getting this response "thanks for reaching out" will be that much less consoling.

But this "reaching out" replacing "contact" is part of the growing devaluation of the English language. 

Age progression of myself

Below on the left is a photo of me taken back in 1985. I uploaded that photo to ChatGPT and said to it "Generate an image of what this person is likely to look like in 40 years' time". The middle photo is the result! The photograph on the right is what I actually look like now 40 years hence (photo taken about a month ago). I'll leave others to judge the accuracy of this AI age progression process! 🤣

I note my alter ego in a parallel Universe still has my super short yellow shorts!

My understanding of "evidence" appears to differ from everyone else's.

My understanding of the word "evidence" seems to differ from almost everyone else's. I thought "evidence" meant any empirical data that increases the chance of a hypothesis or theory being true. Such evidence need not make a hypothesis likely. The evidence might, for example, increase the likelihood of a hypothesis being true from 1% to 2%.

I also specifically don't think arguments are evidence. Arguments are employed to reason something through, but they are not evidence as I conceive it.

Finally, evidence isn't just confined to scientific evidence. For example, any personal experiences of a phenomenon are evidence for its existence.

But, as I said, everyone else seems to employ a different conception of the word "evidence". They appear to think it means scientific proof, and paradoxically, that reasoning is evidence!

Is it a good idea to have regular health checks?

I read the following article:  Why men are so unhealthy - and what can be done.

It says:

"NHS health checks, which are offered every five years to those aged 40 to 74, are considered a crucial intervention when it comes to many of the diseases which are claiming the lives of men early. But fewer than four in 10 men take up the offer".

Is there any evidence these regular health checks extend life? It seems not. For example, a paper:

General health checks in adults for reducing morbidity and mortality from disease: Cochrane systematic review and meta-analysis

reports in its conclusion:

General health checks did not reduce morbidity or mortality, neither overall nor for cardiovascular or cancer causes, although they increased the number of new diagnoses.

On the other hand, regular health checks do worry people as each health check appointment approaches. Or on getting slightly askew test results, say in a blood test, but which never leads to any adverse consequences.

Also, it's interesting that there's evidence for an increase in diagnosis. Yet the mortality rates did not reduce to a statistically significant extent for those having such regular health checks. Over-diagnoses leading to unnecessary treatments, therefore?

Claims in physics are always provisional?

Someone said on twitter/X 

I might be fringe here or ignorant... but I not think that ALL scientific "stuff" is provisional.

The speed of light is an absolute. The four fundamental forces are absolutes. The strength of gravity on earth (9.8m/s^2) is an absolute. For example.

Actually, this is an important point since I'm sure a lot of people are bemused when people say that claims in physics are always provisional. That they can and most probably will be upended in the future.

But the idea is that all scientific theories are provisional, not that facts about the world are provisional. Facts about the world obviously can't be provisional. I expect objects to fall when released. I expect a thrown stone to smash a window. I expect a light to go on when I flick a switch (maybe I don't expect it when saying "light on" to Alexa though 😂). And these facts appear to be eternal. Physical laws seemingly never change, although the theories explaining such laws do.

Belief in reincarnation

So far as I'm aware my parents have never believed in an afterlife.  I remember asking my dad when I was very young what happened when we die, and he said there's nothing.  And I was utterly shocked and dismayed.

So I was surprised when a few years ago talking to them in a pub they seemed very open to the idea of reincarnation. This might be just about the only time in my life I'd broached the subject of an afterlife with them. They had never really seem interested in talking about that sort of thing, or anything philosophical at all really. And they weren't interested in religion, although my mam said she believed in God (even if not an afterlife). When they'd previously rejected an afterlife, I don't think it was due to any strong feeling, just a kind of underlying supposition.

So where did my belief in an afterlife come from if not from my parents?  When I was a child, it was just a deep feeling. I don't think I ever truly believed my dad when he said there's nothing. It was just a very deep feeling that there's an ultimate purpose to all things including our lives. I used to have a fair few experiences of psi too as a child, almost never have them now.

The Climate Crisis

I just read this:

The global far right are weaponising net zero – and we’ll all suffer

I don't really care much about economic growth, I care about the planet. I wouldn't feel differently if I were ultra wealthy. But most people, regardless of their wealth, don't appear to care about the climate crisis.

Each government, at least in the UK, is obsessed by economic growth. We have enough wealth already, it's just that the preponderance of the wealth is concentrated in the hands of a few.

The world isn't physically closed

It is said that all change in the world is purely due to physical forces playing out. These forces can ultimately be boiled down to the four fundamental forces; the electromagnetic force, the gravitational force, the weak force and the strong force.

But, if that's the case, why do I have to make an effort to get out of bed in the morning?  And I do cos it's frigidly cold in my bedroom!

I should find my body moving of its own accord, getting out of bed, typing everything on here, thinking my thoughts for me. Isn't this all obvious transparent nonsense?

Induction and the laws of nature

We don't know, nor strictly speaking can we even say it's probable that the laws of nature will continue to operate. But we have to assume nature is uniform, otherwise we couldn't act in the world at all (if, indeed, the world didn't just disappear).

So, if I release a ball, why does it fall downwards? Why not just stay there? Or accelerate upwards? Or suddenly disappear? Or turn into a beautiful woman?

When I first studied philosophy, I couldn't grasp this. I thought, why doesn't past experience render it at least likely that the laws of nature will continue? It was a revelation when I finally got it. One of the few occasions in my life when I suddenly grasp something, and I thought, "oh wow" and "this means that everything we know is ultimately a type of faith". It added to the mysteriousness of this reality we find ourselves in, and the fact we ultimately know nothing in a strict sense.