G.E. Moore's Hands.

Just read the following article:

G.E. Moore’s Hands Roger Caldwell takes a sceptical look at scepticism.

The author doesn't understand all the underlying issues. Especially where he effectively says that we can trust what scientists tell us about reality!

Also people tend to be inconsistent here. They rail against idealism (the notion that matter doesn't have a consciousness-independent existence), yet are quite happy to suppose that colours, sounds and smells don't actually exist out there, but are creations of the mind. They are also happy to take our scientific theories literally so that, for example, we never actually touch anything since the sense of touch is allegedly the repulsive forces between the electrons in my fingertips and the electrons in the "touched" object. And that all matter is mostly empty space etc.

With idealism, at least subjective idealism, colours, sounds and smells are really out there in the world, even though the world is mind dependent.

Becoming rich is largely a matter of luck

Just read the following webpage:

If you’re so smart, why aren’t you rich? Turns out it’s just chance.

I think people have no idea how much our lives are ruled by randomness. One may often need certain qualities to become rich, but out of all these people who have such qualities, only a small percentage of them will become rich, and that through sheer luck.

Deciding on a novel to read

I've decided to avoid reading all 5 star customer reviews on amazon -- they can't be trusted since 66% of all reviews on Amazon are 5 star. OK, looking for a novel to read. I read the blurb, sounds great, but then read the customer reviews and keep getting put off!

The scientific method is the best way we have to understand the universe?

Sara Passmore who is the president of the Humanist Society of New Zealand says:

The scientific method is the best way we have to understand the universe.

I often hear people say this, especially scientists.  The problem here is that the word "understand" in this context is ambiguous.

Let's consider an analogy. Is the best way to understand a computer game to play it?

Well, it depends what is meant by "understand". By playing it we come more proficient at the game, we can predict more readily what will happen when one's character carries out certain actions. But no matter how often we play the game, one will never understand why the game has the particular characteristics it has, nor why it exists in the first place.

Likewise with science.  The purpose of science is to map out the patterns discerned in reality and calculate how the world changes with particular actions on our parts.  But that's all it does.  Science tells us nothing about the underlying machinery of reality. It tells us nothing about how or why the world exists at all and why it has the particular physical laws it does. That is what metaphysics deals with.

So, when people say "the scientific method is the best way we have to understand the universe", do they simply mean "understand" as in the patterns we discern in reality and the way they change? I don't think so, because often people who say this are atheists and seem to be insinuating that science offers an alternative explanation to "God" as to why there is a Universe at all, and why we exist etc.  And this includes prominent scientists like the late Stephen Hawking, who really should know better.

Inequality in the USA.

People in the USA who are more wealthy than between 80-90% of the rest of the population are roughly as well off as they would be if all the wealth were distributed uniformly. So I find it curious that so many people belligerently defend this state of affairs. What does this tell us about their intelligence and morality?

England where I live is pretty bad, but not quite as bad as the USA.

It's all so bizarre

How did we get here? From living 100,000 years ago in small isolated groups living in caves, to communicating with people across the globe on these devices?

To employ an analogy. We've learnt to play the computer game very efficiently indeed. We can predict very accurately what'll happen when our character performs certain actions. But we have absolutely no idea how the game is possible -- the underlying machinery that makes it all work. Or why it exists in the first place (despite what scientists would have you believe). 

And most importantly of all, why the bloody hell are we here? What or who put us here in this crazy mysterious world? For what purpose, if any?

Our lives are crazy and bizarre.  Yet most people are not aware of this, they do not know how bizarre our situation is, how bizarre our lives and the Universe are.  They sleepwalk through life thinking the purpose is to impress others, to make money, to get married, and then to die. 

And then what happens when we die?  Eternal oblivion?  Some mysterious new reality?  I don't know. 

Existential Dread

We're all just putting on a front, pretending all is well, losing ourselves in the daily activities of existence, pretending things are important. Lest existential dread consumes our souls.

We need to open our hearts and minds to realities beyond our ken. Know that all things will come right at the end. That all things ultimately matter. It is an inner light that shines . .if only we open our eyes to see it.

Preposterous Beliefs

Just read the following article:

Atheists who bring logic to the Easter story are missing the point


The author, Julian Baggini, is conflating one's degree of education with intelligence. The belief in the resurrection might indeed be preposterous, but so are many things that highly educated people believe e.g. colours, sounds and smells don't actually exist out there in the world, they are pure creations of the mind. Or Parallel Universes exist where everything I could do is played out slightly differently in another Universe, hence there are a squintillion differing versions of me! Or animals are not actually conscious (since they lack language).

At last I understand...

I think on reflection I have got everything wrong about there being an afterlife. We desperately want an afterlife, but we have to face facts. Just consider the radical personality changes that may be brought about by injury to the brain. Phineas Gage, to take the most famous example. If his new obnoxious personality was caused by his damaged brain, it would be silly to deny that his normal personality wasn’t caused by his pre-damaged brain!

And what is this thing, this “supernatural soul”, which is supposed to survive anyway? It’s invisible, has no mass or indeed any other physical properties. In fact it cannot be detected by any means whatsoever. What is left by saying it exists??

Since the birth of modern science in the 17th Century, science has been stunningly successful in furnishing us in with knowledge about the world, and has been an extraordinarily fruitful one in terms of the subsequent prediction and manipulation of our environment and in the creation of our technology. This strongly suggests that modern science pretty much accurately describes reality. OK, we have yet to fully explain consciousness. But the brain is the most complex object in the Universe. Give science a chance! Eventually we should be able to understand how the brain produces consciousness. There is no need to invoke a magical soul.

Are we really to suppose there might be supernatural and spooky entities and influences -- such as souls, magic, spirits, demons and what have you-- which somehow escapes the steely gaze of science, and to achieve this by having such supernatural entities exert no measurable influence on reality whatsoever! Why should we believe in the existence of the non-physical, which, by definition, our measuring instruments cannot detect?

People need to get real!

I have got real . .at last, finally I have got real. I now fully admit to my previous error in thinking there is an afterlife. Or sky daddies, or anything else magical. Let us henceforth trust what SCIENCE is telling us about the world.

HA HA!!!....No, not really ...APRIL FOOLS!!! 

Technological and Scientific Predictions

From here.

[E]ngineers working on quantum computing at both Google and IBM say that a quantum “dream machine” capable of solving computing’s most vexing problems might still be decades away. 

So much for all the hype about Quantum Computers. Press accounts always wildly overstate the progress of scientific discoveries, technology etc. Quantum Computers are just around the corner? No one will be driving cars soon? Earth-like planets are being discovered left, right and centre? Conscious robots indistinguishable from humans will soon be here? We'll soon be able to upload our consciousness to computers and achieve immortality? Man will soon land on Mars? The singularity is almost upon us? It's all nonsense. All of it. Be very cynical of reports of rapid technological progress.

Conscious robots? Well, for a kick off they're assuming that brains produce consciousness.  So if brains can do this, and we replicate their function, then we should, in principle, be able to eventually have conscious computers too. But how do we know that brains produce consciousness?

I stress to add that I do think certain technological breakthroughs will eventually happen. Autonomous cars for example. I predicted 4 years ago that all cars on the roads will be autonomous by 2060. But 2060! That's a long time away. Also I think Virtually Reality will eventually completely change everything.