Going back in time and inhabiting my 15 year old body

I'm just wondering what I would do if, say tomorrow, when I woke up I bizarrely found myself in my 15-year-old body back where I used to live in Wolviston Court Estate, Billingham. But I have all my present memories, my present intelligence etc.

After getting over the complete shock, what the heck would I do? I couldn't tell anyone, at least not at first. It's absolutely, completely unbelievable. And is it temporary? Or permanent? Do I go to school (Northfield Comprehensive)?? I can't even remember what time school starts! Either 9am or 9.15am. I remember where to go, though — the registration class. Would my friend at the time, Gary Dix, think I am being a bit weird and strangely intelligent when I start talking? At that age I was starting to talk about all the things I do now -- the Universe, God, life after death etc. But my thoughts have somewhat developed since then!

Do I go to lessons? First thought is obviously not, I nick off and explore this world of 1977! On the other hand, it might be fun to attend school for at least a day and give the teachers a piece of my mind. I could explain to Mr Lonsdale, my physics "O level" teacher, that he is naively pre-supposing our physical theories depict a literal state of affairs and it is difficult to reconcile this supposition with the underdetermination of theories by evidence i.e for any macroscopic state of affairs a unlimited number of theories can be dreamt up employing wildly differing entities to explain that state of affairs. Yep, see how long the condescension by teachers towards me lasts!

Then I'll nick off the next day and forevermore after that (assuming this is a permanent state of affairs, and I'll continue to exist in my 15-year-old body). I should be able to use some of my knowledge of the future to make money. But how would I affect the future? There's the Butterfly effect.

Oh yes, and I would go over to Andrea Stark and tell her that I'm not gay! 😂 (I found out a few years ago that she thought I was gay at the time).

The increase in the price of food from July 2021 to July 2022

I thought I would calculate how much food prices have increased in the past year. These are some of the food products I bought from either Morrisons or Sainsburys. I've only included those products that are identical. I haven't deliberately chosen the one's that have increased the most, I've just included those foods I could actually find. In all cases, for those products that continually cycle up and down in price, I've always bought at the low end of the price cycle, i.e., so-called "offers". 

So, as an average, the price I pay for food at supermarkets appears to have roughly increased by 15% in the past year. I do not know how that compares to the official figures. Obviously, it might be the case that the food I've included increased disproportionately compared to average food price increases. But I doubt it will be wildly inaccurate. So, for instance, I doubt claims that food has only risen by about 10% in the past year that I've heard bandied around (although that might have been around a month ago, and prices are relentlessly sharply increasing).

A quick comment on "Defending the Soul".

I've just read this. 

Defending The Soul

It was hard work reading this. The author needs to learn to communicate in clear English. And it's all just a confused mess from beginning to end.  Just a couple of comments.

He says:

If one is forced to believe a soul is a separate form, that it has its own identity and personality, then of course Sullivan’s assumptions may have some merit. But this assumption is at best, based on a reductionist, materialistic view of science.

I'm not sure what is meant by a soul if it doesn't have its own identity and personality. And how on earth does the author imagine that such a conception is based on reductive materialism?

He says:

The reality is that we are all a sum total of all memories.

This is the standard materialist assumption, so why on earth someone who believes that our essence is a soul would have such a belief is beyond me. I think he's been influenced by materialists and he hasn't understood what is being claimed here. His understanding of personal identity and anything else philosophical is as bad if not worse than even that of the author of The Soul Fallacy!

And all this evidence for an afterlife is an irrelevance. If the original author's (Bill Sullivan Ph.D) arguments work, then at the minimum, they make an afterlife an extraordinary claim if not outright refuting an afterlife. But I've already in my own fb group partially addressed the article the author of this article is addressing. Go here: My thoughts on Souls: It’s Time We Give Up the Ghost

I was actually thinking of writing my own blog post addressing Bill Sullivan's article.  But I think that would be largely redundant, since I've addressed most of his arguments in my own The many Fallacies of "The Soul Fallacy"

Swearing at work

 

I love this car!

 

Look at that!  Gorgeous! I want one!  Facebook where I obtained the picture says:

The Ten Most Beautiful Cars in the World. 1933 Duesenberg SJ Arlington Torpedo Sedan body by Gordon Buehrig

The Duesenberg SJ and SSJ model were the Bugatti Veyrons of the 1930s: big, powerful, expensive, and, by the standards of the day, outrageously fast. This 1933 SJ Arlington Torpedo sedan, with body designed by the legendary Gordon Buehrig (who also designed the Auburn Speedster, Cord 810, and Continental Mk II), was built as a show car for the 1933-34 Century of Progress Exposition in Chicago. It was nicknamed "Twenty Grand" because of its price $20,000, a staggering sum in Depression-era America. Ironically, in today's money that's the equivalent of about $366,000, considerably less than the Arlington Torpedo is now worth.

In 1980 it was named Best of Show at the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance. In the late eighties, the car was selected to be exhibited in Essen, Germany, as one of the 'The Ten Most Beautiful Cars in the World.'

People keep claiming Boris Johnson did well in combating the virus.

So, Boris Johnson announces his resignation today.. thank God.  I do not understand why though, many members of the public and Tory MP's keep claiming that Boris Johnson did well with combating covid.  It's the exact opposite!

He should have taken radical action back in late January 2020, as I suggested at the time.  But he failed to implement any measures at all (so far as I know) until late March!  Then he took no precautions at all to prevent getting the virus himself, and indeed seemed to be deliberately trying to get infected with it.  In this he succeeded, and nearly died.

Then these lockdowns kept being imposed, but by then the virus was rife, and all it achieved was to put a lid on the spread of the virus, only for the virus to spread unabated once the lockdowns were lifted.  And he won't have had anything to do with the development of the vaccines.  

People just repeat each other, they never think for themselves.  The notion that Bojo did well combating covid is simply preposterous.

I need to let go of my ego

I need to let go of my ego and simply be myself. I do not need to impress anyone. I do not need to prove myself to others. I do not need to pretend to be that which I am not. One's exterior persona is a false facade. I need to banish all petty aspirations.  By doing this, my authenticity will be enhanced.

Let us lose ourselves in the moment. Experience our own beingness -- the very rawness of our being. Not be distracted by trivialities. Silent the fearful mind and enter into an empathetic assimilation with all beings, all things.

More ridiculous predictions by Elon Musk

 Elon Musk Believes 2029 is Year We Achieve Both AGI and Humans on Mars

Even though AGI needn't be sentient, I'm dubious that AGI will ever be possible.  But if it is, it will take at least 500 years, or at least that's my prediction.  And I tend to be right most of the time.

OK, Musk says 2029. I say 2522. Who are you going to trust most? Me or Elon?

And I still say a human will land on Mars, most probably a woman (due to her weight), in 2069.

A spiffing idea for a novel

I think a spiffing idea for a novel would be if a group of people want back in time to the age of the dinosaurs, say about 80 million years BC. Talk about their survival, building a shelter etc. Then eventually they discover intelligent dinosaurs walking on their hind legs approximately the size of us humans that communicate with speech to each other! The humans eventually end up getting captured, and the dinosaurs don't initially believe that the humans are intelligent. Until they discover that the humans communicate with speech and they have strange devices on them, and formidable weapons.

I'd write it myself, but I'd be no good at writing novels.

The fine-tuning of the Universe

Suppose someone -- let's call him Peter -- were kidnapped, and the kidnapper is a psychopath and sets up some explosion device that is tied to Peter. The device is programmed to shortly generate 10 random numbers. If the numbers so generated are anything apart from 10 zeros, it will instantaneously explode, and hence kill Peter.

So Peter thinks, well this is it then. The chance of me surviving is 1/10^10 or 1 in 10 billion. However, much to his delight, the contraption duly displays the 10 zeros!

So he says to the psychopath "you had me worried there, you must have programmed it to display 10 zeros!".

The psychopath responds, "no no, not at all! It was completely random and you're just incredibly lucky. Don't forget, if it had been any other combination of numbers, you would be dead and wouldn't be here to think about it. You can only live in a world, and hence contemplate your situation, where 10 zeros come up.

Of course, this sounds preposterous and we would surely conclude the psychopath is lying. But does his argument have merit?

This is not just an idle question. It has direct applicability to the fine-tuning of the physical constants of our Universe. Or indeed the fact we were actually born rather than any of the countless potential human beings that could have been born in our place. Or the fact that the human race came into being due to all the improbable events that were required e.g. the meteor impact 66 million years ago etc.