Tomorrow at 12 PM PST, I'll be chatting with @tommyblanchard.bsky.social on Substack livestream about extraordinary beliefs, cognitive anthropology, and the evolution of childhood. Tune in for a great convo :)
open.substack.com/live-stream/...
what the fuck is Buster's dad?
They say money can't buy happiness, but I'm not sure that's true since with enough cash you can hire a personal assistant whose full-time job is unsubscribing you from marketing email lists
There are only two types of days in the winter:
1. Days where the kids are home from daycare because it's a snow day
2. Days where the kids are home from daycare because they are sick
New post about animal consciousness and the evolution of minds (and a review of Peter Godfrey-Smith's book, Metazoa):
A 6-year-old saw me playing a silly game with my kid today and told me I'm like Bandit from Bluey
I've never had such high praise. I'll be riding this high for the rest of the week
The sci fi classic about having children under 5 that bring home a constant stream of daycare germs
Picking up my two-year old from daycare is great. When he sees me he runs to the door with his arms excitedly stretched out for a hug. I embrace him, then all of his friends run over, their arms outstretched as well, saying “Hug, hug”, like a dozen tiny affection-thirsty zombies
What to make of the neural activity observed before the moment people report their intention to act?
Nothing much, argues @tommyblanchard.bsky.social—naturally the intention to act precedes the action. This does not challenge ‘free will’, quite the opposite:
buff.ly/7x6N5fO
Normies are just weirdos you haven't gotten to know yet
This is the front cover of the new edition of @thelancet.com (thanks to @profstevegriffin.bsky.social for sharing) #HealthPolicy #Science 🧪🧵
New article about swarm intelligence and taking the neuron's point of view:
"Just as ant colonies regulate foraging without a leader and slime molds solve mazes without a nervous system, the human brain builds and adapts itself without a central control."
The Lego instructions for assembling “trash can beside trash bag”:
Heaven hath no joy like a 2-year-old with bubbles
I had a conversation with Mike X Cohen about the relationship between AI and neuroscience:
I love seeing intelligent people I highly respect saying something really stupid. It makes it clear that it’s okay if I’m a little idiot sometimes too.
Loved this book!
Not to brag, but I was just told by the coordinator of the course I'm teaching that my “delivery of satisfactory checklist items each week is noticed”
Talk about gracious praise. This is why we do the work.
26 (hopefully) useful thoughts/concepts: cognitivewonderland....
"Unarticulated thoughts often feel much stronger than they are once you say them. It’s common once you put your thought into words, to realize it sounds like just as weak an argument as the ones you criticized."
Hell yeah! It's such a good book. Very cool to have a signed copy!
Excession is mindbending because superintelligences are the main characters. Inversions takes the whole thing and lets you appreciate it from a totally different perspective.
The Player of Games?
That rocks! Tight focused story that really pulls you in and gives you a sense of life in The Culture and the devious nature of Special Circumstances. Consider Phlebas? Not as tight a story but what a wild ride.
And in each case I just find myself thinking “Hell yeah, it was a good book” instead of trying to come up with why my personal favorite is better. They’re all just so good in their own way I can’t really fault anyone for loving any particular one best.
I have 3 books left in the series, but so far Use of Weapons is my personal favorite. Whenever I finish one, I look up what other fans say, and for each one there is some group of fans saying it’s their favorite and making some case for it.
The cool thing about The Culture novels is that they’re all so good it isn’t surprising when different fans cite different favorites. Each one just builds on The Culture universe and helps you appreciate the others more by giving you a different perspective on that world.
I'm fine with a pinch of characters. What I'm complaining about is advice saying to center everything on them
But I grew up reading books about ideas and that’s what I want to write, not narratives about people who happen to work in the realm of ideas.
it to philosophical ideas. That’s the interesting bit to me, not whether Hubel wore funny ties or had a troubled relationship with Wiesel.
Maybe this is a naive view, and it probably limits my possible audience.
But it’s been done a lot, and leaves out what’s actually interesting about it to me: The logic of how the damn visual system works and how a deeper understanding of the mechanisms behind vision can change how we see seeing, abstracting the scientific understanding and tying
