2018

I have often wondered what the point of materialist psychology is.  Set aside mental illnesses that are manifestations of biological pathologies.  I am talking about, for example, the man who goes to a therapist because he is having marital difficulties  Why shouldn’t the therapy session proceed along these lines: Patient (let’s call him John):  Doc, I feel terrible.  My marriage is on the rocks. Therapist (let’s call him Sigmund):  Let’s explore why that might be. John:  Oh, way ahead of you there doc.  My wife Jill caught me having sex with her best friend Sally.  Let me tell you; she was not keen on that.  And you know I feel kinda bad about it too. Sigmund:  Do you hope to Read More ›

The mechanome, “the body of knowledge about mechanical forces at work in the molecular, cellular, anatomical, and physiological processes that contribute to the architecture of living structures and their physical properties,” became more prominent this year in discussions of biology (though one story on the physics of biology late last year garnered 354 comments). For so long, the genome ran away with all the interest and publicity but maybe that’s changing. At her blog, science writer Suzan Mazur talks about the way that mechanobiology is becoming mainstream: “When I say mechanobiology is all the rage, I’m not simply referring to lab research and scientific conferences on the subject, although they are, of course, central. But also to: (1) mechanobiology university Read More ›

From Neurosurgeon Michael Egnor

Fred Brooks says that human intelligence augmented by artificial intelligence will always beat artificial intelligence alone. Is he right? Jed Macosko, an assistant prof at Wake Forest University, explains: Before we envision scary scenes from The Matrix, we need to remember that Zor, Deep Blue, and any future AI systems are inevitably designed by humans. Developing an algorithm to beat humans or humans-plus-computers in chess requires a lot of other humans doing careful engineering. Not only that but their program designed to play chess won’t suddenly become a champion at Monopoly—or even very good at checkers. The bottom line is that Brooks’ Bet and his IA>AI inequality principle is a good reality check in the face of fears and hype Read More ›