Some think that the properties of our universe are based on strange numbers which have eight dimensions, called octonions.
Year: 2018
What’s The Point of Materialist Psychology?
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, Read More…
New find sheds light on how and when DNA replicates
“If you duplicate at a different place and time, you might assemble a completely different structure,” Gilbert said. “A cell has different things available to it at different times. Changing when something replicates changes the packaging of the genetic information.”
2018 saw mechanobiology, including biophysics, come to the fore
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 Read More…
Webcast: New Horizons flying by Ultima Thule New Year’s Day
For a far out New Year’s Day, try Ultima Thule, 4 billion km from the sun. “The object was subsequently designated 2014 MU69, given the minor planet number 485968, and based on public votes, nicknamed “Ultima Thule”, which means ‘beyond the known world.’”
Getting at what we MEAN by “truth”
Yeah, truth. In an age when fishwraps claim to be telling us “The Truth” even while books are written about post-truth (Oxford’s Word of the Year 2016), a look at the different things people can mean does not come amiss.
The phony war of science vs. religion pales in the face of the “social justice” assault on Darwin
Coyne is right. Atheists got hold of science. But the atheists’ opponents have traditionally been theists who are scientists who believe that truth is important. And much that is claimed to be “science” in Coyne’s own field is questionable but is defended because it supports atheism. But now, along come the social justice warriors…
Michael Egnor on the immateriality of the mind – more
It is much easier to talk about the mind as a “meat robot” than about the reality, especially these days, when a Twitter putdown or TED talk is all you need by way of an argument. Few will bother to seek out someone who knows why it’s absolute nonsense.
Three Knockdown Proofs of the Immateriality of Mind, and Why Computers Compute, not Think
From Neurosurgeon Michael Egnor
Will the Large Hadron Collider doom particle physics?
They’ll find the money to continue. Consider: The Standard Model begins with the hated Big Bang. Nothing that supports string theory, eternal cosmic inflation, or a multiverse has been found. Don’t many people just have to keep looking and keep quiet about what they find that wasn’t what they hoped for?
Can Big Data beat the humans who compile it? A computer pioneer bet No
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. Read More…
Astrophysicist: Alien hunters, please stop using the Drake Equation
Actually, the intuition that They Are Out There is not based on science; it is based on deductive reasoning.
2018 AI Hype Countdown 3: Robert J. Marks on the claim, You Will Never Have Secrets Again!
AI help, not hype: Did you read about the flap they had to cut out of a volunteer’s skull?
Our universe understood at last: An expanding bubble in an extra dimension!
The authors hope that their work will “pave the way for methods of testing string theory.” That could come in handy, you never know.
2018 AI Hype Countdown 4: Robert J. Marks on the claim, Making AI Look More Human Makes It More Human-like!
Some are apparently wowed. Others remain unwowed.