Of Interest

One of the questions that have plagued my insomniac nights over the past decade or so is what makes something interesting. There are many proposals.…

The post Of Interest appeared first on Evolving Thoughts.

My talk online

I recently gave a fuller version of my talk “Comprehension as Compression”, and I placed the slideshow on Slideshare. You may also download the PDF:

A talk on understanding

I will be presenting this one at ISHPSSSB in Oslo in a couple of weeks. Comments and objections received with the usual ill grace…

50 words for snow 7: taxing attacks on taxa

We should consider in each case what Question it is that is proposed, and what answer to it would, in the instance before us, be the most opposite or contrasted to the one to be examined. E.G. “You will find this doctrine in Bacon” may be contrasted, either with “You will find in Bacon a Read More...

50 words for snow 5: constructing phenomena

There is a naive empiricist view held by nobody on close inspection, that phenomena merely present themselves to the observer, and call for explanation. At least since Kant, such a view has been untenable, as Michela Massimi has shown. As she notes, it is well understood that phenomena are underdetermined by observational data, and she Read More...

Closet Darwinism, and definitions

Every so often, somebody makes the case that “Darwinism”, “Darwinist” and “Darwinian”, being the generic noun, the individual term, and the adjective of Darwin’s name and therefore (supposedly) theory, are dead terms that cause nothing but harm (see Scott and … Continue reading

Pizza reductionism, emergence and phenomena

Debates over reduction in science are as old as philosophy of science, but in the 1960s, Ernest Nagel’s book The Structure of Science really set things going. Nagel argued that a goal of science was to reduce one theory to a … Continue reading

Scientism and methodological naturalism

So I’ve been busy with work, and finding a flat and preparing to move. Larry’s been busy tearing strips off those who argue that the ENCODE data shows the genome is mostly functional (only if you think that doing anything … Continue reading