I've highlighted Dr. Ginger Campbell's excellent Brain Science Podcast before. It's an invaluable resource for anyone interested in the science of the brain. Many of the books and concepts I've highlighted here over the years, I first heard about on her show. Campbell, a medical doctor, pretty much focuses on neuroscience rather than philosophy, but … Continue reading Ginger Campbell is doing a series on consciousness
The reflex and the feeling
Stephen T. Asma and Rami Gabriel have an interesting article at Aeon on emotions. Their main thesis is that many emotions are biological, universal, and rooted in evolution. And that they arise through "the strata of consciousness": the physiological, the experential, and the conceptual. They start off casting aspersions on computationalism, evolutionary psychology, and artificial … Continue reading The reflex and the feeling
Recommendation: What Is Real?
Last week I started listening to a Sean Carroll podcast episode, an interview of Adam Becker on his book, What Is Real?: The Unfinished Quest for the Meaning of Quantum Physics. Before even finishing the episode, I downloaded Becker's book and read it. Becker starts out in the early decades of the 20th century, when … Continue reading Recommendation: What Is Real?
The Anthropocene is a conceit of human exceptionalism
Peter Brannen has an interesting piece in the Atlantic, pointing out that the Anthropocene is more of a geological event rather than an epoch, at least so far. Humans are now living in a new geological epoch of our own making: the Anthropocene. Or so we’re told. Whereas some epochs in Earth history stretch more … Continue reading The Anthropocene is a conceit of human exceptionalism
Is the ultimate nature of reality mental?
Philosopher Wilfrid Sellars had a term for the world as it appears, the "manifest image." This is the world as we perceive it. In it, an apple is an apple, something red or green with a certain shape, a range of sizes, a thing that we can eat, or throw. The manifest image can be … Continue reading Is the ultimate nature of reality mental?
Detecting consciousness in animals and machines, inside-out
An interesting paper came up in my feeds this weekend: Indicators and Criteria of Consciousness in Animals and Intelligent Machines: An Inside-Out Approach. The authors put forth a definition of consciousness, and then criteria to test for it, although they emphasize that these can't be "hard" criteria, just indicators. None of them individually definitely establish … Continue reading Detecting consciousness in animals and machines, inside-out
Recommendation: Altered Carbon: Download Blues
I posted a while back on the Netflix series, Altered Carbon, based on the books by Richard K. Morgan. The series presents a universe where everyone has a device implanted in their brainstem shortly after birth that records their personality, so that if they die, the device can be moved to either another human body, … Continue reading Recommendation: Altered Carbon: Download Blues
Higher order theories of consciousness
I've posted on HOT (higher order thought theories of consciousness) before, but there's a new paper out covering the basics of these types of theories. Since first reading about HOT many months ago, the framework has been growing on me. The paper is not too technical and I think would be accessible to most interested … Continue reading Higher order theories of consciousness
The problems with panpsychism
Late last week, there was a clash between philosophers on Twitter over panpsychism. This was followed by Philip Goff, an outspoken proponent of panpsychism, authoring a blog post arguing that we shouldn't require evidence for it. This week, Susan Schneider did a (somewhat confusing) Big Think video arguing that panpsychism isn't compatible with physics, and … Continue reading The problems with panpsychism
Time to dump the concept of cognition?
An interesting paper came up in my Twitter feed. Neuroscientist Paul Cisek notes that many of our current models on how the mind works come from dualistic traditions, as well as psychological ones that were heavily influenced by dualism. He sees the concept of cognition having largely been created after dualism was abandoned. It made … Continue reading Time to dump the concept of cognition?
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