Aaron CT Smith, a cognitive scientist from Melbourne, Australia, has given one of the most brilliant accounts of what beliefs do for us that I have seen to date, Flock Theory, “In my estimation…beliefs follow the same kinds of rules governing flocks of birds…First, successful beliefs fit the rule of separation. Like birds in the…
Building a model of the world is a community project. Series. 5.4.
Recall my project here. In this series, I lay out some "bones" for thinking about the way -- the why and the how -- the people we depend on for our survival, delectation, and companionship (our peeps) help us navigate the world. And we them. You might pick up these bones, if you find them…
Mattering to each other. Series 5.2.
In this series, I lay out some "bones" for thinking about the way -- the why and the how -- the people we depend on for our survival, delectation, and companionship (our peeps) help us navigate the world. And we them. You might pick up these bones, if you find them interesting, and bring them…
The day the Russians nuked my sawmill camp. A survivor’s memoir.
It’s an October morning, 1975, in Upper Fraser, a remote sawmill camp in north central B.C. I’m 9 years old, sitting at my desk in the portable classroom where I’m to spend the remainder of my elementary school years. A bank of windows running the length of wall to my left looks across the dirt…
Thomas Hobbes on controversy. A quote worth contemplating. Series 3.3.
"And as in arithmetic, unpracticed men must, and professors themselves may often err and cast up false, so also in any other subject of reasoning, the ablest, most attentive, and most practised men may deceive themselves and infer false conclusions, not but that reason itself is always right reason, as well as arithmetic is a…
John Stuart Mill, On Liberty. A quote worth contemplating. Series 3.2.
"[Cf Cicero] He who knows only his own side knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may be able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side: if he does not so much know what they are, he has no ground…
Come on, how much do you really want to know? 2.2
If you really want to get detailed, and disturbed, about how much faith you put in the things that matter for your life, think of having a surgery. Just think about the doctor's trust in the science she refers to, the variety and precision of the equipment she uses, the sterilization of equipment, the pharmaceuticals,…
We can’t fact-check every little thing — and still have friends. 2.1.
Can you imagine what a jerk I’d be if I insisted on fact checking everything everyone says to me? Tammy: I went to the mall this morning. Pam: Did you now. Which mall? Tammy: THE mall. The only mall in town. Pam: How do I know you went to the mall? Tammy: I have a…
