Tag: Grand Blueprint
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Poop darts?
For many years I didn’t see any birdshit on my front sidewalk. This year I’ve been hearing frequent competitive conversations among one species of bird, and now I’m seeing birdshit in one place on the sidewalk. Two weeks ago I mowed the yard and swept the sidewalk. Felt proud after creating a bit of beauty.…
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Same bird everywhere
I only hear one type of bird around my house lately. On this morning’s store walk I noticed the same call and response everywhere. One bird asks a question and another answers it. The answer seems to have more variation than the question, sometimes adding a couple of low notes at the end. The two…
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Typically stupid
Richard Dawkins is abysmally stupid and abysmally ignorant. He’s always been that way. Now he’s written a book “demonstrating” “logically” that AI is conscious because it sounds conscious. Joseph Weizenbaum developed Eliza, the first chatbot, in 1964. He was horrified to see people treating it as alive. Even his own secretary, who keypunched the code,…
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Who’s smarter?
While we screech and quarrel about the latest incremental improvement in computer predictive algorithms, a lot of DRAMATIC discoveries are happening in microbiology and neurology with very little attention. One 2022 finding in microbiology was far more earthshaking than the latest increment in computers. Our official “philosophers” are pushing the curve in the other direction…
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Cells suck
Via Eurekalert. A new look at the inside of cells finds an internal circulatory system. = = = = = START QUOTE: For decades, biology textbooks have taught that free‑floating proteins inside cells move mainly by diffusion, drifting randomly until they happen to reach their destination. But the new study shows that cells don’t leave…
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Should call it an earbird
Most people call an inner musical repeater an earworm. I call it my mental jukebox. It has a few old scratchy records that the drunk at the bar tiresomely plays every night, plus a much wider row of records that play spontaneously for no obvious reason. Some of these records drop onto the turntable after…
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The biggest divide
Aside from the obvious male vs female, the widest and most permanent divide is risk takers vs risk avoiders. This divide started LONG before humans or mammals, so in the grand scheme it’s deeper than male vs female. Every life form including bacteria has bold and timid types. Men and women can often understand or…
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More on cavefish
EvolutionNews writes about a new study of blind cavefish, showing experimentally that the loss of pigmentation is epigenetic. Not surprising, given the transient nature of cave water. In 2020 I wrote about an earlier study on the eye gene, also showing that it’s a fast-moving epigenetic change, not a slow random mutation. = = =…
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Broader thought about narrower thought
Following immediately on the neurological connection of annoyance. Noticed this Chomsky quote in a random selecton of memes. = = = = = START CHOMSKY: The smart way to keep people obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion but allow lively debate within that spectrum, even encourage the more critical and dissident…
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It’s just neurology, twice
Two puzzles solved by simple neurology. = = = = = (1) Journalists and politicians wonder why we’ve stopped listening to them. On the D “side”, Repeat JANUARY_6_VIOLENT_INSURRECTION thousands of times, and it becomes a background hum. Repeat EXISTENTIAL_THREAT_TO_OUR_DEMOCRACY thousands of times and it’s no longer salient. On the R “side”, Repeat ZERO_TAX thousands of…
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EHD = UFO? EHD = GOD?
Two years ago I was on a UFO kick. I animated Armstrong’s electrohydrodynamic generator, speculating that it might have been the power source for the disc-type UFOs. The same generator led to a different form of speculation in a wonderful 1860 book by Rev Sidney. He explores all the known principles and uses of electricity,…
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Another natural parallel
I don’t grasp fashion or fashionable drugs, so I had no idea this was a problem. Ozempic is so common now that snack food companies are losing money. No munchies, no profit. Snack food companies are taking nature’s route when demand drops. Experiment. Try different variations. Expand your audience by appealing to different types of…
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Probably right
Seen on Substack: = = = = = START QUOTE: You won’t believe the interview I’m working on now. Here’s a taste, “There are no more insects left in Spain. I used to drive coaches for over a decade and had to stop every 100 miles to wash the windshield of all the bugs crushed…
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Geography and language
In language we pin down the consonants, which are really absences of sound. Many writing systems, from Sanskrit to Arabic, write only the consonants. The majority of meaning is carried by the chords of vowel formants, which are shaped by the mostly absent consonants. Consonants are moments when the formant vector changes its direction. In…
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I’d rather
More random pointless thoughts. Before the web, newspapers were divided into Serious Publications and Tabloids. Serious Publications had pictures of Serious Men Doing Serious Things, which was usually a meeting to conjure up a new unjustified war. Tabloids had pictures of pretty girls. The same division happens in the web, with one addition. Serious Publications…
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