Evolution of Reflexes The reflex was one of the best ideas that Evolution ever had (second perhaps to articulated bodies). What could be better than an unlearned rapid response action to a threatening stimulus? It’s like having a lightning-fast gunslinger ready to get the organism out of trouble. You don’t have to wait ten minutes […]
Stimulus-Response Science Stimulus-response psychology has been out of fashion and favor for a long time now, not without reason. It is associated with behaviorism, physicalism, and conditioning theories of learning. We are not just physical mechanisms triggered into reflex behavior by outside stimuli! Indeed not: we are full of “intervening variables”, cognitive structures, streams of […]
Digital Weapons Suppose the Germans at the time of the Second World War were secretly working on a new weapon with lethal potential. The plan was to manufacture small handheld devices that could be distributed to enemy populations (how they weren’t sure). German psychologists and brain scientists had discovered that a certain kind of propaganda […]
2025 Intentions I don’t make New Years Resolutions (a pitiful concept) but I do intend to do certain things going forward. The main one is to go on hating—hating evil, corruption, and stupidity. I invite you to join me. This won’t be easy: I am not by nature a good hater. Hating is unpleasant, it’s […]
Chemistry I used to love chemistry. It was my first intellectual interest. I was ten. It was my gateway science. Why, I don’t remember; it might have had to do with Dr. Dolittle. I persuaded my parents to equip me with a chemistry laboratory one Christmas. I selected the apparatus and chemical samples from a […]
Limits of Intelligence Does intelligence have limits? What might these be? Where do we humans stand on the intelligence scale? I will discuss these questions by reference to a Star Trek episode and a well-known philosophical contention involving bats. Don’t expect anything too definitive; these questions are very difficult (we may not have the intelligence […]
