Tag: nature
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Domains of Conception
The Borders of Understanding My molecular biologist friend, Barry Bowman, brewed up this stimulating thought: One can understand much about nature without mathematics. Can one understand quantum mechanics only through its arcane mathematics? Can one not comprehend quantum physics other than through its mathematical expression? To explore the thought some agreement is needed on the…
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Robots’ Feelings
Emotion algorithms To answer the question whether robots have feelings or not we must have some notion about the nature of feelings. What are feelings? Or emotions? Are they to be accounted for purely physically; the expression of electrochemical processes that take place within one’s body? Our psyche’s perception of the physiological activity taking place…
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Axioms
Hypotheses I cannot prove; taken on faith I’m thinking about my axioms of faith. On what unprovable hypotheses do I confront the world. My axioms are my prejudices; the fewer the better. The first one is this: 1. That reality exists. That a world exists in whose catalogue of entities I am one. And what…
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Right Wrongs
Drowning in the ocean of injustice. Context: An atomic bomb was dropped by the U.S. on Hiroshima, Japan in August of 1945. This event was the critical one which ended the Second World War. Some claim that it was an act of savagery needlessly killing many because the war could have been ended without that…
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Perspectives
Sadye Stories My mother’s name was Sadie. By some coup of whim I had thought she spelled it ‘Sadye’ when I suggested that name for our new born daughter to her mother. My precious wife, Elfi, acceded so our daughter became Sadye. Quarantine. Sadye was a 5 year old in kindergarten in 1997. The children…
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What is Energy?
An Abstract Reality What IS energy; that you buy it, use it, have it and notice it in others? (“The kids have such energy!”) You never see it, never touch it. Never smell it or hold it. What is the nature of such a substance? Energy is not coal. Nor oil. Nor sunshine. Nor boys…
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Emotion and Reason
“Les passions ont appris aux hommes la raison” Emotion has taught mankind to reason Marquis de Vauvenargues 1715-1747 What is it that captures us about these words? Emotion has taught mankind to reason. It is this. They appear to contradict common opinion which holds that emotion is the antithesis of reason; behavior is either emotional…
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Free-Will-Free
“We must believe in free-will. We have no choice.” ― Isaac Bashevis Singer The words, “free will,” as commonly understood, are without meaning. (Explanation here.) They are words that describe an illusion about reality. Like the word, sunset, describes the illusion that the sun is moving whereas, in fact, the sun is not moving. Rather…
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Genocide
The Weed’s View She rejoices in her gardening skills. In her garden she feels herself surrounded by a fragrant beauty that she, herself, nurtured. She had first cleared the ground of all weeds – a painstaking task. Each one had to be individually discovered and pulled out by its roots. So no descendant should have…
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Off the Road
Getting Off The Road March 19, 2006 Saturday morning I live in the woods. In a redwood forest. I am driving along the road into the town of Sebastopol this morning. Enjoying the ride. It’s springtime. Flowering trees and green foliage everywhere. It’s a country road, one lane each way. And quite often in my…
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Free Will
Sequel to previous post: God Determines Almost 400 years ago, the venerable philosopher, Baruch de Spinoza (1634-1677), in his ‘Improvement of Understanding,’ wrote of free will: these are words to which no idea is attached. That the phrase, free will, has no meaning has been demonstrated by philosophers for several hundred years: Locke, Hume, Hegel,…
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God Determines
The ancient Greek philosopher, Epicurus (around 300 BCE), introduced the world to a conundrum called the Problem of Evil. It says: Since evil exists, God doesn’t. Here is the entire proof: Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able to prevent evil but not willing? Then…
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Waste
Throw-away virtue. Waste is a deliciously ambiguous notion. What is discarded and not used in the venture is waste. Food that is not digested. But waste is also a mark of prosperity. Where much is being done there is waste. Little being done, little being scrapped. So waste is a product of achievement. For those…
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Exponential Growth
Living cells multiply. Their number grows exponentially. The more there are the faster they increase. An exponentially growing population has a doubling time: the time it takes for the population to double. Having a doubling time is a characteristic of exponential growth. In the time it takes each individual cell to divide into two cells,…