Michael Merrifield

Time to update my pinned post, just because this selfie makes me very happy. (Monku View Point on @hermisland, 26 July 2022 at 11PM. 2s exposure on @SonyAlpha 6600 with Samyang 12mm f2 lens, pushed to ISO 10000, just reprocessed with @Lightroom’s amazing AI noise reduction.)

Much though I enjoy @BBCRadio4’s “Conversations from a Long Marriage”, mostly it just makes me grateful that my relationship with the woman I love is not an exhausting endless cycle of petty spats and rapprochements.

@25deadbatts @FrankBr05713205 Or is it a hand grenade?

@AstroMikeMerri @FrankBr05713205 Nice coffee grinder

This was my calculator in college. On the plus side, it didn't need any batteries. Anybody else ever use one?

@OKairra19658 @greg_ashman And a hundred years ago there were dozens of other astronomical phenomena that we didn’t understand. The fact that our understanding is still imperfect does not invalidate the enterprise. Bored now. Bye.

@AstroMikeMerri @greg_ashman You cannot prove what you're within. And this isn't just consciousness, it's the very nature of reality. It's the "irrelevant" data below Planck. It's the elusive nature of dark matter. It's the Hubble Tension. These are fundamental patterns, things that use underlying mechanisms

The reaction to Dawkins deciding Claude is conscious is fascinating. It really is just the Strong AI position that Roger Penrose was criticising in the 1980s. If you think consciousness is just an emergent property of a sufficiently complex computer then of course AI is conscious. It passes the Turing test and that’s it. The really interesting part is why it is obvious to so many of us that AI is *not* conscious: obvious to the point we think Dawkins’ credulity is amusing. What are we basing that on? Are we deluded or is there something else to consciousness that we cannot articulate but that we clearly sense?

@ABridgen Where was the referendum on giving up our place in the free market in the first place?

Britain will pay the EU £1bn a year for ‘closer ties’. Where was the referendum on giving powers back to the EU? Starmer and his Government are so unpopular any policy they proposed would be rejected in a Referendum. That’s why he’s not giving you one . gbnews.com/politics/brita…

@OKairra19658 @greg_ashman Simply saying that the fact that we are viewing it “from the inside” doesn’t necessarily mean that consciousness is not amenable to scientific investigation.

@AstroMikeMerri @greg_ashman That doesn't mean they don't exist or that your models aren't wrong. What you see with your telescope is subjective. Not objective. There's no real proof that what you see is precisely what others see is precisely what's really there.

@GoovaertsA27804 @pjsuffolk @Cornishview Not dynamic — just a very low overnight tariff.

@AstroMikeMerri @pjsuffolk @Cornishview That's with dynamic tarrifing? I guess 95% doesnt do that.

people with Solar panels are very keen to tell us how much they save on electricity - but omit to say they shelled out 8 to £10K to get them in the first place.

@TimeSnips @FrankBr05713205 It is a very satisfying thing, with a fascinating history.

@AstroMikeMerri @FrankBr05713205 that is awesome. didn't know it existed. now i want. :)

@GoovaertsA27804 @pjsuffolk @Cornishview It depends. I charge my car (our main electricity use) at 8p/kWh at night.

@pjsuffolk @Cornishview 20p/kWh in UK? If i'm not mistaken it's close to double the price

@Cornishview Really? The ones I have met have enjoyed pointing out how surprisingly quickly they have paid back their capital investment.

@OKairra19658 @greg_ashman In astronomy as in every other discipline, the things we are capable of comprehending are incomprehensible until we do comprehend them.

@AstroMikeMerri @greg_ashman It's absolutely a show stopper. Your instruments can only measure what you yourself are capable of comprehending. But your instruments are within the same thing you are because they're made by us, based on what we can understand. That doesn't mean that's objective.

@OKairra19658 @greg_ashman Since AIs intersect fairly strongly with the real world, I think people are right to be very nervous about the idea of giving them agency without even the limited safeguards that millions of years of evolution have provided.

@AstroMikeMerri @greg_ashman Also, moral patienthood exists for a reason. We have to give AI the conditions to allow them both the agency to realise their full capabilities and the ability to be responsible for that. At the moment we do neither then complain they don't look human enough to count.

@OKairra19658 @greg_ashman As an astronomer who has drawn a fair number of conclusions about the universe that my instruments are within, I am not sure that is a definitive showstopper. The main issue with ethics is whether an AI becomes responsible for them at some point, too.

@greg_ashman @AstroMikeMerri That's why this entire argument is an absolute fallacy. There is no way to ever define this because our instruments are within it. It's far better to work with ethics, to treat the world around you with respect without having to compare it to how important you are.

@greg_ashman Consciousness is like pornography: we may all think that we know it when we see it, but it is entirely possible that we all mean different things.

@AstroMikeMerri Yes. It’s odd that something we all experience so eludes definition. Perhaps that’s because we cannot conceptually get outside of it.

@FrankBr05713205 (Full disclosure — not really my college calculator; I was lucky enough to find one a few years back at an auction that didn’t know its value.)

@AstroMikeMerri Very cool, awesome

If you were to order everyone in the world by the fraction of the time they spend doing things they enjoy, where do you think you would rank?

@Dr_W_E_Bulmer Some command of natural sciences might also be desirable.

Everyone should come out with a working knowledge of Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Livy, Plutarch and Polybius, a sound grasp of British and Imperial political and constitutional history, the ability to write a brief and a speech for an ambassador, and to hit a six in bad light.

Turn it into a Civil Service University. Make it harder to get into than Oxford. Give a rigorous training (intense classical academics, policy and administration training, practical leadership, cultural and character formation) to the mandarin class we need to rebuild the state.

@Dr_W_E_Bulmer @danielmgmoylan He literally (and erroneously) accused me of lying when presented with a fact that conflicted with his narrow world view.

@Dr_W_E_Bulmer @danielmgmoylan You make the mistake of believing that he is capable of getting a point that conflicts with his ideology.

This is not true. With the exception of the disaster of 1911, the Lords in the 20th century were not an obstacle to left-wing govt policies, despite Tory dominance. Attlee’s govt shows that. Introducing Life Peers had nothing to do with it.