Downlandia

'1 can’t understand people who say there is no God. What does it mean?'

@BigBrainPhiloso It might help to tell young thinkers there is much beyond all the matter and that however absorbed in things and logic they become, this reality will keep coming back at them.

Galen Strawson on why building a conscious machine would still explain nothing: In a 1996 program called Brainspotting, philosopher Galen Strawson dismantles one of the most common assumptions in consciousness research. The assumption: if we can build a machine that behaves exactly like a conscious being, we've explained consciousness. Strawson disagrees. "Even if they built a machine that behaved just like we did and we actually knew somehow that it was conscious… they still wouldn't have explained it." Here's why. Imagine scientists build that machine. They crack it open. They map every microchip, every circuit, every physical process running inside it. And they confirm: when this physical configuration occurs, the machine experiences the taste of salami. What have they actually discovered? A correlation. "All we'd have once again is a correlation that when you get this physical stuff, these microchips, whatever, you get the taste of salami. We know they correlate. But that doesn't explain anything." Knowing that two things happen together is not the same as understanding why one gives rise to the other. And this is precisely where Strawson thinks the entire project of explaining consciousness breaks down. "Imagine giving this incredibly complete story of all the physical goings-on. How could that ever explain how could we understand, how that was the basis of a sensory experience like seeing red, or having a certain taste, or feeling velvet?" The physical story, however complete, remains on one side of a gap. The subjective experience what it actually feels like sits on the other. No amount of additional physical detail closes that gap. It just gives you more correlations. This is what David Chalmers would later call the Hard Problem of consciousness and Strawson was pointing directly at it in 1996. His conclusion: "They can't seriously think that they've explained it. I find it hard to understand what their conception of consciousness is if they think that they can explain it like that." The challenge Strawson lays down isn't "can we build a conscious machine?" It's deeper than that: even if we did, would we understand anything more about what consciousness actually *is*? Most scientists assume the explanation will come once we map the physical processes completely enough. Strawson's argument is that this assumption confuses description with explanation. And until that confusion is resolved, the Hard Problem remains exactly that.

@juliandorey With further masked wording, she will defend her right to use the slur in the interests of balance.

masterclass on how to BODYBAG a passive aggressive interviewer with their own words

@RestoreBritain_ The internet is the public square. What is his point using 'online' as an abuse about?

From a private jet, Farage has just attacked Restore Britain as 'one angry man saying stuff on the internet.' There's a lot more than one of us now, Farage...

@trustfilms @DurhamWASP Perhaps see it more as a prayer, ultimately applicable to all of us.

@DurhamWASP She's right it's not even a national anthem but a hymn in praise of a part German Monarch. Swap it for 'Jerusalem' or 'I vow to Thee my Country'

“It is a strange fact, but it is unquestionably true that almost any English intellectual would feel more ashamed of standing to attention during ‘God save the King’ than of stealing from a poor box.” George Orwell

Obviously the words ‘English’ and ‘intelligentsia’ are not strictly applicable here

@xenocosmography zefiro torna

... Sea Storms are gods of patriotic independence to island peoples. The English should attend more Turner exhibitions and remember why they 💕🇯🇵

Kamikaze, the divine wind that defended Japan from Mongol invasion, is scarcely distinguishable in myth or military effect from the tempests that secured Elizabethan England from the Spanish Armada. ...

“Reverence is the noblest state in which a man can live in the world. Reverence is one of the signs of strength; irreverence, one of the surest indications of weakness. No man will rise high who jeers at sacred things.” John Ruskin

@MartinKnight_ It was usually a moment of contemplation and reflection within a noisy evening of yabbering.

What is it with formal queues in pubs? I preferred the old days - leaning on the bar, waving a £20 note, and being ignored.

@TheLaurenChen Oxford and Cambridge intellectuals also convinced a generation that Gerard Winstanley was a communist, despite the majority of his work being about the Bible and having a much earlier interpretation of the word 'commonwealth'. Many such cases.

It's crazy to me how Robin Hood is now popularized as "stealing from the rich to give to the poor" (Socialist messaging) In reality, Robin Hood stole back the taxes that a cruel leader unjustly levied against the population (Anti-socialist messaging)

@a2_masters @MorgothsReview Had a table at a local craft/arts fair today. Virtually no footfall other than friends of the stall holders. A bit bleak.

@MorgothsReview Fuel prices keep ticking up. Nobody's got any money. Everyone I speak to who does anything is absolutely flat out and not seeing anything for it. Something HAS to give.

I have a feeling we're going to be in for a wild summer.

@iAmJoshHunt We need a new word for the levels of denial.

I think we’re in a period of denial in this country about the likely impacts.

I find newspaper websites unbearable - so haven't read the article.

Brighton's demographic changed markedly in the 80s. Students didn't leave after their degrees, middle class Londoners came in swathes and bought out the railwaymen's terraces. It went from a working class town with eccentrics to trendy in less than 10 years. It was sad to watch.

@RestoreBritain_ Contra the bizarre comments these posts illicit, the impression I get is of slightly sturdier, solid and sober groups of people. No hysterics.

Another meeting in Norfolk...

Norfolk walnut salt bowl.

@northumbriana @holland_tom One of my favourite film lines. Clement and La Frenais masters of mundane irony.

Packing up ahead of a fishing trip with @holland_tom and wondering what refreshments to take along …

@millerman They had to find laughs somewhere.

Henry Kissinger's speechwriter Winston Lord once spent days on a report, then submitted it. Kissinger sent it back: 'Is this the best you can do?' Lord rewrote it, resubmitted. Same response. This went on 3-4 times. Finally Lord snapped: 'Damn it, yes, it's the best I can do.' Kissinger: 'Fine, then I guess I'll read it this time.' This is exactly how I work with Claude.

@TechCom2045 @RupertLowe10 The blocking, one idea a day poster is unable to apprehend an example or abstract the very concept he is waving around in public.

@TechCom2045 @RupertLowe10 Founders of the Labour Party:

Looks like a great Restore Britain meeting in one part of Leeds last night - others took place yesterday with more tonight and tomorrow... This is happening all over the country. It is quite remarkable to see the party building so rapidly. Thank you to everyone.

Mount Fuji, by Nakabayashi Chikkei, ca. 1850, Philadelphia Museum of Art