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The Will to Power--Is "Free Will" All in Your Head?: Scientific American
Neurosurgeons evoke an intention to act during brain surgery
A Self Divided
Philosophy, et cetera:
Notes on Derek Parfit
Derek Parfit in effect denies Descartes's conclusion. He would insist that the conclusion is not nearly as innocent and straightforward as it seems. When Descartes says that he exists, he means that there is a continuing subject of experiences or self or ego, or whatever word you prefer, that exists. Parfit denies that there really is any such thing, and therefore denies that we can know that there is.
Michael Gazzaniga: Split brains and other heady tales
Beyond the hype of left brain versus right brain lies the work of acclaimed neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga. His career was forged in the lab of Nobel laureate Roger Sperry, and together their trailblazing experiments have illuminated the differences between the brain's two hemispheres. All In The Mind - 14 November 2009 -
The Problem Of Machine Intelligence
There have been many discussions relating to transhumanism and augmenting intelligence as well as just intelligence itself. However, at the heart of many of these discussions the subject of Artificial Intalligence (AI) emerges. This raises the question of whether AI is possible and what it actually means.
It's All Semantics: Searching for an Intuitive Internet That Knows What Is Said--And Meant: Scientific American
The National Science Foundation delivers $1.1 million to Rensselaer Polytech researchers to stimulate the Semantic Web
Richard Lewontin-Genetic Determination and Adaptation: Two Bad Metaphors : Pharyngula
He was there to talk about the importance and danger of metaphors, and addressed two of them. The New Testament metaphor of genes make organisms, and the Old Testament metaphor that organisms adapt to the environment.
Philosophical Temperament
Many philosophers have worried about what philosophy is. Often they have looked for answers by considering what it is that philosophers do. Given the diversity of topics and methods found in philosophy, however, we propose a different approach. In this article we consider the philosophical temperament, asking an alternative question: What are philosophers like? Our answer is that one important aspect of the philosophical temperament is that philosophers are especially reflective. This claim is supported by a study of more than 5,000 philosophers and non-philosophers, the results of which indicate that even when we control for overall education level, philosophers tend to be significantly more reflective than their peers. We then illustrate this tendency by considering what we know about the philosophizing of a few prominent philosophers. Recognizing this aspect of the philosophical temperament, it is natural to wonder how philosophers came to be this way: Does philosophical training teach reflectivity or do more reflective people tend to gravitate to philosophy? We consider the limitations of our data with respect to this question and suggest that a longitudinal study be conducted.
A Better Pencil
In this electronic age, new writing technologies seem to proliferate and evolve with alarming speed -- but of course, people have been coming up with new ways to communicate their thoughts for as long as language has existed at all. Writing itself -- writes Dennis Baron -- was once the object of much suspicion; Plato wrote that it could attenuate human memory, since writing things down would obviate the need to memorize them. In his new book, A Better Pencil: Readers, Writers, and the Digital Revolution (Oxford University Press), Baron looks at the history of writing implements and communication technologies, and explores the digital revolution's impact on how we write, how we learn, and how we connect with one another. - Inside Higher Ed
The Evolution of Morality : The Primate Diaries
Morality is the final domain that theists cling to in order to justify the existence of God. They argue that, without a supernatural deity (or deities), there would be no reason for people to be kind with one another and we would be constantly at each other's throats. The view of Darwinian evolution as "nature, red in tooth and claw" is pervasive and theists perceive that the absence of God is the absence of moral sense. However, this façade is cracking around its very foundation as a steady flow of observational evidence reveals it to be one more bit of fallacious reasoning.
Is Free Will an Illusion?
Long before you’re consciously aware of making a decision, your mind has already made it. | Wired Science | Wired.com
Nature vs Nurture, redux
How should we think about ‘nature’ vs ‘nurture’? The issue has been resolved for decades. From On the Brain by Dr. Mike Merzenich,Ph.D.
Ant Lovers Unite! Will Wright And E.O Wilson On Life And Games : NPR
A recent interview with E. O. Wilson
Genes That Make Us Human
Finding genes that have evolved in humans among our genome's 3 billion bases is no easy feat. But now, a team has pinpointed three genes that arose from noncoding DNA and may help make our species unique. Pennisi 2009 (901): 2 -- ScienceNOW
The Pure Society: From Darwin to Hitler
In this review Simon Underdown disagrees with the premise that racism is part of evolution, rather than a crime
Browne on Social Darwinism
Janet Browne: Darwin's Origin of Species, A Biography
New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2006.
[excerpt]
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a struggle for existence among nations and races
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the notorious doctrine of 'social Darwinism' took
the idea of success to justify social and economic policies in which struggle
was the driving force - 12 more annotations...
The Politics of Biological Determinism
Stephen Jay Gould talks about biological determinism, IQ and discrimination. - Vol 14 No 2 - Rethinking Schools Online
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