A collection of 155 posts
The more rapid and intense the brain reward they imparted, the likelier they were to foster pathological learning and craving, particularly among socially and genetically vulnerable consumers.
One of the big questions in evolutionary biology is: what drove our evolution from tree-swinging apes to bipedal, highly intelligent homonins that went on to build civilization and inherit the world?
Unfortunately, St. Edmund’s College did the bidding of the protestors, launched two separate investigations and last month terminated Noah Carl’s employment.
The meme’s-eye view says that memes are selected to the extent that they have effects on the people who encounter them that keep the memes alive in the culture: tunes that get stuck in our heads, for instance, or ideas that motivate us to talk about them, spread them, or impose them on other people.
Science is not the only form of knowledge. There are valid non-scientific ways of approaching reality.
Hossenfelder—who believes women in science are still held back by sexist cultural biases but also opposes preferential treatment as a shortcut to equality—is a welcome exception.
"This monster isn’t David. It’s a parasite of some kind. You see, another consciousness inside him. This thing burrowed into David’s brain … and has been there, feeding off him ever since." - Loudermilk, FX Legion.
Once we have identified a desirable end—human flourishing—we can and should use science to discover and promote the policies that encourage it.
We can acknowledge that male and female brains have differences in structure and function, on average, without subscribing to the belief that one sex is better than the other.
As Thomas Paine wrote, “To argue with someone who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead.”
Instead of using the label “eugenics” to discredit advocates of genetic enhancement, it would be more productive to ask what precisely we deem unacceptable and why.
Trans radicalism is not a war against feminism.
As a parent of an ROGD teen, it has been so disheartening to see so few mainstream sources publishing balanced views on this topic. We have glowing “protransition” pieces in the left-wing press, and (often) angry, and even anti-trans pieces in the right-wing or religious press. These articles are just
Fortunately, there are measures that each of us can take to keep the excesses of dimensionality reduction in check. Unfortunately, they all require a potentially uncomfortable dose of humility.
Without an understanding of the selection pressures that shaped our minds, much of human existence is frustratingly bewildering.