They say a shake of the hand is worth 2,000 likes in the social media thicket. The best way to understand a bush is to beat around it. I saw 12 beautiful sunrises in quick succession. I love the look of OLED in the morning. I swiped the curtains and saw dirty glass, muddy colours, and a lack of clarity. I didn’t like it.
Hah! I took a 400-level / graduate-hybrid neuropsychology course in my third year of undergrad. I was the only BA student in the class (I was allowed to take it because I aced the pre-req) and the youngest person there. About 20% of our grade was for class participation, and I was tanking it because I didn’t have the biology background to keep up with the bio majors and graduate students.
Then for one of our class discussions, the professor described Laplace’s Demon, and asked us a question: Given that Laplace’s demon knows the past, present, and future movement of everything, down to the atom, would the Demon understand Love? He asked who thought “yes”, and half the class raised their hands. Then he asked who thought “no” — I was the only one to raise my hand, while half the class didn’t answer.
It ended up being a debate between me and the half of the class that answered “yes”. I argued that Laplace’s Demon could not understand love unless the Demon fell in love as well, because love can’t just be understood scientifically, mechanistically etc. Love is beyond the material movement of molecules and atoms.
Ended up getting a good mark for participation in the course even though that was literally the only class discussion I participated in.
I’m so glad to see someone else making the connection between the observation effect and the “particles and waves” discovered in quantum mechanics.
It’s part of what bugs me about our pathological culture, the ever-growing DSM, and its outgrowth in the Tumblr/“particle”-inspired list of genders acknowledged by WPATH.
My initial impression of a certain psychologist, who created the AGP/HSTS dichotomy, was that of a bug-hunter, who captures butterflies just to pin them under glass and needles.
There are some great quotes from literature and poetry that express it much better than I ever could…
Gandalf recounts his meeting with Solomon at the council of Elrond in LOTR
“For I am Saruman the Wise, Saruman Ring-maker, Saruman of Many Colours!'
I looked then and saw that his robes, which had seemed white, were not so, but were woven of all colours, and if he moved they shimmered and changed hue so that the eye was bewildered.
I liked white better,' I said.
White!' he sneered. 'It serves as a beginning. White cloth may be dyed. The white page can be overwritten; and the white light can be broken.'
In which case it is no longer white,' said I. 'And he that breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom.'”
They say a shake of the hand is worth 2,000 likes in the social media thicket. The best way to understand a bush is to beat around it. I saw 12 beautiful sunrises in quick succession. I love the look of OLED in the morning. I swiped the curtains and saw dirty glass, muddy colours, and a lack of clarity. I didn’t like it.
To science
By Edgar Allen Poe
Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art!
Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes.
Why preyest thou thus upon the poet’s heart,
Vulture, whose wings are dull realities?
How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise,
Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering
To seek for treasure in the jewelled skies,
Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing?
Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car,
And driven the Hamadryad from the wood
To seek a shelter in some happier star?
Hast thou not torn the Naiad from her flood,
The Elfin from the green grass, and from me
The summer dream beneath the tamarind tree?
Hah! I took a 400-level / graduate-hybrid neuropsychology course in my third year of undergrad. I was the only BA student in the class (I was allowed to take it because I aced the pre-req) and the youngest person there. About 20% of our grade was for class participation, and I was tanking it because I didn’t have the biology background to keep up with the bio majors and graduate students.
Then for one of our class discussions, the professor described Laplace’s Demon, and asked us a question: Given that Laplace’s demon knows the past, present, and future movement of everything, down to the atom, would the Demon understand Love? He asked who thought “yes”, and half the class raised their hands. Then he asked who thought “no” — I was the only one to raise my hand, while half the class didn’t answer.
It ended up being a debate between me and the half of the class that answered “yes”. I argued that Laplace’s Demon could not understand love unless the Demon fell in love as well, because love can’t just be understood scientifically, mechanistically etc. Love is beyond the material movement of molecules and atoms.
Ended up getting a good mark for participation in the course even though that was literally the only class discussion I participated in.
Thank you for resharing this to your new subscribers. Absolutely fascinating. Chimes with a lot of my need for community and RL interactions
I’m so glad to see someone else making the connection between the observation effect and the “particles and waves” discovered in quantum mechanics.
It’s part of what bugs me about our pathological culture, the ever-growing DSM, and its outgrowth in the Tumblr/“particle”-inspired list of genders acknowledged by WPATH.
My initial impression of a certain psychologist, who created the AGP/HSTS dichotomy, was that of a bug-hunter, who captures butterflies just to pin them under glass and needles.
There are some great quotes from literature and poetry that express it much better than I ever could…
Gandalf recounts his meeting with Solomon at the council of Elrond in LOTR
“For I am Saruman the Wise, Saruman Ring-maker, Saruman of Many Colours!'
I looked then and saw that his robes, which had seemed white, were not so, but were woven of all colours, and if he moved they shimmered and changed hue so that the eye was bewildered.
I liked white better,' I said.
White!' he sneered. 'It serves as a beginning. White cloth may be dyed. The white page can be overwritten; and the white light can be broken.'
In which case it is no longer white,' said I. 'And he that breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom.'”