Why Brain-to-Brain Communication Is No Longer Unthinkable

consciousness

This from the Smithsonian.

For all that science has studied and mapped the brain in recent decades, the mind remains a black box. A famous 1974 essay by the philosopher Thomas Nagel asked, “What Is It Like to Be a Bat?” and concluded that we will never know; another consciousness—another person’s, let alone a member of another species—can never be comprehended or accessed. For Rao and a few others to open that door a tiny crack, then, is a notable achievement, even if the work has mostly underscored how big a challenge it is, both conceptually and technologically.

One Last Deal: Documentary on Superfly

curtis mayfield, superfly

Here’s a short documentary about the making of Superfly. Good to see most of the cast and crew interviewed all these years later because several are no longer with us. And yes, all acknowledge that it was Curtis’ contribution that made a somewhat awkward film into something special that transcended the technical flaws and gave the film cinematic depth, resonance and class.

Love the story behind THE Caddy . . . our man is still with us and had a movie highly fictionalized Hollycrap movie made about him.

Some More Recent Oakeshottiana

michael oakeshott

1. Michael Oakeshott’s Skepticism

2. Oakeshott on Practice, Normative Thought and Political Philosophy

3. Michael Oakeshott’s political philosophy of civil association and constructivism in International Relations

The Slivovice Interview

Louis Armstrong

Here’s a fantastic post by the one and only Ricky Riccardi. To my knowledge no other 20th Century genius ever provided such an intimate (not stage managed) window into their life — but that was Pops! Given the description of Slivovice (see link below) it might as well be a legal version of Skokiaan, the eponymous tune of course brilliantly covered by Pops.

Louis sounds very relaxed and friendly. But there was something else present that made for the relaxed atmosphere: a bottle of Slivovice plum brandy Armstrong brought back from Europe earlier that year. Slivovice (now known as Slivovitz) is still around as an online search quickly shows. Louis and Lucille both testify early on about the powers of Slivovice. They warn Dan and Jack that it’s pretty much going to knock them on their asses. Dan and Jack are up for the challenge, so the bottle of Slivovice is cracked open.

OAKESHOTT’S PILGRIMAGE PAST J.S. MILL

J.S. Mill, michael oakeshott

Recent article by the “dean” of Oakshott studies

Generally speaking, those who pursue political philosophy feel an affinity with Mill more than with Oakeshott at this point. It is not that Oakeshott stands in the way of change; on the contrary, he accepts change as natural to humanity; the real objection is that he does not glorify change, or indeed particular changes, and that he is skeptical about proposals for change. The pursuit of intimations is a description that avoids endorsements.

Skillful Coping: Essays on the Phenomenology of Everyday Perception and Action

hubert dreyfus, phenomenology

Review of the first installment of Hubert Dreyfus’ collected papers.

WALKER PERCY WEDNESDAY – 35

walker percy

He sized them up as Yankee sort of Southerners, the cheerful, prosperous go-getters one comes across in the upper South, in Knoxville maybe, or Bristol.

“Where’re you from,” cried Mrs. Vaught in a mock-accusatory tone he recognized and knew how to respond to.

“Ithaca,” he said, smiling. “Over in the Delta.” He felt himself molt. In the space of seconds he changed from a Southerner in the North, an amiable person who wears the badge of his origin in a faint burlesque of itself, to a Southerner in the South, a skillful player of an old play who knows his cues and waits smiling in the wings. You stand in the posture of waiting on ladies and when one of them speaks to you so, with mock-boldness and mock-anger (and a bit of steel in it too), you knew how to take it. They were onto the same game. Mrs. Vaught feasted her eyes on him. He was nice. (She, he saw at once, belonged to an older clan than Mr. Vaught; she knew ancient cues he never heard of.) She could have married him on the spot and known what she was getting.

What scares the new atheists

atheism

Article by John Gray from a few weeks back (and surprisingly in The Guardian).

It’s a reassuringly simple equation. In fact there are no reliable connections – whether in logic or history – between atheism, science and liberal values. When organised as a movement and backed by the power of the state, atheist ideologies have been an integral part of despotic regimes that also claimed to be based in science, such as the former Soviet Union. Many rival moralities and political systems – most of them, to date, illiberal – have attempted to assert a basis in science. All have been fraudulent and ephemeral. Yet the attempt continues in atheist movements today, which claim that liberal values can be scientifically validated and are therefore humanly universal.