Evolution never stops, so there will be a post-human species at some point in the future, and this may arrive sooner, rather than later. Not every species lasts for millions of years like dinosaurs did. When the environment changes fast, …
Language has allowed us to understand and navigate in the world, but we also rely on emotions and instincts. Much of our distress as humans is because we are receiving contradictory messages about the world. It is like listening to two radio stations at once.
How can we best make sense of the world? There are a number of areas that, taken together, give a useful description of the human condition: the nature of society, how language is essential for its complexity, and further consequences …
We humans are a wildly successful species. Why is that? As life developed, it first responded to the world with reflexes, then emotions, then by thinking, but it was the human invention of language that turned thinking into a superpower. …
Why Language is a Superpower and Why That Has Created a Problem Read more »
In my London childhood, a horse-drawn wagon delivered milk each day in glass bottles with the cream risen to the top in a visible layer. Sparrows had learned to peck through the foil caps and gorge on the prize. My …
Why do we believe what we believe, and how is it possible that we differ so much? Our beliefs comes from our senses, culture, in-group, experts, feelings and thinking. Of these, only thinking and expertise can make a defensible case. (This is a major rewrite of the original 5/19/19 post.)
Years ago, I thought I was going to die. The streets were dark and slick with rain. I was getting a ride back from a weekend encounter group where all our emotions had been laid bare, and the driver and …
Call it the law of unintended consequences. The internet is a disruptive technology comparable to the Gutenberg press. Initially it was seen as a global encyclopedia, making all human knowledge available to everyone. Then social media arose, and I saw …
By an original thought, I mean putting together existing ideas and observations and coming up with a new thought or product or process that you’ve never met before. All developments are constructed from the raw materials of our present knowledge, …
You Only Have Six Original Thoughts in Your Life Read more »
The entire canon of Western thought, from Aristotelian logic to George Boole (he of boolean arithmetic) to the divide-and-conquer approach of science, invites us to view and categorize the world according to its differences, not its similarities. A table is …