Friday, May 25, 2007
Bastard.
Umm...
Congratulations and welcome. You have entered a site designed by bastards, for bastards, in a spirit of unapologetic bastardy.I'm not easily confused and not easily amused, but Christophe the Insultor, Archbastard manages both - whilst not managing to insult, alas. Time to open up the insultesaurus for his bastard guest book, though?
If you suspect that you are not a bastard, careful questioning of your mother may reveal that you actually are. If not, I confer upon you the title of honorary bastard for finding this site.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
What's the difference between you, and a fruit fly?
Science, religion and philosophy are pub conversations for the likes us, single and drunk twenty-something* Londoners. They're things that other people do seriously, but which we sit judging from our cosy alcoves with the pints lining up.
This isn't to say we don't take them on with a straight-face, or that we can't have arguments. And the arguments usually occur when it comes to free-will and morality. The hedonists amongst us prefer to say neither exists: thus we can carry on glibly partying, thanks Science, thanks Determinism! A few others take a different view . . . . .
. . . . . Morality and free-will are a natural and obvious part of life, they say. Since evolution created them in us, they will occur to differing degrees in other creatures too. And if Science hasn't caught up with that self-evident fact, operating instead on the basis that 'if we can't explain it, it doesn't exist', Science is all the worse for it. Or in fact, no longer Science . . . . . Someone at this point usually objects, that surely we can only expect free-will and morality to have evolved in Humans? But this is a curious remnant of the religious view of human exceptionalism, something you can't have alongside an acceptance of evolution. And the term anthropomorphism is neatly rebutted by the term anthropodenial . . . . . Someone else might add, but isn't the universe deterministic, and that everything - your latest hairstyle, your choice of white - predicted by the Big Bang? Roger Penrose's name comes to the rescue, along with some stuff about quantum mechanics. The more daring suggest that the very explicability of the universe by humans is an argument in favour of its conscious design, and the mystery of 'before the Big Bang' in no way rules that out . . . . . Then someone or other might add how Darwin had identified forms of morality as having evolved in many species - including Pelicans, of all things - and isn't this kind of real-world-first methodology something rather lacking in Dawkins's delineated, logical approach? The conversation tends to shift at that point, because Wikipedia hasn't prepared anyone for this . . . . .
Why am I telling you this? Well, these rehearsals for a serious life that will never happen are going to have to move on a bit. Because: FRUIT FLIES HAVE FREE WILL. So, thanks, Science! I'm looking forward to the local a bit more than usual now.
*-a term that holds, so say we all, even if the something happens now to be a whole decade.
This isn't to say we don't take them on with a straight-face, or that we can't have arguments. And the arguments usually occur when it comes to free-will and morality. The hedonists amongst us prefer to say neither exists: thus we can carry on glibly partying, thanks Science, thanks Determinism! A few others take a different view . . . . .
. . . . . Morality and free-will are a natural and obvious part of life, they say. Since evolution created them in us, they will occur to differing degrees in other creatures too. And if Science hasn't caught up with that self-evident fact, operating instead on the basis that 'if we can't explain it, it doesn't exist', Science is all the worse for it. Or in fact, no longer Science . . . . . Someone at this point usually objects, that surely we can only expect free-will and morality to have evolved in Humans? But this is a curious remnant of the religious view of human exceptionalism, something you can't have alongside an acceptance of evolution. And the term anthropomorphism is neatly rebutted by the term anthropodenial . . . . . Someone else might add, but isn't the universe deterministic, and that everything - your latest hairstyle, your choice of white - predicted by the Big Bang? Roger Penrose's name comes to the rescue, along with some stuff about quantum mechanics. The more daring suggest that the very explicability of the universe by humans is an argument in favour of its conscious design, and the mystery of 'before the Big Bang' in no way rules that out . . . . . Then someone or other might add how Darwin had identified forms of morality as having evolved in many species - including Pelicans, of all things - and isn't this kind of real-world-first methodology something rather lacking in Dawkins's delineated, logical approach? The conversation tends to shift at that point, because Wikipedia hasn't prepared anyone for this . . . . .
Why am I telling you this? Well, these rehearsals for a serious life that will never happen are going to have to move on a bit. Because: FRUIT FLIES HAVE FREE WILL. So, thanks, Science! I'm looking forward to the local a bit more than usual now.
*-a term that holds, so say we all, even if the something happens now to be a whole decade.
Thursday, May 10, 2007
FWIW
Some news from Tony Blair today about Britain:
This country is a blessed nation.What? Really? Anyone agree? Even, say, in an uttermost drunk moment? Let alone in an innermost thought? I might plausibly agree with the 'special' bit. Although it depends on what is meant by special.
The British are special.
The world knows it.
In our innermost thoughts, we know it.
This is the greatest nation on earth.
