Daydreaming and neuroscience: how brain imaging may track the creative process fostered by the wandering mind. From the article: Dr. Christoff and colleagues suggest that creative thought involves a special interaction between these control systems and mind-wandering. In this activity, the control system holds a particular problem in mind but permits the brain to wander [...]
Tiny bubbles, of the mind (make us feel happy / make us feel fine): the way technological mathematics limits our thinking, enclosing us in ever-smaller circles of awareness. From the article: The ubiquity of incredibly powerful algorithms designed to reinforce our interests also ensures that we see little of what’s new, different and unfamiliar. The [...]
The business of Britain: Prime Minister Theresa May speaks about investment in the sciences. But what of the humanities? From her speech: I want to ask you to work with me to show that the forces of capitalism, globalisation and free trade offer the best hope for the problems facing so many people in our country.... [...]
Science and the music of history: is this a new age of knowledge? A scientist and an historian discuss the value of the past, and the promise of the future. Scientist: Hey there, Scrupulus, what have you been up to this morning? Historian: Oh hello, Speculus. Just listening to music. Scientist: I like to do that, [...]
Nursery rhymes and brain development: "baby talk" of parents brings children in sync with their brain waves, helping them learn. From the article: The early indications are that when the brain waves of mothers and babies are out of sync, the babies learn less well. But when the two sets of brainwaves are in tune [...]
Technology's cost, humanity's price: whether we understand the ways technology asserts its influence even over our most basic self-understanding Modern science and the total state, as necessary consequences of the nature of technology, are also its attendants. The same holds true of the means and forms that are set up for the organization of public [...]
From past stupidity to future intelligence: Stephen Hawking speaks, not without irony, about AI at the new Centre for the Future of Intelligence at Cambridge. From his remarks: We spend a great deal of time studying history, which, let’s face it, is mostly the history of stupidity. So it is a welcome change that people [...]
From Greece to China, with kouros: the Terracotta Warriors in Xi'an may have found their footing through Greek artisans who migrated to China, a hypothesis supported by genetic research. From the article: A separate study shows European-specific mitochondrial DNA has been found at sites in China's western-most Xinjiang Province, suggesting that Westerners may have settled, lived [...]
Merging Human with Artificial Intelligence: The Reality of Sam Altman. The co-founder of Y Combinator considers the consequences of technology. From the article: On a trip to New York, Altman dropped by my apartment one Saturday to discuss how tech was transforming our view of who we are. Curled up on the sofa, knees [...]
The Convergence of the Twain (Lines on the loss of the "Titanic"): a poet meditates on the fateful meeting of science, ambition, and nature I In a solitude of the sea Deep from human vanity, And the Pride of Life that planned her, stilly couches she. II Steel chambers, late the pyres Of her [...]
