CapitalistImperialistPig

Steve Landsburg (OK, I can’t help myself - I can’t quit you Steve. He’s frequently wrong but often writes about interesting stuff) is arguing that the universe, and its contents, are mathematical objects. 1. A “mathematical object” consists of abstract entities (that is, “things” with no intrinsic properties) together with some relations among them. For example, the euclidean plane that you studied in high school geometry consists of points, together with certain relations among them (such as “points A, B and C are collinear”). Mathematical objects can be very complicated. Mathematical objects can have “substructures”, which is a fancy name for “parts”. A line in the plane, for example, is a substructure of the plane. 2. Every modern theory of physics says that our universe is a mathematical object, and that we are substructures of that object. Theories differ only with regard to which mathematical object we happen to be a part of. Particles, forces and energy are not just described by...

Fans of Kaley Cuoco and The Big Bang Theory were distressed to hear that she suffered a broken leg in an equestrian accident . Our best wishes for a speedy and complete recovery. Geeks (and maybe short guys) got a vicarious thrill, though, from her announcement that she and co-star Johnny Galecki (Leonard) had secretly dated for two years. She has announced that they remain friends, but that she won't date any more actors. Geeks of the world (and others) shouted "I'm not an actor!"

....and always have. Sean Carroll is only responsible for the first part of that claim. His claim is falsifiable, and he supplies a standard: What would be a refutation of my claim that we understand the laws underlying everyday phenomena? Easy: point to just one example of an everyday phenomenon that provides evidence of “new physics” beyond the laws we know. Something directly visible that requires a violation of general relativity or the Standard Model. That’s all it would take, but there aren’t any such phenomena. Some point out that we have heard this story before, in the 1890s, say. Sean has a counter. A century ago, that would have been incredibly easy to do; the world of Newtonian mechanics plus Maxwell’s equations wasn’t able to account for why the Sun shines, or why tables are solid. Now we do understand how to account for those things in terms of known laws of physics. A century ago yes, but roll the wayback machine for another two or three decades and I say not. Remember,...

WB reports that the UN has appointed an Ambassador to the Aliens. Apparently, it is a timely move. Astronomers say they've found the first planet beyond our solar system that could have the right size and setting to sustain life as we know it, only 20 light-years from Earth. "My own personal feeling is that the chances of life on this planet are 100 percent," Steven Vogt, an astrophysicist at the University of California at Santa Cruz, told reporters today. "I have almost no doubt about it." I was confident that we would be ready. We've done such an excellent job in protecting the planet in other respects.

If we make a list of more or less universal human activities, and lop off the obviously primal – eating, sleeping, raising children – a prominent member of the items left is gossip. It’s one of the most common things we use language for. Pretty clearly it plays some important role in our cultural economy. Can we say what that is, exactly? At one level I suppose we could say that sharing gossip is our version of the grooming behavior engaged in by some of our relative species – a bonding and alliance building activity. I don’t that’s the real point though. I think that the information shared is more fundamental. All gossip is political, in the sense that it is ultimately about power relationships in the society. Most of the content is about who is doing what to/with whom, and hence about how this affects power relationships. If gossip is about politics, in this sense, it also *is* politics, since the communication of information (or misinformation) is not disinterested but can s...

We humans have a fascination with why questions: why is there something rather than nothing? Why is there air? Why did the chicken cross the road? Why am I writing about an interrogative pronoun? In this case, the immediate provocation was this by Hawking and Mlodinow via Steve Landsburg : To understand the universe at the deepest level, we need to know not only how the universe behaves, but why. • Why is there something rather than nothing? • Why do we exist? • Why this particular set of laws and not some other? So say Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow in their book The Grand Design, and so say I. I sympathize with the sentiment, but I also question its propriety. They tell us that one of the fundamental steps in human cognition occurred when we started modeling other’s thought processes. Once we start thinking about what others are thinking, a very fundamental aspect is that of motivation. Why, for example, is Joe-Bob talking to my enemy Duke? Are they plotting against me? Once we...

On Fox, this morning, they show the clip of the black female Obama supported who said she was exhausted trying to defend him. Give me something, she begged. Brit Hume said people are angry because of Obama's agenda (true, doubtless for Repubs) and Juan Williams said they are dissappointed because Obama has let the Republicans capture the narrative and won't fight back. I'm with Williams, of course. Obama is supposed to be smart. Does he really not get that he needs to be a fighter, or is it just to foreign to his nature? He is finally attacking the Republicans plan, but he needs to present an alternative, and not just the sissy stuff he has been doing this summer.