[Misc] Something Interesting and Thought Provoking

[Curious Orange]

I like listening to interesting and thought provoking things; science, art, politics (left, right or centre), history, and anything else you might find interesting. So I thought I'd start a thread to collate what has interested you recently.

No need to comment on anything, it is absolutely okay not to have an opinion on any topic, as it is indeed to agree or disagree with whatever have been posted.

Here is one to start with, which has rather broadened my knowledge of evolution:

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

The voice is very irritating. Life imitating AI?

The content (to me as a scientist) is both trivial and important. Important because even scientists fall into confirmation bias when it suits them. Trivial because the scientific method is the only way of seeking 'truth'.

 

[Curious Orange]

The voice is very irritating. Life imitating AI?

The content (to me as a scientist) is both trivial and important. Important because even scientists fall into confirmation bias when it suits them. Trivial because the scientific method is the only way of seeking 'truth'.

I've heard worse AI narration, and I'm not keen on click bait titles. But I didn't know about Johann Mendel's contribution to evolution before, and that was fascinating.

 

[Curious Orange]

One for the gricer's on the forum:

 

[Stato]

Dawkins is an excellent writer on evolutionary biology. I've read a few of his books having no background in the field and he writes with clarity and passion on his subject. I should have been an easy audience for his book on religion, as I'd lapped up Hitchens' book and my views are similar to his on the subject. However his writing on things outside of his field is often hampered by an insistence on strict and narrow definitions of his choosing that he applies to the motives of others.

In terms of gender, his writings seem to suffer from the same fallacies. Yes sex is binary, but if you listen to those arguing for a more non binary approach, they do not talk of sex, they talk of gender, which they define as a construct in the same way that he speaks of race being a construct. I find it hard to believe that he is not aware of this, so ignoring it make his arguments on the subject come across as a bit dishonest in the same way that some of his writings about religions did.

Using the old trope of 'I can't identify as a (insert comical object)' just isn't helpful in coming to a greater understanding of what others are experiencing. It's just insisting that your reality trumps theirs. If one is to accept the controversial view that what he labels as 'gender dismorphia' should be treated as a mental illness, then his hippopotamus analogy is like saying to somebody with clinical depression 'Cheer up. You've got nothing much to worry about.' It doesn't advance your understanding of what they are experiencing and it gives them no help at all.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I've heard worse AI narration, and I'm not keen on click bait titles. But I didn't know about Johann Mendel's contribution to evolution before, and that was fascinating.

Mendelian inheritance? Yes, ignored at the time, like so many discoveries and ideas.

 

[Norman Potting]

One for the gricer's on the forum:

Have yet to see this in service but have seen it as "work in progress" over the years and as a finished article looking magnificent in the yard at the Park. Very modest donations made by me of railway books and stuff which hopefully funded a few rivets for them.

 

[OzMike]

What is a gricer ?

 

[darkwolf666]

What is a gricer ?

A posh grocer, innit...!

Seriously though, it's a railway enthusiast... particularly one who seeks out and photographs unusual trains *

* with thanks to Google AI

 

[Norman Potting]

What is a gricer ?

A fanatical railway enthusiast.

I have rummaged around Wikipedia for the origin of the term but there appears to be no definite answer. Strangely enough there seems to be no explanation re other than suggestions that it is linked to grouse hunting!