Peterson, Harris, etc....

Raoul said:
I'm not talking about the bit of attempting to install preferred professors. They donate to quite a few Universities to balance out the hard left slant at most of them. However much they donate, its not likely they will succeed since most campuses are lopsidedly infested with leftist ideology to where alternate views that don't meet the orthdoxy aren't tolerated.
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The thing is, most university have liberal slant because in general, people with liberal beliefs are more likely to go into education and higher education than people with conservative views.
Go into Teacher's College at Columbia and poll the grad students and I bet you find majority are liberal.
Go into Wharton School of business at Penn and poll the business grad students and I bet you find majority are conservative.

In one sense, you are almost saying its okay to disrupt a naturally selecting phenomenon with an artificial influence if the diversity hasn't reached an appropriate threshold. Affirmative action basically. Do you believe in affirmative action in general?
 
oneniltothearsenal said:
I can't imagine how anything would think "No Whites on Campus Day" is a good idea.
I can't even imagine what positives they think could possibly be achieved by that.



You used to have Walnut Creek as your location. How can you spell Berkeley wrong? :lol:
Also what examples are you talking about?
Despite what the perception was from the 1960s FSM, Berkeley's campus was nothing like that Evergreen article.
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:lol:

I always seem to spell it wrong since I know someone with the last name that's spelled slightly different from the city and wind up getting confused between the two.
 
oneniltothearsenal said:
The thing is, most university have liberal slant because in general, people with liberal beliefs are more likely to go into education and higher education than people with conservative views.
Go into Teacher's College at Columbia and poll the grad students and I bet you find majority are liberal.
Go into Wharton School of Business at Penn and poll the business grad students and I bet you find majority are conservative.

In one sense, you are almost saying its okay to disrupt a naturally selecting phenomenon with an artificial influence if the diversity hasn't reached an appropriate threshold. Affirmative action basically. Do you believe in affirmative action in general?
Click to expand...

This and also, liberals tend to be more amenable to reason in general. The issue isn't so much that higher education slants to the left, its the conditions for allowing a climate that attempts to shut down speech by one side or the other. Unis should be places where ideas can be vigorously debated without fear of intimidation or one side attempting a power play to shut down the other because they disagree with it.
 
Carolina Red said:
The two are linked though, are they not? It’s basically like lobbying congressmen.
Click to expand...

Yes you're right and maybe using the Koch brothers as a means to balance out other problems is a bad precedent since it would only justify other groups with money attempting to do the same.
 
Raoul said:
Yes you're right and maybe using the Koch brothers as a means to balance out other problems is a bad precedent since it would only justify other groups with money attempting to do the same.
Click to expand...
Agreed... Which brings to mind one of my favorite bits of George Carlin...
 
InfiniteBoredom said:
The Republican party holds the presidency and both chambers of Congress
The Supreme Court just banned class action for workers who signed arbitration agreements.
Fox News is the #1 news channel in the US.
Sean Hannity is the #1 talk show host in the US
Sinclair owns the local news channels
Talk radio has been dominated for eons with conservative nuts like Limbaugh.
Koch brothers are firing and hiring professors at University at will, to suit their agenda.

Yet, it's the 'authoritarian left' who is trying to clamp down on free speech. Makes perfect sense.
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Don't think this is that's exclusive to the US. In Holland the best rated news show is "hart van Nederland" which is mostly older people losing their cat and the like. People like pulp, they don't like critical thinking. At least, most people.

I think that's part of the reason that the left is clinging onto academics and trying to keep their vies dominant there. It's pretty much their last bastion of hope. If universities devolve in to the same propaganda Fox news, Sean Hannity and Ben Shapiro spout, all is pretty much lost. They know that, and in trying to prevent that, they sometimes go a bit far in trying to filter out "alternative" opinions.

This happens in The Netherlands as well. Most professors are left wing and there's a growing movement on the right criticizing this. At present I think it's still a vocal minority, since most of the followers of these alt right outlets don't give a toss about universities, but things are changing.

That quote from Stephen Fry sums it up perfectly.
 
If the conservative right wouldn't be offering simplified solutions for made-up problems then probably there would be people in academia that politically align with them. But right now everybody that has the curiosity and the willingness to go deep on their politics is just getting disappointed by the lack of substance. So it's not really a surprise that they have no people at universities.
 
Javi said:
If the conservative right wouldn't be offering simplified solutions for made-up problems then probably there would be people in academia that politically align with them. But right now everybody that has the curiosity and the willingness to go deep on their politics is just getting disappointed by the lack of substance. So it's not really a surprise that they have no people at universities.
Click to expand...

Yes, when your most powerful figure is effectively a manchild who doesn't understand political policy and who acts like a child, don't be surprised when people who research this stuff for a living decide that, yeah...he's got no substance whatsoever and isn't worth supporting.
 
Just watched the full Sam Harris interview on Russel Brand's show. Harris is there for the taking. His grasp of the matter is so basic that he would get eaten up in any serious debate on Islam or the Middle East. Someone can get famous very easily off of him. Some of his reasoning is suspect, and his thought experiments and are so childish that it is hard to understand how people view him as someone with an "immense intellectual capacity". Brand had him shook on a few occasions on that. Brand, like Affleck, have their heart in the right place because the nature of their job makes them meet all kinds of people and can draw from experience and not only from numbers and statistics.
 
IhabX7 said:
Just watched the full Sam Harris interview on Russel Brand's show. Harris is there for the taking. His grasp of the matter is so basic that he would get eaten up in any serious debate on Islam or the Middle East. Someone can get famous very easily off of him. Some of his reasoning is suspect, and his thought experiments and are so childish that it is hard to understand how people view him as someone with an "immense intellectual capacity". Brand had him shook on a few occasions on that. Brand, like Affleck, have their heart in the right place because the nature of their job makes them meet all kinds of people and can draw from experience and not only from numbers and statistics.
Click to expand...

Harris is definitely there for the taking in terms of having holes in his arguments. He is still light years ahead of Affleck, who basically had no argument other than to say Harris is wrong/racist etc.
 
Raoul said:
Very fair. He should've never idolizing Harris in the first place and should've just plucked whatever points he agreed with and moved on to the next person.
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Have we actually talked about this, in this thread, yet? It's the main issue, isn't it? None of these people's views would be worth the attention we're giving them if it wasn't that too many people idolise individuals to the extent that they take their word as gospel even when they're talking about things they aren't knowledgeable on.
 
DiseaseOfTheAge said:
Have we actually talked about this, in this thread, yet? It's the main issue, isn't it? None of these people's views would be worth the attention we're giving them if it wasn't that too many people idolise individuals to the extent that they take their word as gospel even when they're talking about things they aren't knowledgeable on.
Click to expand...

I don't see much in the way of idolizing on most of these characters in this thread. The reason this and other similar threads exist is because each of them are making a splash with the various ideas they are advancing, which are being both accepted by some and fiercely rejected by others. I generally agree with what Harris says in most of this videos (as does the guy whose video was posted a couple of posts up). We both agree that he falls short in several areas. The same can be said of Peterson and others. Some of their ideas resonate perfectly well while others don't. The trick is to pick and choose what works for you and apply it to your own views.
 
Raoul said:
I don't see much in the way of idolizing on most of these characters in this thread. The reason this and other similar thread exist is because each of them are making a splash with the various ideas they are advancing, which are being both accepted by some and fiercely rejected by others. I generally agree with what Harris says in most of this videos (as does the guy whose video was posted a couple of posts up). We both agree that he falls short in several areas. The same can be said of Peterson and others. Some of their ideas resonate perfectly well while others don't. The trick is to pick and choose what works for you and apply it to your own views.
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No, not in this thread but elsewhere.

Shapiro and Milo (before his downfall) were the 'cool kids' of the right and adored by young conservatives. Peterson has a large following of alienated young men, these days. Harris has been someone many atheists have looked up to an awful lot for a long time now. Christopher Hitchens has/had an almost cult like adoration for a long while.
 
DiseaseOfTheAge said:
Have we actually talked about this, in this thread, yet? It's the main issue, isn't it? None of these people's views would be worth the attention we're giving them if it wasn't that too many people idolise individuals to the extent that they take their word as gospel even when they're talking about things they aren't knowledgeable on.
Click to expand...
I think the discourse is skewed because of idolization and rigid ideology. Oftentimes there is no nuance, the choice is binary: you either agree with everything these speakers say and are a "follower", or they represent everything you detest. The reality is that while this is true for some people, a broad spectrum of people can form their own opinion on an issue by issue basis. And Peterson, Hitchens, etc. have their areas of expertise, but just because they aren't expert in a field doesn't make them wrong or their opinion isn't worth listening to, and vice versa is potentially true also (if they are experts in something, they might not always be right).

I guess that the fanatics are the loudest on the internet (except perhaps in discussion forums such as this one). That skews and pollutes discourse.
 
So I was at a Sam Harris event a few weeks ago and want to add something I've been meaning to add.

He was interviewing a long time favorite of mine, Antonio Damasio, known for Descartes' Error and more recently The Strange Order of Things.
Damasio is probably one of the most important neuroscience researchers in the world at the moment. He and his wife are MD and PhD in neuroscience. Some of his key findings have been how despite a lot of popular myth, emotion is actual integral to reason and logical thinking. His new book delves into a lot of meanings behind the concept of homeostasis - which is explains is another concept mostly misunderstood in common parlance. Most people believe homeostasis is about maintaining "balance". But he points out that is not the right way to look at it. Rather a better way to describe homeostasis is that it is the body regulating and fighting against entropy.

The discussion was fascinating. Mostly Harris just asked questions to direct Damasio's talking and sometimes re-direct when Damasio was getting too technical (like when he was discussing the specific impact of neurons lacking a myelin sheath). Overall it was a superb experience and very enlightening. One thing I found absolutely crucial was when Damasio was discussing the problems with the strong AI crowd (people like Marvin Minsky, Daniel Dennet et al who believe that all it takes to achieve human level consciousness and self-awareness is enough computational power). While most of machine learning has moved away from strong AI concepts Damasio makes a fascinating observation. We have neurons that are non-synaptic. This is absolutely revolutionary to me, because our entire digital computers are based on the system of 0 or 1 that was originally modeled on how our neurons either fire or don't fire.

Yet we have neurons that don't operate in that strict 0,1 fashion. Its usually commonly understood that our neurons fundamentally function like logic gates in computers. But as we learn more, they actually do not operate in such a simple fashion.

All that babbling is basically so I can say that this is why I am now separating Harris completely from the others. This, to me, is really trying to educate the public and actually stimulate discussion that moves us forward as a society. Too much of public intellectual "debate" is just pointless trolling, name calling and self-promotion like Dyson or Hitchens. Harris is actually doing things to stimulate the public conversation in a much better direction than the "sjw vs. alt-right" paradigm or the people who careless just attack all religion. Those people are the problem that is poisoning public discourse.

Harris far more than any of these other people, seems to be really trying to push debate towards positive, meaningful discussion. He could have on the left and right trolls and probably get far more views and comments than showcasing a true academic like Damasio, so I have to give him a lot of respect for that. It also puts the Chomsky emails in a different light. Noam is known in academic linguistic circles to be a bit of an arrogant prick and I think re-reading those emails shows Harris in a better light than originally. Chomsky really gets more hype than I believe he deserves, but thats another post.
 
oneniltothearsenal said:
So I was at a Sam Harris event a few weeks ago and want to add something I've been meaning to add.

He was interviewing a long time favorite of mine, Antonio Damasio, known for Descartes' Error and more recently The Strange Order of Things.
Damasio is probably one of the most important neuroscience researchers in the world at the moment. He and his wife are MD and PhD in neuroscience. Some of his key findings have been how despite a lot of popular myth, emotion is actual integral to reason and logical thinking. His new book delves into a lot of meanings behind the concept of homeostasis - which is explains is another concept mostly misunderstood in common parlance. Most people believe homeostasis is about maintaining "balance". But he points out that is not the right way to look at it. Rather a better way to describe homeostasis is that it is the body regulating and fighting against entropy.

The discussion was fascinating. Mostly Harris just asked questions to direct Damasio's talking and sometimes re-direct when Damasio was getting too technical (like when he was discussing the specific impact of neurons lacking a myelin sheath). Overall it was a superb experience and very enlightening. One thing I found absolutely crucial was when Damasio was discussing the problems with the strong AI crowd (people like Marvin Minsky, Daniel Dennet et al who believe that all it takes to achieve human level consciousness and self-awareness is enough computational power). While most of machine learning has moved away from strong AI concepts Damasio makes a fascinating observation. We have neurons that are non-synaptic. This is absolutely revolutionary to me, because our entire digital computers are based on the system of 0 or 1 that was originally modeled on how our neurons either fire or don't fire.

Yet we have neurons that don't operate in that strict 0,1 fashion. Its usually commonly understood that our neurons fundamentally function like logic gates in computers. But as we learn more, they actually do not operate in such a simple fashion.

All that babbling is basically so I can say that this is why I am now separating Harris completely from the others. This, to me, is really trying to educate the public and actually stimulate discussion that moves us forward as a society. Too much of public intellectual "debate" is just pointless trolling, name calling and self-promotion like Dyson or Hitchens. Harris is actually doing things to stimulate the public conversation in a much better direction than the "sjw vs. alt-right" paradigm or the people who careless just attack all religion. Those people are the problem that is poisoning public discourse.

Harris far more than any of these other people, seems to be really trying to push debate towards positive, meaningful discussion. He could have on the left and right trolls and probably get far more views and comments than showcasing a true academic like Damasio, so I have to give him a lot of respect for that. It also puts the Chomsky emails in a different light. Noam is known in academic linguistic circles to be a bit of an arrogant prick and I think re-reading those emails shows Harris in a better light than originally. Chomsky really gets more hype than I believe he deserves, but thats another post.
Click to expand...

Sam Harris has become the go to guy for controversial stuff about Islam, so spends a disproportionate amount of time talking about what he perceives as the jihadist threat. He said as much himself on a podcast recently. When he gets onto other, more interesting, less controversial topics is when he really shines. There's a clarity of thought in the way he communicates that is actually quite rare. If you get a chance, read his book about Free Will. IMO that is Harris at his very best.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Sam Harris has become the go to guy for controversial stuff about Islam, so spends a disproportionate amount of time talking about what he perceives as the jihadist threat. He said as much himself on a podcast recently. When he gets onto other, more interesting, less controversial topics is when he really shines. There's a clarity of thought in the way he communicates that is actually quite rare. If you get a chance, read his book about Free Will. IMO that is Harris at his very best.
Click to expand...
I might look into that, Im reading Homo Deus at the moment and Yuval Noah Harari also covers the idea that there is no such thing as free will. Not sure if they rely on the same arguments.
 
Adebesi said:
I might look into that, Im reading Homo Deus at the moment and Yuval Noah Harari also covers the idea that there is no such thing as free will. Not sure if they rely on the same arguments.
Click to expand...

That's on my "to read" list. Coincidentally, I first heard about Harari when he appeared on the Sam Harris podcast. They did seem to be pretty much aligned on everything.
 
Watched the whole Munk-debate, and bloody hell that Dyson guy was awful. :lol:
Only person who came out of that in a positive light for me was Fry, who I've not had the pleasure to watch in debates before.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Sam Harris has become the go to guy for controversial stuff about Islam, so spends a disproportionate amount of time talking about what he perceives as the jihadist threat. He said as much himself on a podcast recently. When he gets onto other, more interesting, less controversial topics is when he really shines. There's a clarity of thought in the way he communicates that is actually quite rare. If you get a chance, read his book about Free Will. IMO that is Harris at his very best.
Click to expand...

I haven't heard anything of him recently on that. Wish he would just move on from that angle as just Bill Maher alone has worn it out.

I hope he moves forward with more authors like Damasio in the future because no one else is doing informative, meaningful events like that - outside of university events which are usually invisible to the general public. I know that Munk debate would probably be more "sound bite worthy" and "social media friendly" but the Harris-Damasio talk was infinitely more meaningful IMO.
 
oneniltothearsenal said:
Yet we have neurons that don't operate in that strict 0,1 fashion. Its usually commonly understood that our neurons fundamentally function like logic gates in computers. But as we learn more, they actually do not operate in such a simple fashion.
Click to expand...
So would a quantum computer solve this or did they not get into that?
 
Maagge said:
So would a quantum computer solve this or did they not get into that?
Click to expand...

They didn't go too much further but I don't think a quantum computer could solve that because the quantum computer is still based on 0,1 logic gates just at a much smaller level.

Damasio believes that we would need some form of analog computing simulation of the human body's entire nervous system. There is something about the way analog technology works that is analogous (pun not intended) to way biological intelligence works that digital simulation can't quite capture.
 
oneniltothearsenal said:
They didn't go too much further but I don't think a quantum computer could solve that because the quantum computer is still based on 0,1 logic gates just at a much smaller level.

Damasio believes that we would need some form of analog computing simulation of the human body's entire nervous system. There is something about the way analog technology works that is analogous (pun not intended) to way biological intelligence works that digital simulation can't quite capture.
Click to expand...
I thought the point of the quantum computer was it operating with a super position of 0 and 1 as opposed to the classical 0 or 1? But I have no idea whether it actually solves the problem you're describing.
 
oneniltothearsenal said:
They didn't go too much further but I don't think a quantum computer could solve that because the quantum computer is still based on 0,1 logic gates just at a much smaller level.

Damasio believes that we would need some form of analog computing simulation of the human body's entire nervous system. There is something about the way analog technology works that is analogous (pun not intended) to way biological intelligence works that digital simulation can't quite capture.
Click to expand...
Do you have a link to a podcast or video of this talk? Sounds fascinating.

Such methods might already exist. I found a paper on analogue quantum simulation. Maybe such a method could be used to complement existing biological simulation and to account for phenomena such as non-synaptic neurons. Or I could just be talking out of my arse (probably).

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2405428317300229
 
Maagge said:
I thought the point of the quantum computer was it operating with a super position of 0 and 1 as opposed to the classical 0 or 1? But I have no idea whether it actually solves the problem you're describing.
Click to expand...
I suppose it comes down to the following question: what the feck is a non-synaptic neuron??
 
Maagge said:
I thought the point of the quantum computer was it operating with a super position of 0 and 1 as opposed to the classical 0 or 1? But I have no idea whether it actually solves the problem you're describing.
Click to expand...

I can't answer that with any degree of expertise. But my guess would be that superposition of 0,1 is still 0 or 1 - or I guess technically both 0 and 1.
But its never a value of 3.14159265359..
I really don't know though, this is all very interesting to me but your questions reach the end of my knowledge :)

Fridge chutney said:
Do you have a link to a podcast or video of this talk? Sounds fascinating.

Such methods might already exist. I found a paper on analogue quantum simulation. Maybe such a method could be used to complement existing biological simulation and to account for phenomena such as non-synaptic neurons. Or I could just be talking out of my arse (probably).

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2405428317300229
Click to expand...

Its on here:
https://samharris.org/waking-book-club-2/

But I am not sure what you have to do to access it as I haven't tried yet. I'm sure eventually it will be easy to find for free but it might be behind his paywall for now.

I'll check out that paper, very interesting stuff
 
oneniltothearsenal said:
So I was at a Sam Harris event a few weeks ago and want to add something I've been meaning to add.

He was interviewing a long time favorite of mine, Antonio Damasio, known for Descartes' Error and more recently The Strange Order of Things.
Damasio is probably one of the most important neuroscience researchers in the world at the moment. He and his wife are MD and PhD in neuroscience. Some of his key findings have been how despite a lot of popular myth, emotion is actual integral to reason and logical thinking. His new book delves into a lot of meanings behind the concept of homeostasis - which is explains is another concept mostly misunderstood in common parlance. Most people believe homeostasis is about maintaining "balance". But he points out that is not the right way to look at it. Rather a better way to describe homeostasis is that it is the body regulating and fighting against entropy.

The discussion was fascinating. Mostly Harris just asked questions to direct Damasio's talking and sometimes re-direct when Damasio was getting too technical (like when he was discussing the specific impact of neurons lacking a myelin sheath). Overall it was a superb experience and very enlightening. One thing I found absolutely crucial was when Damasio was discussing the problems with the strong AI crowd (people like Marvin Minsky, Daniel Dennet et al who believe that all it takes to achieve human level consciousness and self-awareness is enough computational power). While most of machine learning has moved away from strong AI concepts Damasio makes a fascinating observation. We have neurons that are non-synaptic. This is absolutely revolutionary to me, because our entire digital computers are based on the system of 0 or 1 that was originally modeled on how our neurons either fire or don't fire.

Yet we have neurons that don't operate in that strict 0,1 fashion. Its usually commonly understood that our neurons fundamentally function like logic gates in computers. But as we learn more, they actually do not operate in such a simple fashion.

All that babbling is basically so I can say that this is why I am now separating Harris completely from the others. This, to me, is really trying to educate the public and actually stimulate discussion that moves us forward as a society. Too much of public intellectual "debate" is just pointless trolling, name calling and self-promotion like Dyson or Hitchens. Harris is actually doing things to stimulate the public conversation in a much better direction than the "sjw vs. alt-right" paradigm or the people who careless just attack all religion. Those people are the problem that is poisoning public discourse.

Harris far more than any of these other people, seems to be really trying to push debate towards positive, meaningful discussion. He could have on the left and right trolls and probably get far more views and comments than showcasing a true academic like Damasio, so I have to give him a lot of respect for that. It also puts the Chomsky emails in a different light. Noam is known in academic linguistic circles to be a bit of an arrogant prick and I think re-reading those emails shows Harris in a better light than originally. Chomsky really gets more hype than I believe he deserves, but thats another post.
Click to expand...

Is there video of this?
 
I was asking a while back for charismatic, convincing spokespeople with a contrasting worldview to the blokes named in the OP. Stumbled across this guy. Some really compelling arguments about open borders and the need for basic income. Have ordered his book. Very much like the cut of his jib.

 
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