Category: ideas

There are plenty of reasons to commit as citizens to political parties or movements — and there may even be reasons to consider that commitment as partly the product of philosophical reasoning. But someone who speaks as a representative of a fixed ideology or group has subjugated the philosopher within themselves to the partisan.

“Finding one’s true place in the world is a massive trope, not just in film and theatre, but also in literature, education and motivational seminars – any place where young people are involved. In all these cases, the search for the ‘self’ is dubious because it assumes that there is an enduring ‘self’ that lurks within and that can somehow be found. Whereas, in fact, the only ‘self’ we can be sure of is one that changes every second, our decisions and circumstances taking us in an infinite number of directions, moment by moment.”

“Why is the universe so well suited to our existence? The weakest answer is that it’s just a brute fact. If the constants of nature were any different, then we wouldn’t be here to ask why we’re here. The strongest answer verges on theism: The cosmological constant is so improbably small that a godlike fine-tuner must have fashioned it into existence.”

The key result: Compared to working in silence, listening to the uplifting Vivaldi was “associated with an increase in divergent thinking.” Convergent thinking, on the other hand, was not significantly affected by background music. The researchers argue that this suggests the music inspired higher levels of “fluency and flexibility,” which are needed to come up with original ideas, but are less important in the paring-down process.

As we’ve seen this summer, artificial intelligence software has written songs and created paintings that many listeners and viewers can’t distinguish from those made by humans. So why have the few attempts at A.I.-created comedy lagged behind> Turns out humor is a lot more complex than music or art.

“This is the crux of the problem: nation-states rely on control. If they can’t control information, crime, businesses, borders or the money supply, then they will cease to deliver what citizens demand of them. In the end, nation-states are nothing but agreed-upon myths: we give up certain freedoms in order to secure others. But if that transaction no longer works, and we stop agreeing on the myth, it ceases to have power over us. So what might replace it? The city-state increasingly looks like the best contender.”

Political polarization, the rise in populism, ignorance in world leaders, distortion of the truth, and encouraging distrust among people, their leaders, and the media are considered dangerous enough to be featured on a list that includes climate change, population increase, and infectious diseases.

“Different parts of our gray matter respond to different timing tasks, and brain imaging has helped us parse which areas do what. From drumming along with a musical phrase to figuring out how long a lecture has lasted, these specialized areas work together to shape our temporal perception.”

“The most vulnerable are those in the services sector including cashiers and truck drivers. It will also likely affect low-income workers more than those making six figures. Occupations that are expected to remain in demand for a live human are, not surprisingly, those that require compassion, understanding and moral judgment, such as nurses, teachers and police officers.”