In the humble spirit of this post on the state of the mind sciences and this one on science generally, I encourage everyone to read Alexander Fry’s brilliant essay on the state of physics and dark matter research. It’s awesome that science is exploring these bizarre matters and humbling to realize that so many fundamental questions are unanswered. As I was reading, I couldn’t help but wonder whether dark matter, if it exists, impacts or influences humans. If it does exist, there must be some effects, though we have no idea what these effects might be or how they might work.
After physicists get this all worked out, then mind scientists can begin thinking about the implications for human perception, consciousness, behavior, and decision-making. While we are waiting for all this to be accomplished over the next several hundred years, we can rest easy knowing there are no mysteries and humans don’t have “free will” because Sam Harris and Jerry Coyne said so.