Bbenzon
Description
Humankind got its start on the African savannas some hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years ago. At various times in our cultural history we’ve moved to distinctly new cultural ground, as it were. And so we are moving now, and have been for the past half century. This blog is how I see that move. Intellectually, I'm broadly interested in culture and the brain. Within that compass, anything could show up here. Literature and films (including animation), certainly, music as well, and graffiti. But, other things may show up as well. It's a blog, don't you know, it moves.
MY BLOGS
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New Savanna
http://new-savanna.blogspot.com/
Humankind got its start on the African savannas some hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years ago. At various times in our cultural history we’ve moved to distinctly new cultural ground, as it were. And so we are moving now, and have been for the past half century. This blog is how I see that move. I'm broadly interested in culture and the brain. Within that compass, anything could show up here. Literature and films (including animation), certainly, music as well, and graffiti. But, other things may show up as well. It's a blog, don't you know, it moves.
LATEST ARTICLES ( 7846 )
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The Problematics of Text and Form and the Transmutation Zone Between Symbol and...
On the one hand we have those simple diagrams Mark Rose drew back in 1972, the ones he apologized for. Why? Because they’re over the line, ever so slightly.... Read more
Posted on 12 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Sedentary Hunter-gatherers Built Complex Societies – "Recognizing This... Has Bi...
When the Spanish chronicled them in the 1550s, the Calusa consisted of 50-60 politically consolidated villages overseen by a king (a hereditary sovereign who... Read more
Posted on 11 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Robot Researchers
A small but growing crop of machines is learning to design and carry out its own experiments. How will this change the future of research?By Jennifer Walter... Read more
Posted on 10 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Racial Attitudes CAN Change {Black GIs in the UK During WWII]
David Schindler, Mark Westcott, Shocking Racial Attitudes: Black G.I.s in Europe, The Review of Economic Studies, rdaa039, https://doi.org/10. Read more
Posted on 10 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
AI, Robots, and Imitation
Posted to the Humanist list: Might I hazard a somewhat contrary response to François Lachance [Humanist 34.222]? This thread on machines and imitation makes me... Read more
Posted on 10 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Are Conservatrives Losers?
Julius Krein, Conservatism is a Collection of Losers. It Doesn’t Have To Be. The American Conservative, August 7, 2020. I am not the first person to point out... Read more
Posted on 09 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
The Malibu Diner in Hoboken, NJ [pandemic Days]
Posted on 09 August 2020
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
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GPT-3 for (not So) Dummies [performance Rather Than Competence]
Noam Chomsky famously distinguished between linguistic competence and performance in Aspects of the Theory of Syntax (1965). The distinction is a bit obscure. Read more
Posted on 09 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Virtual Tezuka
🤔 pic.twitter.com/tAe9yAwxEU — tkasasagi🐻@女子熊 (@tkasasagi) August 9, 2020 The data they cropped. I wonder how many.... Read more
Posted on 09 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Pancakes!
Posted on 08 August 2020
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
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To the Extent That Chess is a Prototypical Domain for AI, AI Researchers Are...
While thinking about GPT-3 the last two weeks I’ve also been thinking about AI and computational linguistics in general. Computational linguistics (CL) had... Read more
Posted on 08 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Racism Killed Eric Dolphy, the Great Jazz Musician
Reminder: Eric Dolphy's fatal diabetic coma, in Germany: "Doctors figured that, as a black jazz musician, Dolphy must have been a junkie, so he was left in a... Read more
Posted on 08 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
The Star Trek Computer is the Prototypical AGI
I’m pretty sure that many AI researchers were inspired by the computer in Star Trek. I know that David Ferrucci, of Watson fame, was. Isn’t the Star Trek... Read more
Posted on 07 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Friday Fotos: After 13 Years Jersey City Has Its Own Poured Concrete Skate...
Shredding the bowl. Photographing the SK8er. The park measures 12,000 square feet. The bowl at the Berry Lane SK8 park. Street style layout at the Berry Lane SK... Read more
Posted on 07 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Hudson's "common Glad Impulse"
This dance deserves to go viral. pic.twitter.com/8thlvdH2Sq — Ted Gioia (@tedgioia) August 7, 2020 From W. H. Hudson, The Naturalist in La Plata, D. Appleton an... Read more
Posted on 07 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Street Art in the NYTimes – "these Works Point Beyond the Self"
Seph Rodney, New York’s Sidewalk Prophets Are Heirs of the Lascaux Cave Artisans, NYTimes,Aug. 6, 2020. Those early artisans [Lascaux, France] drew these... Read more
Posted on 06 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Gonna' Fly Now [one of Those Old Time Good Ones, as Pops Used to Say]
FDR in Philadelphia DIY in Jersey City, no longer there DIY in Jersey City, no longer there Read more
Posted on 06 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
GPT-3: Waterloo Or Rubicon? Here Be Dragons
I've published a new working paper. Title above, download links, abstract, table of contents, and introduction below. Download at: academia:... Read more
Posted on 05 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Once More into the Chinese Room
I’ve been crashing on my GPT-3 working paper and I had a new thought about Searle’s infamous Chinese room [1]. Yet if you would believe John Searle, no matter... Read more
Posted on 04 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Can We Adapt to Climate Change?
Ashutosh Jogalekar reviews Bjorn Lomborg, False Alarm: How Climate Change Panic Costs us Trillions, Hurts the Poor and Fails to Fix the Planet, in 3 Quarks... Read more
Posted on 03 August 2020 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY
