Deric Bownds
These articles, from Deric's MindBlog at http://mindblog.dericbownds.net report new ideas and work on mind, brain, and behavior - as well as random curious stuff.
MY BLOGS
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Deric Bownds' MindBlog
http://mindblog.dericbownds.net/
This blog reports new ideas and work on mind, brain, and behavior - as well as random curious stuff.
LATEST ARTICLES ( 2547 )
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A Human Machine Writes...
I think the spookily impersonal paragraph I pass on below - composed while getting back to sleep after a 2 a.m. pee-wake - is the way things work. Read more
Posted on 24 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
The Blanding and Flattening of Our Culture
Since I returned to live in my family home in Austin Texas in 2017 I have been sad to see the continuing disappearance of kinky "Keep Austin Weird" coffee shops... Read more
Posted on 22 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
MindBlog Does a Survey of Futurists and Recommends a Few.
In the wild and wooly world of thinking about futures for the earth, its living forms, and humanity there exists a tier of well know public intellectuals. Read more
Posted on 19 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
An Essay on Geopolitics and Globalization
I want to pass on one complete section, indicating titles of the others, of a larger essay addressing tribalism versus global consciousness. Read more
Posted on 17 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
What About Some Positive News for a Change?
Doomsaying can become a self-fulfilling prophesy, as David Brooks points out. I want to point to Fix The News, a website curated by Angus Hervey and Amy... Read more
Posted on 15 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
The Emerging World Order as a Global Version of the pre-Westphalian Middle Ages.
I would like to pass on this link to an essay by Parag Khanna in Noema Magazine which is one of the best description of the increasing entropy in global... Read more
Posted on 12 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
From Nematodes to Humans a Common Brain Network Motif Intertwines Hierarch and...
Pathak et al. (abstract below) suggest the evolved pattern they describe may apply to information processing networks in general, in particular to those of... Read more
Posted on 10 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
Our Well Being Influences Our Mitochondrial Biology.
I pass on the abstract from Trumoff et al (open source) below. The bottom line is that our experienced well being correlates with with higher levels of energy... Read more
Posted on 08 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
ChatGPT as a "lab Rat" for Understanding How Our Brains Process Language.
I've now read twice through a fascinating PNAS piece by Mitchell Waldrop (Open source, with useful references), and urge MindBlog readers to havve a look. Read more
Posted on 05 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
Cumulative Human Culture Began ~600,000 Years Ago, During the Middle Pleistocene
An interesting study by Paige and Perreault: Significance Our species, Homo sapiens, occupies a uniquely diverse set of ecological habitats. Humans expanded int... Read more
Posted on 03 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
There Are No More Human Elites of Any Sort...
I want to pass on the conclusion of a great essay by Venkatesh Rao, giving the meanings of several acronyms in parentheses. You should read the entire piece. Read more
Posted on 01 July 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
How AI Will Transform the Physical World.
I pass on the text of wild-eyed speculations by futurist Ray Kurzweil recently sent to The Economist, who since 1990 has been writing on how soon “The... Read more
Posted on 28 June 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
Off the Rails - Inequity and Unfairness Built into Capitalism
I have largely withdrawn from posting items relevant to the details of our current political and social malaise, but I want to pass on a few clips from a piece... Read more
Posted on 26 June 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
The Tyranny of Words
(Cautionary note: The text of today’s post was voice dictated during mind wandering occurring during a brief wake period at 1:30 AM this morning, and reflects... Read more
Posted on 24 June 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
The Other Shoe is About to Drop in 2024 - Important Closure Moments in the...
I want to pass on a clip (to which I have added some definitions in parentheses) from Venkatest Rao’s most recent Ribbonfarm Studio installment in which he... Read more
Posted on 21 June 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
Managing the Human Herd
This post is a dyspeptic random walk through thoughts triggered by the front page photograph of the Wall Street journal of June 17, 2024, showing Masses of... Read more
Posted on 19 June 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
Empty Innovation: What Are We Even Doing?
I came across an interesting commentary by "Tante" on innovation, invention, and progress (or the lack thereof) in the constant churning, and rise and fall, of... Read more
Posted on 17 June 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
The Future of Life.
I want to pass on this science magazine review of Jamie Metzl's new book "Superconvergence: How the Genetics, Biotech, and AI Revolutions Will Transform Our... Read more
Posted on 14 June 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
The Pathologies of the Educated Elites
Another really nice opinion piece from David Brooks, who notes the consequences, as we have moved from the industrial age to the information age, of... Read more
Posted on 12 June 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE -
Protecting Scientific Integrity in an Age of Generative AI
I want to pass on the full text of an editorial by Blau et al in PNAS, the link points to the more complete open source online version containing... Read more
Posted on 10 June 2024 PSYCHOLOGY, SCIENCE