[newsletter]
How does the brain 'think', pt. I, and other things
12 Jul 2024
Hello,
Here’s everything since my last little missive to you:
Now my PhD is done, I’ll probably spend a bit of time consolidating what I learned. For the next couple weeks, a series trying to explain my PhD, because people keep asking. I want to point out that my initial response to this is always “I promise that you won’t care”, but no one ever believes me. So, as a punishment, I’m going to make you read it. For three articles. You did this to yourselves.
Excerpt: In part one of a series explaining my PhD, I explain the overarching question cognitive neuroscience is interested in: how does the brain do thinking? Habitual, associative processing in which we respond automatically is not really the kind of thinking people want to know more about, but it’s the easiest to explain, and most of what people ‘think’ is exactly this. But there are some quite striking, and puzzling, forms of thought that do seem to be truly higher-order.
Main idea: It’s not exactly clear how often humans really ‘think’. Most of what we do is automatic—habitual responding to a predictable world. But there are a few puzzling examples of thinking, and we don’t really know how they work.
Shamanism and the origin of the Chinese State. See also part one.
In an agricultural era, control over a solar and lunar calendar would provide great benefits, perhaps alongside oracle-bone divination and the ornamental trappings of power. Royal dynasties and magico-religious figures do not always work well together, but in this instance they could have been one and the same, managing the mundane world of pigs and lithics, whilst drawing power as a conduit between the heavens and earth, maintaining harmony in the fields and the quarries.
–
Adoption is predicated on transacting the life of a child. Interesting reflection by an adoptee on the psychology of adopting and being adopted.
–
More evidence social media isn’t so influential. See also Stuart Ritchie on this. See also Peter Gray on this.
–
Spotting Logical Fallacies. Talks about seven. Wikipedia also has a good entry on this. Wikipedia also has an article on arguments we see from advocates of fringe theories, which puts some of this into context.
–
How Many People Are in the People’s Liberation Army?
–
I hope you found something interesting.
You can find links to all my previous missives here.
Warm regards,