Frank Wilczek’s new “baby”… The Lightness of Being
I almost begged for a review copy, but then I saw that blurbs were all by other Nobel Prize winners and crack physicists and such. That took me down a peg. I intend to read it though. And I certainly WOULDN’T TURN DOWN a review copy. The sample chapter looks accessible enough for a layman like me. For example:
To begin, we build our world-models from strange raw materials: signal-processing tools “designed” by evolution to filter a universe swarming with information into a very few streams of incoming data.
Data streams? Their more familiar names are vision, hearing, smell, and so forth. From a modern point of view, vision is what samples the electromagnetic radiation that passes through a tiny hole in our eyes, picking up only a narrow rainbow of colors inside a much broader spectrum. Our hearing monitors air pressure at our eardrums, and smell provides a quirky chemical analysis of the air impinging on our nasal membranes. Other sensory systems give some rough information about the overall acceleration of our body (kinesthetic sense), temperatures and pressures over its surface (touch), a handful of crude measures of the chemical composition of matter on our tongue (taste), and a few other odds and ends.
Those sensory systems allowed our ancestors — just as they allow us — to construct a rich, dynamic model of the world, enabling them to respond effectively. The most important components of that world-model are more-or-less stable objects (such as other people, animals, plants, rocks, . . . the Sun, stars, clouds, . . .) some of them moving around, some dangerous, some good to eat, and others — a select and especially interesting few — desirable mates.
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Jeneane Sessum has re-purposed her eponymous site, jeneane.net. She’s putting the “So?” in social media. This morning she has an interesting post about Techmeme and Duncan Riley. The way I read it, Riley used to work at TechCrunch (Michael Arrington’s property). Then he left. Now his scoops aren’t hitting Techmeme with the frequency that they did when he had Arrington’s backing. And, “So what?”
Sort of an interesting meta-commentary on silly valley stuff for those who might not read the inbred navel gazing blogs of the South Bay.
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Dave Winer puts his money on Tim Kaine for Obama’s running mate. (That is, if the announcement happens today or tonight).
This should put an end to the endless Hillary discussion on Steve Gillmor’s News Gang.
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