“The point is that we are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right.”

— George Orwell, “In Front of Your Nose

Some things I noticed 08/20/2020:
  1. ISO 3103 specify a standardized method for brewing tea
  2. Miel Gibson intends to keep its name but plans to lose the actor’s image from the label.
  3. BlackSky was able to photograph images of Port Elizabeth in South Africa just over two days after launch
  4. This political crisis in Kosovo puts the idea of land-swaps back on table. Redrawing borders along ethnic lines will break the existing stalemate.
  5. In a single year, you give up roughly the same number of dead skin cells as there are stars in the milky way galaxy.
  6. One must take into account not only the actual text, but also, and in equal measure, the actions involved in responding to that text.
  7. Algal the Bard — Toxicity, Nothing Else Matters
  8. Bruno Coulais — Kyrie Eleison
  9. Alabama Shakes – This Feeling
  10. Sevana — Mango

Blindsight

Day 4.

The concept of doing better is weird. Our brains not only reflect the contents of the world, we also simulate our being agents of change in it. We not only see features of things but also how such features act as handles for future interactions.

On the one hand, this tendency to preview consequences gives rise to the concept of reason. We have a module that checks whether events in sequence have something to do with each other. From if this, then that, to if this, then that must have been. When a claim doesn’t quite compute, we can check for ourselves if breaks in the chain exist.

The flipside to this handy feature of brains is that we can be over eager in its application. Selves by default have first person perspectives. Selves are the natural centers of thought. Reason first arises from experience this way. Without taking this fact into account, reason has a blindside to the randomness of nature. Matter are probabilistic waves. Reality exists in many states at the same time. Most likely nothing except ourselves have anything to do with us.

And yet, how often do we forget to account for the limits of our senses and how it curtails the scope of our experience. Even constant deliberate application of reason within said constraints is impossible. We take mental shortcuts. We have biases. Worse, any evaluative act forces us to ascribe byproducts of our experience to others.

Aspirations for betterment are retroactive explanations for the trajectory one is already trodding. Everything is already in a state best afforded to it by its random circumstance. If not, it’s on its way. All else is a cover up generated by hamstrung brains to maintain the illusion of reason. Enough for today.