I'm sure there are plenty of "antenna" references out there but I haven't taken the time to look for them, since I think they are taking the analogy too literally. — Gnomon

Thats why it's a metaphor not an analogy. :wink:

A similar concept is that of the HIndu "Akashic Field" theory, which Ervin Laszlo has updated as a reference to the universal Quantum Field. Yet again, I can accept it as a metaphor, but not as a mechanism. It proposes that the field is like a universal mind, including memory, that humans can tune into. I don't know how you could verify such a theory empirically. — Gnomon

Perhaps experiments could be designed to test that fascinating theory. The problem is that no "respectable" scientists would want to challenge the current it's-all-in-the-brain paradigm.

Brexit joke of the week.

"I think this is the bit where we’re meant to ask what they call their act, and for Johnson to triumphantly declare: “The Aristocrats!”

For any forumites who (like me) didn't get the joke, the Guardian writer (usually better than that) was lazily referring to a "joke" which I'd never heard of, but which, according to Wikipedia, is about a family pitching their act to an agent and describing at great length and with much swearing many disgusting and socially transgressive behaviours. The agent then asks the name of their act, and they say, The Aristocrats. That's the punchline. Hmm.

Take that rightly disliked device, the rhetorical question. Dutch academic editing service Scribbr, advising that rhetorical questions be avoided, says:

... often such questions are used in place of careful argument, and they are a poor substitution... they take up more space than it would take to simply state the point, and they lack the clarity and conviction of a good declarative statement.

Rhetoric isn't inherently irrational, but (in this age) it's seen as inherently tricky, universally disliked by those aware of it, seen as a way to fire up the ignorant masses, and unlikely to be appreciated here, I'd say.

Sheldrake hypothesises, if I understand it right, that consciousness is not in the brain. (Hence his antenna metaphor.) He suggests that it's in a field. The field is beyond time and space.

Actually, I've been reading five non-philosophy books. The one possibly fit to mention here is Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire, "a searing modern polemic... from the BAFTA and MOBO award-winning musician and political commentator, Akala", as UK bookseller Waterstones' synopsis has it.

Well, I've been reading 50 Shades of Grey. (Not really.)

A reading room, perhaps

Sure. But we "understand" evolution since the appearance of DNA.

It's understandable that we don't understand the origin of the universe, less so with DNA.

Rupert Sheldrake! My man! Didn't think I'd see him mentioned here, though...

Would the choice of example (systemic racism) have anything to do with your recent tussle with ubertroll Nosferatu on the colourblind thread?

Get a room...

The meaning of DNA is life, you could say. The question, I'd say, is: is there cosmic meaning behind the inexplicable appearance of DNA some four billion years ago?

Apparently, it's what the multiverse is made of.

Is consciousness a feeling, sensation, sum of all feelings and sensations, or something else? — OP

Something else.

Dominic. Cummings.

I'm with Baden: out of here. Nosferatu has a chilly logic, sure, but also a cog loose, apparently. A vist to chatbot HQ for repairs might be in order.

Despite being a remainer my view (now that no deal is ruled out) is that the 1st ref's result has to be honoured. People's views have not changed enough to justify a rerun. The principle of democracy is too important for us of the 'intelligentsia' to overrule the 'ignorant' masses.. — Tim3003

According to Barnier in The Guardian, no deal is no longer ruled out. Perhaps Labour’s second referendum could have a third no-deal option. In the circumstances, it's not clear that a rerun is undemocratic. If the better informed decision is to remain then, as others here have pointed out, any grievance felt by leavers would be tempered by the consensus that we'll all be better off, economically.

Lol. Good one.

I think you might have scored a point there, Baden. Good shot!

The chatbot is heavily armoured. He just keeps going.

Careful. If you carry on like that, shining the sunlight of reason, the vampire chatbot will explode. (I'm hoping the pieces don't fall on me.)

I don't live in the UK, but I'm in favor of there eventually being world unification/a one-world government... — Terrapin Station

— Terrapin Station

Dream on. That'll never work. The world is too big a place, with multiple conflicting interests. There will always be a great number of those who would oppose unification and prevent it from happening. And if it became corrupt, it would be harder to topple. That actually makes me think of The Empire in Star Wars. — S

Think instead of Star Trek’s United Earth government, which ended poverty, disease and war within fifty years.

As for Labour’s Brexit policy, it guarantees a second referendum, which would produce a more informed decision, and would therefore move the national mood towards unity and harmony. Support for having a second referendum has risen to neck and neck (for and against: 43% each).

https://whatukthinks.org/eu/questions/would-you-support-or-oppose-holding-a-second-referendum-on-britains-membership-of-the-eu-to-confirm-or-reverse-britains-decision-to-leave-the-eu/

The Corbynite far Left is, at least nominally, openly on the side of the people. The Johnson/Cummings far Right is secretly on the side of the super-rich. As regards funding corrective policies, the notion of a balanced economy, equivalent to a household, is a collective illusion. Government could resume its responsibility for issuing money, and, instead of allowing banks to issue 97% of money as debt, could issue 100% of money as social credit. This could fund a state income to replace wages, social spending on health and education, and infrastructure.

He's definitely a troll. Hes not in the US, so maybe not alt-right, but one of its kin. — frank

A vampire?

If you guys can be trolled by opposing opinions perhaps I’m not the problem. — Nosferatu

Trolls don't oppose opinion, they distract and sow discord by posting inflammatory messages with the intent of normalizing tangential discussion.

Blanket cynicism is understandable but is ultimately the philososphy of despair. Informed optimism lets us see a way through the mess.

It's true that social engineering meant to reverse the effects of racism has unwanted side effects. Is that what you mean? — frank

No, I meant that the Count prescribes no race-based social engineering at all because, supposedly, it's based on a false distinction. (Hence, supposedly, the unwanted side effects.) There's a slippery circularity there. Hence my suspicion of alt-right sophistry.

What's the solution to race problems in America? — frank

According to the OP, it's to be colourblind, meaning (according to the OP) not being racist. I suppose the OP has a point, whatever suspicion of alt-right sophism is aroused. Since the abolition of slavery, systemic racism has continued to blight black lives. The OP apparently admits that, and prescribes systemic colourblindness. Hmm.

If the manifestation of DNA has meaning, what might it mean? That life is an experiment? A gift?

Perhaps the OP is a chatbot.

Nosferatu's a clever alt-right troll. Posing as anti-racist to argue against identity politics and "racial" affirmative action. Very calm, though. Like a psychopath. :scream: Let's tiptoe away. Tschüss, Graf Orlock.

I neant H Hndu...

He's gone quiet...

Re "NOS4A2", nosferatu is a word used in Bram Stoker's Dracula for the blood-sucking undead humans better known as vampires. It's also the title of a 1922 German film (which didn't have the right to use the names "vampire" or "Dracula"). The film"s scary Dracula character, Count Orlok, played by Max Shrecke, is the OP"s image. The origin of the word "nosferatu" is uncertain. Suggested original meanings include "the undead", "plague carrier", "the insufferable one" , and "we are all wild animals". Nice.

I think the original post is an alt-right troll bomb. Good discussion, though.

Don't feed the troll.

Clever.

It quacks like a duck. It smells like alt-right white supremacism mischievously disguised as confused liberalism.