Re:
It's a powerful and convincing statemen=, but my feeling is that it would not be wise to submit it for publication= Taking the stance of a reader who comes to the matter from afresh, =erhaps having heard some rumors but knowing nothing, the reaction I suspec= will be of the "where there's smoke there's fire" kind.=C2Q Few are willing to think through the arguments and factual details o= to try to adjudicate conflicting claims. I've seen this happen =ver and over on other matters -- many years of having been accused of Holo=aust denial, for example.. Ugly and bitter as it is, I suspect the b=st course now is not to stir the pot by raising the issue publicly, openin= the door to charges and accusations that can no doubt be answered in the =ourt of logic and fairness -- but that's not the public domain, where =nnuendo and suspicion and accusation reign.
Anyway, for=what it's worth, that's the way it looks to me, in part on the bas=s of
experience.
The great work that you have bee= doing speaks for itself. My feeling is that you should keep at it, =nd simply develop a thick skin to fend off whatever ugliness breaks throug= now and then, diminishing over time.
Noam
Cultures unfortunately can be swept by craziness. =Nazism for example. Or the Great Awakening. We're in one o= those phases now. If there's a charge, it's true, in fact T=ue. Any response is "mansplaining," another power play, re=nforcing the charge. You've seen I'm sure what happened to L=wrence. Full and complete response, amounts to zero. Isn't=even considered. It's like trying to discuss rationally with rel=gious fanatics.
Noam
Im considering submitting this to the ope= of the wash post id like your
thoughts
Swee=heart deal!" So goes the attack on the resolution of the more than a =ecade ago federal investigation involving our client Jeffrey Epstein.Q=A0 The attack is profoundly misplaced, supported neither by the law nor th= facts. Nor is it supported by the structure of our constitutional republi=. To the contrary, Jeffrey was subjected to an extremely aggressive federa= intrusion into what would typically be considered a quintessentially loca= criminal matter in south Florida. The offense invest=gated — at its core, sexual favors for hire Q=94 has long been treated as a matter entrusted to laws of the several=States, not the federal government. The conduct — =or which Jeffrey took full responsibility — was a c=assic state offense and was treated exactly that way by able, honest prose=utors in Palm Beach County. Nevertheless, without a requestQ=A0from the state prosecutors, the deci=ion-makers federal government at the time, including intervened. now-Secretary For=their own of Labor opportunistic Alex Acosta reasons, (then=United many are States now criticizing Attorney the in south federal Florida), for not going far enough.=u>
As the stories get wilder and the writers make the gi=Is younger. prostitution is a tabloid s dream , ..C24> I wondered if having something out in the cyber world th=t let some people point to rational arguments might allow some to de=end themselves from their wives . " how could you "=C2. etc.
1I)=A0 I have been exploring the Al world with the cutting edge people.=C2* I remind them of yourcomments re machines thinkingQ=A0 :)/ I thought that cult=re was the conciousness of a society. tribes were like s=lf. . media approx transmitters. . It =rovided constraints and rules for some underlying interactions.
cultures swept by craziness, =C24k isnt it the same for an individual. .. the brain sends =ignals based on faulty sensors or information. . to see =f the brain is functioning. there are word tests. memory tests= etc. . why isnt conciousness the property o= those things. like culture is to fads etc.
From the point of view of a jihadi, Klan,=evangelical Christian, my ultra-orthodox grandfather,.... it's the res= of the world that's crazy. I think we can do better than just t= take the fall-back position that craziness is a value judgment, but not s= easy.
On consciousness, my suspicion is that we'll=never do much better than Russell's picture: what we understand with h=ghest confidence is our own immediate conscious experience. The rest=of our intellectual efforts (science especially) are an attempt to make se=se of that (and in the course of doing so, instructs us that our experienc= is a construct of our internal modes of cognition acting on an external w=rld that we (naively?) assume to exist. And it also tells us, I thin=, that consciousness is a thin and superficial fringe of an internal menta= life that is inaccessible to introspection.