In a previous post I mentioned that I will moderate a humanist meeting on consciousness. This post contains some further information on that for participants, and whoever else might find it relevant.
Here are some of the questions I will raise:
Continue reading Readings for a Humanist Meeting on Consciousness
The January 25, 2015 meeting on this topic has been postponed. Watch this space, or send me an email in February, to get the new date.
On [Date TBD], I will moderate a humanist discussion on so called “consciousness”. Given that the content will be of broad interest, I will post a few articles for the participants and other interested readers.
For many years, for several reasons, I argued against using the term “consciousness”. “Conscious”, an adjective, is a helpful term that can trigger meaningful psychological inquiry; but the term “consciousness” all too often interferes with the pursuit of understanding the human mind. It tends to induce a reification fallacy, i.e., to assume that because we have a noun (here consciousness) it must actually refer to something particular. Contrast dog, which has referents, and energy which does not. Energy, like gravity, is a helpful problem-centered concept, i.e., a concept that is used to frame and solve problems. Dog is helpful, but it is not problem-centered. It was not developed to solve a theoretical challenge of understanding the world. Treating consciousness as stuff-like can cause problems.
Here’s a little fact that might help you cautiously approach questions using the term “consciousness”: Continue reading “Consciousness”: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly Questions About the Human Mind
I’ve been associated with the Cognitive Science program at Simon Fraser University for several years. Earlier this month, I became Adjunct Professor of Cognitive Science there.
I have an active research program at SFU which is summarized on my SFU home page. Most of my foreground projects at the moment investigate the information processing mechanisms underlying sleep onset and insomnia. They are collaborations with excellent sleep research psychologists at various universities:
As of today, Cognitive Productivity is available for sale on Amazon® as an ebook.
To celebrate this fact, the first 20 people who use the “I-Prefer-Leanpub” coupon URL in purchasing Cognitive Productivity from Leanpub will get this book for only $7.99, less than half the current Amazon price![*] (and half the recommended Leanpub price.) The URL coupon code is embedded in all Leanpub links in this post. Explicitly, it is:
Amazon, as you may have heard, has ruffled the feathers of authors and publishers. I won’t comment on that here.
However, I do encourage readers of Cognitive Productivity to purchase the book on Leanpub rather than Amazon, because:
This epistolary essay was written in 2014 (with some later updates) as a response to Lam Wong’s 21 Elements: Relation, Perception and Meaning painting exhibition of Sept. 2014 in New Westminster. I blogged about the exhibition prior to writing this essay.
In 2014, Lam Wong’s 21 Elements: Relation, Perception and Meaning book was published. That book contains photos of all the paintings in his exhibition. A chapter of 21 Elements, written by Lam, which includes pictures of several of the paintings from his book, are available in this PDF.
Photos of the paintings from 21 Elements are available on Lam’s website.
A version of the essay below appears in the second edition of 21 Elements, published in 2022. That’s a limited edition print.
A version of the essay below, interleaved with photos of the paintings, will appear in Discontinuities: Love, Art, Mind. The letter reflects many of the themes of Discontinuities, including, of course, affective epistolary communication.
Shadows of shadows passing. It is now 1831, and as always I am absorbed with a delicate thought. It is how poetry has indefinite sensations, to which end music is an essential. Since the comprehension of sweet sound is our most indefinite conception, music, when combined with a pleasurable idea, is poetry. Music without the idea is simply music. Without music or an intriguing idea, colour becomes pallor, man becomes carcass, home becomes catacomb, and the dead are but for a moment motionless. Edgar Allan Poe
Dear ______,
I had the pleasure of attending, on several occasions, Lam Wong’s 21 Elements: Relation, Perception and Meaning exhibition and of discussing his art with him. As a result, I am moved to share my reflections with you.
I don’t usually blog about my workshops and presentations. But I thought I’d mention two workshops for School District 23 ( Okanagan) that I will give in Kelowna next Friday:
The first workshop is based on my book, Cognitive Productivity: Using Knowledge to Become Profoundly Effective, which itself is based on extensive research.
The second workshop is based on my research on sleep onset and insomnia, which is described at SFU, on mySleepButton and elsewhere.
Continue reading Insomnia Workshops: Designed to Promote Cognitive Productivity
I have uploaded a timeless address given by Claude Lamontagne, Professor of Psychology, on the occasion of him receiving the 2001 University of Ottawa Teaching Award.
I’ve uploaded this address this evening in order to share the gem, and so that I can link to it in an essay I am writing on Lam Wong’s recent 21 Elements exhibition of paintings on “Relation, Perception and Meaning”. (The essay will be in the next edition of Wong’s book, 21 Elements.) It is fitting that Lamontagne’s paper should itself be so beautifully artistic! Professor of Psychology, on the occasion of him receiving the 2001 University of Ottawa Teaching Award.
Lamontagne’s address is “University Teaching: A critical Rationalist’s Reflexions”.
If you’re a scholar thinking of writing a book, be it for a general or scholarly audience, check out my post on Leanpub’s blog, Lean Scholarly Publishing With Leanpub. All types of authors experience advantages using Leanpub, but there are also some considerations that are particularly relevant to academics.
Continue reading Lean Publishing for Scholars-Why You Should Consider Leanpub
This is a response to a Globe & Mail article by Harvey Schachter, “Technology’s productivity paradox”, last updated Monday, Sep. 08 2014, 2:23 PM EDT. That article is itself a response to a recent Forrester® report:
A Crisis Of Attention: Technology, Productivity, And Flow
Using The Science Of Knowledge Work To Restore Flow To The Workplace (July 14, 2014, by David K. Johnson with Josh Bernoff, Christopher Voce, Elizabeth Ryckewaert, Heather Belanger, Thayer Frechette)
To address the problems that are alluded to in the G&M article and Forrester® abstract, one needs to adequately specify the requirements of cognitive productivity. This is where most solutions fail.
This is a copy of my review of Nicholas Carr’s book _The shallows: What the Internet is doing to our brains (Kindle Edi.). I posted the original this morning on GoodReads.com
Nicholas Carr’s book The shallows is an entertaining book that raises flags about the impact that technology is having on our reading habits. He essentially claims that we (more specifically, our brains) are becoming superficial processors of information because of technology. In carefully reading the book, I found that he supported his thesis through insinuation and rhetoric rather than from premises to the clear conclusion you’d expect from the subtitle of his book.
There are plenty of good things to say about this book. However, I will focus on its significant problems so that we can address them.