Category Archives: Epistemology

Institutions, Tribes, and Faith

Posted on Monday 9 December 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Paul Krugman’s last NYT column, in part about what has changed in the past 25 years, including the collapse of trust in the elites; Helen Lewis echoes Fareed Zakaria yesterday: the mainstream media is part of the “elite” system that … Continue reading →

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Regression Toward the Tribal

Posted on Saturday 14 September 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Let’s see now. Here we are in the 21st century. In the past 500 years humankind has shown remarkable progress on two parallel fronts. Along governance: no longer was the divine right of kings (or tribal leaders) recognized; rather, principles … Continue reading →

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Political Truths and Lies

Posted on Tuesday 27 August 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

A subject which never ends. My fascination with this, yet again, isn’t about politics per se, so much as trying to understand why people believe what they do, and how humanity struggles with the balance of survival vs understanding. How … Continue reading →

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Why Do You “Believe”? Who Do You Trust?

Posted on Monday 12 August 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

One item for today, about which I think is a key principle. NY Times, Zeynep Tufekci, 12 Aug 2024: The Problem Is Not A.I. It’s the Disbelief Created by Trump. This triggers off the recent news items about Trump’s skepticism … Continue reading →

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I’ve Caught a Cold; How Much of Science Fiction is Obsolete?

Posted on Friday 14 June 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

I’ve caught colds my entire life; two or three a year. I sneeze, cough, and it usually starts with a sore throat. (Whereas I very rarely have gotten flues, with a temperature and symptoms that go on for a week.) … Continue reading →

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Stupid Lies

Posted on Monday 13 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Trump’s stupid lies; How conservatives do not trust people to make their own decisions; Heather Cox Richardson on how we got here; A Republican who boasts about cheating homeless people; On a positive note: Ali Velshi on NPR this morning. … Continue reading →

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Trust in Science, Bertrand Russell, and Religious “Truth”

Posted on Tuesday 7 May 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

An item about restoring trust in science, which doesn’t say very much except to improve education; A reading from Bertrand Russell, about religion, morals, and science; How a religious thinker thinks historians should only tell history that is “inspiring and … Continue reading →

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Watching Movies in Theaters; UBI; Reality; Why Everyone Thinks They’re Losing; and Epistemology

Posted on Thursday 4 January 2024 by Mark R. Kelly

Items today: How watching movies in certain theaters (AMC) is a bloated experience; Why UBI studies are not making traction into political policy; A New Yorker graphic essay about how reality might exist only because we’re observing it; E.J. Dionne … Continue reading →

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Real Conspiracy Theories and Fake Crises

Posted on Wednesday 15 November 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

Benjamin Bradford at CFI about how conspiracy theorists shrug about real conspiracy theories; Big Think on conspiracy theories about places claimed not to exist; Robert Reich on the fake crises Republicans use to distract from real problems. CFI, Benjamin Bradford, … Continue reading →

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The Deep State, or, Jonathan Rauch, THE CONSTITUTION OF KNOWLEDGE, part 3

Posted on Saturday 11 November 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

I’ve said the last two posts that I would quote the passages of Rauch’s book in which he describes what he considers to be the components of the “reality-based community.” And how it struck me that some of these components … Continue reading →

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