tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3747656814607537842.post8744070674403333048..comments2023-11-28T02:46:43.715-06:00Comments on Things could be worse...: One year markDhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00873305351253214400noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3747656814607537842.post-66799644892907021322010-09-06T11:50:40.420-05:002010-09-06T11:50:40.420-05:00Martial arts: If you really want to know what I do...Martial arts: If you really want to know what I do, shoot me an email and I'll happily talk about it. It kind of hurts my anonymity, so I don't really want to go into specifics on my blog.<br /><br />Philosophy and stuff: Thanks for the suggestions! I'll definitely check some of those out. <br /><br />Right now, most interesting to me is philosophy of mind and language stuff. I think it's interesting how our language relates to our actual thoughts, what our words refer to, how we mean what we mean, etc. Most recently, I recently read some Kripke and Putnam and then struggled through some Wittgenstein. Kind of needed a philosophy break after the Wittgenstein.<br /><br />Regarding cognition, I think it's a natural progression to be curious about how the brain works, from a scientific perspective, after studying a bunch of theoretical philosophical stuff. I recently read the article, Does Neuroscience Undermine Deontological Theory? by Richard Dean, which, whether you agree with the article or not, illustrates the potential connection between neuroscience and philosophy.<br /><br />As far as linguistics goes, aside from the links on my blog, I've only read one book on the subject. Like I said, it's a new interest.<br /><br />Bioethics: Brace yourself, but I'm actually interested in the legal implications arising out of medical ethics. Patient autonomy, beginning/end of life issues, informed consent - all of it is pretty interesting. My medical ethics class in law school was one of the only interesting classes I had.<br /><br />Lunch: No offense, you're definitely one of my more interesting and helpful commenters, but meeting people from my blog kind of creeps me out.Dhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00873305351253214400noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3747656814607537842.post-75802934056205835292010-09-03T15:03:32.014-05:002010-09-03T15:03:32.014-05:00Wow, you and I have a lot of the same interests.
...Wow, you and I have a lot of the same interests.<br /><br />Martial Arts & Exercise: I trained BJJ (under the late Carlson Garcie: who actually lived in Naperville of all places) as well as Muay Thai. Pre-UFC 1 (before 1993), I trained Wing Tsun. I never actually fought in a cage; and now I’m too old to. I used to lift weights like crazy in college. What style(s) of martial arts do you train?<br /><br />Philosophy/epistemology/cognition: I became interested in law school when I encountered people who are intelligent but have different beliefs than I do. Socratic dialog was interesting as well. This got me thinking about how equally intelligent people can disagree and about rationality, truth, etc. I guess law school was useful for something, thought it has nothing to do with practicing law. I became very interested in Logical Positivism as well as Karl Popper’s Pancritical Rationalism. From there I became interested in Bayesian statistical inference, theoretical computer science, Solomonoff induction, and the like. I recommend that you read Jeff Hawkins’ On Intelligence, Rita Carter Mapping the Mind, David Deutch The Fabric of Reality , David Chalmers The Conscious Mind , and Murray Gell-Mann The Quark and the Jaguar, and Gerald Edelman’s Neural Darwinism. What areas of cognition/linguistics/epistemology are you interested in?<br /><br />Bioethics: This is fascinating. I like Peter Singer a lot; though his ideas are kind of obvious. He gets credit for saying things openly and honesty and taking slack from the general public who don’t understand this area well and are kind of shocked. Derek Parfitt’s Reasons and Persons is a classic. I also like Nick Bostrom and James Hughes. What areas are you interested it?<br /><br />I predict that you will like being a lawyer when you get the opportunity, which you will.<br /><br />You’re a very smart guy. I would hire you if I could, but this is a horrible economy, and we don’t have the budget. I’m happy to share any advice that I have.<br /><br />Let me know if you ever want to grab lunch when I’m at the Daley or Dirksen.<br /><br />GusAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com