Dan Sumption on Mercurial Minutes

This was fascinating! I too am a "reformed Dawkins trooper" and, although the last few years have upended my thinking about the relationship between mind and matter, I still find it very hard to knock that scepticism on the head - probably not least because I was introduced to Dawkins' work by my psychology lecturer Susan Blackmore, who had previously researched parapsychology for 25 years and then gave up because she couldn't find any evidence for it (something she writes about here: https://www.susanblackmore.uk/chapters/why-i-have-given-up/ ). There's so much judgement involved in saying that one picture is much like another, it's really hard to know where to set the bar - I personally don't rate those mountains as very similar... but, having said that, in the context of a universe full of anime girls and mecha warriors, I guess they do have a lot in common. I dunno... experimental design is haaaard (and if studying psychology taught me just one thing, it's that almost all experiments in psychology are untrustworthy). BTW, that "ghost box" was originally designed by my very very distant relative Frank Sumption (he used to call them "Frank's boxes", and invented them to try to hear communication from aliens). Last year, after Daisy started experimenting with them, I got hold of a copy of his biography "Thinking Outside the Box" - not a particularly well-written book but, jeez, quite a sad story. Oh, also, I saw an owl this morning 😁 (not so unusual around here, but it's the first I've seen in a few weeks).