Great and unusual lecture from Dawkins!

[Dog Boots]

This was new to me, so I hope it's not a repost.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADPc3ZF5Yok

An extremely interesting lecture, I found, by Richard Dawkins in 2005, but not exactly on the subject we normally see him on these days. Rather, it's centered about Haldane's "querer than we CAN suppose" idea. About perception, orders of magnitude, bats hearing in color and much more.

Probably the best 22 minutes I ever spent on YouTube.

 

[Roboramma]

Thanks!

That video, along with many others, is also available on Dawkins' site.

Here's my favourite: http://richarddawkins.net/cat1_Science,cat2_Physics-and-Chemistry

 

[The Mad Hatter]

I was lucky, I got to hear this lecture live at McGill a couple weeks ago. I found it very interesting, but in the Q/A session, a few people started their questions with, "I actually came here hoping you would talk about God..."

 

[joobz]

Very interesting. Nice take but feels very much like the, "What is reality" games people always play.

The whole "why can't we pass through walls" game is somewhat passe.
Use the macroscopic model of a chain link fence. Even things with known spaces can be not passible. It all depends upon the way the matter is arranged and the way the energy is distributed among the atoms.

 

[CapelDodger]

Rather, it's centered about Haldane's "queerer than we CAN suppose" idea. About perception, orders of magnitude, bats hearing in color and much more.

I find those ideas profound. I read a few years ago about river-dolphins (I think in the Amazon) who use echo-location to hunt. They use a basic search frequency, but when they find a target they zero in with varying frequencies, searching out resonances. Fish-bodies, with all those cavities and membranes and squishiness, respond very differently to, say, logs. Just as bats might hear in "color" (so to speak), aren't the dolphins perceiving "touch" at a distance?

Probably the best 22 minutes I ever spent on YouTube.

Have you checked out the guy who's building Stonehenge Re-Loaded? That's the best 6 minutes I've spent on YouTube.