I’ve been trying to cut my ties with someone. Unsuccessfully though. A friend keeps asking me why I’m failing. I have no explanation and/but I seem to undermine my own efforts. I did cut my ties with others. To be fair, they cut their ties with me first. It took me quite some time to reciprocate their deeds. Apparently, cutting ties is more than just a two-way...
Ingredients vs mix
Facts, opinions, and (un)learning
For many humans, it's difficult to separate facts from (false) opinions. Moreover, the internet is full of (false) opinions, while it's (probably) the main database for machine learning. Hence, machine unlearning will have - at least - similar challenges as humans, and/but probably much bigger ones. I use doubt to separate facts from (false) opinions. I verify...
Monolingualism and bipartisan politics
My Eureka moment, as mentioned in my Centrism blog, may have arrived. The common ingredient of Anglo-Saxon countries is their English language (eg, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, UK, USA) . Suddenly, I remembered the articles on monolingualism and intelligence. Some examples on the connection between monolingualism and intelligence: 2009 cognition study: On the...
The Grifters
Recently, I had an unpleasant experience in a restaurant. After finishing our desert, I suddenly heard a loud voice behind me saying: "No, it was disgusting!" Apparently, she had responded to the waiter's question: "Did you enjoy your desert?" She also pushed 3 empty desert plates in his hands. Actually, that desert had been excellent: fried (!) strawberries with...
Idealism vs populism
In a recent video (>3 min.), Dutch vlogger Harry Vermeegen wondered why liberal-left beliefs qualify as idealism, while conservative-right beliefs qualify as populism. His remark triggered a question that had once been on my mind, but which I had discarded back then, for reasons I cannot recall. The ingredients of conservative-right beliefs are either (i) emotions...
Completed life
Until recently, I didn't appreciate this topic. In my view, it was a hobby horse (Dutch: stokpaardje) of the liberal-left. Today, my perspective is shifting following its drivers, being: (i) increasing life expectancy or demographics, (ii) being irrelevant to society, (iii) declining religion, and (iv) urbanisation. In many countries, the average age of the...
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