Should the list of members and minutes of SAGE be secret?

This is written in response to https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/23/world/europe/uk-coronavirus-sage-secret.html SAGE = The UK government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies This is a difficult question, but I believe the identity of SAGE members should remain secret. I also agree that the minutes of SAGE meetings should be kept secret during the Covid-19 crisis; however, I think the UK …

Welsh Independence?

This is written as a response to Bill Rowland's post calling for Welsh independence: https://billrowlands.home.blog/2019/05/22/a-vehicle-for-change-why-i-have-come-to-support-an-independent-wales/ I started writing this as a direct reply (first section), but ended up explaining why I disagree with almost all 'independence' campaigns (second section). Direct comments on Bill's piece: First, Bill talks about his disillusionment with Labour. I agree with …

Would We Want to Discover Aliens?

Introduction: We evolved at a relatively late stage compared to the age of the universe and there are hundreds of billions of planets orbiting stars in our galaxy. One would therefore think it likely that intelligent life has also evolved on one of these other planets. Why then do our telescopes not observe any evidence …

Do We Live in a Simulation?

Introduction Do we live in a simulation? The simulation argument, formally set out by Professor Nick Bostrom, is a startling philosophical disjunctive argument which has quite profound meta-physical and epistemological implications (Bostrom, 2003). A disjunctive argument is one which has several mutually exclusive premises (disjuncts) and one of these premises must be true. One of …