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Dr Nick

@nmwilkinson.bsky.social

1.6K followers 1.5K following 9.4K posts

Hey, everybody! Not that kind of doctor. Embodied cognition, AI and robotics, eating behaviour, flavour & the senses Mostly cathartic ranting Personal account

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Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · Nov 10

Ok fine.

Hey everybody, I'm Dr Nick!

I kibbitz #neuroscience and #ai and #embodiment conversations, insert jokes and takes and challenges and share papers.

But mostly, sorry it's cathartic rants about the state of things. I mean, wtaf?

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Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 7m

For sure, it's just that many of the criticisms were so vacuous and/or besides the point. In your case, for eg, it wasn't a grammar thing at all, what are you even doing here. Yeah, I was kinda rude to air my pet peeve at Iris. Sorry Iris. Muting this now

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 47m

Yeaaahhh

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 1h

Can't see that working out, but maybe at least some food will get into Gaza and the bombs will stop for a while

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 1h

fair point

Reposted by Dr Nick

A.R. Moxon @juliusgoat.bsky.social · 1h

I've noticed the opposing team's fans only cheer when the opponents score on us. To win those fans over, I recommend we score on ourselves repeatedly; that will surely make them so happy they'll start supporting us. And I'm sure all our fans will keep cheering for us—who else is there to cheer for?

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Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 1h

👊🏻

Adam Schwarz @adamjschwarz.bsky.social · 2h

Reporter: Why didn’t Trump win the Nobel Peace Prize?

Nobel committee chair: We only give the award to people of courage and integrity.

Reposted by Dr Nick

Mark Jacob @markjacob.bsky.social · 14h

If Trump invoked the Insurrection Act in these circumstances, it would be an unmistakable declaration that he's canceling our democracy and intends to rule as a dictator.
Everyone needs to understand that this would give us a sad but crystal-clear choice between resistance and submission.

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Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 1h

No he can't, he is already responsible for millions of deaths and major geopolitical instability.

Or did you mean David Attenborough?

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Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 1h

"David Attenborough snubbed for 100m sprint gold."

"Wut?"

Nicholas Grossman @nicholasgrossman.bsky.social · 2h

The widespread media decision to frame international affairs as "will Donnie get the prize he wants?" is pathetic.

He's not the protagonist of human events. And to the extent he's a significant character in world affairs, whether or not he gets a prize is one of the least important things about it.

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Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 1h

"I am a linguist, giving me tremendous moral authority as judge of internet behaviour."

"No it doesn't, you're just a daft scold chasing clout by sucking up to big accounts. Stick it up your arse."

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 2h

"You fool, language is constructed by mutual consensus over time, where usage and its reception gradually forms the norms of practice. Not by your imposition of your opinion, asserting your hierarchical dominance."

"May I participate in that mutuality?"

"You a linguist?"

"No."

"Then no."

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 2h

I for one welcome our great future as a weasley Trumpofascist beachhead to Europe

Phil Jones' body double @philsbodydouble.bsky.social · 2h

Over to you Keir. Which side are you going to choose for sovereign UK?

The side of the EU and the "green crap", or the side of your great friend Agent Orange?

EU refuses to bow to Trump demands to tear up business rules

Brussels has signaled it won’t yield to U.S. pressure to ignite a bonfire of green regulations as part of their trade deal, a top official tells diplomats.

www.politico.eu

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 2h

In case it helps
bsky.app/profile/nmwi...

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 23h

fwiw, my point was not 'this is a vocab error', but 'this turn of phrase makes one sound like David Brent'

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 2h

But having to swat off all this vacuous pontificating and insistence that language has no rules and cannot be treated as communicating stuff, and just plain made up nonsense and non-sequiturs from limpet-scolders. Just weird. Gonna mute the thread I think, what a waste of time

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Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 2h

Your link indexes a completely different use of "In which", as famously used in Pooh Bear stories.

Such a bizarre conversation. Like the valid criticism here is "bit of a dick move, man". To which I reply "yeah, feeling it, won't be doing that again".

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 2h

Oh I see

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 3h

Thank you for pointing out a typo, well done you

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 3h

Which votes matter?

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 3h

Sorry, I don't see the relevance of the link. Where is the bit relevant to this use of 'myself'?

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 3h

There probably wasn't. I suspect you just made that up?

If Dr Nick were to speak of himself in the third person, would you not form an impression?

Reposted by Dr Nick

Rosie Holt @rosieisaholt.bsky.social · 4h

MP defends government plans to restrict repeated protests.

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Reposted by Dr Nick

Chaz Firestone @chazfirestone.bsky.social · 21h

This is a big one! A 4-year writing project over many timezones, arguing for a reimagining of the influential "core knowledge" thesis.

Led by @daweibai.bsky.social, we argue that much of our innate knowledge of the world is not "conceptual" in nature, but rather wired into perceptual processing. 👇

Screenshot of a paper abstract:

“Core knowledge” refers to a set of cognitive systems that underwrite early representations of the physical and social world, appear universally across cultures, and likely result from our genetic endowment. Although this framework is canonically considered as a hypothesis about early emerging conception — how we think and reason about the world — here we present an alternative view: that many such representations are inherently perceptual in nature. This “core perception” view explains an intriguing (and otherwise mysterious) aspect of core-knowledge processes and representations: that they also operate in adults, where they display key empirical signatures of perceptual processing. We first illustrate this overlap using recent work on “core physics”, the domain of core knowledge concerned with physical objects, representing properties such as persistence through time, cohesion, solidity, and causal interactions. We review evidence that adult vision incorporates exactly these representations of core physics, while also displaying empirical signatures of genuinely perceptual mechanisms, such as rapid and automatic operation on the basis of specific sensory inputs, informational encapsulation, and interaction with other perceptual processes. We further argue that the same pattern holds for other areas of core knowledge, including geometrical, numerical, and social domains. In light of this evidence, we conclude that many infant results appealing to precocious reasoning abilities are better explained by sophisticated perceptual mechanisms shared by infants and adults. Our core-perception view elevates the status of perception in accounting for the origins of conceptual knowledge, and generates a range of ready-to-test hypotheses in developmental psychology, vision science, and more.

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Reposted by Dr Nick

Mark O’Neill 🐻 @radiobeartime.com · 4h

Lads, I don’t think you can really classify neo-colonialism as peace plan.

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Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 5h

limpet-scolds don't get automatic respect

Dr Nick @nmwilkinson.bsky.social · 5h

In Irish English it is used all the time, but that's irrelevant here. Non-native speakers might import reflexives by direct translation. In which case an fyi from native speaker seems ok