I've not been nearly as active on this blog as I once was. Alas, life tends to get in the way. Apart from a recent health scare and the resulting after effects, my familiar state of melancholia has made even expressing basic thoughts a herculean task. Fortunately though, things are now on the upswing and the muse is starting to return.
Of note lately are the changes in my wellness routine. I've taken up a tripartite regimen of meditation, cold exposure, and apnea training; all of which have been tremendously beneficial (essentially, this is the Wim Hof method + focused attention meditation). This has been especially interesting for me because of the experiential state these practices lead to: in effect, you can reach a stage where all perceptions and bodily sensations become objects of consciousness on par with separate, inanimate objects. Quite congenial for a substance dualist like myself.
New supplements? Nothing too radical; but something I've recently added to my stack is CoQ10 + Selenium. These are 2 compounds that previously weren't on my radar, but there appears to be good reason for anyone interested in longevity to supplement with them, and especially for vegans. For CoQ10, there's at least some preliminary evidence that vegans have lower levels of this than carnists according to this study here (although note that the study was conducted by a company that sells CoQ10, so that should be taken into account). Selenium is particularly important because it's not a staple component of a lot of Western foods, but also because it seems to have quite powerful anticancer properties.
But it's the combination of the 2 that's the most interesting. One of the most fascinating medical studies in the literature involved elderly patients being given a combination CoQ10 + Selenium supplement every day for 4 years. The ones taking the supplement had significantly better cardiovascular parameters and a significantly reduced mortality rate. What is more, these findings held up 10 years after they discontinued taking the supplement! (And as an extra bonus, the combination of these 2 ingredients seems to have a positive effect on reducing telomere shortening).
What's more important though is the state of my recent philosophical reflections. Previously I had considered my philosophical interests to be rather disjoint, but they increasingly appear to be much more connected than I previously assumed. Broadly speaking, in terms of practical philosophy what I've been most interested in is veganism on the one hand and transhumanism on the other; and in both cases in particular I've had a particular interest in reflecting on technological solutions to ethical problems. As far as theoretical philosophy is concerned, my primary concerns have been threefold: non-classical logic (especially relevevant/paraconsistent/substructural logic and modal logics), object theory, information-theoretic/computational philosophy.
On the surface it may seem like these concerns don't have much connection, but recently I've been noticing many more connections between them they I first thought there was. Firstly there's the issue of non-classical logics and information-theoretic/computational philosophy. These probably have the most obvious connections, especially considering how the intended semantics for substructural and relevant logics most naturally has an information-theoretic interpretations. But the semantics for relevant logics in particular is also noneist in character (given that it deals with impossible worlds of various sorts), leading to further connections with object theory.
But how to connect these interests with my interests in practical philosophy? Well as we know from current work on transhumanism, and especially work related to wild animal suffering and genetic engineering, the 'technical solutions' will surely involve quite computational work (recall the references I've made on this blog to reprogramming predators). And given that I'm a staunch advocate of fully working out the theoretical foundations to practical affairs, it will in all likelihood be quite fruitful to explore the possible interconnections between the information-theoretic approach to non-classical logics and the computational work required to solve the ethical dilemmas we face in the practical world.
These are quite speculative ruminations at this point, but we will be sure to explore these issues in more detail in due course.
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