opinions

Someone, the name of whom shall remain anonymous, suggested that I put lots of philosophy at my site to scare people away. I've already posted a link to my old school's philosophy club page, and those of you who're really keen can go there and find some good reading.

On the other hand, I don't have much original material to add here, except for what I have already added.

Interesting quotes:

Diagnosis: Determining the condition of the patinet's purse so that you know how sick to make him. Ambrose Bierce

Doctors: People who cure diseases - of which they know little, with medicine - of which they know less, on people - of whom they know nothing. Voltaire

Professor (and lecturers as well): Someone who talks in someone else's sleep. (A pun, I believe)

(I think these came from 'The Cynic's Dictionary', but since I don't have the copy with me, I'm not quite sure about the accuracy of these quotes.)

For those of you in UNSW Med: If you went to the ICBS lectures you might remember one where Norm mentioned something about scientific theories. There he referred to a certain view that perhaps there are no absolutes in science, citing Kuhn's work to support his view. Guess what - I've found an article dealing with this very issue in my old school's philosophy club page. Click on that link on my front page and look for a link to a reference to Kuhn's theory on scientific revolutions. It seems that 'philosophy' a la ICBS is nowhere as absolute as the course lecturers would like to think . . .

The Chicken and Egg problem

"Which appeared first, the chicken or the egg?" "The egg, because reptiles appeared earlier than birds, and they lay eggs as well."

The question to ask, in reality, is: "Which appeared first, the chicken or the chicken egg?" The response to that is slightly more complicated, but please bear with me if you're interested. (which I know you are, otherwise you wouldn't be here, would you?)

Firstly we'll have to define what a chicken is and isn't. The most likely basis for such a definition is a genetic one - we can define a chicken as an organism the genetic code of which includes certain genes, and excludes some other particular genes. This would allow us to perform a test with a 'chickenometer': an imaginary device which reads the organism's DNA to determine whether it's a chicken or a non-chicken. An egg with cells containing the same DNA as that of a proven chicken is then defined as a chicken egg.

Presumably the first chicken (ie. the first organism which passed the 'chickenometer test) was born of parents that failed the test. So the DNA of the offspring contained a mutation from the original DNA of the parents. Now such a mutation occured either in the germ cells of the parents, or maybe shortly after fertilisation when the conceptus was still at a single-celled stage (in any case, the mutation occured before the birth of the chicken.) Therefore the egg already has the newly improved 'chicken-specific' genes. and that would have been the first chicken egg, which then gave rise to the first chicken after hatching. Therefore, the chicken egg appeared before the chicken. Happy?