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What we know about Trump’s July Fourth fireworks event
President Donald Trump’s celebration for America’s 250th anniversary will culminate Saturday with a record-breaking fireworks show on the National Mall amid scorching temperatures and controversy over his efforts to put himself at the center of the commemoration.
How Trump Made America's 250th Anniversary About Himself
Donald Trump is trying to make America's 250th anniversary about himself, from putting his face on federal building to the celebration itself.
Trump refashions America's 250th as a celebration of himself
Historians say the nation's 250th anniversary has become a politicized spectacle, a celebration of an imperial presidency.
Roma, Basel reach agreement over Calafiori’s resale clause
Riccardo Calafiori is one of the players who emerged from Roma’s youth system and has managed to establish himself on the big stage. The former Giallorossi defender won the Premier League with Arsen...
Boleslaw Wyslouch steps down as director of Laboratory for Nuclear Science
After more than 10 years at the helm of the Laboratory for Nuclear Science (LNS), Boleslaw “Bolek” Wyslouch will step down to continue research in nuclear physics as director of the Bates Research and Engineering Center, a subgroup of LNS. “LNS scientists, including Bolek himself, are world leaders in particle and nuclear physics,” says Nergis […]
Building the Valley: Young Springdale man keeping lawns at bay as business grows
When Justin Burrell started landscaping in 2022, the then-14-year-old wasn’t old enough to drive himself to clients’ houses so he enlisted help from his parents. At first, he mowed lawns for some extra pocket change. Now, at 18, Burrell is working toward turn his Burrell Grounds and Services business into
Jalen Brunson receives praise from Knicks fans for offseason work
Jalen Brunson is wasting no time keeping himself in shape this offseason. He led the New York Knicks to the 2026 NBA championship on June 13, and the superstar guard is already working out 16 days later. A video of…
8-year Cowboys team leader retires after 12 NFL seasons
The Cowboys special teams ace has made a name for himself among the club's fans.
Sanford Health to highlight best practices for AI adoption at national leadership conference
Sanford Health’s Dr. David Newman will speak at two HIMSS AI conferences in Boston this week, discussing AI adoption, governance and clinical workflows.
Sanford Health to highlight best practices for AI adoption at national leadership conference
Sanford Health’s Dr. David Newman will speak at two HIMSS AI conferences in Boston this week, discussing AI adoption, governance and clinical workflows.
Vancouver turns its Science World museum into a giant 17-story soccer ball for the World Cup
It started with a whimsical idea
Vancouver turns its Science World museum into a giant 17-story soccer ball for the World Cup
It started with a whimsical idea.
Vancouver turns its Science World museum into a giant 17-story soccer ball for the World Cup
It started with a whimsical idea. Why not transform the landmark Science World museum in downtown Vancouver, the geodesic dome-topped building not far from BC Place stadium, into a gigantic 17-story soccer ball for the World Cup?
Vancouver turns its Science World museum into a giant 17-story soccer ball for the World Cup
It started with a whimsical idea. Why not transform the landmark Science World museum in downtown Vancouver, the geodesic dome-topped building not far from BC Place stadium, into a gigantic
Andy Burnham distanced himself from UK Prime Minister Starmer, but may be stuck with his policies
Burnham, the former mayor of Greater Manchester who was sworn into Parliament hours after Starmer announced his resignation on Monday, will be constrained by the platform the center-left Labour Party was elected on that decisively ended 14 years of Conservative rule in 2024.
Andy Burnham distanced himself from UK Prime Minister Starmer, but may be stuck with his policies
Andy Burnham has set himself apart from the man he expects to replace as British prime minister
Trump posts new passport rendering — featuring a memorable photo of himself
President Donald Trump unveiled a new rendering of a special commemorative US passport bearing his likeness Friday, debuting a limited-edition passport to mark America’s 250th anniversary this year.
Vance Downplays Watergate and Compares Himself to Nixon
The vice president said that the scandal that ended Richard Nixon’s presidency would be “like a 12-hour news story” if it happened today and that the “deep state” had taken down Nixon.
Karl Stefanovic Speaks Out on Nine Exit After Tommy Robinson Scandal
The 'Today' host declares himself 'free' in a YouTube statement after Nine ends his contract following a deleted Tommy Robinson podcast episode.
Will Red Grooms' whimsical, wonderful Tennessee Fox Trot Carousel ride again?
The Tennessee State Museum in Nashville is considering how to bring a beloved whimsical carousel back to life. The Tennessee Fox Trot Carousel was the creation of Nashville-born artist Red
JD Vance claims Diddy is 'not a Christian' after federal conviction
Sean "Diddy" Combs might have scored a reference in Vice President JD Vance's new book, but the politician is not eager to associate himself with the imprisoned music mogul.
Health systems must shift AI use from automation to transformation
While healthcare investments in AI are two to three times that of other industries, most providers focus AI's power on tackling administrative tasks. But AI's true value is in transforming care, explain experts at the HIMSS AI in Healthcare Forum.
David P. O'Brien
About five years ago, David P. O'Brien had a comfortable position at Marsh & McLennan Cos., where he held the top post at the financial giant's Louisville, Ky., office. Despite the lofty rank, Mr. O'Brien found himself longing to be at a smaller company that had to work a little harder to land business. That desire led him away from Kentucky five years ago and to Cleveland, where he serves as executive vice president at business insurance agency Oswald Cos. "I left Marsh before it was en vogue," he said, referring to layoffs and defections at Marsh over the course of this year that followed accusations of bid rigging at the big firm. Above all, Mr. O'Brien, 38, wanted to work at a company that relied on its inventiveness, rather than its name, for business. He said he has found that at Oswald. "It causes you to be more creative, to be more resourceful," Mr. O'Brien said. For instance, an Oswald client seeking to do business internationally might be directed to the network of offices abroad run by competitors such as Marsh and Aon Risk Services Inc. "We're going to use whatever access into the market that makes the most sense for our clients," he said. Of course, using such a strategy can be dangerous for Oswald if its client decides to further a business relationship with one of the firms Oswald recommended. "That's the obvious question and why it's nontraditional," he said. "I think if we're good, and if we're bringing value to the client, then there's no risk. I'm not threatened by it." Imaginative business solutions of that type made his career move to Oswald from Marsh worthwhile. "It's very much a challenge," he said. "It helps you keep your edge. I'm all for the competition." John Jacunski, currently vice president and corporate controller at York, Pa., paper company PH Gladfelter Co., met Mr. O'Brien four years ago when Mr. Jacunski was at WCI Steel Inc. in Warren. So impressed was he with Mr. O'Brien's work for WCI that Mr. Jacunski has retained the Oswald executive at PH Gladfelter. "He's a young guy for the position he has, but he's done a great job for us," Mr. Jacunski said. Among his roles at Oswald, Mr. O'Brien leads the firm's client retention efforts and also serves as director of its property and casualty group. "You don't have the same human resources," he said of the job jump to Oswald. "You don't have, obviously, the safety net a big company has." But sometimes, it can be difficult to ascertain individual contributions when working at a big company. "I wanted to be able to see the end results of my work and my efforts," Mr. O'Brien said.
How should European scientists respond to the US AI kill switch?
Earlier in June, Europe’s worst fears of technological dependence were confirmed when the White House ordered the AI firm Anthropic to stop non-US citizens using its leading models. This kill-switch moment crystalised anxieties in Brussels that the continent, lagging the US on the creation of leading-edge AI models, is now a technological of vassal of Washington. The shock has specific implications for European scientists and universities. Some governments are now worried that with AI being integrated into labs, Donald Trump now has his finger hovering over an off switch for European science. “Having restrictions on this tool, it can have an impact on our own research,” said France’s research minister, Philippe Baptiste, at the VivaTech conference in Paris on June 18.Baptiste, himself a former academic, said that colleagues in mathematics had recently warned him they were now cut off from leading-edge US models, risking their work. “This model is not available anymore now because of the US restriction, and for the first time this had an impact on mathematics,” a field where large language models (LLMs) are making a significant contribution, said Baptiste. So, should European scientists avoid relying on US models in the future? Or would this be a self-harming overreaction? And how is AI being used in science, anyway? What happened?On June 12, it emerged that Washington, citing cybersecurity concerns, had ordered Anthropic to stop non-US citizens using two models: Claude Mythos 5, and Claude Fable 5, a version of Mythos but with guardrails to prevent abuse. Anthropic said Washington’s concerns were overblown. But forced to follow the order, yet with no way to check who was using the models, the company suddenly shut down access for everyone, US citizens included. There’s still no agreement on how to restore broad access. But last week, Bloomberg reported that select US companies, and the US government, still had access to Mythos despite the ban, but the EU’s cybersecurity agency Enisa had been shut out. Class division of researchersIn the longer term, access outside the US should be restored, said Marcel Salathé, co-director of the AI centre at the Federal Polytechnic School of Lausanne (EPFL), because a permanent restriction would be financially ruinous to US AI firms. “Even Trump will eventually budge to economic pressure,” he said.However, US AI firms might end up operating rather like banks, doing due diligence on users of their leading-edge AI models, he went on.European scientists are unlikely to fall foul of such checks, he said. But having a Chinese postgraduate in their lab, or doing a type of research the US disapproved of, could potentially result in access being denied. “It will create a sort of class division of researchers,” he said. More than frontier modelsHowever, successfully deploying AI in science is about far more than just having access to leading LLMs such as Mythos.Instead, many science-specific tools, most famously Alphafold, which predicts protein folding structures, require “far less” computing power to train than frontier models, well within the capabilities of European supercomputers, according to a recent analysis by the Arq Foundation, a Brussel-based AI think tank. Instead, tools such as Alphafold are possible because certain fields, like protein folding, weather prediction or astronomy, have large, clean, standardised datasets that can be used to train predictive models. Rather than compute, “data is the central constraint for AI for science,” the report says. For example, a less powerful physics model trained on CERN’s data “will be more valuable than the best model without certain data,” said Bengüsu Özcan, author of the report. European advantage?Europe could therefore steal a march by using its scientific data and infrastructure to create models US digital giants cannot. “They might actually match or go even beyond what these big [US] companies are doing,” said Özcan.Indeed, some European start-ups hope to create automated testing labs to create the kind of standardised data that could speed up the discovery of new materials. Materials scientists say there’s currently too little data to train models. AI scientistsHowever, even if the bottleneck for AI in science is often data, rather than compute, being at the mercy of the US for LLM access could still become a problem for European scientists. A new class of “AI scientists” based on leading LLMs is also emerging, Özcan’s report says.Unlike domain-specific tools like Alphafold, these try to automate day-to-day scientific work, by providing an overarching tool that coordinates specific models to synthesise existing literature, generate hypotheses or run analysis of data. The problem for Europe, however, is that these tools are sometimes based on US leading models. Google Deepmind’s AI Co-Scientist, for example, is built on Google’s Gemini LLM. Systematic failureThese scientific automation tools are still in their early stages, and still exhibit “systematic failures on scientific tasks,” Özcan’s report says. One of the problems is that the messy, day-to-day process of scientific discovery is largely not documented, meaning LLMs don’t have a good source of data to learn how scientists actually work. Meanwhile, some tasks, such as literature synthesis, don’t typically require access to leading edge models.However, the performance of AI scientific assistants could improve as companies such as Google pour resources into developing them. Rely on US“Unfortunately, for scientific assistants, there is not much we can do right now except rely on US frontier AI,” said Antoine Bosselut, a natural language processing expert based at EPFL. Chinese-built open models, which can run on local computers, lessening the risk of a shutdown, are touted as one alternative to US dependence. There’s also Mistral, once seen as Europe’s main AI hope, but the Paris-based company has seen its recent models fall behind in performance. But the Chinese alternatives are generally not as capable as US frontier AI models, said Bosselut, unless paired with fiddly, custom tools that allows them to act as independent agents. “Most scientists do not have the time,” he said. Don’t jump ship yetAlthough the kill switch moment is seen a warning shot for European scientists, it doesn’t mean labs should abandon US AI tools immediately. “I do not think the right response is simply to abandon US-based models and systems under the banner of sovereignty or independence,” said Mattias Björnmalm, secretary general of the Cesaer university association. “That would be an overreaction.”Related articlesEuropean sovereignty in AI requires ‘ugly trade-offs,’ say experts Robotic lab start-up makes case for €500M EU-funded materials testing facilityAI in science: is it useful? Instead, European researchers need to ask themselves whether they’re becoming dependent on technology that could be turned off in Washington, said Özcan. “They might not see this today, but they should really start asking this question,” she said. European researchers need a plan B, said Salathé. “I would recommend to every researcher, very proactively explore alternatives.”Own toolsIn addition, Björnmalm and others want European research institutions to develop their own scientific AI tools.Instead of signing AI deals with US digital giants, European universities should be using this money to create their own models, which may end up being superior for research, said Sabine Leonelli, an expert on the use of AI in science at the Technical University of Munich. “Universities in Europe seem to be happy to sign commercial contracts with US companies on the assumption [their AI tools] are better,” she said. But US frontier LLMs are typically opaque, and have been developed without independent scientific input, she said. “This is not good enough for science.”Last year, Swiss researchers released Apertus, an LLM designed to be completely transparent, from its development methods to its training data. The idea is that this makes scientific tools built on top of the model far more reproducible than with closed, commercial alternatives.“Europe needs more of this: serious capacity-building that gives researchers, universities and companies credible options,” said Björnmalm.
Hims' obesity drug business may get boost as employers drop coverage
Telehealth provider Hims and Hers Health may get a boost next year from employers dropping coverage of weight-loss drugs like Novo Nordisk's Wegovy and Eli Lilly's Zepbound and Foundayo to rein in costs, investors and analysts say.
Is Trump celebrating the country, or himself, on America’s 250th?
It was almost as if the last 250 years never happened.
Is Trump celebrating the country, or himself, on America’s 250th?
It was almost as if the last 250 years never happened.
Colts offensive line fixture lands in ‘NFL Top 100’ again
Colts offensive line anchor Quenton Nelson finds himself in the ‘NFL Top 100’ yet again.
Wicks working to show he's ‘worthwhile' for Eagles with a bet-on-himself deal
It might not be receiver by committee in Philadelphia after all. That’s if newly acquired Dontayvion Wicks has something to say about it.
Suspect arrested after shooting, standoff at north Charlotte business
A suspect is facing charges after shooting into an occupied vehicle and barricading himself inside a local business.
Chig Okonkwo Fitting with Washington Commanders On, Off the Field
The Washington Commanders added a major weapon to the offense this offseason with tight end Chig Okonkwo proving himself as a fit on and off the field
Opinion: Trump's 'Drill, baby, drill' serves himself, oil companies
“Drill, Baby Drill” domestic oil production was supposed to protect us from international price fixing, bad behavior in the Middle East. It hasn't.
Cooling hoodies help England staff combat World Cup heat
As the England players trained under the searing heat of the Kansas City sun on Saturday, manager Thomas Tuchel took a very different approach to keeping himself cool.
Why some Russians are breaking with Putin as Ukraine war drags on
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s iron grip on power is being challenged by the war in Ukraine and his government’s authoritarian crackdowns. He finds himself in unfamiliar political territory, questioned by some of the country’s elite and embarrassed by Ukraine’s strikes into Russian cities. Compass Points moderator Nick Schifrin discusses the state of Russian politics with Arkady Ostrovsky.
U.S. Open: Dustin Johnson returned to the top, then vanished at Shinnecock
Dustin Johnson seemingly turned back the clock, getting himself in contention, until disaster struck.
Living Longer Is Big Business. These Stocks Will Benefit.
Longevity healthcare could be big business for companies like Planet Fitness, Abbott, and Hims & Hers.
Saving the trees: Decades of work lead to UTC faculty publication in Science
The first American chestnut tree Dr. Hill Craddock ever saw was one he grew himself. He was about 15 years old, working out of a small greenhouse his father built beside their home. A neighbor gave him a handful of chestnut seeds and suggested Craddock try growing them.
I read JD Vance’s new book. It reveals more than he realizes.
The vice president pitches himself as a humble Catholic convert in a new memoir — but somehow skips the humility part when it comes to politics.
Health leaders urged to curb aggressive AI spending
This HIMSS26 APAC speaker advises leaders to pace their AI investments despite the technology's rapid development.
Spider-Man faces off against the Hulk in 'Brand New Day' trailer: 'Didn't know you could get that big'
Is your Peter tingle activated? Spider-Man finds himself going up against the Hulk in the newest 'Brand New Day' trailer.
Yakuza Creator's New Game Seems To Have Lost Its Director After NetEase Reportedly Pulled Funding
Daisuke Sato is now describing himself as 'ex-Nagoshi Studio'
Terminated employee accused of stealing from Lexington business
Police say Wayne Michael Properties in Lexington reported a former employee was forging and issuing checks to himself.
Spurs' Dylan Harper keeping 'positive attitude' after NBA Finals loss
Dylan Harper has separated himself as one of the best young guards in the league following his NBA Finals performance.
Major Shedeur Sanders development emerges amid Browns QB competition
Shedeur Sanders has reportedly closed the gap between himself and Deshaun Watson during the Cleveland Browns offseason program.
How former Dallas Cowboys player Jaylon Smith ‘cracked the code' in business
FRISCO — He opened the front door himself — the 30-year-old who has taken a sledgehammer to the trope about NFL players going broke. There’s Jaylon Smith, shuffling about as “So Amazing” by Beyoncé and Stevie Wonder resonates through his 5,000-square-foot home. His 9-year-old dog, Achilles, meanders. Follow the former Dallas Cowboys linebacker into his office, past the golden skull…
Temporary Protected Status needs to be protected from political whims
Temporary may be part of the the title, but temporary protected status for immigrants shouldn't be arbitrary, write Jennica Larrison and Ben Coleman, who say a White House push to cancel TPS for a dozen countries is "nothing short of betrayal."
Trump puts himself at center of birthday spectacle
Trump marked his 80th birthday with a UFC fight staged on White House grounds — a spectacle that underscored how he has sought to turn sports, historically an escape from politics, into another front in America's divisions.
These Portland trail guides build community through science, education and whimsy
“Drag Me Outside,” where field biology meets fabulousness.
📝 2026 World Cup, overnight round-up
The full recap of the night at the World Cup!The must-see moment of the nightA remarkable record was broken very early this morning by a rising star who has just revealed himself to the world!Nestory ...
‘Winning at all costs:’ Trump wraps himself in UFC’s bareknuckle image
UFC Freedom 250 marks the culmination of a decades-long relationship between a president and a sport which harnessed bravado to reach the White House.
How Trump has deceived himself on Iran
President Donald Trump is nothing if not studied at crafting elaborate alternate realities.
PAD patients minimize risk when they listen to their doctors
Patients who exercise and take all prescribed medications, for instance, experience better outcomes than those who do not.
Fantasy Rookie Profile: Zachariah Branch in redraft leagues
Zachariah Branch is lining himself up to make an impact as a rookie, but can he be worth a spot in your fantasy lineup?
‘Big Ev’ breaks silence on Barstool absence, reveals gambling addiction
Evan “Big Ev” McDowell broke his silence Wednesday in a video posted to social media, confirming that he checked himself into a residential treatment center for a gambling addiction, in what amounted to his first public statement since disappearing from Barstool Sports content in early April amid allegations that he stiffed multiple illegal bookmakers out…
Commentary: Spencer Pratt could have been a real contender. His greatest enemy was himself
Spencer Pratt had a few things going for him when he launched an insurgent campaign to become Los Angeles' next mayor.
2nd District, gubernatorial races to go to ranked-choice runoff
Republican Bobby Charles declared himself the first-round leader in the GOP gubernatorial race.
Dennis Arfa Inducted by Billy Joel into the Long Island Music and Entertainment Hall of Fame
Induction part of 2-day Billy Joel Symposium Event Stony Brook, NY — Music Executive Dennis Arfa, Billy Joel’s longtime booking agent and chairman of the Music Division at Independent Artist Group, was recently inducted into the Long Island Music & Entertainment Hall of Fame (LIMEHOF) by LIMEHOF Inductee Billy Joel himself at a special ceremony at their Stony Brook Village location (97 Main Street). The induction was part of the 2-day ‘Billy Joel Symposium’.
Hugh Laurie slams writer for criticizing 'House' 14 years after its finale: 'Wasn't meant for you'
Hugh Laurie channeled Dr. Gregory House himself when responding to criticism of the medical drama on which he starred for eight years: 'It wasn't meant for you.'
Is Hims & Hers Health, Inc. (HIMS) A Good Stock To Buy Now?
Is HIMS a good stock to buy? We came across a bearish thesis on Hims & Hers Health, Inc. on Valueinvestorsclub.com by Pridwen. In this article, we will summarize the bears’ thesis on HIMS. Hims & Hers Health, Inc.’s share was trading at $27.51 as of June 2nd. HIMS’s trailing and forward P/E were 57.14 and 58.82 […]
Dolphins Chop Robinson reveals changes he's made this offseason
Miami Dolphins linebacker Chop Robinson has done a lot work to make sure he's the best version of himself in 2026.
Dodgers' Japanese-born starting trio establishes unique MLB mark
With Roki Sasaki establishing himself in his past four starts, Los Angeles' pitching staff remains internationally celebrated.
Shohei Ohtani’s Cy Young Push Comes With Dodgers Dilemma
The Dodgers are in a tough spot, with Shohei Ohtani pitching himself into the Cy Young race, but the team still needs him to be healthy for October.
Where rookie Lewis Bond’s skillset fits in Houston’s offense
Texans sixth round receiver is carving out a role for himself in a crowded room.
America’s oceans need protection, not politics
Rather than relying solely on the whims of a particular administration, the MARA Act would establish science-based requirements, ensuring clear and consistent guardrails for how aquaculture researc…
America’s oceans need protection, not politics
Rather than relying solely on the whims of a particular administration, the MARA Act would establish science-based requirements, ensuring clear and consistent guardrails for how aquaculture researc…
Paul Skenes Sends Clear Message To Himself After Astros Outing
Skenes knows he has to go deeper in the games.
President Trump says he will nominate Todd Blanche to serve as attorney general
Blanche sought quickly to position himself as the favorite for the permanent job after Pam Bondi's firing in April
President Trump says he will nominate Todd Blanche to serve as attorney general
Blanche sought quickly to position himself as the favorite for the permanent job after Pam Bondi's firing in April
President Trump says he will nominate Todd Blanche to serve as attorney general
Blanche sought quickly to position himself as the favorite for the permanent job after Pam Bondi's firing in April
President Trump says he will nominate Todd Blanche to serve as attorney general
Blanche sought quickly to position himself as the favorite for the permanent job after Pam Bondi's firing in April
Short-sighted: John Ternus behind Apple Vision project refocuses
Apple's head-mounted hardware plans are slowly being cut, reportedly by new CEO John Ternus himself, with Vision Air said to be killed off alongside Display glasses.
The cult of objectivity has broken consciousness science
With 22 competing theories and no consensus in sight, the science of consciousness is lost. In this exclusive IAI interview, Berkeley psychedelics researcher and bestselling author of a new book on consciousness Michael Pollan insists that even though consciousness lies beyond traditional forms of scientific investigation, we should resist becoming dualists who see it as something radically different from ordinary stuff in the world. Instead, he makes the case for reimagining science itself: it must stop reaching for objective descriptions of physical reality, and instead embrace subjectivity as the indispensable core of all inquiry. Alasdair Craig: How did your experiences with psychedelics get you interested in consciousness?Michael Pollan: One of the things that happens on psychedelics is that they foreground consciousness. What formerly seemed perfectly transparent and ever present—and yet, non-existent, as water is to fish—suddenly you see it. The metaphor I use in the book is that psychedelics sponge the windscreen. Suddenly you realize: wow, there’s a windscreen, there is this phenomenon that’s mediating my relationship to reality. This is not an unusual realization on psychedelics. I think a lot of people are called to think about consciousness after psychedelic experiences. So that was the proximate inspiration for A World Appears: A Journey Into Consciousness (2026).And then there was a more specific way in which psychedelics influence the book. That was a particular experience I had on psilocybin. I had the sensation that the plants in my garden were conscious and returning my gaze, with their own point of view and agency, and I got curious as to how to evaluate an insight like that. I mean, what’s the truth quotient of insights you have on psychedelics? And I was reading William James—who, of course, wrote beautifully about mystical experience—and he said, we can’t judge the metaphysics here, but we should pay attention to two criteria: (1) How useful is it to think this is true? He was a pragmatist, of course. And (2) can we subject it to other ways of knowing to validate it? Because maybe we should treat these insights as hypotheses. And that’s kind of how I approach psychedelics, as a great generator of hypotheses, but they need to be tested against other ways of knowing. And so that led me down this long path exploring the science of plant intelligence and plant sentience.AC: I love your phrase, “smudging the windowpane of conscious experience.” So do you now start to think, actually, even when I’m not on psychedelics, I’m just seeing a screen all the time, which is not reality, but rather is my conscious experience, behind which reality is hidden?MP: Well, you know, not when I’m brushing my teeth and making breakfast! But yes, in meditation, certainly. I mean, one of the things you realize is that my experience happens to be this way now, but it could be another way. And many things can affect it. My morning coffee changes the screen in various ways, sharpens certain things.___The only tool we have to understand consciousness is consciousness.___There’s this wonderful metaphor in Aldous Huxley’s book, The Doors of Perception, where he thinks we channel consciousness, and that what the brain does is edit it, and there’s a reducing valve. And psychedelics open the reducing valve wider. I don’t know that I’m ready to buy into the idea that consciousness exists outside brains, but I do love that metaphor because there are times when you are more conscious than others. I know I’ve switched from window pane to valve, but you know, a camera aperture can open wider or narrower. And I do have a sense of that. I have a sense of when I’m being less conscious, and when I’m being more conscious, by which I mean, you know, more present, taking in more sensory information. So when you start thinking about consciousness as a matter of degree, that changes things also.I think when we scroll on social media, obviously, we’re conscious. But minimally so, because we don’t have to generate our own thoughts. We’re basically taking these little hits from other people and thinking their thoughts.The process of writing this book made me kind of relativize everyday consciousness as just one type, which is exactly what William James said. Normal consciousness is one type, separated by the flimsiest of screens from the other types.AC: If we stick with the metaphor of the smudge on the window that you get when you take psychedelics, it seems like we’re saying that consciousness has become like an object that you’re looking at, right? You’re looking at the smudge and that just is consciousness. But sometimes we’ll talk about consciousness as a state that you’re in, rather than an object you can perceive. You’re either conscious or you’re not conscious. So it’s difficult to really know what sort of thing we’re talking about when we talk about consciousness, right?MP: Yeah. When you say that consciousness is an object, what’s the subject? Consciousness also? The only tool we have to understand consciousness is consciousness. So we’re in a closed loop and when we get a perspective on consciousness, we’re not achieving any distance from it. That’s one of the problems with studying consciousness. Science is predicated on an objective, God’s eye view of things, and you never get that. There’s no such thing. SUGGESTED VIEWING The brain filters consciousness With Àlex Gómez-Marín But, yeah, there is this sense, I think, that consciousness is something you can approach. Certainly, when you’re writing and trying to recreate a conscious experience, it’s a fiction, but you’re standing back from it, and looking at it. But there’s no real subject-object distinction.AC: That’s so interesting, because when philosophers start talking about consciousness, they often talk about what they call “qualia”, which is their word for the felt experience of, say, the color red. And I think that way of speaking often makes us think of the qualia as an object, which you can see out there: the redness of red. But, as you say, we also want to collapse the subject-object distinction when we talk about consciousness. So there’s something strange going on here…MP: Oh, yeah, there are many strange things going on! *AC: Let’s talk about the varieties of consciousness. Apart from perceptions, there are, pains, emotions, thoughts, and so on. What is it that holds all this diversity together so that they all count as instances of consciousness? What is it that they all have in common?MP: Yeah, that’s a really good question. I mean, there is sensory information, right? Which we perceive coming from the world outside ourselves. And then there’s internal information, which is what’s called interoception. And this is very important too. This is where feelings come from—what are sometimes called homeostatic feelings—that are intended to get the brain to keep us in these narrow ranges of temperature and glucose and so on. That’s a very important part of consciousness. And according to some researchers, who I think are probably right, this is where consciousness begins, with these very primal feelings, like hunger and thirst and warmth and itch, and things like that. And then there’s this third thing, which is our thinking about thinking.And what holds all this together is, I think, the sense of self. Consciousness generates a self: it is probably an organizing principle. All this stuff is happening to the self. It’s a construct, I think, but it is very useful. It can connect all these different streams of consciousness to a single being or a place, metaphorically speaking.* AC: The first half of your book is about the science of consciousness. Is consciousness just another thing, like black holes or the origin of life, which we don’t yet understand, but which we should have every hope that science will one day get to the bottom of, or is there something special about consciousness that makes this unlikely?MP: It depends how you define science. As we define science now, it’s going be very difficult. Science since Galileo has had a set of rules or assumptions, which is that the proper remit of science is to deal with the objective, quantifiable, third-person world. And the physical sciences have done amazing work under that set of limitations. Galileo—for tactical reasons, not for philosophical reasons—said science should not deal with the soul, which at the time was what consciousness was considered to be. So what is subjective, what is qualitative, what is first person, we’re going to leave to the church, he said. And this was a good agreement, and it probably kept many scientists from getting burned at the stake. But it leaves science in an awkward spot, now that it wants to venture into that territory of qualities, of first-person experience. And I don’t think it has the proper tools. I think it will have to add to its toolkit in some way, and find a way to bring in phenomenology, or lived experience and introspection, which science is usually dismissive of.The challenge—we alluded to it earlier—is that the only tool you have to study consciousness with is consciousness. And what I mean by that is, the whole scientific enterprise is a manifestation of consciousness. As much as scientists like to flatter themselves with this idea that they attain a godlike perspective on what they study, when it comes to consciousness, there’s no such thing. And it’s fine for all the things you can step outside of and study from that perspective. But two areas it won’t work are consciousness and cosmology.___It could be that we live in this anomaly of not believing nature is conscious. And maybe psychedelics are teaching us something we’ve forgotten.___With cosmology, too, you have to study the universe from inside the universe. It’s not that cosmologists haven’t made progress. We know a lot about the age of the universe and expansion and things like that. But we can’t penetrate what happened before the Big Bang. We just don’t have the tools because we can’t stand outside.The fact that there are 22 full-scale theories of consciousness tells you all you need to know: we’re kind of lost. And I was surprised to find that we are more lost than I thought we were when I started this. I thought that there’d be leading theories, or that we had experiments that we could conduct that would nail some of this down. And the fact is, we don’t.So, I don’t know if science can solve it. But, of course, we can change the rules of science. A really influential book for me was a book called The Blind Spot, by two physicists, Marcello Gleiser and Adam Frank, and a philosopher, Evan Thompson. It’s a reminder that science is a social practice. It’s organized in a certain way and it can be organized in a different way. But it has this huge blind spot at the center of it, which is its failure to recognize that it is a form of consciousness itself, and it doesn’t have a good way of taking account of lived experience.AC: On the one hand, I think you want to resist traditional dualism, which would say that consciousness is something magical, something supernatural, right? But on the other hand, you’re accepting that there is this division in reality between the stuff that you can investigate objectively and measure, and so on—the stuff that science has been good at finding out about—and consciousness, which, for some reason, you can’t objectively measure. Some would take this to suggest that the dualism is actually right. Is there a way of reconciling these two strands of your thinking?MP: To call it magical is full of value judgement. I mean, you could just say immaterial. The interesting thing is, I think, that intuitively we’re all dualists. And I don’t know whether that’s because we’re children of Descartes and other cultures are less dualist than we are. Or it may be because that’s how consciousness feels. It feels different than the body. It feels separate from the body. But I don’t think we should trust that intuition.AC: So let’s think about ways that science might be changed to get at consciousness. I suppose the starting point would be the way that you begin the second half of your book. You have this nice line from William James, where he says, “We now begin our study of the mind from within.” Could you give us some sense of the ways of studying the mind from within? What does this involve?MP: I don’t know what that science looks like. But one of the points I’m making is that it depends on the humanities. I found that I learned as much, if not more, about consciousness, from reading novels and poetry. There is a sense of the fullness and complexity of consciousness that you don’t get in any scientific account. I interviewed this stream-of-consciousness writer and I approached her as an expert on consciousness, and she is. So I think that dialogue is really important.I’m reading Ben Lerner’s new novel, Transcription. Just read the first page of this novel: it’s a man falling asleep on a train, going to conduct an interview, and there is the experience of being in the train, facing backwards, there’s the view outside, but there’s a reflection of himself through which he’s seeing outside. There’s the memory of dropping his kids off at school. All this is going on in one moment of consciousness. Scientists aren’t going anywhere near that. But I think it’s useful for them to think about. That’s where we’re trying to go: like, how does such a layered experience happen? You know, it also makes you wonder, could a computer ever do this? And it gives you some doubt.*AC: Before we get to computers, perhaps we could talk briefly about plants. How did you come to feel that they are sentient?MP: Well, it was a psychedelic experience, and it’s not unusual on psychedelics. In fact, there’ve been studies about how people become animists during psychedelic experience. Their belief in animism arises after a single psychedelic experience.You know, most scientists would say this is all a myth. But we have only 400 years of the age of enlightenment and science. Before that, we were animists, and if you go around the world, most indigenous cultures are still animists, and children are animists, by and large, until they go to school. So it could be that we live in this anomaly of not believing nature is conscious. And maybe psychedelics are teaching us something we’ve forgotten.As I said, I wanted to test this idea, and see whether there was conventional scientific evidence for it. And there’s fascinating work going on in a field that calls itself—in a rather cheeky way—plant neurobiology. These are people who fully realize there are no neurons in plants, but they’re trolling conventional botanists! And they’re doing experiments that are demonstrating that plants can learn and remember, which is kind of amazing: how do you store a memory without neurons? They’re finding plants that can solve problems, that can hear and see. In fact, they have 20 senses to our five or six. For example, a bean plant looking for something to twine, and given a pole within eight inches or so of it, knows where that pole is and will aim its spiraling reach at that pole. What is that about? Is it bouncing signals off of it?One of the spookiest things is the fact that the same anesthetics that put us out put plants out. You might think that plants are already out, but they’re not. They’re just slow. If you take a plant with a fast behavior, like a Venus flytrap, and give it an anesthetic, it will stop reacting. So you have to ask yourself, what is lost when the plant is anaesthetized? Some state of alertness, of awareness, of its environment, of reactivity. I’m not prepared to call that consciousness, but maybe it’s sentience—which is a simpler form of consciousness, and involves the ability to sense what’s going on in your environment and assess what’s good and bad for you and act appropriately. That may be a universal quality of life.AC: Let’s turn from plants to AI. You point out that LLMs are trained on the internet rather than direct interactions with reality. You put this really nicely when you say the internet is not the world so much as a shadow cast by the world. So LLMs are living in this kind of shadow world, or in Plato’s cave, as you put it. What’s the significance of this for AI consciousness and moral consideration? And, to recall the beginning of our conversation, if we’re stuck behind a veil or screen of consciousness, are we also stuck in a kind of shadow world?MP: I don’t think they’re the same shadow worlds because our world includes nature and other people. And even if it’s mediated in some ways... There is a reality out there, and we are in relation to it, through consciousness. There’s friction with it. What’s missing from the LLMs is that friction with the real world. There’s more to the world than human representation, which is what they’re dealing with. And that means that so far, AI is a cultural technology for combining thoughts we’ve already had. SUGGESTED VIEWING Cracking the code for thought With Roger Penrose, Sabrina Gonzalez Pasterski, Max Tegmark, Güneş Taylor Genuine creativity is more than collage. A lot of what AI does now is tantamount to collage, putting this with that and you know, that’s part of art, certainly. But there are also genuinely new ideas that come into the world that don’t come in through manipulating the representations we already have. So it remains to be seen whether AIs can be truly creative in that more radical sense.But my arguments against AI becoming conscious have to do with the fact that the idea of AI consciousness is based on this faulty metaphor that the brain is a computer. There are dimensions in which the brain is like a computer—it certainly does its share of computation. But computers have this sharp distinction between hardware and software, and brains don’t. In a brain, hardware and software are identical. Every memory is a physical change to the brain. Brains are not interchangeable in the way computers are. So this idea that you could take the consciousness out and somehow run it on another substrate, a silicon substrate, seems foolhardy.Anyway, it’s a more extended argument, and I may be wrong. And when we move to computers that aren’t based on silicon—neuromorphic computers and things like that—all bets may be off.AC: Regarding your point about LLMs being stuck in the world of our representations—the internet or whatever—and not being able to interact with reality, are these representations, the world of the internet, themselves part of reality? We’ve created the internet, but it’s still a real thing that exists. And so while the LLMs may be trapped within that part of reality, they’re nevertheless within reality and interacting with it and so on. So it’s not obvious that there’s a barrier there to them becoming conscious and being creative.MP: Yeah, I mean, if our consciousness is built out of human culture, which is what we’re talking about with all those representations. But I tend to think consciousness comes a bit more out of nature and friction with the natural world, but...AC: So there’s a fundamental divide between the natural world and human artefacts?MP: And we lose track of that, and especially people in this computer world. You know, the people who are creating these AI systems, my guess is they’ve been into video games since the age of three, and they didn’t go outside a lot. And their own contact with nature is somewhat limited. I could be wrong, it’d be a very interesting thing to ask, all the wizards of AI, whether they like to go fishing and hiking and do things like that. Or were they on computers from a very early age? I interviewed Blake Lemoine, the Google engineer who came to believe that LaMDA, the Google LLM out at the time, was conscious and deserved personhood. It was very clear that he didn’t see a distinction between this bubble in which he lived and the real world. And I think we’ve all been distanced from the natural world, and this is taking us even further away. But it’s still there, you know, and we still have bodies, and we’re still mortal, and we don’t live in a simulation.AC: I think that’s a great place to finish. Michael Pollan, thank you very much!
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