Jamesian Philosophy Refreshed

Long time readers of this blog will recognize the name Sabine Hossenfelder. I have referred to her and ideas she has championed with some regularity. I am sad to report that attempts have been made to silence Dr Hossenfelder and happy to add that she has resisted them, and appears likely to continue saying what she means for some time to come.   Hossenfelder has a doctorate in theoretical physics from Goethe University Frankfurt.  Her dissertation, in 2003, looked at microscopic black-hole production. Lately, she has acquired some prominence as a nemesis of what she considers bullshit in the world of science and of physics in particular.  She believes that physics as an academic field of research has guided itself into a dead end, where bullshit creation is incentivized. Recently, for example, a distinguished scientific journal published a paper about the mathematical modeling of 'warp drive' as a way to get near and/or past the speed of light. The paper was then pic...

 It has been 245 years today since the "mutiny of the Pennsylvanian line," an important though now often overlooked moment in the history of our war for independence.  It happened on the first day for a new year, 1781. The year would eventually see Cornwallis' surrender at Yorktown and the effective end of the war, but that was not obvious on the first of its days. The "Pennsylvania line," the human contribution of the state of Pennsylvania to the fighting of the war, had hundreds of soldiers who had signed up three years before under contracts in which they offered their service for "three years or during the war." The wording was ambiguous.  Did it mean they were enlisted until the first-to-occur of the elapse of three years or the end of the war? or the later-to-occur?  Three years having passed, many of the soldiers took the view that they had completed their obligation. Their officers took the view that they were in for the duration.   On this day...