Andy Rover

Researcher. Psychology/philosophy. British & European.

[Stefan. @paradeevic]

A BBC interviewer asked a Nobel physicist the simplest question in the world: why do two magnets push each other apart. He refused to answer it. What he did instead is the best seven minutes on thinking ever filmed.

The man is Richard Feynman, at home in 1983, no blackboard, no notes, sitting in an armchair.

He does not dodge because he cannot answer. He dodges because he wants you to see what the question is actually asking. So he takes an ordinary sentence, that a woman slipped on the ice and broke her hip, and starts asking why, and every answer opens another why, until the ground gives way.

Then he turns it around on the interviewer with a question about ice that sounds trivial and is not.

The point he arrives at is the uncomfortable one. Every explanation is only a translation into something you already accept without explanation. Magnets have no such translation. There is nothing more familiar than magnetism to reduce magnetism to, which is why every answer you were given at school was a picture, not a reason.

It matters more now than it did in 1983. Any tool will hand you a fluent answer in a second. Knowing which questions actually have a bottom is the part that is still yours.

One question. Seven minutes. It is in the video.

[Marie Bernard @MarieBnard]

La coupe du monde commence.
Les Allemands jouent en 4-2-4. Leibniz est dans les buts. Hegel soutient que la réalité n'est qu'un a priori d'une éthique non naturaliste. Kant invoque un impératif catégorique imaginaire.
Socrate est là et but !

Monty Python
https://t.co/bPnnIin8VA

[A Cambridge Diary @acambridgediary]

15th May 2020
Five years ago at Hobson's Passage.

[Andy Rover @EuropeanRover]

@devilscustard I agree. Nice photo as well, by the way.

[A Cambridge Diary @acambridgediary]

13th May 2015
Ten years ago today Newnham College Boat Club very kindly caught some water for me.

[Richard Bentall #FBPE @richardbentall.bsky.social @RichardBentall]

Labour lost my vote today.

It's not that immigration isn't a problem - it's complex and can't be solved by emulating Farage with xenophobic soundbites and making promises that no government will be able to keep.

We already have two protofascist parties. We don't need a third.

[Nick Tyrone @NicholasTyrone]

Even more political space just opened up for the Lib Dems. Be interesting to see if they can fill it, or if they just walk on by like they normally do.

[Philip O'Connor @PhilipOConnor5]

"An island of strangers". I am afraid that I had never expected to hear this from a Labour Prime Minister. Sad. I think that @Keir_Starmer is essentially a good person, but I no longer either understand him nor what he stands for. As an immigrant, I am done with Labour. Bye😢.

[Philip O'Connor @PhilipOConnor5]

Unfortunately, I think that today might be the day when some of us who supported @Keir_Starmer and gave him the benefits of many doubts have given up. He is gifting Reform UK by pandering.
It's sad. I think he is a good person, but doesn't really get politics...

[Emmanuel Macron @EmmanuelMacron]

En Ukraine, unis.

[WG RumblePants @WG_RumblePants]

Today’s beautiful cricket ground is the home of Mountain Ash CC in Wales

[Andy Rover @EuropeanRover]

@simongerman600 This is highly dubious. I think it is completely implausible that such a large number of people eg in the UK even consider this possibility, let alone believe it. Please take a close look at how these figures were arrived at, including question phrasing.

[Guy Verhofstadt @guyverhofstadt]

Ode to Joy fills the Grand-Place, a moving tribute to peace, unity, and the shared future we’re building together. 🇪🇺

[Tamsin Shasha @TamsinShasha]

Today is #EuropeDay and I stand proud holding the #EuropeanUnion flag. I look forward to the day we return to our rightful place at the heart of Europe.

Take heed ⁦@UKLabour⁩ ⁦@Keir_Starmer⁩ ⁦@BestForBritain⁩ ⁦@pimlicat⁩ ⁦⁩ ⁦@MarchForRejoin⁩

[non aesthetic things @PicturesFoIder]

A moment Conan O'Brien would never forget, starring Nina Dobrev.

[BabelColour @StuartHumphryes]

The timelessness of nature. I have enhanced this glorious autochrome, which was taken in colour 117 years ago, in 1908. The woodland scene was in Champigneulles, France, taken by Julien Gérardin. It is original colour, not colourised.

[Scott @Havenlust]

Olive Tree Wood

Claude Monet