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The persistence of objects means not only that they continue to exist when you can’t observe them, but also, and more primitively, that when you are watching them they remain the same object1. This will probably be inherent in what it means to be an object, but such a concept cannot predate the concept of object.

The distinction between within and without is not easy. Even many adults haven’t really managed it, as denoted in phrases such as “You made me love you.” or “You made me so angry”, where internal actions are attributed to external causes, even though others would react to the same stimuli in different ways. This is probably because episodic events tend to be externally attributed, though of course denial of responsibility is another reason. But originally denial isn’t a reason as the mere existence of a separation between “me” and “not me” isn’t yet given, much less the bounds.

When things are too unusual they just aren’t “noticed”, and when things are too familiar they also aren’t noticed. In the first case the sensations are just perceived as “noise” and are filtered out. In the second case they aren’t interesting enough to notice, and are filtered out. You can override these filters, but it takes careful attention.
This presents a problem in “how to get started”. The resolution is the existence of a few built-in “forms”. One demonstrable one is a view of a smile, I’m sure there are other demonstrable ones. Just how many built-in forms exist is a good question, and some, probably most, will be quite difficult to detect.
Given a few forms to start with they can act as “seeds” for other “objects” to “crystallize” around. But the “how” of this crystallization needs explication.
Well, if one this is recognized, then other sensations can be linked to it. Thus if a smile is recognized, then a forehead can be linked as “occur above smile”, and this will cause it to be “expected” when the smile is seen, and hypothesized when not seen, perhaps because of being obscured by something else. This uses state specific memory to enable weak signals to become established as a definite object. After being stabilized as an object, it can then be recognized in other contexts. Please note that while this example is visual, most of the early linkage is kinesthetic or goniometric, and much will be auditory or cross-modality.

Sunday 2018/10/21
Sensory stimuli preferentially occur in certain built-in forms. Visual examples are lines, arcs of circles, and areas of light or dark.
Is an object initially required to have a particular distribution of features? The face recognizer has been shown to initially require two dark spots above a centered dark spot above an arc, but that is a highly specialized feature that is, if not species specific, probably primate specific. But what about a dresser or refrigerator? A Chair? Does later speed of recognition derive from the initial process? Or is it because since we usually see chairs upright, the upright chair is more readily accessible?
How are objects indexed for access? Seeing the same object from slightly different angles would alter the positioning of features, but many, or even all, of the features would still be present (vertical lines, areas, etc.). Others would be rotated, changing, e.g., the angle at which diagonal lines were seen. (I’m assuming translation rather than rotation of the view with respect to the object. Sometimes some of the features will be obscured, or partially obscured. So what seems to be going on is that the features visible are activated, causing the other features “linked” to them to be activated.
The preceding doesn’t sound sufficiently specific, but this is handled by “state specific memory”, i.e. the entire context is linked into each memory, this includes things like “Where am I?”, as in “what room”, and also emotional state, what recent thoughts have occurred, what other objects have been seen recently (i.e. are still partially active), etc.

Friday 2018/10/20
Object Persistence depends on recognition.
Object: A particular collection of “sensory” impressions.
N.B.: An object won’t be all of the “sensory” impressions from an area of focus, but only those selected as “foreground”.
To form an object, we must l rely on a loose interpretation of “Hebb’s law”, paraphrased as “neurons that fire together, wire together”, so when particular neurons are simultaneously stimulated repeatedly they begin to stimulate each other. Thus perceiving (or imagining) a piece of an object will render the entire memory active.

Mike, assuming you have a normal sized kidney, tomorrow you will be approximately 150g lighter... Unless the surgeon leaves some tools inside you, then it will be a little less.

I'm sure you are in good hands and I hope everything goes well and I look forward to you getting back on here and posting random Unix commands and updates on your current mental state.

Godspeed MDC, godspeed!

Things are really coming to a head here. We have a bunch of alt-right jerkoffs hysterically jumping up and down shouting "butbutbutbut MUH FREEZE PEACH!!!111one" over Gab getting its blood supply cut off like the cancer it is.

Listen, you Constitutionally-ignorant know nothings, you fucking fourth-grade civics class failures, you frothing wild-eyed lunatics: the First Amendment merely says the government may not restrict your speech in and of itself (and there are still exception clauses for public safety).

It does not mean you have a right to be heard.

It does *not* mean you have a right to a platform.

It does NOT mean you have a right to incite violence.

And MOST OF ALL, it does NOT mean you have a right to escape the consequences of your speech.

Now, I personally am all for shitholes like gab.io, and would even support funding them. Why? Because they keep you stupid motherfuckers all in one place, contained, exposed, letting you mingle and hybridize and ooze and fester, like the old Chinese sorcery "gu." Some interestingly poisonous shit must come out of that. Free association and all that, right? And poison goes where poison's wanted.

The most hilarious part of this, though? It's when all the gibbertarian shitheads start demanding that Thuh Eebil Gubbamint stop *private corporations* from doing what the fuck they want with their resources! News flash, assholes: corporations have discovered that hosting actual, literal, Heil-Hitlering, 1488'ing Nazis is a Bad Business Decision (TM). That burning pain you feel is the Invisible Hand of the Free Market smacking you across your inbred faces so hard it raises welts. And raising a gigantic middle finger at you. You made your bed, now lie in it.

So keep screaming and howling at the corporations and the government both to do your bidding. Keep marching. Keep concentrating yourselves into ever smaller and more feverish and more frenzied little circlejerks deep in the festering asshole of the internet. Keep displaying your ignorance and stupidity and hatred and utter, utter impotent rage.

We won't necessarily punch a Nazi, but we're sure as shit gonna mock a Nazi till y'all drop dead of apoplexy. And something tells me what you really can't stand is mockery; violence you will merely take as incentive to continue on. But being laughed at? No. Never. What you fear most isn't death; it's having to live on, knowing your entire political philosophy is a laughingstock, a byword for ineffectual, self-destructive evil, your entire lives wasted on this destructive, fruitless comedy of errors.

It's coming. You've already lost. You lost the moment you started this.

These are two stories that I may or may not submit based on upcoming electoral events:

Congressman John Culberson is a driving force behind the Europa Clipper mission, and an SLS proponent. He may lose his re-election bid this November. This could have a significant impact on the mission. Or not, who knows?

Could November elections scramble a controversial U.S. mission to a frozen moon?

Here is an in-depth story about Culberson's Europa obsession: Inside NASA’s daring $8 billion plan to finally find extraterrestrial life

And a follow-up: The billion-dollar question: How does the Clipper mission get to Europa?

FiveThirtyEight currently forecasts a slight chance of Culberson losing, but it's essentially a coin toss.

This is a Denver local ballot initiative to decriminalize psilocybin mushrooms. It won't be on the ballot in November. They are collecting signatures so that it can be on the ballot in May 2019. 4,726 signatures must be collected by January 7th:

Denver, Colorado, Psilocybin Mushroom Initiative (November 2018)
After the success of cannabis legalization in Denver, could mushrooms be next?
No Magic Mushrooms On The Denver Ballot This Year. Supporters Are Looking To 2019
Denver’s Psilocybin Initiative Moves Forward to Signature Gathering Phase

If you live in Denver, go and sign the petition.

Here is the big list of 2018 ballot measures, amendments, etc.. And here's a few that may be of interest:

California Proposition 12, Farm Animal Confinement Initiative (2018)
Colorado Amendment 74, Compensation to Owners for Decreased Property Value Due to State Regulation Initiative (2018)
Florida Amendment 3, Voter Approval of Casino Gambling Initiative (2018)
Florida Amendment 4, Voting Rights Restoration for Felons Initiative (2018)
Massachusetts Question 3, Gender Identity Anti-Discrimination Veto Referendum (2018)
Michigan Proposal 1, Marijuana Legalization Initiative (2018)

Missouri has two amendments and one proposition regarding medical cannabis that are in conflict:

If two conflicting constitutional amendments, such as Amendment 2 and Amendment 3, are approved, the one receiving the most affirmative votes prevails. State law does provide a protocol for when voters approve statutes, such as Proposition C, and amendments, such as Amendment 2 and Amendment 3, that are in conflict. Speaking to a similar issue regarding tobacco tax initiatives in 2016, the attorney general's office said the issue would need to be decided in court.

Missouri Amendment 2, Medical Marijuana and Veteran Healthcare Services Initiative (2018)
Missouri Amendment 3, Medical Marijuana and Biomedical Research and Drug Development Institute Initiative (2018)
Missouri Proposition C, Medical Marijuana and Veterans Healthcare Services, Education, Drug Treatment, and Public Safety Initiative (2018)

Amendment 2 taxes cannabis at 4%, Amendment 3 taxes it at 15%, Proposition C taxes it at 2%.

North Dakota Measure 3, Marijuana Legalization and Automatic Expungement Initiative (2018)
Ohio Issue 1, Drug and Criminal Justice Policies Initiative (2018)
Oregon Measure 106, Ban Public Funds for Abortions Initiative (2018)
Utah Proposition 2, Medical Marijuana Initiative (2018)
Washington Initiative 940, Police Training and Criminal Liability in Cases of Deadly Force Measure (2018)

Legislative and automatic referrals

Alabama Amendment 1, Ten Commandments Amendment (2018)
California Proposition 2, Use Millionaire's Tax Revenue for Homelessness Prevention Housing Bonds Measure (2018)
California Proposition 7, Permanent Daylight Saving Time Measure (2018)

Hey look, it's Kanye's issue: Colorado Amendment A, Removal of Exception to Slavery Prohibition for Criminals Amendment (2018)

Colorado Amendment X, Definition of Industrial Hemp Amendment (2018)

I think one of our ACs complained about this mess: Florida Amendment 11, Repeal Prohibition on Aliens’ Property Ownership, Delete Obsolete Provision on High-Speed Rail, and Repeal of Criminal Statutes' Effect on Prosecution Amendment (2018)

Hawaii Constitutional Convention Question (2018)
Louisiana Amendment 1, Felons Disqualified to Run for Office for Five Years Amendment (2018)
Nevada Question 2, Sales Tax Exemption for Feminine Hygiene Products Measure (2018)
New Hampshire Question 2, Right to Live Free from Governmental Intrusion in Private and Personal Information Amendment (2018)
South Dakota Constitutional Amendment X, Constitutional Amendments Require a 55 Percent Supermajority (2018)
South Dakota Constitutional Amendment Z, Single-Subject Rule for Constitutional Amendments (2018)
West Virginia Amendment 1, No Right to Abortion in Constitution Measure (2018)

I plan to submit a story focusing only on ballot initiatives, measures, propositions, amendments, etc. Last time around, I submitted a story before the election. This time, I think I will do it after the results are in so we can see what succeeded and what failed.

If there's a specific ballot measure you want to see mentioned, please let me know below in the comments.

Some “obsolete” tech that is no longer used perhaps should be (I’ve written about it) because they were better in some respects than newer replacements, but there are some other obsolete technologies that no longer serve a useful purpose, some remaining among the near dead, some almost comatose and some screaming in fear.
        The steering wheel, brake pedal, and throttle control are screaming in fear. They only have twenty or thirty years left. When they’re gone, good riddance! But the tech isn’t quite there yet, although the clutch has died a quiet death.
        The near dead is the home phone. I haven’t had one in over fifteen years, but my ninety year old mom who uses her cell phone like we used to use pay phones when they still existed (and had a reason to exist) still has one. Call her cell and you get no answer. I knew a few other, but very few, all wedded to the past. I had a grandpa who refused to use the toilet my uncle installed in the bathroom he built, always using the outhouse.
        The home phone is dead. But it still writhes.
        Then we have cable and satellite TV. They became endangered when TV became digital.
        When they were young (to me, meaning when I first met them) they were great. No snow, no ghosts, no static in the sound. Plus, you got half a dozen more channels, including HBO, for ten bucks. The cable channels either didn’t have commercials, or only had them between shows. Most cable channels didn’t censor out vulgarity.
        There were educational channels, like Discovery and The History Channel. There was the rock channel, MTV, that played music videos.
        It gradually changed. Commercials started appearing, and now they show commercials at the bottom of the screen while the actual content is running. MTV stopped playing music videos and started showing stupid reality shows. Discovery stopped showing science and technology and started showing stupid reality shows. The History Channel stopped showing history and started showing stupid reality shows.
        More channels were added, none anyone in their right mind would watch, like the four or five shopping channels. So many sports channels were added that the “sports” channels started showing pool, poker, and even chess, despite the fact that those games aren’t sports. And the price kept rising to the point that the cable bill cost more than the phone bill or the trash bill.
        Then television went digital. The number of over the air channels tripled or quadrupled. Ghosts, snow, and audio static were banished. Now, instead of cable giving a better picture than over the air, it’s reversed. Almost all cable channels are standard definition with none offering better than 720, while the same channels over the air are in 1080.
        There was no longer any reason to have cable, unless you were a Nascar fan, but now even Nascar fans can watch the races with Nascar’s TV app. And it got worse for cable. Netflix started streaming for about ten bucks a month with a plethora of excellent shows and movies, without commercials, and uncut, for about ten bucks a month, a little over a tenth of the cost of cable. Their highest pricing tier offers 4K content.
        But a lot of people (I’m guessing Nascar fans that haven’t heard of streaming boxes) still have cable. When will this zombie die?