New links…

1. “Ukrainians have all but stopped criticizing the government. But it is a philosopher’s job to think critically and speak naïvely” — a profile of Ukrainian philosopher Irina Zherebkina, who has just left her position at Kharkiv to take one at LSE
2. “If we do someday create AI entities with real moral considerability similar to non-human animals or similar to humans, we should design them so that ordinary users will emotionally react to them in a way that is appropriate to their moral status” — the “emotional alignment design policy” of Mara Garza and Eric Schwitzgebel (Riverside)
3. Aphantasia is the neurological condition of being unable to mentally visualize imagery, or see things with your “mind’s eye” — How might having this condition affect one’s philosophical beliefs? Reflections from Mette Leonard Høeg (Oxford) and photos from Derek Parfit, both aphantasic
4. Last year, Inquiry published a paper by Hanno Sauer (Utrecht) arguing against the value of the history of philosophy. It has now published a rebuttal. — Its author? Hanno Sauer. And yes, it was anonymously refereed.
5. “For some tasks and some [large language] models, there’s a threshold of complexity beyond which the functionality of the model skyrockets” — “Researchers are racing not only to identify additional emergent abilities but also to figure out why and how they occur at all—in essence, to try to predict unpredictability”
6. “It seems impossible to be confident about the identification of more than a few of the philosophers whom Raphael depicts” — a guided tour of Raphael’s “The School of Athens” and the history of its interpretations
7. “What is the evidence for retrocausality?… The relevant experiments just won a Nobel Prize. The tricky part is showing that retrocausality gives the best explanation of these results” — Huw Price (Cambridge) and Ken Wharton (San Jose) on the case for retrocausality

Discussion welcome.

Mini-Heap posts usually appear when 7 or so new items accumulate in the Heap of Links, a collection of items from around the web that may be of interest to philosophers.

The Heap of Links consists partly of suggestions from readers; if you find something online that you think would be of interest to the philosophical community, please send it in for consideration for the Heap. Thanks!