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Notable Emacs news

#emacs

Emacs 29

  • Adjust font size globally: C-x C-M-+ (global-text-scale-adjust)
  • You can now hit M-X after having hit M-x, without first exiting the M-x prompt.
  • key M-SPC now bound to cycle-spacing, instead of just-one-space
    • related new command: ensure-empty-lines
  • new frame parameter: alpha-background
  • new mode: pixel-scroll-precision-mode
  • NO LONGER RECOMMENDED: so-long-mode!
  • new command: find-sibling-file
    • I often use custom commands I call "my-find-next-file-in-dir" and "my-next-buffer-of-same-mode"; this sounds like a similar idea. Though now I also discovered ff-find-related-file and better-jumper-jump-backward.
  • new command: rename-visited-file
  • new command: help-quick
  • new hotkeys in help buffers!
    • n(next) p(prev) e(edit)
    • see option: help-enable-variable-value-editing
  • when point is on any image anywhere, there are commands to manipulate it under the i prefix
    • See M-x describe-keymap image-slice-map.
  • image-dired is faster now
  • image-dired slideshow on S
  • in image-dired, marking an image in the display buffer shows the next image
  • new theme: leuven-dark
  • new fn: setopt (like Doom's setq!)
  • new fns: buffer-match-p and match-buffers
  • describe-buffer-bindings no longer prints tons of "Prefix Command"
    • relevant to me, because my package deianira looks it up
    • controlled by option describe-bindings-show-prefix-commands
  • new fn: key-valid-p
  • new fn: key-parse that always returns vector output unlike kbd,
    • but (key-parse "<TAB>") and (key-parse "TAB") still differ
  • new fn: keymap-set instead of define-key
  • new fn: keymap-lookup instead of lookup-key and key-binding
  • new fn: define-keymap
  • new fn: defvar-keymap
  • M-x shortdoc RET keymaps RET
  • new fn: org-get-title
  • Whoops! "The Gtk selection face is no longer used for the region. The combination of a Gtk-controlled background and a foreground color controlled by the internal Emacs machinery led to low-contrast faces in common default setups. Emacs now uses the same 'region' face on Gtk and non-Gtk setups." That may be why I've been confused with results when attempting to theme that face.
  • new option battery-update-functions can trigger actions based on battery status
  • new fn pixel-fill-region should let you refill variable-pitch text more consistently
  • new option eww-auto-rename-buffer
  • new option proced-enable-color-flag
  • new package: eglot
  • new package: tree-sitter
  • new fn: string-edit
  • new fn: file-name-split
  • new fn: file-name-parent-directory
    • no more of this hairy expression: (car (last (split-string (file-name-directory FILE) "/" t))!
  • new fn: with-undo-amalgamate
    • maybe we can use this instead of disabling undo entirely in some commands

Emacs 28

  • New mode: context-menu-mode
  • New mode: repeat-mode
  • eval-last-sexp now actually does re-eval defvars!
  • C-x x a new keymap for "buffer actions"
  • C-x 5 5: other-frame-prefix! no more multitude of *-other-frame. is there an embark "postfix" instead of prefix?
  • C-x t t: similar to above but for other tab
  • describe-keymap useful for e.g. image-dired-map or ess-mode-map
  • toggle-truncate-lines now disables visual-line-mode
  • M-o prefix gone!
  • M-x shell now uses pop-to-buffer-same-window, consistent w/ eshell
  • eshell-mode-map loads normally (no need for an eval-after-load to modify the keymap)
  • new option: use-short-answers
  • new option: abbrev-suggest

What links here

  • 2021-08-11
Created (2 years ago)

Inferential distance

Inferential distance wasn't a problem in the EEA. At most, what you had to stay was one inferential step removed from public knowledge:

When you discover a new oasis, you don't have to explain to your fellow tribe-members what an oasis is, or why it's a good idea to drink water, or how to walk.

One reason why we fall for the illusion of transparency / the curse of expertise.

What links here

  • Expecting Short Inferential Distances
  • Illusion of Transparency: Why No One Understands You
  • Why people may appear stupid
  • Availability heuristic
Created (2 years ago)

Feminism as a practice-case for rationality

You know how the history of science is littered with cases where progress was held back because so many people couldn't let go of their preconceived notions? It's why rationalists prize the ability to abandon preconceived notions, and to do so quickly, regardless of how many people stand by the notion currently. "Speak the truth though your lips may tremble" and all that.

Seen through that lens, women's role in history can be another case study of mass-delusion. Lots of people were unable to see the fact in front of their noses: that women are people. Even the women themselves didn't see it. Yet it should be the simplest thing in the world. Isn't that worrying?

If our brains can serve us that badly, how do you know yours isn't keeping up other massive blind spots?

The concepts of intersectional feminism are not just things you learn in order to be able to claim you did your part in building a more equal society.

They also give you some practice at deconstructing deeply entrenched Aliefs. Even today, nobody is free of aliefs around gender… it's a collective project to catalogue them all, hence that gender studies is a field of research.

We can benefit from what they have found so far, like premade lessons. But the biggest leg of the journey is within yourself, as you digest this material. You get to observe, almost directly, the shift that happens as various hidden attics in your mind get unhidden, and you realize they were there all along, and it's humbling that, you know, you just didn't see them.

Best of all, you get the kind of personal development that makes you feel like a more complete human being.

Related

What links here

  • 2023-05-19
Created (2 years ago)

p-zombies

We speak of "hearing" our internal voices, and scientists have seen activity in the brain's auditory cortex when we do. Apparently we've also been able to reconstruct images from a cat's visual cortex, seeing what it sees.

One day, we'll likely be able to read back someone's internal monologue.

That's useful to know in the p-zombie thought experiment, which tries to eliminate dualism without eliminating it. It's the idea that you could have a world where all the people behave exactly like people in our world, but nobody is home in their heads to experience things – no "soul" so to speak. Philosophical zombies. Pretty much what René Descartes (1596–1650) thought of non-human animals, but extended to claim that the very fact that people go around talking about feelings still isn't proof that they experience any.

But in this purely "mechanical" world where nobody's actually experiencing anything—where there's nobody we would think of as alive—why would the p-zombie have an internal voice, and talk to other p-zombies about how they experience their internal voice?

Dissolving the thought experiment gets very deep, so I'm stopping here.

Conclusion

If you skimmed the above summary, you might get the idea that the conclusion would run along the lines that there must be "a ghost in the machine", that-which-experiences, a soul, but the conclusion is the opposite! We can see the experiences in the lab: the auditory cortex, made of material cells, very much part of this world, does some work which is the sensation of an internal voice.

In other words, the p-zombie is an impossible postulate because the material world is sufficient to create experiences. If the material world is sufficient to create experiences, there's nothing left for a soul to do. What's it there for?

It's rather the belief in souls (dualism) that requires also claiming that p-zombies are possible, so that the soul can be said to add something.

Created (2 years ago)
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