I don't think Penrose is insane, merely mistaken. If making mistakes in areas outside your field of expertise requires a diagnosis of insanity, then who among is sane enough to make that diagnosis?
His argument in The Emperor's New Mind seems very weak to me. As far as I can tell, it goes like this:
Premise: we don't understand quantum gravity.
Premise: we don't understand consciousness.
Conclusion: they might be related.
Josephson on the other hand has a bit of a persecution complex. I went to a talk by him a few years ago and when someone in the audience asked him (very mildly, in my opinion, given the nonsense he had subjected us to for the last hour) whether he had any evidence for the paranormal phenomena he was talking about he complained that we were all closed-minded bigots.
no subject
His argument in The Emperor's New Mind seems very weak to me. As far as I can tell, it goes like this:
- Premise: we don't understand quantum gravity.
- Premise: we don't understand consciousness.
- Conclusion: they might be related.
Josephson on the other hand has a bit of a persecution complex. I went to a talk by him a few years ago and when someone in the audience asked him (very mildly, in my opinion, given the nonsense he had subjected us to for the last hour) whether he had any evidence for the paranormal phenomena he was talking about he complained that we were all closed-minded bigots.