The matrix reloaded, rain, Blyth’s and yet more rain

 

Blyth's Reed Warbler

I have a Blyth’s Reed Warbler as a pencil tick on my UK life list from a bird I saw in Norfolk a few years ago. Why a pencil tick? There was subsequently some debate about the purity of the bird, i.e. did it have a bit of hybrid in it. So when a small influx of these rare birds, which normally spend the summer in Eastern Europe, occurred last week I resolved to go and see one and remove the ambiguity from my list. Due to other commitments, I could only spend a whole day birding on Thursday or Friday this week. Friday’s forecast was marginally better so I chose that day – mistake no. 1!

A remarkably showy one had been singing its heart out at Far Ings nature reserve in north Lincolnshire so I was up at my customary silly o’ clock and headed to Far Ings. The weather worsened as I drove north and on arrival at Far Ings the rain was coming down in biblical deluge fashion. I put my waterproofs on, prayed that Cannon's stated “fully waterproof” spec on my optical equipment was correct, and set off with very low expectations of seeing the bird. Much to my surprise the sodden little bird was singing its heart out in full view! A couple of other birders told me that this valiant songster had been doing this since they arrived at 6 am. The drive to find a mate was clearly overwhelming any desire to keep dry for this poor lovelorn little chap. Its song was absolutely exquisite and lifted my heart enormously on this damp dull morning.

It’s a testament to the abilities of my new 1Dx Mark 3 that it managed some half reasonable pictures in terrible light and pouring rain. It is a remarkable piece of technology especially at the high ISO speeds so often needed when photographing wildlife in the UK.

I also experimented with the new “live view” feature on the camera which effectively turns it into a silent mirrorless camera. Its video abilities are also supposedly very good so I thought I would try and capture the bird singing. I’ve underexposed the resultant video but it does convey how beautiful the song is of this little avian jewel.

Having got the Blyth’s under my belt early I decided to move onto Spurn some 40 miles away and try for a Greenish Warbler which would be a UK life tick for me. Now Spurn in the past has been a bit of a birding nemesis for me. It’s always been horrendous bleak weather when I’ve been there and I’ve never found what I’m looking for. The Greenish Warbler had been reported early morning in buses by the high tide shelter. On arrival I consulted the car park map and it seemed to be along the beach twice as far as the Warren. Not surprisingly there were no other birders to ask for directions so I set off counting my steps to the Warren and then along the beach. At the allocated number of steps I was on bare beach and could not see any bushes in the distance with my bins. So I went back to the car and bumped into a friendly local birder who had seen the bird early that morning. He told me I needed to walk along the beach for 30 minutes to find the sheller. The map was hence hopeless not to scale, in fact it seemed to be logarithmic rather than linear and worse than useless. I only had my monster 800mm lens with me but I set off in very bleak conditions along the beach. About half way along a Guillemot was siting asleep upright on the beach totally in its element and obvious to the howling gale. I eventual got to the high tide shelter and there were indeed some weather beaten bushes but of the target bird there was no sign. I found another birder a little further along who told me that the bird had not been seen at that location for a couple of hours but that it or another one had been seen at the point an hour or so ago. I dejectedly gazed at the distant point in the rain and simply could not find the motivation to slog it out to it so went back- mistake no.2! Back at Spurn I looked for one of the two Red Backed Shrikes that had been reported that morning. I found the female hunkered down in a bush but just as I was about to grab my camera another birder, oblivious to its presence, flushed it and that was that. 

There is little of no phone signal at Spurn, the local birders carry walkie talkies to communicate, but I eventual had enough signal to check RBA and found that another Greenish Warbler was showing well and singing at Flamborough point some 30 miles up the coast. I had to be home by 8 but a quick calculation said that I would have 60 mins or so at Flamborough to find the bird so I set off -Mistake no.3 as the rain was yet again lashing down. Not being familiar with Flamborough head it took me a little while to find the location where two birders were chatting. They told me the bird had not been seen for an hour since the rain stated. I had a quick look but could not locate the bird and at this point I was out of time and set off for home.

You can image my delight the next morning when the Flamborough bird was reported again as singing and showing well and not one but two birds were reported at Spurn Point!!

What a silly hobby birding is!

So matrix reloaded?

I recently read an article on the ancestor simulation theory. Now this is going to sound like science fiction but it’s a theory that’s gaining some traction and debate amongst academic philosophers. It was originally proposed by the philosopher Nick Bolstom in 2014 and goes something like this.

Much as we recreate our ancestors and their history through TV and film dramas, let’s suppose a sufficiently advanced civilisation would do the same with the advanced technology tools available to them. They would create an accessorial simulation in an unimaginably powerful computer which would bestow consciousness on their human simulations. Given the exponential growth in our technological knowledge this is not as far-fetched as it sounds. No more magical to us than, say, TV would be to the Victorians only 150 years ago.

If you accept that this is possible you can use a method of logical to prove there are only three possible conclusions.

1. "The fraction of human-level civilizations that reach a posthuman stage (that is, one capable of running high-fidelity ancestor simulations) is very close to zero", or
2. "The fraction of posthuman civilizations that are interested in running simulations of their evolutionary history, or variations thereof, is very close to zero", or
3. "The fraction of all people with our kind of experiences that are living in a simulation is very close to one."

So could whoever is writing the code please write in a greenish warbler close to home for me next week please. Thankyou!

Footnote – my blogs are posted with sometimes rather imaginative spelling and grammar due to my extreme dyslexia!