Today I suddenly remembered seeing Roger Penrose speak at McGill University in 1999 or 2000. I saw so many major figures speak in Montreal, and today I suddenly missed having access to events like that. It’s not the same as watching a talk online… Penrose’s talk was about Platonic forms, quantum computation, and consciousness—Emperor’s New Mind stuff. It was *very* unconvincing (to me, and to many students; the Q&A after was kinda brutal, and Penrose seemed a bit). But it was also stimulating…