71 min listen
Episode 52: Thought Experiments (Huh!) What Are They Good For? (Part 2)
FromVery Bad Wizards
ratings:
Length:
77 minutes
Released:
Aug 25, 2014
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
Experience Machines, Chinese Rooms, Original Positions, and Ice Buckets. ("I don't know what you have in mind for this evening Homer, but count me out!") Dave and Tamler continue their discussion on thought experiments--how they can be effective, the difference between their use in philosophy and psychology, and how they can spin out of control like deadly viruses and become the disease they were trying to cure. Plus, do our motives matter when it comes to raising money for charity? LinksChinese Room thought experiment [wikipedia.org]Turing Test [wikipedia.org]Ice bucket challenge [alsa.org]Weird Al Yankovic does the Ice Bucket Challenge [youtube.com]Flight of the Conchords "Pro-Aids" [youtube.com]Rawls' Original Position [plato.stanford.edu]The Veil of Ignorance [wikipedia.org]Press Your Luck "No Whammies!" [youtube.com]Behaviorism [wikipedia.org]Logical positivism [wikipedia.org]
Released:
Aug 25, 2014
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (100)
Episode 1: Brains, Robots, and Free Will (Free Will and Morality Pt. 1): Dave and Tamler talk about the new wave of skepticism about free will and moral responsibility in the popular press from people like Sam Harris and Jerry Coyne, and argue that neuroscientific data adds little of substance to the case other than telling us what we already know: human beings are natural biological entities. Dave comes out as a Star Trek nerd and asks whether we're all, in the end, like Data the android. They also wonder whether a belief in free will is all that's keeping us from having sex with our dogs. Finally, Dave grills Tamler about his new book on the differences in attitudes about free will and moral responsibility across cultures. by Very Bad Wizards