Episode 22 - What is Life?

March 06, 2022 by Darron Vigliotti in Podcast Episode

Jeff and Darron attempt to define life, at least as they see it - not necessarily in the scientific sense, but in the subjective and qualitative realm of everyday experience as a conscious entity living in a specific place and time in the history of the universe. They begin with a discussion of the awe inspiring unlikelihood of our own specific existence, move from there into the philosophical realm of absurdity and farce, Jeff explores his struggle to balance the long and short term implications of a home improvement project, and they close with a look at how meaning is derived from the connective tissue of the mundane everyday events that comprise the majority of our lives in between more memorable moments.

Notes:

2:20 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 21 - The Myth of the Desert Island Self from January 2022
4:30 - Listen to the excellent Strong Songs podcast which is created, recorded, and produced by Kirk Hamilton, the specific episode referenced here is from November 2021 and is a deep dive into the classic concert film Stop Making Sense by Talking Heads
5:00 - Watch the video of “Once in a Lifetime” from Stop Making Sense (1984), read the lyrics, and see the original music video from 1980
6:55 - See the “Hot Vax Summer” entry on Slangit - The Slang Dictionary
9:05 - See The Marginalian (formerly Brain Pickings) by Maria Popova
10:00 - Alan Lightman, Einstein’s Dreams, Probable Impossibilities, and “Probable Impossibilities: Physicist Alan Lightman on Beginnings, Endings, and What Makes Life Worth Living” (The Marginalian)
10:53 - Watch “The Beginning of Everything - The Big Bang” (Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell YouTube channel) and check out the Big Bang Wikipedia entry
16:26 - This idea may have come from Carl Sagan or Alan Watts (or someone else)
16:48 - Listen to Mindscape Episode 38: Alan Lightman on Transcendence, Science, and a Naturalist’s Sense of Meaning from March 2019, at the time his most book was Searching for Stars on an Island in Maine
17:12 - Transcendentalism, Henry David Thoreau, and Ralph Waldo Emerson
18:00 - Orion and the Big Dipper
20:01 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 11 - Darwin & The Dude: Darron's Journey to Poetic Naturalism from February 2021
20:10 - Absurdism
23:03 - See “Ice This Morning Led to Dangerous Driving Conditions, School Delays” (NBC CT) and “Freezing rain causes school delays, closures, and crashes” (Fox 61)
25:44 - See “Three ways to be more rational this year” by Steven Pinker (BBC, 2022)
27:32 - Listen to “Live Like You Were Dying” (YouTube) by Tim McGraw and read the lyrics (Genius)
30:48 - Listen to Carl Sagan’s famous “Pale Blue Dot” remarks and see “A Pale Blue Dot” (The Planetary Society)
34:30 - Listen to “All Things Must Pass” (YouTube) by George Harrision (YouTube) and read the lyrics (Genius)
35:02 - Watch “Time: The History & Future of Everything” (Kruzesagt YouTube Channel) and while you’re at it watch the “Optimistic Nihilism” video too as an “antidote” the dread produced by the time video
35:27 - Watch the “Coin Toss” scene from the 2007 movie No Country for Old Men (IMDB)
38:17 - See “How We Spend Our Days Is How We Spend Our Lives: Annie Dillard on Choosing Presence Over Productivity” (The Marginalian)
36:09 - The play Our Town by Thornton Wilder
46:25 - Consciousness and the Brain by Stanislas Dehaene
47:08 - Read Jeff’s essay “On Reading Nonfiction (and Writing)” on the Beautiful Illusions website
49:52 - Joan Didion
50:51 - See “Joan Didion's 'lost' commencement address, revealed” for a complete transcript of Didion’s 1975 commencement address at the University of California, Riverside
50:59 - The line “But it’s alright, Ma, it’s life, and life only” concludes Bob Dylan’s classic 1965 tune “It’s Alright Ma, I’m Only Bleeding” (YouTube)

Episode 12 - A New Enlightenment: The Age of Cognitivism

March 05, 2021 by Darron Vigliotti in Podcast Episode

Jeff and Darron explore some of the major ideas of Enlightenment thought that have shaped our current historical era. Jeff lays out his vision for a new Enlightenment - an age of cognitivism - that applies current insights gleaned from neuroscience and related fields about how brains and cognition work, and the limits of current conceptions of reason, in order to more fully realize the progressive vision of the original Enlightenment movement. Building off the work of two influential scientists and thinkers, biologist E.O. Wilson and neuroscientist Lisa Feldman Barrett, they discuss the predictive nature of our brain, the possibility of seeding our brain today to predict better in the future, and how the unification of the humanities and sciences might allow us to fully embrace what it means to be creative beings who are shaped by both biological and cultural evolution.

Notes:

2:07 - See “Literary Periods, Movements, and History” (The Literature Network)
2:45 - See entries on “Classical Greece,” “Renaissance,” and “Enlightenment” from History.com for brief overviews
3:45 - Issac Newton (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
3:50 - First published in 1687, Isaac Newton’s Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, often referred to as just “the Principles”, lays out, among other major ideas like the law of universal gravitation, Newton’s famous 3 Laws of Motion, which formed the basis for classical mechanics and the science of physics. It is also notable in that Newton developed and used mathematical models to support his physical theories, many of which are now included in the field of calculus, and “The Principles” is generally regarded as the culmination of the Scientific Revolution that had been ongoing since the 16th century. Along with works by the likes of Rene deCartes, whose famous philosophical proclamation “I think, therefore I am” is seen as a precursor to the philosophy of reason that undergirds much Enlightenment thought, and philosophers like John Locke, whose ““Essay Concerning Human Understanding” was published in 1689, this early Enlightenment Period provided the scientific, mathematical and philosophical grounding for the major Enlightenment advances of the 18th Century. The Enlightenment period is generally thought to conclude with the onset of the French Revolution in 1789 and the beginning of the 18th century.
5:10 - See “What is Enlightenment?” by Immanuel Kant - “Enlightenment is man's emergence from his self-imposed nonage. Nonage is the inability to use one's own understanding without another's guidance. This nonage is self-imposed if its cause lies not in lack of understanding but in indecision and lack of courage to use one's own mind without another's guidance. Dare to know! (Sapere aude.) "Have the courage to use your own understanding," is therefore the motto of the enlightenment.”
5:12 - The Great Conversation: A Historical Introduction to Philosophy by Norman Melchert
5:56 - See “Scientific Revolution” (Britannica) and/or “Scientific Revolution” (Wikipedia)
6:10 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 11 - “Darwin & The Dude: Darron’s Path to Poetic Naturalism”
6:32 - The Enlightenment is also referred to as “The Age of Reason” and although there have been many ideas throughout the history of Western Culture about what reason is, how it relates to the mind, and how it might best be applied in finding truth and living a good life, the celebration of reason that marked Enlightenment thought is heavily influenced by the empirical emphasis of the preceding Scientific Revolution, and can generally be regarded as the capacity of humans to consciously apply rational thinking based on evidence, discourse, and openness to new ideas, as a means to gain knowledge and make sense of the world, as opposed to relying on blind faith, superstition and other traditional dogma. The movement was highlighted by the progressive ideal that through their powers of reason and observation, humans can make nearly unlimited, linear progress over time
7:23 - Such notable figures as Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and Alexander Hamilton, were building off of Enlightenment thought in the time leading up to the American Revolution and the founding of the United States, See “American Enlightenment Thought” (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy) and “American Enlightenment” (Wikipedia) for more
8:25 - See “Allen Ginsberg’s Definition of the Beat Generation” (Literary Hub) for more on Jack Kerouac and the naming of the Beat Generation, then listen to Jack Kerouac read “San Francisco Scene (The Beat Generation)” from his 1959 spoken word album Readings by Jack Kerouac on the Beat Generation, and “Is There a Beat Generation?” - a live lecture by Kerouac to students of Hunter College on November 6, 1958
9:26 - See E.O. Wilson (Wikipedia) and the E.O. Wilson Biodiversity Foundation
10:18 - Liberty (Wikipedia)
11:57 - I don’t mean to intimate that our ancestors from previous eras were unintelligent - there is certainly abundant evidence, not least of which is the fact that we are still here today, that people had plentiful information and skills related to their local world and surviving in it, but at the same time most knew almost nothing about the wider world that existed beyond their local geographic area, and did not have true conceptual or explanatory understanding of the plethora of natural phenomena filling that world, or any way to access the most up to date thoughts and ideas about them.
12:30 - Johannes Gutenberg is credited with inventing the printing press around 1436 setting the stage for the dissemination of knowledge on a wider and faster scale than ever before, for more see “7 ways the Printing Press Changed the World” (History.com), “The Printing Press and the Spread of Ideas” (Encyclopedia.com), and “The Evolution of Media” (University of Minnesota Libraries)
14:15 - The agricultural revolution (Wikipedia)
14:56 - The Origins of Creativity by E.O. Wilson
20:27 - Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain by Lisa Feldman Barrett
21:02 - David Hume (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
23:06 - Philosophy of mind (Wikipedia)
24:42 - See the entry on “allostasis” from the extended endnotes of How Emotions Are Made by Lisa Feldman Barrett and/or the “Allostasis” Wikipedia entry
26:20 - Homeostasis (Wikipedia)
28:37 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 07 - “Boxing Aristotle”
32:15 - In 7 ½ Lessons About the Brain, Barrett states this explicitly with the half lesson that opens the book titled “Your Brain is Not For Thinking” which lays the foundation for the subsequent 7 lessons, - In a New York Times op-ed piece of the same title published in November 2020, after drawing a brief sketch of the evolution of the animal brain, she writes “This story of how brains evolved, while admittedly just a sketch, draws attention to a key insight about human beings that is too often overlooked. Your brain’s most important job isn’t thinking; it’s running the systems of your body to keep you alive and well. According to recent findings in neuroscience, even when your brain does produce conscious thoughts and feelings, they are more in service to the needs of managing your body than you realize...Your brain runs your body using something like a budget...This view of the brain has many implications for understanding human beings. So often, for example, we conceive of ourselves in mental terms, separate from the physical...In body-budgeting terms, however, this distinction between mental and physical is not meaningful...Your brain is not for thinking. Everything that it conjures, from thoughts to emotions to dreams, is in the service of body budgeting.”
35:02 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 03 - “The Examined Life” , according to Plato, in defending himself at his trial Socrates said “I am wiser than this man, for neither of us appears to know anything great and good; but he fancies he knows something, although he knows nothing; whereas I, as I do not know anything, so I do not fancy I do. In this trifling particular, then, I appear to be wiser than he, because I do not fancy I know what I do not know.”
35:35 - In addition to the difficulty with thinking critically using the scientific framework that emerged from Enlightenment thought due to the truly immense body of knowledge that has been accumulated and the inherent complexity of the modern world, there is the fact that this way of knowing is not even universally accepted, as many people the world over determine truth in much more intuitive, experiential, or faith-based ways. To quote Danah Boyd, who conducts research largely focused on the intersection of technology, information, and society, and founded the organization Data & Society, “No matter what worldview or way of knowing someone holds dear, they always believe that they are engaging in critical thinking when developing a sense of what is right and wrong, true and false, honest and deceptive. But much of what they conclude may be more rooted in their way of knowing than any specific source of information. If we’re not careful, “media literacy” and “critical thinking” will simply be deployed as an assertion of authority over epistemology.” (Source) These ideas of different ways of knowing and epistemology are something we plan to explore further in future episodes of Beautiful Illusions.
38:11 - See the entry on “Tuning and pruning” from the extended endnotes of Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain by Lisa Feldman Barrett
40:20 - Listen to episode 89 of The Knowledge Project Podcast - “Less Certainty, More Inquiry” featuring an interview with psychologist, writer, and poker player Maria Konnikova
44:30 - Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aaronson
49:51 - The Patterning Instinct by Jeremy Lent
50:35 - Sometimes called the father of empiricism, and referred to by none other than E.O. Wilson as the “grand architect” of the Enlightenment, the philosopher Francis Bacon is generally credited with developing the scientific method. His works emphasized that scientific knowledge could be gained through a skeptical and methodical approach based on inductive reasoning and careful observation of nature whereby scientists avoid misleading themselves. Bacon felt that the metaphysical ideas of the classical thinkers all the way back to Plato and Aristotle were holding back humanity and that once the human mind was freed from these ideas and metaphysical speculation was replaced by knowledge based on experience and induction organized by clear and regular methods, that the reality of nature could be revealed and nature could be conquered "for the relief of man's estate." In Bacon's view, this conquering of nature could remove many of the harsh constraints of physical human existence, and consequently so too would be removed the vain illusions that disturb the soul and cause political strife. On the foundation of modern science would rise the rational and secular state, whose business is progress. The idea of progress as an organized and benevolent project was first broached by Bacon, and he was revered by the figures of the later Enlightenment of the eighteenth century. See the Francis Bacon Wikipedia entry and “Ideas of Progress - The First Prophet of Progress”
53:22 - Liberalism (Wikipedia)
55:41 - Behavioral economics (Wikipedia)
58:14 - Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power by John Meacham
59:04 - Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harrari
1:01:01 - See “Why Chimpanzees Don’t Hold Elections: The Power of Social Reality,” an excerpt from Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain by Lisa Feldman Barrett

Episode 11 - Darwin & The Dude: Darron's Journey to Poetic Naturalism

February 02, 2021 by Darron Vigliotti in Podcast Episode

Jeff and Darron explore a few of the major ideas that shaped Darron’s perception and thinking about the world. They talk about how an early encounter with the work of Charles Darwin started him down a path towards scientific thought and empiricism as a way of understanding the world, how one man’s quest to get his rug back reinforced his roughly existentialist personal philosophy, and how embracing poetic naturalism gave him a framework for unifying the various layers of reality, both fundamental and emergent, science, and art into a more coherent worldview.

Jeff and Darron explore a few of the major ideas that shaped Darron's perception and thinking about the world.

Notes:

2:41 - The Darwin Fish
2:59 - “...you better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone” (BobDylan.com) from “The Times They Are A-Changin’” (YouTube video)
3:18 - See “What is Darwin’s Theory of Evolution” (LiveScience, 2018) and “Darwin and His Theory of Evolution” (Pew Research Center)
7:23 - Charles Darwin
8:20 - First published in 1859, Darwin’s master work On the Origin of Species is undoubtedly one of the most important books ever published. It introduced the scientific theory that populations evolve over the course of generations through a process of natural selection and is considered to be the foundation of evolutionary biology. The book presented a body of evidence that the diversity of life arose by common descent through a branching pattern of evolution. With its unrivaled explanatory power of a variety of biological phenomena, Darwin’s idea has become the unifying theory of all biology, and importantly has revolutionised our understanding of nature and our place within it. In a 2015 survey conducted by a group of academic booksellers, publishers and librarians in the UK, On the Origin of Species was voted the most influential academic book ever written. In his 1995 book Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, Philosopher Daniel Dennett called Darwin’s theory “...the best idea anyone ever had” saying that "In a single stroke, the idea of evolution by natural selection unifies the realm of life, meaning and purpose with the realm of space and time, cause and effect, mechanism and physical law." As the great biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky famously, and correctly, said, "Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution." For more see the On the Origin of Species Wikipedia entry, “Darwin’s ‘Origin of Species’ tops list of most important academic books” (Washington Post, 2015), and “Darwin 200 years later: Evolution by selection of quotations” (Scientific American, 2009)
10:33 - See “Darwin on a Godless Creation: “It’s like confessing to a murder”” (Scientific American, 2009)
10:39 - Modernism
10:42 - The Descent of Man by Charles Darwin
10:54 - Albert Einstein
11:10 - See “Darwin and Genetics” (Genetics, 2009) and “Darwin would have loved DNA: celebrating Darwin 200” (The Royal Society Biology Letters, 2009)
11:27 - See “Nietzsche & Evolution” (Philosophy Now, 2000)
12:40 - The best current fossil evidence suggests that the divergence of humans and chimps began as early as 13 million years ago but it was not a clean split and some hybridization may have been occurring as late as 4 million years ago, so the 6-7 million year number stated in the podcast should not be taken as definitive in any way, for more see the “Chimpanzee-human last common ancestor” Wikipedia entry and “Fossil Reveals What Last Common Ancestor of Humans and Apes Looked Like” (Scientific American, 2017)
12:51 - See the “Tree of life” Wikipedia entry and “What is the Tree of Life?” (Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History)
14:33 - The “Copernican Revolution” (Wikipedia) actually began during the 16th century, approximately 300 years before Darwin’s time, but certainly did alter human perception of our place in the Universe, for more see “Copernicus’ revolution and Galileo’s vision, in pictures” (EarthSky.org)
15:18 - Darwin was well aware of the explosive nature of his ideas and how they undermined the foundations of a society shaped by the Anglican Church, commenting in one of his private journals "As soon you realize that one species could evolve into another, the whole structure wobbles and collapses.” The Autobiography of Charles Darwin, was first published posthumously in 1887, and quotes about Christianity were omitted from the first edition by Darwin's family, whom the autobiography was actually written for, because they were deemed dangerous for Darwin's reputation. These passages were restored in a revised 1958 edition published by his granddaughter. In it Darwin writes “By further reflecting that the clearest evidence would be requisite to make any sane man believe in the miracles by which Christianity is supported, — that the more we know of the fixed laws of nature the more incredible, do miracles become”, that “The old argument of design in nature...which formerly seemed to me so conclusive, fails, now that the law of natural selection had been discovered. We can no longer argue that, for instance, the beautiful hinge of a bivalve shell must have been made by an intelligent being, like the hinge of a door by man. There seems to be no more design in the variability of organic beings and in the action of natural selection, than in the course which the wind blows. Everything in nature is the result of fixed laws” and though he was "very unwilling to give up my belief...disbelief crept over me at a very slow rate, but was at last complete.The rate was so slow that I felt no distress, and have never since doubted even for a single second that my conclusion was correct." Although Darwin had no doubt about natural selection and the evolution of species, his correspondence shows that his religious beliefs changed substantially over the course of this life, but never reached a fixed position, and despite how his ideas may be perceived by others he was not himself antagonistic towards religion. His agnosticism should be understood as a state of genuine uncertainty regarding the existence and nature of God. Darwin’s unwillingness to pronounce on religious matters stemmed from his strongly held view that science and religion rest on different foundations and forms of evidence, and that his scientific expertise, no matter how extensive, did not make him a religious authority and throughout his life Darwin maintained a commitment to the practice of conscientious doubt and critical inquiry in both science and religion. For more see the Wikipedia entry on “Charles Darwin”, “Darwin on a Godless Creation: “It’s like confessing to a murder”” (Scientific American, 2009) and “What did Darwin believe?” (The University of Cambridge Darwin Correspondence Project)
18:38 - Naturalism
18:53 - The mind being a product of the brain is a somewhat controversial assertion, although basically accepted by naturalists who root all causes in the physical, but for more see the “Mind-body problem” Wikipedia entry
19:22 - See “8 People Who Influenced and Inspired Charles Darwin” (ThoughtCo, 2019)
22:23 - See the “History of Science” Encyclopedia Britannica entry
22:34 - See “Galileo vs The Inquisition: The Real Story”, excerpted from The Patterning Instinct by Jeremy Lent
23:05 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 02 - “Our Back Pages”
23:26 - William Shakespeare
23:33 - The book I’m referencing here is Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell, a beautifully written novel released in March 2020 that imagines the emotional, domestic, and artistic repercussions after a husband and wife lose their only son, 11-year-old Hamnet in 1596. Four years or so later, the husband writes a play called Hamlet. I’ve since finished reading it and certainly would recommend it for anyone who enjoys historical fiction and is interested in Shakespeare and the Elizabethan era of English history, but more broadly for anyone who just enjoys great writing, thoughtful meditations on life and human relationships, and the innumerable individual stories that have largely been lost to history and and can only be imagined based on the scant bits we have available to us today. For more see Hamnet (Goodreads), and “The Real 'Hamnet' Died Centuries Ago, But This Novel Is Timeless” (NPR, 2020)
24:50 - See “99 Percent Of The Earth's Species Are Extinct—But That's Not The Worst Of It” (Discovery, 2019) - Darwin did not literally say this, the statement in the podcast is an extrapolation based on his ideas about evolution and all the species that must have existed in the past to give rise to those extant species around us today
26:30 - Richard Dawkins and “fathering the meme”
29:07 - Existentialism
29:18 - See “How Did Life Begin?” (Scientific American, 2018) and the “Abiogenesis” Wikipedia entry
29:53 - See “Maybe You're Not an Atheist–Maybe You're a Naturalist Like Sean Carroll” (Wired, 2016), and “Existential Therapy from the Universe: Physicist Sean Carroll on How Poetic Naturalism Illuminates Our Human Search for Meaning” (Brainpickings)
31:09 - The Big Lebowski
31:14 - The Coen Brothers
31:32 - See “Love the Dude? You’ll Want to Go to ‘The Big Lebowski’ Festival” (Travel & Leisure, 2017) and the “Lebowski Fest” Wikipedia entry
31:41 - Even though this movie is over 20 years old at this point I feel compelled to say that we do discuss some plot points and the ending of the movie, so if you’ve never seen it and care about spoilers, then maybe skip the next ten minutes or so and relisten later. That being said, having seen this movie probably at least 50 times in full, it only gets better the more you rewatch it and know what’s going on. It’s my favorite movie (so far) and I highly recommend it.
32:19 - Farce
35:41 - See the “Film noir” Wikipedia entry, “Essential Noir Films: Sean Geraghty on THE BIG LEBOWSKI” (The Black List), and “Is The Big Lebowski a Great Noir Film? A New Way to Look at the Coen Brothers’ Iconic Movie” (Open Culture)
36:19 - Kurzgesagt (YouTube Channel) and Kurzgesagt website
36:35 - “How Evolution Works” by Kurzgesagt (YouTube video)
36:42 - “Optimistic Nihilism” by Kurzgesagt (YouTube video)
36:48 - Nihilism
36:57 - The absurd
37:48 - Albert Camus
37:52 - Sisyphus is a figure from Greek mythology who was known for his trickery and twice cheating death and consequently was punished by Zeus to roll a boulder up a hill in the depths of Hades for all eternity. In Homer’s epic poem the “Odyssey” he is described thusly by Odysseus: “Then I witnessed the torture of Sisyphus, as he wrestled with a huge rock with both hands. Bracing himself and thrusting with hands and feet he pushed the boulder uphill to the top. But every time, as he was about to send it toppling over the crest, its sheer weight turned it back, and once again towards the plain the pitiless rock rolled down. So once more he had to wrestle with the thing and push it up, while the sweat poured from his limbs and the dust rose high above his head.” According to the Ancient History Encyclopedia Sisyphus is nowadays best remembered as a poignant symbol of the folly of those who seek to trifle with the natural order of things and avoid humanity's sad but inescapable lot of mortality. The adjective Sisyphean denotes a task which can never be completed.” In The Myth of Sisyphus, French philosopher Albert Camus uses the figure of Sisysphus as an analogy to the absurdity of humans seeking meaning in a meaningless universe, concluding “I leave Sisyphus at the foot of the mountain! One always finds one's burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks. He too concludes that all is well. This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile. Each atom of that stone, each mineral flake of that night filled mountain, in itself forms a world. The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy” See the entry on Sisyphus from the Ancient History Encyclopedia and The Myth of Sisyphus Wikipedia entry
40:00 - Watch the final scene of The Big Lebowski (YouTube video)
41:21 - Dictionary.com defines abide as “to put up with, tolerate, stand, to endure, sustain, or withstand without yielding or submitting” and it should also be noted that this is likely a biblical reference, specifically Eccesiastes chapter 1, verse 4 which says “Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains forever.”
42:37 - “...it’s alright, Ma, it’s life, and life only” (BobDylan.com) from “It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)” (YouTube video)
43:20 - Listen to the section of “Part of Your World” (YouTube video) from The Little Mermaid starting at 1:24 in the linked video
43:38 - Listen to the section of “Space Oddity” (YouTube video) by David Bowie starting at 3:22
44:55 - According to Joni Mitchell’s official website the line is actually “I don't know who I am, But you know life is for learning” - listen to the Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young cover of “Woodstock” (YouTube video) from their brilliant 1970 classic album Deja Vu (All Music)
45:15 - Victor Shklovsky
46:10 - Defamiliarization
46:16 - In his essay Art As Device Shklovsky writing about Leo Tolstoy, says “The narrator of “Kholstomer,” for example, "is a horse, and it is the horse’s point of view (rather than a person’s) that makes the content of the story seem unfamiliar”
48:40 - See “Are you sleepwalking now?” (Aeon, 2018) by Thomas Metzinger, who notably is not a neuroscientist as stated in the podcast, but is actually a theoretical philosopher who does work on neuroethics and neurophilosophy - “Imagine you are standing on the prow of a sailboat, watching a school of dolphins leaping left and right. When travelling long distances, jumping saves dolphins energy, because there’s less friction in the air than in the water below. It also seems to be an efficient way to move rapidly and breathe at the same time. Typically, the animals will alternate long, ballistic jumps with bouts of swimming underwater, close to the top, for about twice the length of the leap – a spectacular, high-speed, surface-piercing display sometimes known as ‘porpoising’. These cetacean acrobatics are a fruitful metaphor for what happens when we think. What most of us still call ‘our conscious thoughts’ are really like dolphins in our mind, jumping briefly out of the ocean of our unconscious for a short period before they submerge themselves once again.”
48:56 - See “At high speeds dolphins save energy by leaping” (Nature, 1980)
50:06 - See the “Memory consolidation” entry on Wikipedia, “Rehearsal initiates systems memory consolidation, sleep makes it last” (Science Advances, 2019), and “Memory Consolidation” (Cold Spring Harbor Perspectives In Biology, 2015)
52:12 - The Dunning-Kruger Effect
55:47 - Listen to episode 40 of the It’s Not What It Seems podcast where Darron discusses Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert with his brother Doug
57:12 - See the “Intellectual humility” Wikipedia entry, “Intellectual Humility: A Guiding Principle for the Skeptical Movement?” (Skeptical Inquirer, 2020), “Intellectual humility: the importance of knowing you might be wrong” (Vox, 2019), and “How ‘Intellectual Humility’ Can Make You a Better Person” (New York Magazine, 2017)
1:00:34 - The Big Picture by Sean Carroll and the concept of Poetic Naturalism
1:00:59 - Emergence
1:02:05 - Mind-body dualism
1:02:30 - In describing Poetic Naturalism on his website Preposterous Universe, Sean Carroll notes that, “while there is only one world, there are many ways of talking about the world."Ways of talking" shouldn't be underestimated; they can otherwise be labeled "theories" or "models" or "vocabularies" or "stories," and if a particular way of talking turns out to be sufficiently accurate and useful, the elements in its corresponding vocabulary deserve to be called real...There is more to the world than what happens; there are the ways we make sense of it by telling its story. The vocabulary we use is not handed to us from outside; it’s ultimately a matter of our choice. A poetic naturalist will deny that notions like "right and wrong," "purpose and duty," or "beauty and ugliness" are part of the fundamental architecture of the world. The world is just the world, unfolding according to the patterns of nature, free of any judgmental attributes. But these moral and ethical and aesthetic vocabularies can be perfectly useful ways of talking about the world. The criteria for choosing the best such ways of talking will necessarily be different than the criteria we use for purely descriptive, scientific vocabularies. There won’t be a single rational way to delineate good from bad, sublime from repulsive. But we can still speak in such terms, and put in the hard work to make our actions live up to our own internal aspirations. We just have to admit that judgments come from within ourselves.”
1:03:57 - See “Philosophy and the Scientific Image of Man” by philosopher Wilfird Sellars - from the Wikipedia entry on Sellars: “In his "Philosophy and the Scientific Image of Man" (1962), Sellars distinguishes between the "manifest image" and the "scientific image" of the world.The manifest image includes intentions, thoughts, and appearances. Sellars allows that the manifest image may be refined through 'correlational induction', but he rules out appeal to imperceptible entities.The scientific image describes the world in terms of the theoretical physical sciences. It includes notions such as causality and theories about particles and forces. The two images sometimes complement one another, and sometimes conflict. For example, the manifest image includes practical or moral claims, whereas the scientific image does not. There is conflict, e.g. where science tells us that apparently solid objects are mostly empty space. Sellars favours a synoptic vision, wherein the scientific image takes ultimate precedence in cases of conflict, at least with respect to empirical descriptions and explanations.”
1:05:10 - Sean Carroll’s Mindscape Podcast
1:05:46 - Rene Descartes and mind-body dualism
1:05:47 - See “"A Strange Hybrid Monster": The Foundational Christian View of Humanity” (excerpted from The Patterning Instinct by Jeremy Lent)
1:06:16 - See “Of 2 Minds: How Fast and Slow Thinking Shape Perception and Choice” from Scientifc American, excerpted from Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
1:08:30 - See “What Does It Mean to Live the Good Life?” (ThoughtCo), “The Philosophy of the Good Life” (The Gifford Lectures), and “What is the Good Life? Plato, Aristotle, Nietzsche, & Kant’s Ideas in 4 Animated Videos” (Open Culture)

Episode 08 - System 2, Superman, & Simulacra: Jeff's Amateur Philosophy

December 05, 2020 by Darron Vigliotti

Jeff and Darron talk about the evolution of Jeff’s amateur philosophy and the development of his Beautiful Illusions concept- the ongoing exploration of which is the foundational idea behind this podcast. Jeff walks through some experiences that changed his thinking, they discuss some of the key ideas that led to further construction and refinement of the bigger idea, and how this exploration ultimately opened up new avenues of thought to pursue. A quick content warning, there is a bit of mild swearing in this episode, so if that kind of thing bothers you please take note.

Notes:

2:03 - Existentialism entry from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy and Existentialism: Crash Course Philosophy #16 (YouTube video)
2:20 - Atheism (IEP)
2:56 - The Law of Conservation of Mass (TED-Ed YouTube video)
5:10 - Holden Caufield from The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger
6:07 - The Quran, The Book of Mormon, The Bhagavad Gita, Buddhism, Daoism
10:41 - The Drunkard’s Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives by Leonard Mlodinow
14:18 - Grand Central Station in New York City
14:46 - Subliminal: How Your Unconscious Mind Rules Your Behavior by Leonard Mlodinow
15:13 - See “Why People Choose Coke Over Pepsi” and “How the Brain Reveals Why We Buy”
15:45 - Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
15:54 - Douglas Vigliotti
17:40 - Keith Stanovich and Richard West coined the terms System 1 and System 2 in their work on dual process theory, as noted by Kahneman in the first chapter of Thinking, Fast and Slow entitled “The Characters of the Story” - Psychologists have been intensely interested for several decades in the two modes of thinking evoked by the picture of the angry woman and by the multiplication problem, and have offered many labels for them. I adopt terms originally proposed by the psychologists Keith Stanovich and Richard West, and will refer to two systems in the mind, System 1 and System 2.
18:15 - Neuroscience book by David Brooks?
18:16 - Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain by David Eagleman
18:34 - Thus Spake Zarathrustra by Friedrich Nietzsche
18:55 - See “What Did Nietzsche Really Mean When He Wrote “God Is Dead”? (Open Culture, 2016)
19:10 - The Overman
20:03 - Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey TV Series w/Neil deGrasse Tyson
20:18 - See “Tool-Making Crows Are Even Smarter Than We Thought” video from National Geographic regarding the New Caledonian Crow
20:22 - See images of bowerbird nests and “What Makes Bowerbirds Such Good Artists” (Scientific American, 2015) “Bowerbirds, Art, and Aesthetics” (Communicative & Integrative Biology Journal, 2012)
20:28 - The Guggenheim Museum designed by the famous and influential architect Frank Lloyd Wright
21:05 - To be clear the “lizard brain” idea has been disproven by neuroscience, but remains one of the most enduring myths about the brain. Originally developed by the neuroscientist Paul MacLean between the 1960s and 1990s, the triune brain theory asserts that we have a “lizard brain” under our “mammal brain,” and that our “mammal brain” is itself under our primate/human brain. Our lizard brain, as the theory goes, is a small, primitive part of our brain that functions entirely on instinct. Through the course of evolution, that little lizard brain was enveloped in a more sophisticated but ancient cortex, the limbic system, which is the source of our emotions. Then that was enveloped in an even more sophisticated neocortex that is unique to humans. The only difference between humans and other vertebrate animals, according to this theory, is the existence of these newest layers of our brain that allowed humans to make rational, intelligent decisions. But according to neuroscientists Daniel Toker, the triune brain theory is completely wrong, most notably for the simple reason that our brains aren’t fundamentally different from those of reptiles, or even from those of fish. Every mammal has a neocortex (not just the really intelligent ones), and all vertebrates, including reptiles, birds, amphibians, and fish, have analogues of a cortex. Neuroscientist Lisa Feldman Baarrett notes that the lizard brain idea became wildly popular in the 1970s with the publication of astronomer Carl Sagan’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book The Dragons of Eden, right around the same time that neuroscientists disproved the lizard brain theory as advances in gene sequencing techniques allowed them to discover that most vertebrate brains are made of the exact same ingredients; that there weren’t “new” parts of the brain and “primitive” parts of the brain. Still, the idea of the lizard brain has proven stubbornly persistent, frequently showing up today in media articles, pop psychology, self help, and occasionally even more scientifically reputable sources, but as Barrett notes “The problem here is that it takes 10, 20, sometimes 50 years before discoveries in science make it to the public.” - For more on the lizard brain myth see “You Don’t Have a Lizard Brain” and “It’s Time To Correct Neuroscience Myths” and “A Theory Abandoned But Still Compelling”
23:32 - See “The Evolution of the Human Brain” (YouTube video from BrainFacts.org), “A natural history of the human mind: tracing evolutionary changes in brain and cognition” (Journal of Anatomy, 2008), and the “evolution of the brain” Wikipedia entry
23:43 - Kingdoms in taxonomic classification - humans are classified in the Kingdom Animalia
24:00 - See “Unraveling the Evolution of Uniquely Human Cognition” (PNAS, 2016)
24:23 - Self-Consciousness gives us an ability to reflect on our experience and project into the future and recognize that we exist
25:23 - Animal consciousness - Do animals have subjective experience?
26:50 - Simulacrum and Simulation by Jean Beaudrillard
27:13 - Hyperreality
27:17 - The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon
27:20 - Postmodernism
28:12 - Flow
30:04 - BeautifulIllusions.org - “Today abstraction is no longer that of the map, the double, the mirror, or the concept. Simulation is no longer that of a territory, a referential being, or a substance. It is the generation by models of a real without origin or reality: a hyperreal.” -Jean Beaudrillard
30:08 - Read “On Exactitude in Science” by Jorge Luis Borges
31:32 - See “Baudrillard’s Thoughts on Media” (Philosophical Society.com)
31:47 - The Drive-By Truckers at Infinity Music Hall in Hartford, CT (7/26/17)
32:02 - See “A Journey to the Oldest Cave Paintings in the World” (Smithsonian Magazine, 2016) and the cave painting Wikipedia entry
32:12 - See “Ziggurats and Temples in Ancient Mesopotamia” (History on the Net) and the “ziggurat” Wikipedia entry
32:22 - See “Egyptian Pyramids: The Capstone Pharaoic Power” (History on the Net) and the “Egyptian pyramids” Wikipedia entry
32:24 - See “Art of the Americas Before 1300” (SlideShare presentation based on “Art of the Americas Before 1300” from Art History Teaching Resources)
33:10 - See “Modern human brain organization emerged only recently” (Science Daily, 2018) - “The Homo sapiens fossils were found to have increasingly more modern endocranial shapes in accordance with their geological age. Only fossils younger than 35,000 years show the same globular shape as present-day humans, suggesting that modern brain organization evolved some time between 100,000 and 35,000 years ago.”
33:13 - See “The (Violent) Origin of Sports” (Psychology Today, 2008) and the Wikipedia entry on the history of sport - “It is likely that after the switch from hunter-gathering to farming becoming the primary means of providing food became dominant, those individuals who had previously been assigned to the Hunter role- and were likely naturally more physically built for the purpose- had little way to utilize their skill sets in a practical setting anymore, so instead entered a form of perpetual preparation for hunting and practicing the skills required, which then let to competitive bouts intended to indicate whomever was the most "prepared" for the different elements of the hunt- for example the speed to chase down, strength to wrestle down or accuracy to rapidly dispatch the prey and associated wagering on the outcomes of contests, which them evolved gradually into what we would recognize as sports as we would know them today.”
33:35 - See “On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs: A Work Rant” by David Graeber (STRIKE! Magazine, 2013), and this 2018 Vox interview with Graeber about his book Bullshit Jobs: A Theory
33:59 - See “How Can Scientists Create New Elements?” (Discover Magazine), the “Island of Stability” video from PBS Learning Media, and the Wikipedia entry on synthetic elements
34:07 - George Carlin on “natural” (YouTube video, definitely NSFW)
35:22 - See “What is the Universe Made Of?” (Science Magazine, 2005)
36:38 - See this discussion on social reality and this post on causal reality vs social reality from LessWrong, and the Wikipedia entry on social reality
36:58 - It’s generally understood that biological life is made up of cells that are themselves comprised structurally and functionally of interacting molecules and elements (chemistry) which take place according to the laws of physics - see “Life is Physics” (Physics, 2019) for an interesting discussion of trying to understand “life” as an emergent phenomenon of a physical system
38:35 - Can we overcome our cognitive biases? See “Your Lying Mind: The Cognitive Biases Tricking Your Brain” (The Atlantic, 2018) and this 2015 interview with Daniel Kahneman (The Guardian)
43:20 - Do humans have agency?
44:01 - Freaks and Geeks (TV Show)
46:50 - In Buddhism, enlightenment is when a Buddhist finds the truth about life and stops being reborn because they have reached Nirvana. (Wikipedia)

In today's episode "System 2, Superman, and Simulacra" we talk about the evolution of Jeff's amateur philosophy and the development of his Beautiful Illusions concept - the ongoing exploration of which is the foundational idea behind this podcast.

Episode 07 - Boxing Aristotle

November 21, 2020 by Darron Vigliotti in Podcast Episode

Jeff and Darron discuss two titans of the ancient world, Plato and Aristotle - they discuss reading, and grapple with some of the difficulties of interpreting ancient texts. Jeff tries his best to overcome the intuitive responses of his mind as they try to parse the nuance of a regressive framing that offends our modern sensibilities, and they both attempt to relate to Plato and Aristotle from the novice’s point of view, gleaning what wisdom they can in their attempt to make sense of some of the great thinking that has led us to today.

Notes:

2:00 - See the Ten Year Reading Plan from The Great Conversation Reading Group
3:07 - A Game of Thrones Novel & HBO TV Series
4:34 - Bo Knows Bo, No Direction Home, On The Road
5:58 - The Op-Ed “Skim reading is the new normal. The effect on
society is profound.” by Maryanne Wolf was published by The Guardian in 2018 and posits that “Research surfacing in many parts of the world...cautions that...essential “deep reading” processes may be under threat as we move into digital-based modes of reading.” and furthermore that “a series of studies...indicate that the “new norm” in reading is skimming,” - For a counterpoint see “Is Skim Reading the New Normal?” by Yellowlees Douglas Ph.D. on Psychology Today who points out other studies that indicate technology does not change how we engage with reading - that “It's not the medium but the content and context that determine how we engage with a text. Close reading may be a habit most people leave behind with their education, not an inevitable development of reading a physical page.”
7:55 - See The Republic by Plato, Ethics by Aristotle, and Politics by Aristotle
8:41 - See System I & System II and Thinking Fast & Slow
9:16 - ~2350 years ago
10:13 - “According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Aristotle’s writings tend to present formidable difficulties to his novice readers. To begin, he makes heavy use of unexplained technical terminology and his sentence structure can at times prove frustrating. This helps explain why students who turn to Aristotle after first being exposed to the supple and mellifluous prose on display in Plato’s dialogues often find the experience frustrating.
11:26 - Dunning-Kruger Effect
12:23 - See BI Episode 05 - “It’s Alive!”
13:00 - “The pressing, human questions we have about our lives depend directly on our attitudes toward the universe at a deeper level. For many people, those attitudes are adopted rather informally from the surrounding culture, rather than arising out of rigorous personal reflection. Each new generation of people doesn’t invent the rules of living from scratch; we inherit ideas and values that have evolved over vast stretches of time. At the moment, the dominant image of the world remains one in which human life is cosmically special and significant, something more than mere matter in motion. We need to do better at reconciling how we talk about life’s meaning with what we know about the scientific image of our universe.” - Sean Carroll, from The Big Picture
14:02 - While there’s a lot of fun speculation about who was the last “know it all,” the tales all end up being a bit apocryphal in nature, yet there’s know doubt that Aristotle is good a candidate as any. As prolific a polymath as ever lived, he literally founded many fields of study as well as a school dedicated to their pursuit, inscribed over 200 works, studied physical sciences such as anatomy, astronomy, embryology, geography, geology, meteorology, physics and zoology, Wrote philosophy on aesthetics, ethics, government, metaphysics, politics, economics, psychology, rhetoric and theology, and still managed to find time for education, foreign customs, literature and poetry. For more see “Aristotle The Philosopher Who Knew It All” from Classical Wisdom Weekly
17:21 - The “polis”
17:33 - See “Philosophers Justifying Slavery” from BBC Ethics Guide
20:02 - See The Declaration of Independence - “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal…”
20:17 - In ancient Athens, slaves were not citizens, and they considerably outnumbered male citizens. Greeks sometimes enslaved other Greeks in wars, but most slaves in Athens were foreigners. Slavery was hereditary, and freeing one’s slaves was rare.This extensive slave underclass gave the citizen elite time for leisure and contemplation, which was important for political participation in the Athenian democracy. For more on Aristotle’s views on slavery and why it was natural and necessary for the good of the state, see the links in the show notes. From today’s vantage point we can firmly say that there’s no such thing as a natural slave, and no morally acceptable justification for slavery, so I guess that sense Aristotle clearly didn’t know it all - a humble reminder to us mere mortals that even the smartest people can be badly misguided and fail to critically examine their own beliefs and society’s customs, and that future generations are likely to be horrified at some of the views we hold and justify today. - For more see “Aristotle’s Defense of Slavery” from 1000-Word Philosophy
21:40 - “Don’t criticize what you can’t understand” from the The Times They Are A-Changin’ by Bob Dylan
22:05 - See “The Work Required To Have An Opinion” from the Farnam Street Blog
22:44 - I think Yo-Yo Ma is a pretty damn good cellist even if I don’t know exactly why (other than it sounds absolutely perfect and beautiful to my ears) - If you want some Yo-Yo Ma base level knowledge I highly recommend checking out this video featuring a beautiful rendition of Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major, Prélude
23:13 - Anchoring (cognitive bias)
25:00 - Based on criteria he lays out, Aristotle first rules out some other options as the supreme end, such as a pleasure or honor, before settling on eudaimonia, or happiness. According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Scholars in fact dispute whether eudaimonia is best rendered as ‘happiness’ or ‘flourishing’ or ‘living well’ ...eudaimonia is achieved, according to Aristotle, by fully realizing our natures, by actualizing to the highest degree our human capacities, and neither our nature nor our endowment of human capacities is a matter of choice for us. Still, as Aristotle frankly acknowledges, people will consent without hesitation to the suggestion that happiness is our best good—even while differing materially about how they understand what happiness is. So, while seeming to agree, people in fact disagree about the human good. Consequently, it is necessary to reflect on the nature of happiness. Regardless, it seems clear that Aristotle was looking at a concept more akin to Maslow’s self-actualization over a lifetime than to the state of mind associated with moments of happiness experienced throughout our days, or happiness as we commonly understand it today. For more see Aristotle - Happiness and Political Association
25:55 - Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
27:57 - In his Metaphysics, Aristotle states that “Human beings began to do philosophy... as they do now, because of wonder, at first because they wondered about the strange things right in front of them, and then later, advancing little by little, because they came to find greater things puzzling” Human beings philosophize because they find aspects of their experience puzzling. The sorts of puzzles, or aporiai, we encounter in thinking about the universe and our place within it tax our understanding and induce us to philosophize. When encountered with puzzles, such as the ones that typically exist at the end of many of Plato’s Socratic dialogues, Aristotle’s pragmatic method was to begin philosophizing by trusting in his well-trained perceptual and cognitive faculties, looking out at the world, and laying out the the phainomena, or, the things appearing to be the case, and then also collecting the endoxa, or the most credible opinions handed down regarding the specific puzzles that he was investigating. Then he would explore the multiple opinions and see what wisdom could be gleaned, often seeking the middle ground between extreme positions. By employing this method Aristotle was practicing a sort of empirical philosophy, almost scientific in approach, as opposed to purely relying on his own theorizing or logic. For more see Phainomena and the Endoxic Method
29:15 - The History of Political Science
30:20 - See Sam Harris and The Moral Landscape - Harris is a somewhat controversial figure nowadays. He lays out his vision in his 2010 book The Moral Landscape, which among other things argues that science can contribute to our understanding of morality, which has traditionally been the realm of philosophy, and in doing so challenging philosopher David Hume’s conception that it is not possible to derive what “ought” to be simply by describing what “is” as science does. Whether you agree or disagree, like Aristotle, Harris is undoubtedly trying to apply rational and reasoned thinking, and is quite articulate in doing so. Certainly this is an extremely complex topic that merits much deeper conversation.
31:46- See “The Sophists” from The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, or “Nature of Sophistic Thought” from Encyclopedia Brittanica
32:15 - Thrasymachus and justice as the “advantage of the stronger”
33:21 - See BI Episode 03 - “The Examined Life”
35:51 - According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the difficulty of his task helps to explain why Socrates takes the curious route through the discussion of civic justice and civic happiness. Socrates can assume that a just city is always more successful or happy than an unjust city, furthermore, If Socrates can then explain how a just city is always more successful and happy than an unjust city, by giving an account of civic justice and civic happiness, he will have a model to propose for the relation between personal justice and flourishing. Socrates’ strategy depends on an analogy between a city and a person. There must be some intelligible relation between what makes a city successful and what makes a person successful. For more see “Socrates’ Adopted Strategy”
37:29 - Nature vs Nurture
39:17 - See BI Episode 4 - “Too Cultured”
39:33 - See Key Terms: Auxiliaries, Guardians, Producers - Plato divides his just society into three classes: the producers, the auxiliaries, and the guardians. The auxiliaries are the warriors, responsible for defending the city from invaders, and for keeping the peace at home.They must enforce the convictions of the guardians, and ensure that the producers obey. The guardians are responsible for ruling the city. They are chosen from among the ranks of the auxiliaries, and are also known as philosopher-kings. The producing class is the largest class of society; it is a catch-all group that includes all professions other than warrior and ruler. Farmers and craftsmen are producers, as are merchants, doctors, artists, actors, lawyers, judges, and so forth.
39:40 - See Key Terms: Tripartite Soul, Appetite, Spirit, Reason - According to Plato, the human soul has three parts corresponding to the three classes of society in a just city. Reason lusts after truth and is the source of all of our philosophic desires. In the just man, the entire soul is ruled by reason, and strives to fulfill reason’s desires. Appetite is the largest aspect of our tripartite soul. It is the seat of all our various desires for food, drink, sexual gratification, and other such pleasures. It contains both necessary desires, which should be indulged (such as the desire to eat enough to stay alive), unnecessary desires, which should be limited (such as the desire to eat a ten pound sirloin steak at every meal), and unlawful desires, which should be suppressed at all costs (such as the desire to eat one’s children). Spirit is the source of our honor-loving and victory-loving desires. Spirit is responsible for our feelings of anger and indignation. In a just soul, spirit acts as henchman to reason, ensuring that appetite adheres to reason’s commands.
39:42 - Plato divides his just society into three classes: the producers, the auxiliaries, and the guardians, which he then analogizes to the tripartite soul which comprises the appetite, the spirit, and the reason.
43:49 - See “Freud: Id, Ego, and Superego” at Simply Psychology
44:28 - In his book, The Happiness Hypothesis, psychologist Jonathan Haidt characterizes the human mind as a partnership between separate but connected entities using the metaphor of the rider and the elephant - the rider represents all that is conscious and is the director of actions and executor of thought and long term goals, while the elephant represents all that is automatic, and often acts independently of conscious thought. According to Haidt, our problem is that we overemphasize the power and importance of our conscious verbal thinking and neglect the other components of our mind. In his book, he argues that we must improve our understanding of these divisions and learn to let them operate in harmony, not compete for control. For more see Jonathan Haidt: The Contributions of a Moral Psychologist and The Happiness Hypothesis

Jeff and Darron discuss two Titans of the ancient world: Plato and Aristotle - they discuss reading, and grapple with some of the difficulties of interpreting ancient texts.

Episode 03 - The Examined Life

September 26, 2020 by Darron Vigliotti

Jeff and Darron take a look at the ancient wisdom of Socrates as conveyed by Plato in “The Apology.” They discuss how they came to Socrates through the discovery of, and subsequent engagement with a “Great Books” curriculum, as well as about the value of living an examined life and the true wisdom of knowing what you don’t know. They conclude with a discussion of what these ideas mean in the context of today’s cultural moment, as well as how the ideas inform their thinking about the Beautiful Illusions concept.

Notes:

2:04 - The Art of Manliness Podcast episode #430 “Why You Need to Join the Great Conversation About the Great Books”
2:37 - Ten Year Great Books Reading Plan
5:14 - “Apology” and “Crito” by Plato
5:52 - The Art of Manliness Podcast episode #587 “How to Get More Pleasure and Fulfillment From Your Reading”
7:18 - Gargantua and Pantagruel by Rabelais
8:23 - Maybe it was The book of Dead Philosophers by Simon Chritchley?
8:29 - “The unexamined life is not worth living”
11:23 - The Pre-Socratic Philosophers
19:21 - “I know that I know nothing”
26:23 - List of British Invasion artists
26:28 - The 1988 New York Yankees
28:15 - The Sophists
30:10 - Dr. Anthony Fauci - “We don’t know everything about this virus”
30:38 - What is Real? The Unfinished Quest for the Meaning of Quantum Physics by Adam Becker
33:28 - Bayesian inference, frequently referenced by Sean Carroll
36:25 - Protein Synthesis
47:21 - “Of 2 Minds: How Fast and Slow Thinking Shape Perception and Choice” from Scientifc American, excerpted from Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman

Jeff and Darron take a look at the ancient wisdom of Socrates as conveyed by Plato in "The Apology." They discuss how they came to Socrates through the discovery of, and subsequent engagement with a "Great Books" curriculum, as well as about the value of living an examined life and the true wisdom of knowing what you don't know.