Episode 13 - What We Talk About When We Talk About Politics Part 2: Just the Facts

Jeff and Darron continue their conversation about the difficulties of having political conversations. They discuss how we determine what’s true and how our conscious perceptions might not reflect reality to the extent that we believe, how well-meaning people looking at the same evidence can come to different conclusions based on their prior life experiences, how our lived reality is socially constructed to a degree of which we are generally unaware, and how all of these factors interact in the context of our current information environment to make political discussions particularly fraught and ripe for disagreement over even our most basic assumptions about reality. Finally they discuss what we might do as individuals to try and make our own conversations less acrimonious and more productive.

Jeff and Darron continue their conversation about the difficulties of having political conversations.

Notes:

• 2:10 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 06 - “What We Talk About When We Talk About Politics”

• 3:07 - See “U.S. Media Polarization and the 2020 Election: A Nation Divided” (Pew Research Center, 2020)

• 3:45 - See “American News Pathways Project,” “How Americans Navigated the News in 2020: A Tumultuous Year in Review,” and “Misinformation and competing views of reality abounded throughout 2020” (Pew Research Center, 2021)

• 4:45 - See “The COVID Confidence Conundrum” (Gallup, 2020), “How misinformation is distorting COVID policies and behaviors” (Brookings, 2020), and “Covid’s Partisan Errors” (New York Times, 2021)

• 10:11 - Watch “How We Figured Out That Earth Goes Around the Sun” from the SciShow Space YouTube channel

• 10:45 - See the “Copernican Revolution” entry from Britannica  

• 14:17 - The Atlantic

• 14:45 - Epistemology (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

• 15:40 - Listen to You Are Not So Smart Episode 200 - “Socks and Crocs”

• 16:02 - See “The inside story of the ‘white dress, blue dress’ drama that divided a planet” (Washington Post, 2015)

• 17:00 - See “‘The dress’, 5 years on” (Pascal’s Pensees, 2020), and “Two Years Later, We Finally Know Why People Saw “The Dress” Differently” (Pascal Wallisch writing for Slate, 2017), and “Illumination assumptions account for individual differences in the perceptual interpretation of a profoundly ambiguous stimulus in the color domain: ‘The dress’” (Journal of Vision, 2017)

• 18:40 - See “Disambiguation of ambiguous figures in the brain” (Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 2013)

• 19:15 - The Brain Science podcast

• 19:45 - See “Liberals and Conservatives React in Wildly Different Ways to Repulsive Pictures” (The Atlantic, 2019)

• 20:00 - Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aaronson

• 22:35 - Laplace’s demon

• 26:36 - See “Imagination inflation: Imagining a childhood event inflates confidence that it occurred” (Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 1996) by Elizabeth Loftus Et al. 

• 27:40 - See “Three kinds of propaganda, and what to do about them” by Cory Doctorow (Boing Boing, 2017)

• 30:06 - Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway

• 30:30 - See “Merchants Of Doubt: How The Tobacco Strategy Obscures the Realities of Global Warming” (Farnam Street, 2016)

• 32:48 - For more on the concept of “negative partisanship” and it’s role in our politics see “‘Negative Partisanship’ Explains Everything” (Politico Magazine, 2017), the research the article is based on, “The rise of negative partisanship and the nationalization of U.S. elections in the 21st century” (Electoral Studies, 2015), and “How Hatred Came To Dominate American Politics” (FiveThirtyEight, 2020)

• 34:59 - See “Confirmation bias”, and the “Cognitive bias cheat sheet” and “What Can We Do About Our Bias?” by Buster Benson writing for Better Humans

• 35:14 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 12 - “A New Enlightenment: The Age of Cognitivism”

• 35:40 - See “You Think You Want Media Literacy… Do You?” (or watch the video) by Danah Boyd (Data & Society, 2018)

• 37:13 - Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain by Lisa Feldman Barrett

• 38:38 - Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave by Frederick Douglass

• 38:48 - “Phrenology” and “Scientific racism”

• 40:09 - Social reality

• 40:30 - See “Trust and Distrust in America” and “Key findings about Americans’ declining trust in government and each other”, and “Trust and Mistrust in Americans’ Views of Scientific Experts” (Pew Research Center, 2019)

• 40:05 - See “Why Chimpanzees Don’t Hold Elections: The Power of Social Reality” (Undark, 2021) excerpted from Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain by Lisa Feldman Barrett

• 43:12 - Watch Carol Tavris and Elliot Aaronson describe “The Pyramid of Choice” and how it leads to justification of actions and leads to further action and self justification

• 45:10 - See “Our Consensus Reality Has Shattered” (The Atlantic, 2020)

• 46:19 - Anthony Giddens

• 49:32 - Tyler Cowen 

• 50:07 - Listen to Episode 116 of the Mindscape Podcast - “Teresa Bejan on Free Speech, Civility, and Toleration”) - an interview with Teresa Bejan, political scientist and author of Mere Civility: Disagreement and the Limits of Toleration

• 51:09 - Naive realism

• 53:14 - See “Truth Decay” - a 2018 report from the RAND Corporation

• 57:35 - See “Bad science in the headlines. Who takes responsibility when science is distorted in the mass media?” (EMBO Reports, 2006), “Opinion: The media is ruining science” (Washington Post, 2016), “How the media warp science: the case of the sensationalised satnav” (The Guardian, 2017), “Fake science: Who's to blame when the media gets research wrong?” (National Post, 2018), or “Hyped-up science erodes trust. Here’s how researchers can fight back.” (Vox, 2019)

• 58:38 - See “Op-Ed: I called Arizona for Biden on Fox News. Here's what I learned” by Chris Stirewalt

• 1:00:43 - As Jeff will note in a minute, this is false, for more see “Shattering the infertility myth: What we know about Covid-19 vaccines and pregnancy” by reproductive endocrinologist and infertility specialist, Dr. Eve Feinberg, who is also an associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. For an extremely reasonable and respectful take on vaccine hesitancy and talking with people who may be expressing reservations about vaccination, I recommend listening to a recent episode of The Dispatch Podcast from March 26 which features an excellent interview with former CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden

• 1:01:17 - Listen to “Coronavirus, Variants, and Vaccination” (The Dispatch Podcast, 2021)

• 1:03:19 - Another thing to be aware of when conducting online information searches is the potentially pernicious filter bubble effect, which was first identified by activist Eli Pariser and described in his 2011 book The Filter Bubble: What the Internet is Hiding From You. According to Wikipedia, a filter bubble is the result from personalized searches when a website algorithm (like Google’s, YouTube’s, or Facebook’s, for example) selectively guesses what information a user would like to see based on information about the user, such as location, past click-behavior and search history. One outcome of this effect is that how we search and what we click affects what we see in future searches, so that unless we are actively trying to counter the effect through various technological and personal search habit countermeasures, we see a flood of articles, posts, and videos that support our current opinions and perspectives to ensure that we enjoy what we see, which captures our attention and keeps us clicking. Eventually, due to the human tendency to believe that what we see is all there is, combined with a general lack of awareness that what we are seeing online is being filtered, we end up in personally tailored echo chambers, where we might begin to believe that everyone thinks like us, and we forget that other perspectives exist. In this example, a person who has previously searched for, or clicked on, information about why vaccines are bad will see very different results from someone who has previously searched for or clicked on information of why vaccines are safe and efficacious. 

• 1:04:54 - Watch Eli Pariser’s 2011 TED Talk “Beware Online ‘Filter Bubbles’”, and see “How Filter Bubbles Distort Reality: Everything You Need to Know” (Farnam Street, 2017)

• 1:05:48 - See “Facebook Built the Perfect Platform for Covid Vaccine Conspiracies” (Bloomberg Businessweek, 2021)

• 1:07:14 - Difficult Conversations by by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, Sheila Heen

• 1:10:48 - See “Social media and the challenge of managing disagreement positively” (Pascal’s Pensees, 2017) - click here for diagram image

• 1:13:23 - See the “How To Understand Your Enemy” episode of The Good Fight podcast, which features an interview with political science professor Dr. John Hibbing

• 1:13:37 - Austin Bradford Hill

Episode 12 - A New Enlightenment: The Age of Cognitivism

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.

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.

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

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 10 - Craft Beer Culture: A Personal History

Darron and Jeff talk about their experiences and relationship with beer from their late teens to present day. In the process of highlighting a few specific beers and their associated memories that hold special significance for them, they explore their relationship to the once burgeoning, but now booming world of craft beer. They examine how our their own personal tastes and interests evolved along with the craft industry, and how craft beer exemplifies active participation in culture. 

Darron and Jeff talk about their experiences and relationship with beer from their late teens to present day. In the process of highlighting a few specific beers and their associated memories that hold special significance for them, they explore their relationship to the once burgeoning, but now booming world of craft beer.

Notes:

• 2:05 - Treehouse Brewing Company

• 2:19 - Sean Carroll’s Mindscape Podcast and the Brain Science Podcast with Ginger Campbell, MD

• 2:28 - Mecca

• 2:30 - The Brewers Association trade group, which represents the majority of American Brewing companies, defines an American craft brewer as a small, independent brewer with an annual production of 6 million barrels or less, which represents roughly 3% of annual American beer production. Although the vast majority produce way less than this, the number was increased from 2 million barrels in 2011 to reflect the growth of the industry. For reference, the Treehouse Brewing Company has the capacity to produce about 150,000 barrels per year at its current facility which opened in 2017, whereas the Boston Beer Company, makers of Sam Adams and one of the largest craft breweries in the US brewed about 5.3 million barrels in 2019. Additionally, an independent brewer is one in which less than 25 percent of the craft brewery is owned or controlled by a beverage alcohol industry member that is not itself a craft brewer. See “The Importance of Defining Small and Independent” (Brewers Association, 2018)

• 4:00 - King Julius, Very Hazy, and JJJjuliusss! From Treehouse Brewing Company

• 4:17 - The top 250 beers overall and the top 100 rated New England IPAs according to Beer Advocate

• 6:44 - A “package store” is a regionalism popular in the northeast US that just means “liquor store” - for more see “Why People From Connecticut Call Liquor Stores Package Stores” and “The Origins of the Package Store” 

• 6:50 - Rolling Rock Extra Pale Lager

• 6:59 - Newcastle Brown Ale

• 7:22 - See “What Is the Difference between Ale and Lager?” (Craft Beer & Brewing, 2017)

• 7:34 - See “American Lager” and “American Adjunct Lager” 

• 7:42 - Generally speaking, lager style beers are brewed with yeast strains that prefer colder temperatures, and typically have a long period of cold fermentation or “lagering” which for various reasons you can read about suppresses many of the by-products of fermentation allowing the beer to be very clean tasting with a focus on the malt and hop flavors. Examples of lager style beers would be Pilseners, Bock style beers, Oktoberfest style beers, and well known brands like Budweiser, Coors, Heineken, Corona, and Sam Adams Boston Lager. For various historical reasons, lager dominates world beer production. Ales, on the other hand, are brewed with yeast strains that prefer warmer temperatures - the very same strains used by bread bakers - do not tend to have a long cold fermentation, and feature many flavor characteristics produced by the by-products of fermentation at warmer temperatures. Examples of ale style beers would be pale ales, India Pale Ales, Double IPAs, and Stout. The American craft beer boom has been largely driven by breweries pushing the boundaries of various ale styles, particularly IPA and stouts, innovating new styles and driving trends. 

• 10:35 - Genesee Cream Ale

• 10:40 - Coors Light

• 12:38 - Nuclear family

• 15:39 - See “Alcohol is a Social Lubricant, Study Confirms” (Association for Psychological Science, 2012) and “5 Studies That Help Explain Why Social Drinking Is So Rewarding” (The British Psychological Society, 2017)

• 16:07 - Ice beer

• 16:16 - See the entry on “College Drinking” from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism

• 16:46 - Sierra Nevada Pale Ale

• 18:13 - Although alcohol use is a complex cultural phenomenon that can potentially serve a variety of prosocial purposes, it is one that merits a much more thoughtful look due to its potential for harm, particularly amongst young people. According to the American Addiction Centers and Alcohol.org, the use of alcohol has been normalized in almost every culture, but it should be noted that alcohol is a toxin, and regular use of the can lead to medical, mental health, and social problems...In the U.S., alcohol is the most commonly used substance of abuse among young people...Individuals ages 12-20 account for 11% of all the alcohol consumed, more than 90% of which is consumed by binge drinking. Current drinking culture can make it difficult for parents and young people to fully understand the severity and potential consequences of alcohol abuse. Teens may drink because of peer pressure, experimentation, stress, or other reasons...this risky behavior can lead to an alcohol use disorder (AUD) and heavy alcohol use in the teenage years can cause lasting cognitive deficits and alter the course of brain development as the brain continues to mature into a person’s early 20’s. Other dangers associated with underage drinking include impaired judgment, which can lead to violent behavior, and drinking and driving, increased risk of carrying out or suffering from physical or sexual assault, injuries, increased risk of later alcohol problems, and death. The CDC estimates that alcohol plays a role in the deaths of 4,358 individuals under age 21 each year on average. (Source: “Binge Drinking Statistics”)

• 20:18 - “Neil Young - Silver & Gold” 

• 20:44 - Watch a video of Neil Young performing “Buffalo Springfield Again” - you can see the Sierra Nevada sitting on the stool next to him

• 21:13 - Cascade hops

• 21:21 - Sam Adams and Harpoon

• 21:56 - See “History of Craft Beer in CA” (California Craft Brewers Association)

• 22:08 - See “Our Story” from Sierra Nevada and listen to an interview with Ken Grossman about the origins and growth of Sierra Nevada Brewing Company on the NPR podcast How I Built This with Guy Raz

• 22:16 - See Anheuser-Busch and “Horse-story In the Making: The Budweiser Clydesdales”

• 22:50 - North Coast Brewery

• 22:54 - Lagunitas Brewing Company

• 22:56 - Anchor Brewing and Anchor Steam Beer

• 23:13 - See “Craft Beer Is the Strangest, Happiest Economic Story in America” (The Atlantic, 2018)

• 23:48 - See the Wikipedia entry for “Underdog” 

• 24:01 - Prohibition

• 24:16 - See “How America’s Iconic Breweries Survived Prohibition” (History.com, 2019)

• 24:32 - See “How the Army Made Lager America’s Beer” (War On The Rocks, 2018)

• 21:32 - Laws change re: homebrewing end of 70’s

• 21:43 - National Homebrewing Society

• 21:54 - For more on the connection between homebrewing and craft industry, See “The Roots of American Craft Brewing” (CraftBeer.com), and “The Evolution of the ‘Craft’ of Brewing” (BeverageDaily.com)

• 24:52 - See “The Day Homebrewing Was Legalized” (Craft Beer & Brewing) and “Homebrewing Rights” (American Homebrewers Association)

• 25:02 - The American Homebrewers Association is founded in 1978 by Charlie Papazian who also published The Complete Joy of Homebrewing in 1984 which many consider to be the “homebrewing bible”

• 25:50 - See “Beer History” (Craft Beer)

• 27:04 - See “Utah State Liquor Laws” (Utah.com) and “Explaining Utah’s Liquor Laws” (SaltLakeCityUtah.org)

• 28:34 - The Connecticut Real Ale Festival

• 28:52 - A real ale, or a cask ale, is an unfiltered beer that is put into a small keg or cask after its primary fermentation period and sealed. The slight secondary fermentation that takes place in the cask is the only source of carbonation, unlike typical keg beer that is carbonated under CO2 pressure which is also used to dispense the beer once tapped. Because of this difference real ales tend to have a much gentler level of carbonation, a rounder mouthfeel, and since they are unfiltered, they usually have a slightly more complex flavor and aroma profile. The ales are often cloudy, and served around 55°F, and because they are not stored under CO2 pressure then spoil quickly after opening, so are not good options for commercial products. Casks ales are often used by brewers to experiment with new recipes and various flavor additions, and even cask versions of tried and true recipes will taste different than what it bottled, canned, or kegged using more standard methods, for this reason real ales are sought after by beer aficionados. See “Cask Ale: Draught Beer At Its Best” (Craft Beer) and “What is Real Ale?” (The Beer Connoisseur) 

• 27:14 - Mikro (opens around 2011) See “MiKro Beer Bar In Hamden: Craft Brews, Gourmet Food” (Hartford Courant, 2011)

• 32:28 - New England Brewing Company

• 32:47 - Sea Hag and G-Bot, the beer formerly known as “Ghandi Bot”, for more on the name change see “New England Brewing Decides To Rename Its Gandhi-Bot Beer” (Hartford Courant, 2015) 

• 33:20 - See “Cascade Hops: The Variety That Launched A Craft Beer Revolution” (Kegerator.com), the “American IPA” style sheet from Craft Beer, and “How the West Coast-Style IPA Conquered the World” (First We Feast, 2015)

• 33:35 - See “Citra Hops: The Most Citrusy Aroma Hop in the World of Beer” and “Galaxy Hops: The Homebrewer’s Guide to the Variety” and “Amarillo Hops: The Citrusy Hop That Was Discovered By Accident” (Kegerator.com)

• 34:25 - Lagunitas Little Sumpin’ Sumpin’

• 34:54 - Prime 16 

• 35:07 - Galaxy Pale Ale from NEBCO

• 35:12 - The Bru Room at BAR

• 36:01 - See “What are Chili (Chile) Beers?” (Just Beer), “Water, Yeast, Malt, and Hot: Chile Beer 101” and “7 Spicy Craft Beers to Try” (Craft Beer & Brewing)

• 36:48 - Sip of Sunshine from Lawson’s Finest Liquids, although in retrospect I think the beer we tried that day was actually Double Sunshine, the beer upon which Sip of Sunshine is based

• 37:39 - Heady Topper from The Alchemist

• 37:45 - See “Four Elusive 'White Whale' Beers That Are Still on the Loose” (Eater, 2015), “The Craft Breweries Who Make Them Weigh In: Why White Whales?” (Brew Studs, 2016), “10 Cult Beer Releases, and What to Drink If You Can't Get Them” (First We Feast, 2013) and “Are Rare Beers Worth The Fuss?” (Beverage Dynamics, 2017)

• 37:50 - Pliny the Elder from Russian River Brewing Company

• 38:49 - The style I am describing here is what eventually came to be known as the New England IPA, which was officially classified as the “Juicy or Hazy Double IPA” style by the Brewers Association Beer Style Guidelines in 2018. These IPAs have a high alcohol content over 7.5% and are typically described as having intense fruit flavors and aromas, a soft body, and smooth mouthfeel. They often have an opaque color with substantial haze and have less perceived bitterness than traditional IPAs but are always massively hop forward. This emphasis on late hopping, especially dry hopping, with hops with tropical fruit qualities lends the specific ‘juicy’ character for which this style is known. The New England IPA has undoubtedly been the hottest trend in craft over the past few years with many small and larger craft brewers trying their hand at some version of a hazy IPA-style beer. In 2018, its first year as a competition category at the Great American Beer Festival, the “Juicy or Hazy Double IPA” style garnered more entries than any other style category - dethroning the American IPA as most entered beer for the first time in 16 years. For more on the New England IPA phenomenon, see “How the Hazy New England IPA Conquered America” (Thrillist, 2018), the “New England IPA” style sheet from Craft Beer, “‘Juicy or Hazy’ Ales Debut in BA Beer Style Guide, Representing New England IPAs” (CraftBeer.com, 2018), “The New England Style IPA is The Anti-IPA” (CraftBeer.com, 2017), “What Are New England IPAs (NEIPAs)?” (Beer Cartel, 2018), and “What the Hell Happened to the West Coast IPA?” (Gear Patrol, 2019) 

• 41:02 - Trillium Brewing Company

• 41:16 - Double IPA (Craft Beer & Brewing)

• 43:14 - Second Fiddle from Fiddlehead Brewing Company

• 43:18 - Grapefruit Sculpin from Ballast Point

• 44:00 - Generally speaking, the west coast IPAs that pioneered the American style highlight the bitterness of hops over everything where east coast IPAs strike a balance between malty sweetness and hoppy bitterness. Whereas west coast IPAs are dryer and have an aggressive bitterness, an east coast IPA is sweeter on the front end, which fades into bitterness, thanks to the hops. As an offshoot of the east coast style, New England IPAs are distinctly juicy, as in they can sometimes taste like you took a bite into a tropical fruit or citrus with the rind still on. Previous holdouts, who due to the early dominance of the west coast style thought that “craft” and “bitter” were synonymous, as well as newbies to the craft beer scene, have typically found it somewhat easier to get in on the game through the New England IPAs more approachable flavors, which has increased overall interest in craft beer. - For more see “East Coast IPA vs West Coast IPA: What's the Difference?” (Gear Patrol, 2020)

• 38:40 - Untappd

• 48:26 - Hill Farmstead Brewery

• 49:39 - See “How The Rise Of Craft Beer Is Contributing To The Decline Of The Homebrewing Lifestyle” (Forbes, 2016)

• 49:43 - Counterweight Brewing Company

• 49:45 - DuVig Brewing Company

• 49:49 - In January 1985 there were 100 craft breweries open and operating in the US, including early craft pioneers like Sierra Nevada and the Boston Beer Company, by 1996 the number of craft breweries had grown to 1000, and 50 different categories were recognized and judged at the Great American Beer Festival. The first “American Craft Beer Week” took place in 2006, and in 2014 craft beer production volume saw an 18% increase over the previous year with IPA taking over the overall production lead for the first time. By 2016 there were over 5000 craft breweries operating in the US, by 2019 there were over 8,000. In 2019 craft breweries captured 13.6% of the overall US beer market with sales totaling over $29 billion dollars, up from just slightly over $10 billion in 2011, and Ken Grossman, who founded Sierra Nevada back in 1980, has a net worth of $1 billion dollars. - For more see “Beer History” (Craft Beer), “National Beer Sales & Production Data” (Brewers Association), “Retail dollar sales of craft beer in the United States from 2011 to 2019” (Statista), and the Forbes profile of Ken Grossman

• 51:00 - See “contract brewing” and statement from Lawson’s Sip of Sunshine page - “Our Sip of Sunshine IPA is brewed by Lawson’s Finest Liquids in Stratford, CT at Two Roads Brewing and it will continue to be produced at that location.”

• 52:30 - For more on justifying purchases see the “Choice-supportive bias” Wikipedia entry

• 53:16 - See “2020 Zymurgy’s Best Beers in America Results” a list compiled by Zymurgy, which is the bi-monthly magazine of the American Homebrewers Association

• 53:29 - See “10 Types of Beer Glasses to Complement Your Beer” (Kegerator.com)

• 54:33 - Miller High Life

• 56:42 - See “The History of Beer” (Craft Beer & Brewing), “Who Invented Beer?” (History.com), and the “History of beer” Wikipedia entry

• 57:00 - See “An ancient thirst for beer may have inspired agriculture, Stanford archaeologists say” (Stanford News, 2018), “The History Of Beer And Why Civilization As We Know It May Have Started Because Of It” (All That’s Interesting, 2016)

• 58:12 - Yuengling - “America’s Oldest Brewery” was established in 1829 

• 58:49 - See the “Stout” Wikipedia entry and various style sheets from Craft Beer for American Stout, American Imperial Stout, Irish-Style Dry Stout, English-Style Oatmeal Stout, English-Style Sweet Stout (Milk Stout)

Episode 09 - Lying About Santa: Naughty or Nice?

Darron and Jeff talk about the somewhat contentious issue of lying to kids about Santa Claus - why do we do it and what are some possible impacts that encouraging belief in fiction as fact might have on both individuals and the larger culture? They discuss ways adults view the world and relate to kids, the changing nature of cultural traditions, and how we might handle the Santa story in a different way. Stick around after the main show for a special interview with BI's first ever guest, Darron's daughter Lia, who shares some of her thoughts about Santa Claus.

*A note about the audio in this episode - due to COVID this conversation was recorded in a large garage on a brisk 40 degree November Sunday, so there’s a bit of natural reverb, along with the buzz of propane heaters and leaf blowers audible in the background. Like so many things over the past 9 months, it’s not optimal, but we make the best of a challenging situation, and the cleaned up audio is certainly listenable, if not quite up to BI's usual standards.*

Notes:

• 2:09 - The Elf on the Shelf

• 2:24 - Listen to “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” as performed by Bing Crosby (YouTube video) and read about the history of the song and the lyrics

• 3:28 - See “Let’s Bench the Elf on the Shelf” (Psychology Today, 2012) or “You’re a Creepy One, Elf on the Shelf” (The Atlantic, 2012)

• 4:45 - Magical realism

• 10:20 - Hanukkah

• 11:07 - The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES)

• 13:17 - Menorah

• 13:58 - See the Magical thinking Wikipedia entry and “Why Everyone Believes in Magic (Even You)” (Live Science, 2012) and “Do You Believe in Magic?” (New York Times, 2007) and “All Paths Lead to Magical Thinking” (Psychology Today, 2013)

• 16:02 - See “Cognitive and Social Skills to Expect From 6 to 10 Years” (American Psychological Association) 

• 16:08 - See “Should parents lie to kids about Santa Claus? We asked the experts.” (Popular Science, 2019) which draws on the opinions of philosophy professor David Kyle Johnson and psychology professor Cyndy Scheibe

• 16:32 - Jean Piaget 

• 16:48 - According to Piaget’s theory of cognitive development, “The concrete operational stage is the third stage of Piaget's theory of cognitive development. This stage, which follows the preoperational stage, occurs between the ages of 7 and 11 (middle childhood and preadolescence) years, and is characterized by the appropriate use of logic. During this stage, a child's thought processes become more mature and "adult like". They start solving problems in a more logical fashion.”

• 18:15 - See “What should I tell my kids about Santa?” (BBC, 2018) or “What psychologists really think about you lying to your kids about Santa” (Washington Post, 2016) or “Should parents lie to children about Santa?” (EurekAlert, 2016)

• 21:04 - See “Against the Santa Lie” which is a blog post by David Kyle Johnson that contains the hate mail he received based on his Op-Ed piece “SORRY, VIRGINIA…” (Baltimore Sun, 2009)

• 22:46 - See “How the Bagel Became the Most Famous Jewish Food” and “What Is Lox?” (My Jewish Learning) 

• 31:51 - See “Santa Claus: Real Origins & Legend” (History.com) and “From St. Nicholas to Santa Claus: the surprising origins of Kris Kringle” (National Geographic)

• 32:07 - See the Saint Nicholas and Sinterklaas Wikipedia entries - Santa Claus evolved from Dutch traditions regarding Saint Nicholas (Sinterklaas, a legendary figure based on Saint Nicholas, and patron saint of children). When the Dutch established the colony of New Amsterdam, they brought the legend and traditions of Sinterklaas with them.

• 3:47 - The Protestant Reformation

• 3:12 - Krampus

• 33:33 - Originally published anonymously on December 23, 1823, the poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas” by Clement Clarke Moore, changed Santa from a figure who was, until that time, traditionally depicted as a thinner, less jolly, horse-riding disciplinarian, a combination of mythologies about the British Father Christmas, the Dutch Sinterklaas, and the fourth-century bishop Saint Nicholas, into the cheerfully chubby, magical, gift-giver, complete with his eight reindeer, with whom we are now well acquainted. Moore claimed authorship of the poem, which is popularly known today as “Twas the night before Christmas” in 1836, but this claim is now in question and many believe the author was actually the writer Henry Livingston. 

• 33:38 - Using imagery from the poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” the famous political cartoonist Thomas Nast is credited with creating the first illustrations of Santa as we know him today. In total, 33 of Nast’s Santa drawings were published in Harper’s Weekly from 1863  to 1886. In addition to his Santa contributions, Nast’s drawings of Uncle Sam, the Republican Party elephant, and the Democratic Party donkey, among others, are widely credited as forming the basis of popular depictions used today. For more see “A Civil War Cartoonist Created the Modern Image of Santa Claus as Union Propaganda” (Smithsonian Magazine, 2018) and “The Man, the Myth, the Legend: Thomas Nast’s Santa Claus” (Daily Art Magazine, 2019)

• 36:10 - Trivial Pursuit

• 36:44 - For the complete history of Rudolph see “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” (History.com)

• 36:54 - The “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” TV special was created by Rankin/Bass Animated Entertainment and released in 1964, and although it is at this point undoubtedly considered a Christmas classic, it is not universally beloved as some of its plot points and themes are questionable by today’s social standards. For more on this perspective see “Don’t Subject Your Kids to Rudolph” (The Atlantic, 2020). To hear the noise his nose makes, check out this video. 

• 37:11 - Listen to “Run, Rudolph, Run” by Chuck Berry (YouTube video)

• 38:35 - The Christmas window, a special window display designed for the Christmas shopping season, is a tradition established by Macy’s who debuted an animated shop window in 1883 - For more info and pictures see “Holiday Windows - The Wonders of Christmas Holiday Windows” (Victoriana Magazine)

• 40:52 - Capitalism, consumerism, and consumer capitalism

• 41:25 - See “Gift exchange” (Britannica) - “Gift exchange may be distinguished from other types of exchange in several respects: the first offering is made in a generous manner and there is no haggling between donor and recipient; the exchange is an expression of an existing social relationship or of the establishment of a new one that differs from impersonal market relationships; and the profit in gift exchange may be in the sphere of social relationships and prestige rather than in material advantage” - and “The History and Complexities of Gift Giving” (Reporter Magazine from the Rochester Institute of Technology) 

• 45:06 - See the Feast of the Seven Fishes Wikipedia entry or “An Eye-Opening Look at the Feast of the Seven Fishes” (Saveur Magazine, 2018) or “The Origin of the Feast of the Seven Fishes” (Eataly)

• 45:56 - Listen to “The Two Cultures” episode of the the Context podcast from November 2018

• 46:08 - Listen to Beautiful Illusions Episode 04 “Too Cultured”

• 48:30 - See “Is It OK To Lie About Santa And The Tooth Fairy?” (NPR, 2019)

• 52:50 - Google Santa Tracker

Darron and Jeff talk about the somewhat contentious issue of lying to kids about Santa Claus - why do we do it and what are some possible impacts that encouraging belief in fiction as fact might have on both individuals and the larger culture?

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

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

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 06 - What We Talk About When We Talk About Politics

Jeff and Darron discuss how difficult it is to discuss politics and political issues, particularly with our friends and loved ones who might have views different than our own. Jeff relays a story of a recent conversation among friends gone awry, and they consider the role that emotions, identity, and cognitive biases play in our political conversations. Lastly they consider some ways in which we might have more productive conversations that help build understanding and hopefully don’t harm our relationships. This conversation was recorded a few days before the 2020 presidential election.

Notes:

• 5:01 - See “What Happens to Your Body During the Fight or Flight Response?”

• 5:53 - See “This is why you get worked up about politics, according to science” (CNN, 2017)

• 7:35 - Emotional Hijacking

• 7:58 - Difficult Conversations by by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, Sheila Heen

• 10:03 - Confirmation bias

• 10:44 - Motivated reasoning

• 11:04 - “According to Peter Ditto, a psychology professor and researcher who studies motivated reasoning and what he refers to as “hot cognition” - the interface between passion and reason,“People think that they think like scientists, But really they think like lawyers. Scientists don't care what the answer is: they look at the data and draw a conclusion, Lawyers know the conclusion they want to reach, then they harness a bunch of facts to support that conclusion.” And this is how we construct our political facts, whether we realize we’re doing it or not.” - For more on this, confirmation bias, motivated reasoning, and other cognitive biases see “When It Comes to Politics You’re Not As Rational As You Think” (University of California News, 2016) and “Cognitive Biases Cheat Sheet” from writer Buster Benson, author of Why Are We Yelling? The Art of Productive Disagreement

• 12:02 - Loss aversion

• 12:54 - See effects of stress on memory and  “Your Brain on Stress Fails to Learn Properly” (Psychology Today, 2018)

• 13:46 - Illusion of validity 

• 14:42 - See “This Article Won’t Change Your Mind” (The Atlantic, 2019) or “Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds” (James Clear)

• 15:25 - See “Why Won’t They Listen?” (New York Times, 2012) and Jonathan Haidt interview with Tamler Sommers 

• 17:12 - See A Theory of Justice (John Rawls) and the “Original Position” (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

• 17:49 - See “The Psychology Behind Why Politics Can Get So Heated — and How to Show Up Differently” (Healthline)

• 18:29 - “Due to this overlapping of identities, political identity is now sometimes referred to as a mega identity. According to political psychologist and author Liliana Mason, people have a huge number of different group identities, any of which might seem the most salient at any given time. In general, the identity at the top of your mind at any given moment most likely will be the identity facing the most pressing threat. But over the past few decades, the parties have become increasingly aligned with other social identities including race, religion, and rural or urban location. And when these links start connecting our parties and other parts of our social identities, then all of this gets drawn into that one particular political competition. once these mega-identities get formed, we start to think of out-group partisans as quite different from us — not just in terms of their political views, but also racially, religiously, and with any number of overlapping categories. We feel ever more socially distant from these out-group members, which makes it easier to dehumanize them, to think about them with less generosity.” - See “As the Rhetoric Escalates: Talking with Liliana Mason” an interview with Lilliana Mason, political psychologist and author of Uncivil Agreement: How Politics Became Our Identity

• 22:40 - The exact lyric is “Scotty liked all of the books that I recommended even if he didn't I wouldn't be offended........” in the song “Tire Swing” by Kimya Dawson, which appears on the Juno movie soundtrack 

• 20:54 - Social Identity Theory

• 23:03 - See “Nirvana Vs. Pearl Jam” (Noisecreep, 2013) 

• 23:52 - “For people who pay attention to such things, New Haven is widely regarded as a pizza mecca, and is home to a few locations, most notably Pepe’s and Sally’s, that frequently appear on best pizza lists. Locals not only identify as being defenders of New Haven pizza, or more appropriately “apizza,” against other cities such as New York and Chicago, but also within New Haven everyone has a particular place that they argue is the best. For what it’s worth, and although I’ve certainly softened in my stance, I still happen to be a Pepe’s partisan, and won’t really argue unless you try to tell me that Modern is better.” For more on the New Haven pizza scene see Frank Pepe’s Pizzeria Napoletana, and “The Definitive Guide to New Haven Pizza” (Eater, 2014)

• 25:08 - See Negative Partisanship, “Negative Partisanship Explains Everything” (Politico, 2017), “How Hatred Came to Dominate American Politics” (FiveThirtyEight, 2020), and “The rise of negative partisanship and the nationalization of U.S. elections in the 21st century” (Electoral Studies, 2016)

• 27:35 - “Smells Like Teen Spirit” (YouTube video) by Nirvana

• 28:55 - See Dehumanization, “What Is Dehumanization Anyway?” (Psychology Today, 2018), “The 5 Steps of Dehumanization” (Psychology Today, 2018) and “Dehumanizing Always Starts With Language” (Brene Brown, 2018)

• 30:33 - Tribalism

• 30:48 - See “The Age of “Mega-Identity” Politics” (The Ezra Klein Show) - an interview with Lilliana Mason, political psychologist and author of Uncivil Agreement: How Politics Became Our Identity

• 30:52 - Minimal Group Paradigm 

• 30:57 - See “Robbers Cave Experiment” (Simply Psychology) and “Revisiting Robbers Cave: The easy spontaneity of intergroup conflict” (Scientific American, 2012)

• 35:02 - See “How Filter Bubbles Distort Reality: Everything You Need to Know” (Farnam Street Blog, 2017)

• 40:55 - “I’m trying to make a nuanced point here about how we conduct our group politics versus how we discuss politics with people in our lives - and it is not to say that people in a democracy bear no responsibility for the actions of elected leaders. Nor is it to excuse hateful, derogatory, or dehumanizing rhetoric. As it is famously stated in the Declaration of Independence, “...Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,” politics and elections absolutely do have consequences, and plans, policies, and legislation implemented or not implemented do have impacts in the world, as do the words and ideas expressed by elected leaders. That being said, people’s identities are complex, and their perception of the world and how they see things in any given situation equally so, and I do not believe there is a 1:1 correlation between individuals and the governance of a particular politician or party. If we disagree then it is our job to continually do the work, as hard as it is, to understand multiple perspectives, even if they seem inimical to our own, and we must never forget our shared humanity. As the philosopher John Stuart Mill said “He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, if he does not so much as know what they are, he has no ground for preferring either opinion... Nor is it enough that he should hear the opinions of adversaries from his own teachers, presented as they state them, and accompanied by what they offer as refutations. He must be able to hear them from persons who actually believe them...he must know them in their most plausible and persuasive form.”

• 43:08 - “Six of One - Obamacare vs. The Affordable Care Act” (2013  video clip from Jimmy Kimmel Live)

• 44:00 - See “Party Over Policy: The Dominating Impact of Group Influence on Political Beliefs” by Jeffrey Cohen (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2003)

• 49:06 - The Beatles vs. The Stones (Ultimate Classic Rock)

• 51:48 - “Don’t put too many onions in the sauce” (video clip from Goodfellas)

• 54:52 - See “Masks Work. Really. We’ll Show You How.” (New York Times, 2020)

• 55:52 - See “Teresa Bejan on Free Speech, Civility, and Toleration” (Episode 116 of the Mindscape Podcast) - an interview with Teresa Bejan, political scientist and author of Mere Civility: Disagreement and the Limits of Toleration 

• 56:45 - See “Managing Conversations When You Disagree Politically” (American Psychological Association)

Jeff and Darron discuss how difficult it is to discuss politics and political issues, particularly with our friends and loved ones who might have views different than our own. Jeff relays a story of a recent conversation among friends gone awry, and they consider the role that emotions, identity, and cognitive biases play in our political conversations.

Episode 05 - It's Alive!

Jeff and Darron discuss Mary Shelley’s classic novel Frankenstein and the way that the cultural conception and meaning of the novel, its eponymous doctor, and his famous monster, have evolved over time. They begin by talking about the images that the name Frankenstein conjures in their minds, then discuss the novel itself and how the nuance of the original is largely lost in today’s popular culture. Darron makes the argument that the modern cultural conception of Frankenstein is anti-science, and potentially contributes to the larger vein of anti-science bias and misconception that runs through our culture. Spoiler alert - the novel is discussed extensively and many plot points are spoiled, so if you’ve never read it, and this matters to you, maybe skip this episode for now and come back after you’ve read. 

Notes:

• 2:15 - Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (Wikipedia entry on Frankenstein)

• 2:25 - Google image search for Frankenstein (and for Herman Munster)

• 4:20 - The movie The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) was the sequel to Frankenstein (1931), and featured Boris Karloff in the now iconic depiction of Frankenstein’s  Monster 

• 4:25 - Released in 1994, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein featured Robert DeNiro as “The Creation”

• 6:04 - See “Frankenstein Reflects the Hopes and Fears of Every Scientific Era” (The Atlantic, 2017) or  “The Horror Story that Haunts Science” (Science, 2018)

• 6:19 - See “How Franken- Lurched It’s Way Into Our Lexicon” (Slate, 2017) and “The Way We Live Now: 8-13-00: On Language; Franken-” (New York Times, 2000) - According to late journalist William Safire, writing in his “On Language” column for the New York Times, the first noted use of the prefix Franken- was in 1992 by Boston College English professor Paul Lewis, who, in a letter to the New York Times commenting on an op-ed piece regarding bioengineered crops, ''If they want to sell us Frankenfood, perhaps it's time to gather the villagers, light some torches and head to the castle.'' Since then the prefix- has caught on and become shorthand for human efforts to interfere with nature, especially where genetic modification is concerned, and it is almost always used in a pejorative sense.

• 7:48 - The creation scene from the 1985 movie Weird Science is a spoof on the Frankenstein monster creation

• 7:52 - See the famous “It’s Alive” scene from the 1931 version of Frankenstein 

• 8:54 - Victor’s description of the moment his creation is brought to life - “It was on a dreary night of November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils. With an anxiety that almost amounted to agony, I collected the instruments of life around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet. It was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out, when, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a convulsive motion agitated its limbs.How can I describe my emotions at this catastrophe, or how delineate the wretch whom with such infinite pains and care I had endeavoured to form? His limbs were in proportion, and I had selected his features as beautiful. Beautiful! Great God! His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath; his hair was of a lustrous black, and flowing; his teeth of a pearly whiteness; but these luxuriances only formed a more horrid contrast with his watery eyes, that seemed almost of the same colour as the dun-white sockets in which they were set, his shrivelled complexion and straight black lips.” (Frankenstein, chapter 5)

• 12:34 - See “The Absurdity of the Nobel Prizes in Science” (The Atlantic, 2017) - “The wider problem, beyond who should have received the prize and who should not, is that the Nobels reward individuals—three at most, for each of the scientific prizes, in any given year. And modern science, as Ivan Oransky and Adam Marcus write in Stat, is “the teamiest of team sports.” Yes, researchers sometimes make solo breakthroughs, but that’s increasingly rare. Even within a single research group, a platoon of postdocs, students, and technicians will typically be involved in a discovery that gets hitched to a single investigator’s name. And more often than not, many groups collaborate on a single project.”

• 12:48 - Monomania

• 17:50 - See “The Promise and Challenge of The Age of Artificial Intelligence” (McKinsey & Company, 2018)

• 18:46 - See for example The Institute for Ethical AI & Machine Learning or the Centre for the Governance of AI, which is part of the University of Oxford’s Future of Humanity Institute directed by Nick Bostrom

• 19:43 - See “AI Has Arrived, And That Really Worries The World’s Brightest Minds” (Wired, 2015) or “An Open Letter: Research Priorities for Robust and Beneficial Artificial Intelligence” or “Benefits & Risks of Artificial Intelligence” from the Future of Life Institute

• 22:15 - British literary critic Chris Baldic as quoted in the The Atlantic article “Frankenstein Reflects the Hopes and Fears of Every Scientific Era”, “That series of adaptations, allusions, accretions, analogues, parodies, and plain misreadings which follows upon Mary Shelley’s novel is not just a supplementary component of the myth; it is the myth.”

• 25:17 - Cultural memes - “In this broad sense, a meme can be thought of as an idea which often carries symbolic meaning, that becomes a fad and spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture. A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas that can be transmitted from one mind to another through various means, and seem to, for better or for worse, evolve over time. The word meme itself was originally coined by evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins, in his 1976 book The Selfish Gene.”

• 28:32 - The Ruins,Or, Meditation on the Revolutions of Empires by Constantin François de Chassebœuf, comte de Volney is indeed a real book dating back to the late 1700’s

• 28:50 - “These wonderful narrations inspired me with strange feelings. Was man, indeed, at once so powerful, so virtuous and magnificent, yet so vicious and base? He appeared at one time a mere scion of the evil principle and at another as all that can be conceived of noble and godlike. To be a great and virtuous man appeared the highest honour that can befall a sensitive being; to be base and vicious, as many on record have been, appeared the lowest degradation, a condition more abject than that of the blind mole or harmless worm. For a long time I could not conceive how one man could go forth to murder his fellow, or even why there were laws and governments; but when I heard details of vice and bloodshed, my wonder ceased and I turned away with disgust and loathing.” (Frankenstein, chapter 13)

• 32:13 - See Atomic Age

• 32:43 - See The Manhattan Project

• 32:59 - Perhaps I’m oversimplifying a bit here, as the creation of powerful new weapons was the purpose driving the atomic research of the late 1930’s and early 40’s. This lead directly to the development of the first atomic bombs, the 1945 bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that killed somewhere between 130,000 and 230,000 Japanese, most of whom were civilians, and the subsequent surrender of Japan and the end of World War Two. To this day it remains the only time that nuclear weapons were used in an armed conflict and there is still much debate concerning the ethical and legal justification for the bombings.

• 35:12 - “And what was I? Of my creation and creator I was absolutely ignorant…I was not even of the same nature as man...When I looked around I saw and heard of none like me. Was I, then, a monster, a blot upon the earth, from which all men fled and whom all men disowned? I cannot describe to you the agony that these reflections inflicted upon me; I tried to dispel them, but sorrow only increased with knowledge. Oh, that I had for ever remained in my native wood, nor known nor felt beyond the sensations of hunger, thirst, and heat! Of what a strange nature is knowledge! It clings to the mind when it has once seized on it like a lichen on the rock.” (Frankenstein, chapter 13)

• 37:28 - See Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil

• 38:18 - 21 Lesson for the 21st Century by Yuval Noah Harari

• 40:25 - See “Our fiction addiction: Why humans need stories” (BBC, 2018)

• 41:04 - See hyperreality

• 43:29 - See “The Arctic” section of the Mary Shelley Wiki and “Literature’s Arctic Obsession” (The New Yorker, 2017) 

• 46:10 - “Such a monster has, then, really existence! I cannot doubt it, yet I am lost in surprise and admiration. Sometimes I endeavoured to gain from Frankenstein the particulars of his creature’s formation, but on this point he was impenetrable.“Are you mad, my friend?” said he. “Or whither does your senseless curiosity lead you? Would you also create for yourself and the world a demoniacal enemy? Peace, peace! Learn my miseries and do not seek to increase your own.”” (Frankenstein, after CH 24, Walton’s letter dated August 26, 17--)

• 55:32 - In Herman Melville’s classic novel Moby Dick, Captain Ahab is the monomaniacal captain of the whaling ship Pequod, and his obsessive hunt for the eponymous white whale dooms his ship, most of his crew, and himself. 

• 55:45 - “Farewell, Walton! Seek happiness in tranquillity and avoid ambition, even if it be only the apparently innocent one of distinguishing yourself in science and discoveries. Yet why do I say this? I have myself been blasted in these hopes, yet another may succeed.” (Frankenstein, after CH 24, Walton’s letter dated September 12)

• 57:38 - See “Hollywood's Portrayals of Science and Scientists Are Ridiculous” (Scientific American, 2019), “Hollywood’s War on Science” (Huffington Post, 2014), “The Impact of Science Fiction Film on Student Understanding of Science” (Journal of Science Education and Technology, 2006), or “What the public thinks it knows about science” (National Center for Biotechnology Information, 2003)

• 57:48 - The Terminator

• 57:50 - According to Discover Magazine, “A survey of more than 1,000 horror films shown in Britain between 1931 and 1984 found that scientists or their creations were the villains in 41 percent of the films and that scientific or psychiatric research had produced 39 percent of the threats. Scientists were heroes in only 11 of the horror movies.” Emory University School of Medicine professor and researcher Carlos Moreno comments it is important that “...science itself be portrayed as a force for good rather than something to be feared. From Frankenstein to The Terminator to The Matrix to Jurassic Park to Spider Man, the antagonists of the films are the result of scientific and technological innovations that have run amok and out of control. This recurring theme is symptomatic of an overall unease or fear of topics that are poorly understood by the general public. People fear and distrust what they don’t understand. And quite often Hollywood inflames and reinforces these fears rather than dispelling them. The negative effects of a public mistrust, misperception, and misunderstanding of science can be very real…” (see “Hollywood’s War on Science” fromHuffington Post, 2014)

• 59:10 - The Divine Comedy (Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso) by Dante Alighieri

• 59:48 - The Industrial Revolution takes place from roughly 1760 to sometime in between 1820 and 1840 and Frankenstein is first published in 1818

• 1:00:32 - Quote from The Big Picture by Sean Carroll: “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.”

Jeff and Darron discuss Mary Shelley's classic novel Frankenstein and the way the cultural conception and meaning of the novel, its eponymous doctor, and his famous monster, have evolved over time. They begin by talking about the images that the name Frankenstein conjures in their minds, then discuss the novel itself and how the nuance of the original is largely lost in today's popular culture.

Episode 04 - Too Cultured

Jeff and Darron discuss scientist and novelist C.P. Snow’s influential 1959 lecture “The Two Cultures”, describing the growing cultural schism that he perceives between the sciences and the humanities, and why it’s a barrier to human progress. They take a look at this argument 60 years later and try to bring it into the context of today as they explore the question “Why can’t we talk about science?” This episode was recorded in January 2020, before the COVID-19 pandemic hit the United States, but many of the ideas discussed have even more resonance in light of events that have unfolded since then.

Notes:

• 2:00 - Context with Brad Harris podcast episode “The Two Cultures, by C.P. Snow” from November, 2018

• 2:06 - “The Two Cultures” by C.P. Snow

• 2:53 - Simulacra and Simulation by Jean Baudrillard

• 3:16 - “What is Science?”

• 3:34 - History of Science

• 4:45 - Snow gave the Rede Lecture at the University of Cambridge in 1959 - “The Rede Lecture”, named for Sir Robert Rede, an English judge who provided an annual stipend to Cambridge University for lectures in logic, moral philosophy, and the humanities, is a tradition that dates back to the 16th century. In 1858 it became a single annual lecture with one appointee per year, a tradition that continues to this day, with the most recent lecture, “Reasons for Hope,” being given by famous primatologist Jane Goodall in 2019”

• 8:43 - See “From the anti-vaxxers to flat earthers: what makes people distrust science?” and “Why flat-Earth theory and anti-vax conspiracies exist” (video)

• 10:00 - “What is a pandemic?” from Live Science

• 11:27 - List of equations in quantum mechanics

• 13:44 - See “Advances in weather prediction” from Science Magazine (January 2019) - “According to research summarized in Science Magazine, “Modern 72-hour predictions of hurricane tracks are more accurate than 24-hour forecasts were 40 years ago” and “Weather forecasts from leading numerical weather prediction centers have also been improving rapidly: A modern 5-day forecast is as accurate as a 1-day forecast was in 1980, and useful forecasts now reach 9 to 10 days into the future.”

• 14:25 - Outcome bias

• 14:50 - See the “manifest image” and the “scientific image” as proposed by the philosopher Wilfrid Sellars in his work Philosophy and the Scientific Image of Man, which is erroneously referred to here as the “manifest reality” and the “scientific reality”

• 21:45 - Humans want narrative and story, see “The Neurology of Narrative” or “The art of storytelling: Researchers explore why we relate to characters” 

• 21:55 - See Chapter 3 of Speaking of Culture by Nolan Weil for a good summary of creation myths

• 22:19 - See Dunbar’s Number

• 24:20 - Ode to a Flower, spoken monologue from Richard Feynman (video, highly recommended) 

• 25:38- See “Explainer: Where fossil fuels come from” from Science News for Students

• 26:38 - Modern Marvels: The Invention of Indoor Plumbing (video)

• 28:29 - Is your blue different from my blue? See “Is Your Red The Same as My Red?” (video from Vsauce) or “Your Color Red Really Could Be My Blue” from Live Science

• 29:56 - According to “Sweet Music to Your Nerves” from Physics, “A recent mathematical model suggests that the key may be the rhythmically consistent firing of neurons in response to a harmonious pair of frequencies.” 

• 29:59 - An Octave is “the interval between one musical pitch and another with double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been referred to as the "basic miracle of music", the use of which is common in most musical systems.”

• 32:46 - “What is the Difference Between Pure and Applied Science?”

• 33:42 - See Max Martin -  Jeff is likely referring to the Norwegian songwriter and pop producer Karl Martin Sanberg. Sanberg, better known as Max Martin, is the most notable of a number of Norwegian pop songwriter-producers who use a formulaic approach combining pleasing components of past pop trends to churn out hits. Since 1998 he has written or co-written, and produced or co-produced, 23 Billboard Hot 100 number one hit songs for artists such as Brittney Spears, NSYNC, Katy Perry, Pink, Kelly Clarkson, Maroon 5, and Taylor Swift. The  3 number ones as a songwriter place him third all time in the category behind only Paul McCartney and John Lennon, and the 23 number ones as a producer are tied for first all-time in the category with yet another Beatle, George Harrison.”

• 34:35 - “Hit Charade: Meet the bald Norwegians and other unknowns who actually create the songs that top the charts.” published by The Atlantic in October 2015

• 35:10 - We might be confusing people like Max Martin who are writing/producing the music, with researchers who analyze past hits to generate formulae or descriptors of what makes a “hit” - see “The Secret Math Behind Feel Good Music” or “Love That New Single? Mathematical Equation Predicts Music’s Hits and Flops” and “The Hit Equation”, but the point still stands that a scientific analysis of the music we like is on some level possible and able to be applied in a more direct way during the creation of new music. 

• 37:19 - Magical thinking

• 38:05 - Quote from The Big Picture by Sean Carroll: “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.”

• 39:54 - Romanticism

• 43:09 - See “Overcoming status quo bias in the human brain” and “Born to Choose: The Origins and Value of the Need for Control” and the “Illusion of Control”

Jeff and Darron discuss scientist and novelist C.P. Snow's influential 1959 lecture "The Two Cultures" - describing the growing cultural schism that Snow perceived between the sciences and the humanities, and why it's a barrier to human progress.

Episode 03 - The Examined Life

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.

Episode 02 - Our Back Pages

Jeff and Darron look back to a time when they were so much younger and discuss how their early connection over Bob Dylan opened them up to the broader world of culture and ideas communicated through the arts. They talk about their evolving relationship with Dylan, how he influenced their thinking and led them down other paths, and what he represents. Jeff introduces the distinction he sees between hyperreality and our collective Beautiful Illusion and they conclude with a discussion of the song “My Back Pages.”

Notes:

• 2:30 - Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits, released in 1967 and eventually referred to as “Volume 1” by fans upon the subsequent release of Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits, Vol. 2 in 1971 and then Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits, Vol. 3 in 1994

• 3:40 - Circuit City

• 4:03 - Bob Dylan lyrics by song title

• 4:37 - No Direction Home: The Life and Music of Bob Dylan by Robert Shelton

• 4:48 - Jack Kerouac

• 4:49 - Arthur Rimbaud

• 5:46 - *NOTE* It’s a Steal! How Columbia House Made Money Giving Away Music 

  • Back before the internet, mp3’s, music piracy, and streaming were a thing, mail-order music clubs like Columbia House and BMG would offer multiple albums for 1 penny to new members, as long as members agree to buy a certain amount of albums in the future at regular price. The catch was that the club would automatically send you a new album each month, and the full-price bill, unless you told them in advance you didn’t want, in a model called negative option billing. The obvious result was a lot of people with a lot of albums they didn’t really want. 

• 6:17 - Actually, the release referred to here is actually The Best of The Doors, but the album cover description is spot on 

• 7:48 - Grunge and Pearl Jam - for a pretty interesting take on the 90’s “Alternative Rock” era, check out this 10-part series from rock writer/critic Steven Hyden: Whatever Happened To Alternative Nation? Parts 1-5 are of particular interest here

• 7:53 - The Mighty Mighty BossToneS and the Third Wave Ska scene

• 9:02 - “I Want You” from Dylan and The Grateful Dead’s 7/4/87 show in Foxboro, MA - not the exact version on the album (in terms of Dylan’t enunciation it’s actually better), but you get the idea. 

• 9:12 - “When the Wheels Came Off: The History of Bob Dylan in the 80’s” from Ultimate Classic Rock

• 9:26 - Dylan & The Dead, recorded on tour in 1987 and released in 1989, considered by some to be the worst album from either act

  • AllMusic.com calls Dylan & the Dead “Quite possibly the worst album by either Bob Dylan or the Grateful Dead, the live Dylan & the Dead completely squanders its promise. Working from an intriguing selection of songs -- it includes staples like "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" and more obscure gems like "Joey" -- the Dead and Dylan contribute listless, meandering versions that are simply boring. Both artists have done much better -- reportedly they have done better together, according to various bootleg fans -- but Dylan & the Dead is a sad, disheartening document.”

• 10:24 - “I Want You” from Bob Dylan’s 1966 masterpiece Blonde on Blonde

• 10:27 - Backstage With Bob Dylan

• 10:58 - According to Wikipedia, as of February 2020 “Bob Dylan has released 38 studio albums, 91 singles, 26 notable extended plays, 50 music videos, 12 live albums, 15 volumes comprising The Bootleg Series, 19 compilation albums, 14 box sets, seven soundtracks as main contributor”- and since this recording was made, he just released his 39th studio album, Rough and Rowdy Ways in June of 2020. 

• 11:22 - “Hurricane” and “One More Cup Of Coffee” off the 1976 album Desire

• 11:59 - “Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts” from the 1975 album Blood On The Tracks

• 13:13 - In Huckleberry Finn’s famous epigraph Twain writes “Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot." BY ORDER OF THE AUTHOR PER G.G., CHIEF OF ORDNANCE

• 14:26 - “Love Minus Zero/No Limit” from the 1965 album Bringing It All Back Home

• 14:35 - “The Man In Me” from the 1970 album New Morning, and famously used in the Coen brother’s extraordinary cult classic movie  “The Big Lebowski” 

• 15:34 - Beautiful Illusions

• 17:40 - The “subjective character of experience” as an essential aspect of “consciousness” was introduced by philosopher Thomas Nagel in his influential essay “What Is It Like To Be A Bat?” 

• 18:02 - Paul Simon

• 18:33 - “Paul Simon says he ‘doesn’t like being second to Bob Dylan’”

• 19:28 - Check out Bruce Springsteen, the 1975 Rolling Stone article “New Dylan From Jersey? It Might As Well Be Springsteen”, “The Members of ‘The Next Bob Dylan’ Club” and “Who Is The Next Bob Dylan?: 10 Songwriters Once Voted Most Likely” 

• 19:35 - One of the questions Rock writers have loved asking throughout the years has been “Who is the next Bob Dylan?”, besides Springsteen, other “new Dylans” have included Donovan, Gordon Lightfoot, Loudon Wainwright III, John Prine, and more recent artists such as Jason Isbell, Father John Misty, Conor Oberst, Courtney Barnett - basically just about anyone who has a way with words, picked up an acoustic guitar, and wrote a song”

• 20:10 - Jakob Dylan and The Wallflowers

• 20:47 - Bob Dylan at The Palace Theatre on April 14, 1996 reviewed here in the Hartford Courant 

• 21:05 - Jewel yodeling circa 1996

• 21:50 - “Bob Dylan in concert: Infuriating, genius, or both?”

• 22:43 - Time Out Of Mind

• 22:55 - Time Out Of Mind won 3 Grammy’s at the 40th Annual Grammy Awards for Album of the Year, Best Contemporary Folk Album, and Best Male Rock Vocal Performance for the song “Cold Irons Bound” - perhaps most memorably Dylan’s performance of “Love Sick” at the show was crashed by a spastically contorting and shirtless Michael Portnoy who infamously had the words “Soy Bomb” painted across his chest - Dylan and the band kept going like the true pros that they are without missing a beat or seeming to acknowledge the intrusion in any way. Also notably “Time Out of Mind” beat out Radiohead’s masterpiece “OK Computer” for Album of the Year. 

• 23:32 - “Bob Dylan’s Career-Reviving Classic ‘Time Out Of Mind’ Turns 20”

• 19:58 - Bob Dylan at The Oakdale Theater on August 18, 1997

• 23:45 - “Dylan Recovers From Heart Ailment” - Dylan was hospitalized in late May, 1997, for severe chest pains which turned out to be histoplasmosis pericarditis - a rare fungal infection of the sac that surrounds the heart caused by inhalation of fungal spores found in bird or bat droppings. He was 56 at the time.

• 24:05 - Rick Danko (late, of The Band) joins Bob Dylan for “This Wheel’s On Fire” and then again during the encore for “I Shall Be Released” 

• 24:40 - The Fugees album “The Score” released in 1996 was a critical and commercial hit, the “Killing Me Softly” cover was ubiquitous, and introduced most of the world to Lauryn Hill who became a superstar with her 1998 release “The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill” 

• 25:07 - 7/26/99, 11/10/99, 11/14/99 - featuring Darron’s favorite performance of his all-time favorite song “Don’t Think Twice, It’s Alright”, 11/17/99, 11/18/99, 11/11/00, 11/12/00

• 25:15 - “Don’t Think Twice, It’s Alright” original version from the 1963 album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan

• 25:27 - The Gibson J-45 Sunburst acoustic guitar

• 25:36 - Dylan played the J-45 as his primary acoustic throughout the late 90’s and early 2000’s - it can be seen and heard prominently on this video of “My Back Pages”

• 26:57 - See, for example, “Rolling Stone Readers Pick the Top 10 Songwriters of All Time” or “The 100 Greatest Songwriters of All Time” (heavily biased towards rock era, but it’s Rolling Stone, so that’s somewhat expected), or try a list from Dave’s Music Database that aggregates 36 other lists, an article/poll from BBC news, an opinion piece from a philosophy professor, or maybe the fact that Dylan won a Nobel Prize in Literature “for having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition”

• 27:30 - see Newport concert review (with setlist) from Berkshire Links website, and “Dylan at Newport, 2002” from the blog singer-songwriter/Dylanologist Peter Stone Brown (originally posted on Bobdylan.com), Dylan notably wore a wig and fake beard for the occasion (pic with wig, beard, and J-45) - Actually it was the 2002 festival, 37 years after his last Newport performance. In true enigmatic Dylan fashion, he played the entire show in the summer sun wearing a long-hair wig and fake beard.

• 28:05 - Bob Dylan at the Augusta Civic Center on August 4, 2002

• 29:10 - Dylan sang “Only A Pawn In Their Game” and “When the Ship Comes In” (with Joan Baez) as part of a musical program that included Mahalia Jackson, Marian Anderson, Joan Baez, Peter, Paul and Mary, Odetta, and The Freedom Singers, before Martin Luther King gave his famous speech 

• 29:15 - See “Bob Dylan’s Influence On The Beatles” from The Flip Side Beatles Blog, and “How Bob Dylan Influenced The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Who“ from Far Out Magazine

• 29:26 - See “How Bob Dylan Changed the 60’s, and American Culture” 

• 29:44 - See “Bob Dylan, The Beatles, and the Rock of the Sixties” 

• 29:48 - The Sixties - You know, “a whole lotta stuff” like the Viet Nam war, the Civil Rights movement, the Summer of Love, Urban Riots, Woodstock, and the moon landing, for starters...

• 31:16 - Hyperreality

• 32:59 - Jean Baudrillard

• 33:37 - See “How to Stop Romantic Comedies from Ruining Your Love Life,” or maybe just listen to “Love Like the Movies” by The Avett Brothers 

• 34:00 - “Is this cave painting humanity’s oldest story?”

• 34:20 - The Rolling Stones at Gillette Stadium on July 7, 2019

• 34:32 - Blues music

• 36:46 - See “Processing Information with Nonconscious Mind,” or “New Research Suggests We Have No Control Over Our Thoughts” or “We may have less control over our thoughts than previously assumed”

• 38:10 - Realism, moral constructivism, and relativism

• 39:15 - See “Thinking, Fast and Slow” by Daniel Kahneman, or read this excerpt in Scientific American

• 39:37 - For more on the evolution of the brain and neocortex see “A brief history of the brain”

• 42:41 - Another Side of Bob Dylan released in 1964

• 42:50 - Bob Dylan performing “Maggie’s Farm” at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival, and just because it’s cool here is an awestruck Jason Isbell playing the 1964 Fender Strat that Dylan played at the Newport performance, and here is a bunch of others including Courtney Barnett with the same  guitar

• 42:58 - For more on the “Electric Dylan Controversy” see “The Night Bob Dylan Went Electric,” “Dylan goes electric at The Newport Folk Festival,” “July 25, 1965: Dylan Goes Electric at The Newport Folk Festival,” and “Revisit Bob Dylan’s electric performance at Newport Folk Festival 50 years later” - Perhaps no tale in the history of rock and roll is as dearly told and mythologized as Bob Dylan at Newport in 1965. Taking the stage backed by a rock outfit featuring guitarist Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper on organ, eschewing his acoustic guitar for a Fender Stratocaster, Dylan famously “went electric” - he played raucous and ragged versions of Maggie’s Farm, It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train to Cry, and his current single “Like a Rolling Stone” before walking off the stage- many in the crowd booed, whether it was the rock and roll band or the inadequate sound system remains a topic of debate. Dylan returned a few minutes later, alone with an acoustic guitar borrowed from Peter Yarrow, he played Mr. Tambourine Man before ending with his farewell to Newport and the folk movement, “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue.” As he left the stage the legend was born - Dylan had gone electric, married folk to rock, and changed the course of popular music. 

• 44:15 - Here’s a good example of an antagonistic interview from the famous Dylan documentary “Don’t Look Back”

• 44:40 - See “How Robert Zimmerman Became Bob Dylan” - Arguably, Bob Dylan himself was never a real Bob Dylan. Born in Minnesota as Robert Allen Zimmerman in1941, he arrived in New York in 1961 stylizing himself as a dusty troubadour in the mold of his idol Woody Guthrie and famously told fantastical versions of his personal history all throughout his early career. Before settling officially on the name Bob Dylan in 1961, he had already gone by Elston Gunn, and Robert Allen. In a 2004 interview Dylan said "You call yourself what you want to call yourself. This is the land of the free." and perhaps most tellingly, in the 2019 Martin Scorscese documentary “Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story” he says “Life isn’t about finding yourself—or about finding anything, Life is about creating yourself.”

• 45:59 - “My Back Pages” album recording and lyrics

• 46:53 - The album Bringing It All Back Home was released on March 22, 1965 a few months before the Newport Folk Festival in July of that same year

• 47:01 - “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue” album recording

• 47:05 - “It Ain’t Me Babe” album recording

• 48:21 - “On Exactitude In Science” is a one paragraph short story by Jorge Luis Borges that plays with the concept of the relationship between map and territory

• 48:50 - See “Simulacra and Simulations” excerpt from Jean Baudrillard: Selected Writings 

• 49:40 - Meta-narrative

• 51:11 - List of Bob Dylan songs based on earlier tunes

• 53:36 - 1965’s Highway 61 Revisited and the 1966 masterpiece Blonde on Blonde, along with Bringing It All Back Home are widely considered the peak of Dylan’s 60’s output

• 53:46 - Check out the classic video for “Subterranean Homesick Blues”

• 57:54 - The 2005 documentary “No Direction Home” by Martin Scorsese

• 58:50 - “Shelter from the Storm” album version

This episode was recorded in February 2020

Jeff and Darron look back to a time when they were so much younger and discuss how their early connection over Bob Dylan opened them up to the broader world of culture and ideas communicated through the arts. They talk about their evolving relationship with Dylan, how he influenced their thinking and led them down other paths, and what he represents.

Episode 01 - Why It's Pointless to Start a Podcast in a Pandemic

In the first “real” episode Jeff and Darron consider the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on their Beautiful Illusions project, and how it makes explicit some of the major ideas they had already planned to explore prior to its occurrence. They discuss the way the reality we perceive is mediated, the effect this has on our perception of what is “normal”, and how the ongoing pandemic strips away certain layers of reality that we had perhaps taken for granted, which makes dealing with the implications of COVID-19 and aligning around solutions that much harder.

Notes:

• 2:33 - See article by Alissa Wilkinson published by Vox on April 13, 2020: “No one can opt out of this pandemic. And that will change us forever.” 

• 9:17 - See article by Charles Yu published by The Atlantic on April 15, 2020: “The Pre-pandemic Universe Was the Fiction”

• 11:25 - The Michelle Obama Podcast “Protests and the Pandemic with Michele Norris” - Michelle Obama’s guest was Michele Norris, a journalist who currently writes an opinion column for the Washington Post, and formerly hosted from 2002 to 2011 NPR’s evening news program “All Things Considered” (not “Morning Edition” as I erroneously stated in the show). Notably, Norris was the first African-American female host of the show. 

• 20:41 - For more on “Dunbar’s Number” see “Social network size in humans” and “Optimising human community sizes” - Also of interest, “The human socio-cognitive niche and its evolutionary origins”

• 29:57 - See “New IHME COVID-19 Forecasts See Nearly 300,000 Deaths by December” from The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) 

• 32:48 - See “Dumped Milk, Smashed Eggs, Plowed Vegetables: Food Waste of the Pandemic” from The New York Times, April 10, 2020

• 41:29 - See book by Yuval Noah Harari - 21 Lessons for the 21st Century

• 46:26 - See article “Hundreds of thousands in CT lose power as Isaias’ winds topple trees, wires” from The Connecticut Post, August 4, 2020 and “PURA to investigate Eversource and UI’s preparation for and response to Isaias” from the WTNH News 8 website, August 5, 2020

This episode was recorded in September 2020

Jeff and Darron consider the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Beautiful Illusions project, and how it makes explicit some of the major ideas they had already planned to explore prior to its occurrence.

Episode 00 - Introducing Beautiful Illusions

Jeff and Darron ponder the intersection of reality, consciousness, and culture through conversations that comprise an ongoing attempt to construct meaning by exploring art and science, develop understanding of the context underpinning our current moment in time, and imagine possible futures for human civilization. No expertise here, just two guys who enjoy learning, thinking, and talking about big ideas, deep questions, and the “beautiful illusion” that is the subjective human experience. In this introduction to Beautiful Illusions we lay out some of the major ideas, questions, and thinking that have led to the development of the project, discuss what Beautiful Illusions means to us, and we introduce a few areas of thought that will be further expounded upon in future episodes.

Show Notes:

• 1:46 - Friedrich Nietzsche’s concept of the Overman (Superman, or Ubermensch) as presented in the prologue of Thus Spake Zarathustra: “I TEACH YOU THE SUPERMAN. Man is something that is to be surpassed. What have ye done to surpass man? All beings hitherto have created something beyond themselves: and ye want to be the ebb of that great tide, and would rather go back to the beast than surpass man? What is the ape to man? A laughing-stock, a thing of shame. And just the same shallman be to the Superman: a laughing-stock, a thing of shame.”

• 2:40 - Jean Baudrillard , Hyperreality, and Simulacra and Simulation

• 4:56 - “Of 2 Minds: How Fast and Slow Thinking Shape Perception and Choice” from Scientifc American, excerpted from Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (book overview from Wikipedia)

Jeff & Darron ponder the intersection of reality, consciousness, and culture through conversations that comprise an ongoing attempt to construct meaning by exploring art and science, develop understanding of the context underpinning our current moment in time, and imagine possible futures for human civilization.