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Ep. 221: Functionalist Theories of Mind (Putnam, Armstrong) (Part Two)

July 22, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

Continuing on functionalism with David M. Armstrong’s “The Causal Theory of the Mind” (1981).

We delve into this version of functionalism that is supposed to clear the way for the scientific identification of mental states with brain states. Mental states are defined by their causal relations with other states and with behavior, and the content of a mental state is exhausted by its intentional object, e.g. the content of a perception is the thing you’re perceiving which (normally) causes the perception. So what about things like colors and sounds that aren’t really out in the world? Can functionalism explain how these seem to us?

Listen to part one first or get the full, ad-free Citizen Edition. Please support PEL!

End song: “Pain Makes You Beautiful” by Jeff Heiskell’s JudyBats, as featured on Nakedly Examined Music #5.

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Subscribe to Mark’s new podcast at prettymuchpop.com.

Pretty Much Pop #1: Pop Culture vs. High Culture

July 15, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

The debut episode of a new podcast hosted by Mark Linsenmayer, Erica Spyres, and Brian Hirt covering films, TV, novels, games, music, comedy, theater, and more.

What is pop culture? Does it make sense to distinguish it from high culture, or can something be both?

For more, visit prettymuchpop.com, or support us to hear episodes in advance and get bonus content for every episode at patreon.com/prettymuchpop. Follow the new podcast on Facebook.

Ep. 221: Functionalist Theories of Mind (Putnam, Armstrong) (Part One)

July 15, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 4 Comments

On Hilary Putnam’s “The Nature of Mental States” (1973).

What is the mind? Functionalist theories identify the mental not with the brain exactly, but with something the brain does. So some other creature without a brain (maybe a computer) might be able to do that same thing if it could duplicate the structure of what our brains do. Is this a satisfying account of the mind?

Don’t wait for part 2! Get the full, ad-free Citizen Edition now. Please support PEL!

Sponsors: Visit omnifocus.com for a free trial of a great to-do list manager. Visit the St. John’s College Graduate Institute: partiallyexaminedlife.com/sjcgi. Check out our new culture/entertainment podcast, Pretty Much Pop, at prettymuchpop.com.

Saints & Simulators 20: #theOne

July 11, 2019 by Chris Sunami Leave a Comment

When God is in everything, and everything is within God, does that not implicate God in our crimes of the spirit as well? Is God present in our angers, and our wars; our dirty jokes and our pornography? Here, perhaps, we have made a mistake by conflating God, as traditionally conceived, with our conception of “the Dungeon Master,” who is merely the maximally simple simulator. But then again, our entire purpose was to determine if there is any necessary connection between the two; between the simulator predicted by Nick Bostrom’s theory and God as envisioned by theologians and believers throughout the ages.

Combat and Classics #29: Emerson’s Divinity School Address

July 9, 2019 by Sanya Kerksiek Leave a Comment

How does speech move the human soul? How can a leader use speech inspire others to action? Lise, Jeff, and Brian tackle those questions in their discussion of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s address to the graduating class of Harvard’s divinity school in 1838.

Get more C&C on the PEL site or at combatandclassics.org.

Ep. 220: 10-Year Retrospective of The Partially Examined Life

July 8, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 13 Comments

Mark, Seth, Dylan, and Wes reflect on the changing state of podcasting and public philosophy over the last decade, how our goals and interests have changed since we started we started. Why don’t colleges pay their faculty to educate the public through regular, broadcasted conversations like ours? If you think we’re snarky, take a look at actual philosophy faculty! Should we continue to do more literature, poetry, and other topics that are not strictly philosophy? Also, the stalled state of the PEL book. Thanks so much to each and every Partially Examined Life listener for making it worth our time to do this!

End song: “High Rollin’ Cult” by Mark Lint with Erica Spyres, celebrating a new attempt to capture the fun of the beginning of PEL: Pretty Much Pop, which you get to hear a teaser of. Listen now to the latest episodes in advance of the masses, including our interview with Yakov Smirnoff, at patreon.com/prettymuchpop.

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Saints & Simulators 19: #TheLonelyDungeonMaster

July 3, 2019 by Chris Sunami 1 Comment

The simulation theory, however, does not have to be turtles all the way down. For example, imagine that somewhere along the chain of simulators, perhaps directly above us (what Bostrom calls “below”), or perhaps much further on up toward the top, we reach an entity we might call the “maximally simple simulator,” an entity of pure and limitless intellect, unbounded in time (and therefore eternal), with no body at all, in a universe containing nothing else but itself, the simplest possible universe.

Ep. 219: The Harder Problem of Consciousness (Block & Papineau)

July 1, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 5 Comments

On Ned Block’s “The Harder Problem of Consciousness” (2002) and David Papineau’s “Could There Be a Science of Consciousness?” (2003).

What would give us sufficient reason to believe that a non-human was conscious? Block thinks this is a harder problem that we might suspect. We can’t know for sure exactly what consciousness in us is, so we can’t know for sure what such a being might require (a brain? certain patterns of behavior?) for them to be enough like us that we could safely apply our own experience of our own conscious states to them. Papineau diagnoses this as a fundamental vagueness in the concepts we use to describe our conscious states.

This conversation continues from ep. 218, with guest Gregory Miller from the Panpsycast still with us.

End song: “Mindreader” by Phil Judd as interviewed on Nakedly Examined Music #98.

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Authentically Connect: An Author Interview with Dr. Gordon Marino

June 27, 2019 by Natalie Kopp Leave a Comment

Kierkegaard instead of Prozac? That is the suggestion of Dr. Gordon Marino—leading Kierkegaard scholar, professional boxing coach, and author of The Existentialist’s Survival Guide: How to Live Authentically in an Inauthentic Age.

Episode 218: The Hard Problem of Consciousness (Chalmers, et al) (Part Two)

June 24, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 2 Comments

Continuing on “Consciousness and Its Place in Nature” by David Chalmers (2003).

We finish Chalmers’s account of the types of physicialism, then move on to dualism (including epiphenomenalism), and finally dally with panpsychism, the specialty of our guest, Gregory Miller from the Panpsycast.

Listen to part 1 first or listen to the unbroken, ad-free Citizen Edition. Please support PEL!

End song: “Georgia Hard” by Robbie Fulks, as interviewed on Nakedly Examined Music #36.

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NEM#100: Dan Stuart Faces Truth and Writes Fiction in Mexico

June 21, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

Dan fronted Arizona cow-punk band Green on Red from 1979 to 1992, releasing seven albums and three EPs, and has since released four solo albums and some collaborations, growing increasingly literary, with two of his recent albums accompanied by novels.

We discuss two tracks from The Unfortunate Demise of Marlowe Billings (2018): “A Killer Now” and “Sky Harbor,” plus “La Passionaria” from Can o’ Worms (1995). We conclude by listening to “Who Knows” by The Slummers from Love of the Amateur (2010). Intro/outro: “Sixteen Ways” by Green on Red from Gas, Food, Lodging (1985). More at marlowebillings.com.

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Saints & Simulators 18: #Gaia

June 20, 2019 by Chris Sunami Leave a Comment

The reason, perhaps, that Bostrom’s demonstration of the probability of God’s existence has received so little attention and notice (especially as compared to the stir and commotion caused by his demonstration of the probability that we live in a simulation, and despite the fact that both conclusions are entailed by the exact same line of argument) is because readers have failed to note the connection between Bostrom’s simulator and God.

Episode 218: The Hard Problem of Consciousness (Chalmers, et al) (Part One)

June 17, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 25 Comments

On “Consciousness and Its Place in Nature” by David Chalmers (2003), with special guest Gregory Miller from the Panpsycast Philosophy Podcast.

Can we explain human experience using the terms of brain physiology? Chalmers thinks not, and lays out the arguments against this and the range of positions philosophers have taken in response to these objections.

Continues on part two, or get the full, ad-free Citizen Edition now. Please support PEL!

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Can Meditation Help Enable Human Flourishing?

June 11, 2019 by Lachlan Dale 4 Comments

In the years since Owen Flanagan’s The Bodhisattva’s Brain, there have been thousands of studies, of varying degrees of quality, on the effects of meditation on the human brain. Here, Lachlan Dale reviews some of the highlights of that research as it’s presented by Daniel Goleman and Richard Davidson in Altered Traits.

REISSUE-Ep. 21: What Is the Mind? (Turing, et al) w/ New Intro

June 10, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 3 Comments

Discussing articles by Alan Turing, Gilbert Ryle, Thomas Nagel, John Searle, and Dan Dennett. What is this mind stuff, and how can it “be” the brain? Can computers think? What is it like to be a bat? With guest Marco Wise.

Plus a new intro by Mark, Wes, and Seth reflecting back on this 2010 discussion, which we’re re-releasing to help you prepare for our upcoming episodes in this area.

End Song: “No Mind” by Mark Lint and the Fake Johnson Trio (1998).

Become a PEL Citizen or $5 Patreon supporter for more energized conversations like this, including the the Not School discussion on David Chalmers’s book The Conscious Mind.

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(sub)Text #1: Shakespeare’s “The Tempest”: Poesis as Revenge Forsaken (Full Release)

June 8, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

At last, the full, public release of this discussion between Wes Alwan and Bill Youmans covering Shakespeare’s 1611 play about revenge, forgiveness, and authorship. Or maybe it’s about exploitation, or how we react to changes in status, or perhaps how a liberal education can give you magical powers! Listen and decide for yourself!

Saints and Simulators 17: #PascalReloaded

June 6, 2019 by Chris Sunami 2 Comments

The setup of Pascal’s Wager, as this argument is generally known, is quite similar in form to Newcomb’s paradox. The glass box with the visible $1000 bill is your ordinary life on earth: you know it exists, and is yours to spend. The opaque box is your eternal reward. It might be empty, or it might be filled with a vast reward far beyond the one in the glass box. You will discover which one is the case only when you die and the box is opened. Do you take the glass box with the known, but finite reward, or the opaque box that could have nothing or everything inside it?

Combat and Classics #28: Aristotle’s Politics Bk. I, Part 4

June 5, 2019 by Sanya Kerksiek Leave a Comment

Jeff, Lise, and Brian continue a “close-read” series on Aristotle’s Politics. They continue to tackle Aristotle’s discussion of slavery, which raises questions about nature, law, and virtue.

Get more C&C on the PEL site or at combatandclassics.org.

Phi Fic #28 A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

June 4, 2019 by Laura Davis Leave a Comment

Join Cezary Baranieckli, Laura Davis, Nathaniel Hanks, Daniel Johnson, and Jennifer Tejada, as we all struggle with what is defined as truly “evil”.
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I see what is right and approve, but I do what is wrong.
-A Clockwork Orange

Episode 217: Discussing Calderón’s “Life Is a Dream”

June 3, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

On the 1636 comedy by Pedro Calderón de la Barca, considering destiny (Christian vs. Ancient Greek), skepticism, meta-theater, and the ethic of honor. Listen to our performance first. With guests Bill Youmans and Erica Spyres.

End song: “Pulling Apart” by Jonathan Segel. Hear him on Nakedly Examined Music #38.

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Sponsors: Visit TheGreatCoursesPLUS.com/PEL for a free month of online learning. Visit the St. John’s College Graduate Institute: partiallyexaminedlife.com/sjcgi.