The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast

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Episode 168: Darwin’s “Origin of Species” (Part Two)

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More on Darwin’s famous book. Why does it matter for philosophy, beyond providing an alternative to intelligent design? Is it really anti-religious? How can well tell if it’s really a scientific theory? Talking about a species evolving trait X to enable survival sounds teleological; is it really, and is that bad? Why would the mind develop through natural selection?

Continues from part 1, or just get the unbroken, ad-free Citizen Edition. Please support PEL!

End song: “I Live” by Jason Falkner, as interviewed on Nakedly Examined Music #47.

Episode 168: Darwin’s “Origin of Species” (Part One)

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On Charles Darwin’s 1859 book, ch. 1–4, 6, and 14. What are the philosophical ramifications of Darwin’s theory of evolution? We go through Darwin’s arguments, compare his views to other theories of evolution like Lamarck’s, and talk about how an evolutionary way of looking at things has influenced philosophers.

Episode 168: Darwin’s “Origin of Species” (Citizen Edition)

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On Charles Darwin’s 1859 book, ch. 1–4, 6, and 14. What are the philosophical ramifications of Darwin’s theory of evolution? We go through Darwin’s arguments, compare his views to other theories of evolution like Lamarck’s, and talk about how an evolutionary way of looking at things has influenced philosophers.

End song: “I Live” by Jason Falkner, as interviewed on Nakedly Examined Music #47.

Naturalism & Philosophical Thinking

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[editor’s note: Here’s our guest blogger Tom McDonald with a bit of original philosophizing. You can read more like this on his blog zuhanden.com. -ML] I want to pose some general questions to all readers, but especially to those scientifically inclined and favorable to a naturalistic worldview. The questions are about the naturalistic worldview that is presently normative but problematic Continue Reading …

Naturalism & Philosophical Thinking

by 20 Comments

[editor’s note: Here’s our guest blogger Tom McDonald with a bit of original philosophizing. You can read more like this on his blog zuhanden.com. -ML] I want to pose some general questions to all readers, but especially to those scientifically inclined and favorable to a naturalistic worldview. The questions are about the naturalistic worldview that is presently normative but problematic Continue Reading …

Thump Thump or Pump Pump? Fodor’s Confusion Explained.

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This is an animated but polite discussion between Jerry Fodor and Elliott Sober — very interesting, and I think I understand Fodor a little better now (i.e., motivates what I believe to be his error — other than the fact that he’s worried about problematic teleological notions like function being necessary to natural selection as a theory). And I do believe I’ve Continue Reading …

Fodor, Darwin, and the Philosophy of Science

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I had been looking forward to Jerry Fodor’s What Darwin Got Wrong (co-authored with Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini), not because I have anything against Darwin but because Fodor is a superb writer, the well-respected cognitive scientist who “laid the groundwork for the modularity of mind and language of thought hypotheses,” and a worthy opponent of the idiocy of evolutionary psychologists who seem Continue Reading …

About The Partially Examined Life

The Partially Examined Life is a philosophy podcast by some guys who were at one point set on doing philosophy for a living but then thought better of it. Each episode, we pick a text and chat about it with some balance between insight and flippancy. You don’t have to know any philosophy, or even to have read the text we’re talking about to (mostly) follow and (hopefully) enjoy the discussion

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