1 - Haim Gaifman: Vagueness & the Sorites Paradox

Chiara Mingarelli is a gravitational-wave astrophysicist and a professor in the Department of Physics at Yale University. She studies supermassive black holes at the centers of galaxies and their mergers using data about gravitational waves that are detected by pulsar timing array experiments. In this episode, Robinson and Chiara discuss PTAs, gravitational waves, black holes, how and why they merge, and the fresh release of NANOgrav’s fifteen-year data set, which gives the first ever evidence of a gravitational wave background in the universe, an unprecedented discovery that marks the dawn of a new era of astrophysical research. Chiara’s Website: https://www.chiaramingarelli.com/ Chiara’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/Dr_CMingarelli OUTLINE 00:00 In This Episode... 00:30 Introduction 02:58 Chiara’s Interest in Black Holes 10:25 What Are Gravitational Waves 15:47 Detecting Gravitational Waves 31:39 How to Visualize Black Holes 40:55 Black Holes and Gravitational Waves 48:51 Two Different Backgrounds 53:46 Collecting and Interpreting Data 56:36 Why Do Black Holes Anchor Galaxies? 58:34 Why Do Black Holes Form Binaries? 01:04:25 Lingering Questions 01:11:33 Cosmic Strings 01:17:35 NANOgrav’s Data Release and the Gravitational Wave Background Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.

29 Kesä 20231h 31min

Kevin Dorst is a professor in the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy at MIT. He works at the intersection between philosophy and social science, focusing on rationality. In this episode Kevin and Robinson discuss just this: They begin with classical theories of rationality and where they fall short before discussing instances where the empirical literature shows that humans do not reason rationally at all, touching on the gambler’s fallacy, sunk-cost reasoning, and the hindsight bias. They then move on to discuss the phenomenon of political polarization, which draws both on our capacity for rationality and irrationality. Make sure to check out Kevin’s Substack, Stranger Apologies. Stranger Apologies: https://kevindorst.substack.com Kevin’s Website: https://www.kevindorst.com Kevin’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/kevin_dorst OUTLINE 00:00 In This Episode… 01:02 Introduction 04:14 Rationality and Philosophy 15:14 Bayesian Reasoning 45:10 The Hindsight Bias 56:53 What is Bias? 01:04:03 The Gambler’s Fallacy 01:15:00 Sunk-Cost Reasoning 01:19:07 Political Polarization 01:40:12 Talking Through Disagreement Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.

27 Kesä 20231h 45min

David Albert is the Frederick E. Woodbridge Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University and Director of the Philosophical Foundations of Physics program at Columbia. David is a prior guest of the Robinson’s Podcast multiverse, having appeared on episodes #23 (with Justin Clarke-Doane), #30, and #67 (with Tim Maudlin). Sean Carroll is Homewood Professor of Natural Philosophy at Johns Hopkins University and fractal faculty at the Santa Fe Institute. He is also host of Sean Carroll’s Mindscape, a terrific show (that influenced the birth of Robinson’s Podcast ) about science, society, philosophy, culture, arts, and ideas. Sean also had a great conversation with David on Mindscape, linked below. Both David and Sean are rare breeds—philosophers who are physicists, and physicists who are philosophers—and in this episode Robinson, David, and Sean speak about some of the philosophical concerns at the foundations of physics. They first discuss the Many-Worlds theory of quantum mechanics before turning to the apparent fine-tuning of our universe for life and the possibility of Boltzmann Brains, or complex observers in the universe that arise spontaneously due to quantum fluctuations or the random motion of matter. Preorder David’s A Guess at the Riddle: https://a.co/d/4MUEJZN Sean’s Website: https://www.preposterousuniverse.com Sean’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/seanmcarroll The Biggest Ideas in the Universe: https://a.co/d/dPKZ40X David Albert on Sean Carroll’s Mindscape: https://youtu.be/AglOFx6eySE  OUTLINE 00:00 In This Episode… 00:59 Introduction 08:11 Superposition and The Many-Worlds Theory of Quantum Mechanics 22:34 Decoherence 27:20 Probability 41:32 Some Thought Experiments Concerning Probability 01:08:35 Parsimony 01:12:03 The Fine-Tuned Universe and Quantum Theory 01:14:52 Entropy 01:45:37 Intelligent Design 01:47:22 Boltzmann Brains Galore Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.

25 Kesä 20232h 10min

Luciano Floridi is the Oxford Internet Institute’s Professor of Philosophy and Ethics of Information at the University of Oxford, Distinguished Research Fellow of the Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics of the Faculty of Philosophy, and Research Associate and Fellow in Information Policy of the Department of Computer Science. Beginning in the fall, he will be the Founding Director of the Digital Ethics Center and Professor of Cognitive Science at Yale University. For much of the past twenty-five years Luciano has been developing the philosophy of information as its own free-standing discipline within the philosophical world. In this episode he and Robinson delve into just one small corner of the subject. They talk about Luciano’s view of artificial intelligence as a novel form of agency before turning to some future applications of AI and the novel ethical considerations its use raises in the modern world. Luciano’s Website: https://www.philosophyofinformation.net Luciano’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/Floridi Information: A Very Short Introduction: https://a.co/d/5Jgq1wS OUTLINE 00:00 In This Episode… 01:04 Introduction 04:58 Luciano’s Tetralogy 09:27 Artificial Intelligence as a New Form of Agency 26:49 Future Applications of AI 32:50 Ethics and Levels of Explanation 46:09 The Ethics of AI Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.

23 Kesä 20231h 1min

Nicholas Christakis is the Sterling Professor of Social and Natural Science at Yale University, where he is also Director of the Human Nature Lab and Co-Director of the Yale Institute for Network Science. Nicholas is both a sociologist and a physician; after completing his undergraduate at Yale in biology, he received an M.D. and M.P.H. from Harvard and then a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Pennsylvania. Nicholas has written numerous books, including Apollo’s Arrow: The Profound and Enduring Impact of Coronavirus on the Way We Live (Little, Brown Spark, 2020) and Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society (Little, Brown Spark, 2019), and this latter book is the subject of this episode. Robinson and Nicholas first discuss the way that genetics manifest themselves in behavior before turning to the way that specific behaviors and tendencies have evolved in humans to promote the flourishing of societies. They then talk about some particular such behaviors and tendencies, like in-group bias and hierarchy, before turning to some implications of the view for how societies ought or ought not to be structured. Nicholas’s Website: https://www.humannaturelab.net Nicholas’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/NAChristakis Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society: https://a.co/d/4BeJyS0 OUTLINE 00:00 In This Episode… 01:16 Introduction 04:28 The Motivation Behind Blueprint 23:02 The Genetic Basis of Human Societies 28:27 What Is Network Topology? 38:28 Trade-Complementarity 42:07 The Cultural Universality of Love 48:12 The Eight Cultural Universals 01:02:06 Is Hierarchy Natural? 01:07:13 Human In-Group Bias 01:12:23 Is There a Relationship Between Genes and Social Status? Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.

21 Kesä 20231h 24min

Brad Schoenfeld is Professor of Exercise Science in the Department of Heath Promotion and Nutrition Sciences at Lehman College in the Bronx, New York, where he serves as the graduate director the Human Performance and Fitness Program. Brad is one of the foremost—if not the foremost—authorities on human muscular development, and author of the textbook Science and Development of Muscle Hypertrophy. In this episode, Robinson and Brad talk first about the foundations of hypertrophy on a theoretical level (what makes muscles grow) before moving on to some applications of these principles in the gym. Science and Development of Muscle Hypertrophy: https://a.co/d/fRoyKDb Brad’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/BradSchoenfeld Brad’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bradschoenfeldphd/?hl=en OUTLINE 00:00 In This Episode… 01:11 Introduction 07:31 Muscular Hypertrophy and Hyperplasia 15:24 Applicability of Animal Studies 17:42 Satellite Cells 24:10 Three Factors of Muscle Growth 33:39 The Most Important Gym Variables for Maximizing Muscle Growth 44:32 Muscle Stress 50:07 Muscle Action and Range of Motion 58:20 New Frontiers Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.

18 Kesä 20231h 5min

Stephen Wolfram is the founder and CEO of Wolfram Research, and the creator of Mathematica, Wolfram|Alpha, and the Wolfram Language. He received his PhD in theoretical physics from Caltech when he was twenty years old. In addition to his work at the helm of Wolfram Research, he writes and researches widely across computer science, physics, mathematics, and more. Most recently, Stephen is the author of What Is ChatGPT Doing…and Why Does It Work? (2023). Robinson and Stephen begin by discussing just this, before moving on to some more theoretical questions about intelligence in general and artificial intelligence in particular. Then, after a long digression on the philosophy of mathematics and the foundations of computation, they turn to the ways in which ChatGPT may impact research in STEM fields and beyond. What Is ChatGPT Doing…and Why Does It Work?: https://a.co/d/aADrGGh Stephen’s Website: https://www.stephenwolfram.com Stephen’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/stephen_wolfram Wolfram Research on YouTube: https://a.co/d/aADrGGh OUTLINE 00:00 In This Episode… 00:29 Introduction 03:42 How Does ChatGPT Work? 11:58 Does ChatGPT Pass the Turing Test? 34:33 Will Philosophy Be a Growth Industry? 41:02 Will Mathematicians be Replaced by Computers? 49:26 What is the Ruliad?  01:08:57 Philosophy of Mathematics? 01:32:54 LLMs and STEM 01:43:16 Returning to ChatGPT and AI Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.

16 Kesä 20231h 57min

Paul Bloom is Brooks and Suzanne Ragen Professor Emeritus of Psychology at Yale University and Professor of Psychology at the University of Toronto. He works quite broadly in psychology, and studies how children and adults make sense of the world, with special focus on pleasure, morality, religion, fiction, and art. Paul is the author of seven books, most recently Psych: The Story of the Human Mind, some of the topics of which constitute the subject of this episode. More particularly, Paul and Robinson discuss Freud’s legacy in contemporary psychology, mental illness, human rationality and irrationality, and the roots of motivation. Paul has also recently been producing a fantastic podcast with his friend and colleague David Pizarro—also called Psych—that covers many of the topics in introductory courses to psychology, and it comes highly recommended. Psych (Book): https://a.co/d/eYNR4q7 Psych (Podcast): https://psych.fireside.fm Paul’s Website: https://paulbloom.net Paul’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/paulbloomatyale OUTLINE 00:00 In This Episode… 01:10 Introduction 06:09 Writing Psych 08:30 What is Mental Illness? 23:40 Freud versus Contemporary Psychology 36:31 Psychoanalysis versus Contemporary Therapeutic Modalities 52:13 Is Man THE Rational Animal? 58:24 The Psychological Roots of Our Irrationality 01:17:46 The My-Side Bias and Political Gridlock 01:24:47 The Psychological Roots of Human Motivation 01:52:24 Susan Carey Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.

13 Kesä 20231h 57min