150 | Simon DeDeo on How Explanations Work and Why They Sometimes Fail

150 | Simon DeDeo on How Explanations Work and Why They Sometimes Fail

You observe a phenomenon, and come up with an explanation for it. That's true for scientists, but also for literally every person. (Why won't my car start? I bet it's out of gas.) But there are literally an infinite number of possible explanations for every phenomenon we observe. How do we invent ones we think are promising, and then decide between them once invented? Simon DeDeo (in collaboration with Zachary Wojtowicz) has proposed a way to connect explanatory values ("simplicity," "fitting the data," etc) to specific mathematical expressions in Bayesian reasoning. We talk about what makes explanations good, and how they can get out of control, leading to conspiracy theories or general crackpottery, from QAnon to flat earthers.

Support Mindscape on Patreon.

Simon DeDeo received his Ph.D. in astrophysics from Princeton University. He is currently an Assistant Professor in Social and Decision Sciences at Carnegie Mellon University, and External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute.


Episoder(415)

6 | Liv Boeree on Poker, Aliens, and Thinking in Probabilities

6 | Liv Boeree on Poker, Aliens, and Thinking in Probabilities

Poker, like life, is a game of incomplete information. To do well in such a game, we have to think in terms of probabilities, unpredictable strategies, and Bayesian inference. These are ideas that pla...

23 Jul 20181h 10min

5 | Geoffrey West on Networks, Scaling, and the Pace of Life

5 | Geoffrey West on Networks, Scaling, and the Pace of Life

If you scale up an animal to twice its height, keeping everything else proportionate, its volume and weight become eight times as much. Such a scaling relation was used by J.B.S. Haldane in his famous...

16 Jul 20181h 23min

4 |  Anthony Pinn on Humanism, Theology, and the Black Community

4 | Anthony Pinn on Humanism, Theology, and the Black Community

According to atheism, God does not exist. But religions have traditionally done much more than simply proclaim God's existence: they have provided communities, promoted the arts, handed down moral gui...

12 Jul 20181h

3 | Alice Dreger on Sexuality, Truth, and Justice

3 | Alice Dreger on Sexuality, Truth, and Justice

The human mind loves nothing more than to build mental boxes -- categories -- and put things into them, then refuse to accept it when something doesn't fit. Nowhere is this more clear than in the idea...

11 Jul 20181h 20min

2 | Carlo Rovelli on Quantum Mechanics, Spacetime, and Reality

2 | Carlo Rovelli on Quantum Mechanics, Spacetime, and Reality

Quantum mechanics and general relativity are the two great triumphs of twentieth-century theoretical physics. Unfortunately, they don't play well together -- despite years of effort, we currently lack...

10 Jul 20181h 12min

1 | Carol Tavris on Mistakes, Justification, and Cognitive Dissonance

1 | Carol Tavris on Mistakes, Justification, and Cognitive Dissonance

For the first full episode of Mindscape, it's an honor to welcome social psychologist Carol Tavris. Her book with co-author Eliot Aronson, Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me), explores the effect that ...

4 Jul 20181h 11min

Welcome to the Mindscape Podcast!

Welcome to the Mindscape Podcast!

I've decided to officially take the plunge into the world of podcasting. The new show will be called Mindscape, and will mostly consist of me talking to smart people about interesting ideas. (Occasion...

1 Jul 201816min

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