Campus Protests, Dennett’s Legacy | Robert Wright & Paul Bloom

[@greenwavefitness7545]

rest in power, dr. dennett. i needed your full & admirable defense of free will before i could reject its existence entirely. sincerely grateful.

[@sterlingveil]

I discovered Robert Wright via his "Meaning of Life" interviews that were up on the Internet in the early 2000's. Wright's interview with Dan Dennet (whose books I was reading at the time) left an impression, and is probably the reason I ever clicked on a blogging heads video. My admiration of Dan has only grown over the years, as I've discovered more and more of his insightful and prescient writing. Everyone knows about his books, so let me recommend my favorite few of his shorter pieces: Where Am I? Real Patterns Higher Order Truths About Chmess Intentional Systems Theory These are all google-able, concise and edifying. Where Am I? is a speech, or based on a speech, and it's by far the most fun to read. RIP Dan.

[@t3mporal3lbow]

"Just the power of my argument...?" I love these guys.

[@_mark1]

Thank you Bloom for giving a proper retrospective of Dennett's influence and trying to limit Wrights uninformed criticisms.

[@explrr22]

For me it's not that Bob's position is without merit. It's that he holds positions, so tightly and passionately, that he blocks consideration and respect for other positions crafted with equal or superior consideration. ... He often avoids doing much of the Bayesian evaluation thing...🙉🙈🙊

[@_mark1]

@@explrr22 Yeah that's a better way of putting it.

[@mikerpiker]

"You need [subjective experience] to explain why we're talking about consciousness" Drives me crazy whenever Bob says this. Why?? In exactly the same way you don't need subjective experience to explain why you pull your hand out of a fire, you also don't need it to explain why your mouth and tongue and lungs move in a certain way to create the sounds of those words in response to certain stimuli

[@mikerpiker]

I was looking back at this 2016 podcast with Chalmers on the subject: kzbin.info/www/bejne/pYfXZWOwaq98j7s Interesting to contrast this with my quote from Bob above. His view at that time seemed to be "let's just stipulate that consciousness causes us to talk about consciousness". His view seems so much stronger now: its not just a stipulation it's necessary for explanation

[@eemoogee160]

I recommend Katie Halper's video on Seder in the streets.

[@avengemybreath3084]

The “line” is simply the law.

[@Businedu]

You never miss 🔥

[@surrealistidealist]

40:18 Interstitial Lung Disease 💔😭

[@yrukind]

The girl hit in the eye is from Yale. She testified before Congress about flag incidence. She also complained that Yale removed names of countries from their food options and her favorite salad is no longer called Israeli Couscous. She also didn't have time to cry for weeks because of ?? I personally think he was waving flag in front of the camera without intentions of hitting her like the others putting scarves in the way.

[@noahghost4476]

13:48 I'm so relieved Bob pushed back against this. Bob has been surprising me a lot, but at least he pushed back at this part.

[@josefschiltz2192]

Daniel Dennett structured way of talking about consciousness was a invaluable help to me getting through C-PTSD after being a sole caregiver for decades for a disabled parent. I will be forever in his debt.

[@karohe]

It is so bizarre to say that "advocating for violence against palestinians is saying collateral damage is worth the cost" and "advocating violence against israelis is a crime".

[@WILLYNOTWALLY]

😅😅😅oo😅😅😅😅😅

[@MikeDrewYT]

Bob has such a weird objection to the physicalist explanation. “If the experience just is the brain state then why is there subjective experience?” …? Bob. The experience just is the physical process in the brain. It’s not another thing. Qualia really are *just* the brain state. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t consciousness - it’s just that consciousness isn’t *another thing* than the brain state. It’s the brain state - it’s complex enough that it *constitutes* experience for the being. *Why* did brains states become that exquisitely complex? Why did “something that it feels like to need to pull your hand out of the fire” evolve? Because those brain states were adaptive - the creature with the most exquisite feeling of needing to save itself from fire did in fact save itself from fire most reliably. The feeling of sex made it that much more motivating to try to gain sex from the opposite sex. Etc. There being a omething that it’s like to feel the need to self-preserve and reproduce made creatures more likely to do so. It doesn’t seem crazy to think that’s likely.

[@SandipChitale]

Note that even to internally recognize that one is conscious and self-aware requires a physically, normally working brain. We all know that perturbing the brain can make us lose partial or full consciousness and self-awareness. In other words subsystems of class S1 (say!) of the brain generates the conscious phenomenon, be it perception of color or self awareness, and subsystem S2 of the brain monitors S1 and recognizes/classifies the conscious phenomenon. If S2 is disturbed, it fails to do its function of recognizing the conscious phenomenon generated by S1. Of course this is a description at an abstract level. We know the workings of S1 like systems quite well. We know we can perturb systems like S2 to knock off the consciousness awareness. Brain injury, alcohol, drugs like LSD and DMT and anesthesia do this all the time (permanently or temporarily) and there is no controversy about that. And we may not fully know yet how precisely S2 like subsystems work and scientists are working on it. Neuroscience is still ongoing and of course difficult problems are likely to be solved last. People should not talk as if Neuroscience is a finished project. When people are discussing these heavy and heady topics, it is almost required that their brain is functioning normally, and thus it becomes a blind spot in plain sight to realize the above aspect. Try having the awareness of self-awareness under general anesthesia. And please do not bring out the bogus argument that brain is a receiver blah blah. "What is it like to be a bat?" is kind of cute and all, but it can be simply phrased as "What is it for conscious entity A to be like conscious entity B?". If you logically and precisely think about it, then the answer is that "not 100% possible". Because most likely those two entities do not have the same representation in their brains of things due to physiology, location in space, history of life experiences, abilities, intelligence, perception. In other words it is a red herring, just like the cute black-and-white room in Mary's experiment proposed by Frank Jackson is. In some sense any new experience one has, is different by definition - that it is a new experience. For example, testing an extremely sour fruit like tamarind first time is different than only having tasted slightly sour orange until that time. So appeal to "black-and-white" room is a red herring. A new experience generates a new neural pattern that is distinct enough that it is discernible by ones brain, which BTW depends on that brains abilities. Good musicians can discern between two subtly different note, sure. Just to be complete, Franck Jackson has now disavowed the original inference of his Mary's room experiment. But people like Philip Goff still trot it out, playing willfully ignorant. I think eventually we are going to find that we will need to rethink the demand of the explanation of consciousness. It will require a conceptual shift to something along the line para 2 above.

[@explrr22]

My view is close to Paul's on how University should be approaching controversy. It does irritate me that the they don't come to close to applying any standard evenly or consistently. When Heterodox Academy, Harper's Letter, etcetera appealed against expression policing, they were monsters or at best.. mostly ignored by people like Bob and Paul. Id love to see something like a strong embrace of Kalvin or Chicago principles, but it needs to come with a disavowal of mistakes made in recent decade, and a commitment to cease!

[@NessieJapan]

Good one!

[@teenidol18]

How come Robert never laughs at Paul Bloom's jokes?

[@surrealistidealist]

He seems to stay pretty zen no matter who's joking. Lol

[@teenidol18]

@@surrealistidealist I just want to make sure this doesn't upset Paul.

[@erick.roberts9074]

He laughed at the Wirecutter remark around 10:00 (see above comment)

[@teenidol18]

I commented prematurely before watching the entire episode. Week after week I’ve been waiting, so thank you for the timestamp. It was very satisfying. I hope it meant as much to Paul as it did to me.

[@ssehe2007]

Could someone clarify how the phrase “all lives matter” is meaningfully comparable to anti-Israeli protests? This seems to assume that the current Israeli government epitomizes Israel’s role as a refuge for oppressed Jews and that Israel is primarily defined by its function as a defense against antisemitism? I just don’t see the state of Israel as the consummate expression of Jewish suffering and redemption so that to criticize it would somehow amount to downplaying antisemitism and the Jewish peoples’ unique burdens.

[@synchronium24]

Both phrases can function as dogwhistles. "All Lives Matter" has frequently been used to dismiss Black Lives Matter, despite the literal meaning of the slogan being reasonable. In a way, "from the river to the sea" is even worse because it's not merely informal usage that brought the genocidal connotation. The phrase is part of the official Hamas Charter. Expecting people to interpret it super charitably as "one state solution peaceful fun time" just isn't going to fly. I agree with Bob that most of the students saying the phrase don't want to kill Jews, but the rhetoric is nonetheless an unnecessary optics nightmare. It detracts from substantive criticism of Israeli warcrimes and the blockade of Gaza. "Intifada revolution, there is only one solution" is even worse.

[@chandlergordon8878]

you mean they think consciousness isn't REAL, as in it lacks a direct correlation to physical causality. of COURSE it exists. everything exists, even insensible imaginary objects

[@johns.7297]

Perhaps cut Dawkins some slack. He is not a social scientists.

[@MikeDrewYT]

Try harder, Bob.

[@noahghost4476]

23:11 the other guy claims to think it looked unintentional, Bob says it got nowhere near her eye but it was intentional, and Bob somehow also says it was assault and it was like a tap even though he also says it got nowhere near her eye.

[@explrr22]

More clarification than criticism: "nowhere near" eye does seem descriptively wrong ... even if it's Bob's wording. Bob pointed to a spot on the face within about an inch of the eye socket. His report does suggest that reports of actual eye damage was incorrect... Paul might even be correct that severity of harm was unintentional, as when people move against each other violently, such things and worse can and do occur.

[@noahghost4476]

@@explrr22 but doesn't that just serve as more example of how he's hyper focused in on the stuff to undermine those is of us more sympathitic to israel? It's brutal, how biased this seems. To be focusing on whether it actually hit her in the eye or not. Stuff like that makes a person flinch. I don't want Bob to be one of. These people like Chomsky and Finkelstein who have to stay opposed to Israel or else seem intellectually inconsistent. Let him change with the changing times. I think Israel is the good guy here. It's still a hostage situation. You don't run up to the SWAT team and tell them to stand down because you're afraid of casualties. It's a hostage situation. Not just the kidnapped hostages but all the people of gaza who live under gang rule by hamas. Everything can get better for everyone now. But not by just blaming israel. Or pretending like they don't have to do what they're doing.

[@explrr22]

@@noahghost4476 it does seem significantly biased to me (and away from my own perspective)... But on today's contemporary public discourse scale, it also seemed milder than most. Not satisfactory to me, but toned down from the most consumed media content.

[@synchronium24]

"Bob somehow also says it was assault" Bob says it was technically assault in the same way that spitting on someone is legally assault but doesn't match the severity that "assault" typically brings to mind. From the video it looked to me like the guy intended to bonk Sahar on the forehead with the flag in a "shut up, you idiot" kinda way, but not with the intention to do physical harm. It also seems like he got closer to her eye than intended, but certainly did not "stab her in the eye" as she alleges. I would agree "nowhere near" her eye is inaccurate.

[@noahghost4476]

@@synchronium24 if somebody punches me I might let it go. But if they spit on me or "bonk" me, somebody's going to the hospital. You sound a little too comfortable with people bullying jews.

[@chandlergordon8878]

dennet was wrong about identical. he really meant to say equivalent. like x = y. so, they have the same quantitative values but can differ in qualitative values. an easy mistake to make for someone imprecise in their use of language :>

[@mardomacfleno2474]

Bob, you might not want to say K the J. KZbin transcribes your speech and uses that data for all sorts of stuff like whether or not your video stays up. People can take a clip making it look like it's your opinion and most people aren't going to look to see if it's out of context. The algorithm will recommend antisemitic videos to your listeners and recommend your videos to antisemitic people. Lastly, it could trigger some people.

[@pamvavra7981]

18:36 "Him celebrating...a brutal attack on Jewish people." Except he didn't celebrate and the attack was against the Israeli people, which the Palestinians see as occupiers, not all Jewish people. A typical conflation.

[@jesselitsinger9399]

Thanks for the retrospective on Dennett. Was great to hear Bob's perspective on him

[@61jcfield]

Columbia does not have the responsibility to protect, promote or facilitate unfettered speech. The government has that responsibility and only in the broader public sphere. Private institutions whose members participate voluntarily have the right and responsibility to set the standard for participation; this includes the standards of behavior and therefore speech. The promotion of the wide-ranging exchange of ideas can and should coincide with the enforcement of policies an ensure an orderly campus environment.

[@dawidhenning1467]

Tapas billing

[@MikeDrewYT]

I can’t remotely see how the passages read by Bob can be seen as beyond the pale in any sense. It essentially follows from any pro-armed-resistance pro-Palestinian view of the conflict. It’s kind of language historians describing what’s seen as righteous independence movements (🇺🇸?) would use to describe attacks and counterattacks by overmatched independence movements that succeed by attacking ingenuity - “stunning,”etc. I wasn’t aware of what commentary had occasioned the outrage of this professor - I’m actually stunned at how unremarkable it is.

[@MikeDrewYT]

@@ThomasMuir-eh6hfIt’s probably not effective advocacy, no, but as it’s read by Bob it sounds more like analysis than advocacy. What’s the issue with the passage? “Stunning”? The Israelis would tell you they were stunned - shocked, even. The degree of surprise was almost inconceivable.

[@synchronium24]

@@ThomasMuir-eh6hf "Effective support for the Palestinian movement probably depends on criticising this kind of madness." Based. Palestinians cannot have peace and freedom until both Hamas and Netanyahu are gone. Apologetics (if not outright support) for Hamas runs totally counter to that goal.

[@olewetdog6254]

Since Columbia is a private university why does the president of it have to talk to congress at all?? Didn't Leonard Leo just refuse to talk to the senate by saying it was just political anyway? Why aren't liberals this hard nosed?? Just tell stephanick to go pound sand! And if they want to pursue it then dare them to go for it.

[@amant7963]

You can say no but then you can not accept any federal money .. has Columbia offered to not accept federal money ? So these commie rich universities can go pound sand .. plus it seems like these universities r hiring presidents by sex not merit .. thats why all these universities r losing respect .. they need real men to run things right

[@nebwachamp]

These are intellectuals? Wtf. I know 4 year olds with more wisdom and better reality concepts.

[@noahghost4476]

Bob is whipped by his woke kids. 1. Bob gives a disclaimer that the examples you see tends to be the most extreme examples. 2. Bob has a token Jew for cover. Unsurprisingly, it's a Jewish woke professor. 3. Bob starts to cherry pick examples he can easily pigeonhole. So he is invalidating the examples he tells you are probably the most extreme. 4. The token Jew cherry picks an example of someone who posted a video of his Jewish wife *not* getting harassed, and the videa was cringy because it was an instance where a Jew was playing the victim. 5. Bob completes his dismissal about the assaulted Jewish girl by reasoning that all kinds of trouble could result if counter protesters try to encroach upon the space being occupied by hostile protesters. Okay bob, some of your previous episodes made me lose respect for you but this one I think is the worst. Disclaimer, I'm not Jewish or israeli. Don't judge them by what I say. I'm a Catholic rando from massachusetts.

[@mikerpiker]

Yes it was definitely Bob's kids that influenced his views on Israel. Even before they were born they were influencing his writings on the subject, it's remarkable

[@noahghost4476]

@@mikerpiker fair point. I'm glad you go to bat for him. I still love him because of his books!

[@synchronium24]

Paul Bloom was consistently against woke calls for censorship in this discussion.

[@wp9860]

Dennett? Wrong on free will and consciousness. Haven't looked at the rest of it.

[@greenwavefitness7545]

i know a few people (myself included) who found dennett's defense of free will to so perfectly articulate its absurdity, religiosity, & necessity to the prevailing power structure, that they finally accepted that it does not exist. 😂

[@credman]

You misspelled "I'm wrong about free will and consciousness".