Noam Chomsky on René Descartes

Source: • Noam Chomsky speaks ab...

[@AbtinX]

Chomsky, generous as always. Speaking to a hall of black plague suffering peasants somewhere in rural Europe. Never heard so much coughing and I spent 7 years of my life in Scandinavian universities

[@choggerboom]

Abtin Khamoshi this is a laugh out loud funny comment, thanks for that

[@heeheehawhawheehee]

Coronavirus

[@AC-AC-AC]

Abtin Khamoshi Your comment is beyond funny! I was barely a couple of minutes in and I could not concentrate on what he was saying with all that coughing. These coughers should have been called out and ushered out. To think that’s how they want their moment of « fame »??

[@AstroFluid]

lolmax... you can be khamosh.. but, not all people esp. with cough!! :D

[@asielsmith8480]

Right! Maybe a passive aggressive stare, nudge, or even *accidentally* tripping up.

[@GlorifiedTruth]

The audience members were deeply influenced by Descartes: "I cough, therefore I am."

[@properuser]

They might have tuberculosis.

[@samreenasyed123]

Hilarious.

[@kennarajora6532]

I thought it was more of a "I am, therefore I cough".

[@karlschmied6218]

I'm disturbed by the coughing, therefore I am.

[@AbtinX]

It makes this talk very dramatic. Offers ambiance

[@RegularMat]

There is always a cougher...

[@JuanDeSoCal]

It's like he's lecturing at a colony for TB exiles.

[@trolabee]

I know. Makes you wonder if all this coughing was intentional or just some extremely selfish individuals who didn't realize it's time to get up and take that dry cough out to the lobby

[@ramirosan145]

There's like 3-4 loud coughers in this audience

[@ramirosan145]

JuanDeSoCal lol 😂😂😂

[@tylermoore8795]

Mateus Nedel or twenty ...

[@jonassteinberg3779]

Noam is so cool man. I mean...sure he's human and all but I just really admire his desire to learn.

[@MichaelWaisJr]

I just admire that he doesn’t get POed at the coughers! It’s his Buddha nature, man!! So dope!

[@anhumblemessengerofthelawo3858]

_he's all too human. I don't study philosophers of this nature._

[@jean6872]

*_Does Chomsky not think he knows it all, already?_*

[@UnconsciousQualms]

"what was exorcised was the machine, not the ghost" lol this gets me everytime

[@GunsOnRoof]

@@gm679 Simply put, Chomsky refers to the fact that Newton's model of reality was built on invisible forces (such as gravity or friction), as opposed to a sort of mechanically physical 'push and pull', and claims that this is more closely connected to mystical ideas at the time than what contemporary scientists believed. In this way, the common narrative trope of scientific progress removing mysticism from existential models, is seemingly reversed.

[@GunsOnRoof]

@@gm679 Well the 'mind/body' separation concept is one that he's sort of likening it to the whole 'physicality/invisible forces' like in my previous reply. The more we learn through science and philosophy the more it seems (at least to Chomsky... and me) that our traditional perception of 'matter' doesn't really exist. There is no 'body' to speak of, just a relationship of invisible forces. Contemporary ideas of quantum mechanics mostly support this (not that scientific models are the be all and end all).

[@foureuro5664]

@@gm679 I think the term "mind" is meant to be an abstraction. At the time of Descartes, the only "invisible" force, as Chomsky says, was the will of humans to not be compelled to act given a specific set of circumstances and stimuli. Since this will comes from the mind, the invisible forces of the world were named as such. Although the actual human mind is yet to be understood as an "invisible" or "physical" process, the idea is that Newton revealed to us that the world consisted of mainly invisible forces, and thus he "exorcised the body".

[@stuckinamomentt]

But didn’t the people of that day see the sun and moon in the sky? Magnets? And even the apple falling from tree … to realize some of the forces were ‘invisible’. Why was this news or a big deal?

[@doclime4792]

​​@@stuckinamomentt They used the Aristotelian model. That is what Chomsky is referring to when he mentions the leaf falling to the ground as the natural place or the place it wants to be. Earth was the heaviest of the "four elements" recognized in what is referred to as a "geocentric" model of the universe, it sunk in water so was thus the heaviest and formed the core. Water was like a shell that surrounded the earth. Water had bubbles (air) that rose up in water, thus was lighter and formed the next layer. Fire was even above air because it goes up. Above that was the celestial materials, referred to as aether and thats where the moon and stars and planets were.

[@teogo]

Well reasoned. He's not putting Descartes before the the horse.

[@edwardjones2202]

Hahaha!

[@one_of_the_masses]

LOL 😂😂

[@rillloudmother]

yessss

[@thanlem2522]

Get out

[@svmz7676]

Seeing Chomsky kind of choke on a word (cognosticive?@ 4.01) is refreshing, then giving a sheepish smile. Usually he talks for hours without slipping up.

[@kourii]

cognoscative - truly a mouthful. Reminds me of in a college course we were discussing 'justificatory' writing or something, and people generally could not get that word to come out.

[@Investigamer]

sVMZ Because those two events weren't fucking conspiracies, and we adults use science to describe reality. Not idiotic unfounded uncited bullshit claims from known conmen like Alex Jones.

[@MorganQu]

Daniel o He didn't say they didn't happen, he said they were not conspiracies.

[@nonrepublicrat]

whatever

[@ramirosan145]

kourii at least we know he's only human too.... But definitely a cut above imho.

[@65minimom]

Brilliant! Chomsky is a master at communicating complex esoteric knowledge to those of us who are not educated in this area

[@ThePayola123]

Sandy Are you a practicing witch? You have a picture of a black cat next to you. Will you pass the drowning test? Will you sink or float? If you float, then you're certainly a floater. These are the photos of other floaters you may know. 💩💩💩

[@gattopardodilampeduza3211]

Sandy or in your case any area!

[@johnnonamegibbon3580]

I was inspired by Chomsky and I spend a lot of my time breaking down complex ideas to ordinary people who don't have time to look into such things. It's damn fun.

[@neohumanist8181]

Itś a shame that this is esoteric to so many. Descartes is central not only to mathematics (where I think you would agree his contributions are well known), but also to philosophy. The problem is that most people today think it is possible to be well educated without knowing philosophy. The great achievements in science have led to a consensus that it has become irrelevant. But this is not really true, as is evident in many misapprehensions in science and politics today that are widespread but rarely addressed.

[@whogivesafuckzappsiskinggu8885]

Good point people talk without knowlegde

[@JamesWilson-mi2qo]

Trying to watch this while eating chips is impossible I can't hear a thing!

[@cosmosofnature6411]

😄😄😄

[@TheKamikazenaz]

Crisps, you degenerate Philistine! :)

[@bpatrickhoburg]

Chili cheese Fritos and a sandwich for me right now. Haha, you called it!

[@skiphoffenflaven8004]

My YTPP as well (KZbin perusal plight).

[@gimpyboy-joy2825]

I enjoyed this while scoffing a curry, good thing I had headphones 😁

[@Skullman367]

I think he’s saying that the hard problem of consciousness stands between us and the prospect of taking materialism seriously anytime soon. The mind-body dualism will continue to be our model for the foreseeable future.

[@Requiredfields2]

A couple of things: 1) Animals are given short shrift reducing them to automata. It seems reasonable there is a wide spectrum of personalities and competencies among animals. It may not be as striking as the differences among humans, at least, not to us. For example, there are likely animal geniuses that make discoveries in tool use that others of their species have no knowledge of. The difference is that they do not have generations of written output to reflect upon. 2) People may have completely original conversations based on the arrangements of words but what they say is not original. People at bus stops have virtually the same conversations everyday. Language may be unbounded or undetermined but it's highly predictable and repetitive like animal behavior. Original ideas or ways of seeing are extremely rare.

[@gregorycugnod1693]

Thank you! I was surprised at how easy it is to poke holes into Descartes's theory. His famous motto should have been : "I have a partial vision of the root mechanisms of how and I think and no inclination to transpose my experience of existence to nonhuman beings, therefore I get to decide who is an automaton ans who is not

[@bbailey17b]

1) Certainly Descartes was reductionistic in his regard for animals. Maintained that they couldn't actually feel pain, but only mimicked the motions of feeling pain. 2) I think you've misapprehended Chomsky's claims about Descartes's philosophy of language. It's not that what people say is necessarily original or unique, just that those things, linguistic responses, are not governed by antecedent causes, linguistic or otherwise ...as is the case for physical effects, which do result from prior physical events.

[@beingtheir]

@@bbailey17b 2) Well, one could argue that linguistic responses are just as governed by antedecent causes as everything else, it´s just not as obvious and their causation can be almost infinitely more complex and therefore unpredictable (while some people´s utterings are almost mechanistically foreseeable).

[@bbailey17b]

@@beingtheir Only if you deny freedom of the will, as some have. Descartes doesn't.

[@fortsechs]

Depends on what freedom of the will actually means. If you think about it a bit more than Descartes and other thinkers did, you will find that a realistic notion of freedom actually requires determination to be called free in any sensible form.

[@flawedhypothesis]

Such a national treasure. Will be missed when he’s gone. Thankful he exists to begin with.

[@nikhildesai7715]

"Will be missed when he's gone"- That's a bit cynical isn't it.

[@bbailey17b]

He is our age's main US prophet, and I don't mean for his philosophy of language, or his academic contributions--which are considerable. It's taken decades for so many to catch up to him on his political insights.

[@seabrookthemagnificent9580]

Reading recently about his connection with Jeffrey Epstein...,

[@knowingwhatthebuttondoes3432]

And blasting into #1 again on my Chomsky top 40 for the 33rd week in a row it's... Chomsky on René Descartes.

[@M0stlyHarmless9]

About to finish my philosophy degree and Chomsky just completely upended my understanding of dualism..

[@ramirosan145]

Charlie Silva is that good or bad? Just curious

[@M0stlyHarmless9]

ramirosan145 Definitely a good thing. I can always look to Chomsky for an alternative perspective on things I think I already have a grasp on.

[@ramirosan145]

Charlie Silva that's awesome. The only reason I asked was because there are so many keyboard critics of Chomsky. I was hoping u weren't one of those asshats that say he doesn't know what he's talking about 👍

[@blinktwiceforyes4820]

ramirosan145 Yes - he’s so brilliant it’s easy for freak-shows to rebuff what they can’t and don’t care to understand. Though it’s always curious why they make it to comment section rather than leaving with nothing

[@djtan3313]

U've been chomskied!

[@abside30glu]

I love P. NOAM CHOMSKY ALL AT ONCE SINCE A KNEW ABOUT HIM AT UNIVERSITY! this love is not for anybody. just for him ! With sincerity and withouth reservations ! MAY 2, 2017

[@lewisstreet7266]

So you are telling the world "my love is only for Noam". The question is, How old are you? My guess is you are probably 11 years old.

[@danielnorman7051]

as a theoretical physicist I found this to hit the nail on the head. Though i worry Chomsky was not careful in his language. Physics is not mystical in the sense that it proves the mystical claims about the universe as put forward by religion, not even slightly, but it is mystical in the sense that it overthrows all attempts to explain the universe in terms of mechanical concepts. Our brains evolved to think in terms of mechanical concepts to navigate the world but these concepts are abandoned by physics within a week of physics 101. physics abides by its own internal logic, self constant as far as we can tell, but absolutely alien to our intuitions, incompatible with mechanistic concepts and in no way supporting religious/spiritual concepts. physics describes a universe of 'quantum fields' in a dynamic space-time. we have made significant yet still highly limit success in developing a set of mathematical equations which make accurate predictions about our reality. The equations do not in a philosophical sense explain what the quantum fields 'really are' just how they interact with one another. But it would also be wrong to say that the universe is 'made of math' because the mathematical equations we do have are not perfect, there are many observed phenomenon in the universe which are not properly predicted by the best equations we have developed to date and while we certainly will in time replace our contemporary equations with more advanced ones which have more accurate predictive power, there is absolutely no guarantee that we will ever arrive a a singular final grand equation which explains everything. It may be the case that physics is not containable within mathematics and that someday in order to proceed forward in trying to explain the universe we will have to drop mathematics as we know it for some radically different symbolic system of logic with which to explain the universe. Or it may be that a complete understanding of physics is simply impossible...

[@fntime]

Our minds never evolved to think mechanically. That's a metaphor I presume for rational & logical thinking which in fact is a corruption of the mind when used exclusively. Decartes was wrong, thinking is not our identity unless we think too much and then identify and experience reality through the egoistic mind. the 'mechanism' thinks it's us and we think we are it. The unencumbered mind has powers that the 'rational mind' doesn't possess. But those caught up in 'thinking' don't even realize.

[@yeziu3475]

Daniel Norman you could call that mystical or spiritual without a religious context plus the only way to over throw math is to make a better math like the better way to overthrow logic is to go beyond logic when in itself that is logic therefore math and logic can’t be something you can’t overthrow it’s just straight up universal it’s a priori like a square has 4 sides. Science may not be able to answer if there is something that can it’s philosophy.

[@craigbrownell1667]

that "radically different symbolic system" would still be mathematics...ponder this

[@chrisdrew9666]

Hi Daniel - I don't know if you go back and look for replies to old comments that you've made in the past on KZbin videos, but if you do, thanks for putting the time and energy into your comment. I thought it was really interesting and helpful - I've never heard Newton's ideas described the way that Chomsky described them and I found it confusing - I still don't understand it very well, but your comment helps. Thanks again.

[@JJRasta97]

“I worry Chomsky was not careful in his language.” - Most worries are unfounded. I am comfortable with saying worries about the language used by the man regarded from many as the father of modern linguistics is one of those unfounded worries.

[@jamesboulger8705]

The clockmaker analogy is very important to understanding many things in history, science, and religion when in its proper context. For example, people misportray the deists of the Founding Fathers as somehow equivalent to what evangelicals want, even though Jefferson rewrote the bible with no miracles, but really what is was was a popular way of thinking among intellectuals at the time that built off of ideas from Newton and Langrange, the latter who I believe said "if you could simulate every particle in the universe and know the initial conditions, you could predict how the universe developed" (paraphrasing). That last bit was a very popular view, and it is where the clockmaker comes from - even Newton when his calculations were off on planet behavior accounted for this as the work of some higher being that periodically adjusted things. This eventually lead to a completely disattached entity, the deist view, because they believed the universe was based on very well-designed and predictable principles. By the late 19th century, some people even though that most of physics was basically solved. The new controversy came with quantum mechanics and the introduction of probability, something even Einstein struggled with initially when trying to conceptualize it ("God does not play dice"). So for a long time the success of Newtonian physicists really affirmed the later believes that the universe was perfectly ordered, and the problem was simply a matter of the immense computations involved. In some ways, I suppose, it still is; enumeration is at the heart of most problems.

[@eddievangundy4510]

That's an important point. Chomsky is a little glib here.

[@dogzdigital]

I always attributed that to Douglas Adams.

[@aaronchristopher71]

It had never occurred to me that Newton was in effect returning science to an “occult force” model. This is super interesting to ponder.

[@paulbcote]

Yes, but by describing gravity as a predictable force with a precise acceleration didn't Newton reconcile gravity with mechanical descriptions?

[@hyf-sd1yc]

@@paulbcote Yeah but I think Chomsky's point is that at the time people interpreted mechanical forces as being in contact. Newton demonstrated the a force generated by any mass could cross great distances and instantaneously change the motion of other objects (which today we know acts with the speed of light). Leibniz and most continental philosophers could not live with that. But Newton's point in Principia is that "look, the theory works and it matches almost with everything that can be calculated within satisfactory precision, so then let it be. I can't figure out why the force can act like that but I don't wanna make any hypothesis without convincing evidence, let's leave that to the readers (in the future)." But I guess Chomsky is saying that Newton deep inside is also bothered by the instantaneous action across space.

[@VVinstonSmit]

Actually Newton was aware of the problem of having an interaction that apparently affected things at indefinite distance and 'immediately' without even having a 'mean' transmitting it, and he was not completely satisfied with it. If I am not wrong he also formulated the first hypothesis about aether and stuff like this. So I don't think it's a correct narrative seeing Newton as reviving occult forces, because for Newton the 'occult' part of the force was not a feature of nature but a simple sign of ignorance, of incompleteness of the model and of our knowledge. Thus, philosophically speaking, Newton was absolutely 'mechanical'. As everyone knows I guess, the problem of action at distance was later resolved by mean of force fields, and much more later by Quantum Field Theory, even if the latter still struggles to include gravity to date.

[@stuckinamomentt]

@@VVinstonSmit this makes sense. Obviously it must have been plain for people (who conceived the mechanistic model) to see there are many things in the world that are moving or held in place without actual contract(at a distance)! That must have been a part of their mechanistic view.

[@oftbanned101]

..more importantly he tried to disprove his own findings! ..seeking the expected machine driving it all. But lo! No machine! Only 'mystical forces' or as we (me and Steve Meyer) say: intelligent design.. dark matter? ..dark energy? Plûs ça change: plus la même chose"..

[@johnpenner5182]

this is great - finding first-rate philosophers speaking with clarity on the history of our thinking. noam chomsky is one of the most erudite thinkers of our time! stuff like this is what makes youTube superbe! thxu! 🙏

[@madsleonardholvik3040]

You are right. People can oppose his political stance, but he is one of the super stars of the intellectual world, no doubt.

[@dogzdigital]

His understanding of physics is sadly lacking though. Good grasp on language and philosophy, he should probably speak within the confines of his knowledge.

[@djtan3313]

So so v brilliant this man...

[@SDsc0rch]

the sickly-est audience I've ever heard

[@ghjhgjdfhhjfghefhjfg3327]

They all have socialized medicine

[@aspergianheteroclite3014]

Clear and concise as usual.

[@MichaelWaisJr]

The Chomsky lecture that happened when the coughing flash-mob showed up.

[@Parkhill57]

The desirability of cardioid microphones over omni.

[@bbailey17b]

Fascinating clarity of his analysis of Descartes's demo of how the 'creative' ways that language works links up with something beyond the mechanically-governed universe, the mind, which is governed by entirely different rules. Interesting, too, how he recasts the well-known de-animation of the universe, his attack of the Aristotelian grasp of nature, as an 'exorcising' of the ghost from a mechanically-governed universe.

[@maximpopov8651]

Peace Love and Philosophy 💙

[@christopherhaines2492]

Sadly one of the only true thinkers left in the United States...

[@termsofusepolice]

You are forgetting Joe Rogan.

[@jogendron6320]

Dana White is incredible too.

[@JohnDoe-vp9ey]

@@termsofusepolice Rogan? Are you kidding? He's dumb as rocks

[@skyjuiceification]

Thankfully, that's not really true. but I get what u wanted to say. I appreciate his scholarship as well.

[@ryublueblanka]

Is coughing and clearing your throat a requisite to sitting in on lectures?

[@bpatrickhoburg]

Chomsky is great at contextualizing Descartes and those around him but reading Descartes is a different matter. His work is not summed up so easily when you look into his notes and self-criticisms. I learned a lot here though about how to tell a valuable history. I leave the intricacies of Descartes to those who have dedicated much of their careers to doing so.

[@turnipsociety706]

same for Newton

[@gregorycugnod1693]

Funny you should say this, I was under the impression that his présentation of Descartes was rather simplistic

[@dogzdigital]

I haven't dedicated much of my career to Descartes, being a a truck driver it wouldn't make much sense (apart from reading maps). I have read plenty of Descartes though and agree that Chomsky is presenting a very rudimentary take on his work. I consider Newton to be somewhat overrated, yes he has contributed a lot, though I consider that anyone with a decent brain and work ethic in his position would have achieved a similar result, perhaps without so much theft of the ideas of others.

[@MichaelWaisJr]

He’s much more polite than I’d be. If I was lecturing, at the end of the talk I’d say, “And hey, who’d like some cough drops??”

[@MarkTarmannPianoCheck_it_out]

keith jarrett give lessons on how to handle coughers. he stops playing, scolds and lectures them, or walks off. Thus the difference we clearly perceive between a Keith Jarrett type and a Noam Chomsky type.

[@MichaelWaisJr]

@@kurdtinchains I’m 99% sure they’re deliberately being disruptive.

[@skyjuiceification]

So u came to this vid as a comedic opportunity and not as a sincere investigation into the subject?

[@jesuisravi]

I think Chomsky has the kind of mind that gets engrossed in what it is doing and just doesn't pay that much heed to anything extraneous to his purpose. It's called focus.

[@neuenscheneuenschwander8832]

A wonderful piece! I use it in my course of Neurocinema to explain the Cartesian dualism.

[@rkrw576]

A great modern genius.

[@rfvtgbzhn]

15:33 actually modern physicists (and scientists in general) don't think that they can ever understand nature fully. So they don't think that the universe actually consists of fields, but that fields are the best description that we have for the universe now. The question if the universe itself is mathematical is something that most physicists don't consider, as it can't be proven or disproven, so it is considered a philosophical question and most modern physicists aren't concerned with philosophy (though they certainly use it, despite mainly unconsciously).

[@blackbird5634]

Gestalt is the concept of connecting those three dots on a blackboard and creating a triangle. If you've drawn a triangle even slightly off, the mind does not immediately try to straighten the line or measure the angles. Monet suggested with his paintings that the eye/mind conceives of shapes and colors first and only then does it superimpose a template over it. A red rectangle on a green background, in New England, is going to represent a farmyard barn, even before it is correctly defined with right angles, doors, windows, and perhaps a weather vane rooster. 🐓

[@dogzdigital]

Geo spatial heuristics.

[@billyoumans1784]

Yes. Absolutely.

[@MarkLewis...]

If Descartes actually did the experiments, he would have realized the results were just mental constructs of what he wanted to see, and been completely skeptical on them.

[@dirkplankchest1796]

Descartes work let to one of the deepest degrees of scepticism possible. As a matter of fact, it leads to hard solipsism.

[@MarkLewis...]

@@dirkplankchest1796 Respectfully... By who's definitions are you making an easy bridge from skepticism to solipsism? Descartes even separated the two. it to Skepticism... (Descartes) is doubting the veracity or validity of expressed knowledge, or (put simply) incredulity. Such as some people are skeptical or incredulous toward certain scientific ideas and theories, while others are skeptical or incredulous towards religious claims. While Solipsism (Descartes as well) deals with the reality of self in mind is only provable to exists, or (put simply) lone self awareness. The act of "skepticism" or incredulity does not lead or bridge to "Solipsism" or demonstrable lone self awareness. Both ideas are fundamentally Descartes, but comparatively, the jump from skepticism to Solipsism is beyond Herculean. It would be analogous to comparing fire, from rubbing two sticks together, to a rocket blasting off to the moon... or claiming a very distant relative is actually a very close relative. There's a lot in between. Maybe I'm wrong? Is there some references to the thoughts you expressed in your previous post, where Descartes closely linked these two? Thanks

[@letyvasquez2025]

Descartes, the master of circular logic, would have realized the term mental construct is also just a mental construct, and would have taken great pleasure in mobiusly revisiting that idea, ad infinitum.

[@MarkLewis...]

@@letyvasquez2025 Lol... Points out language and communication as mental constructs. It would seem Capt. Obvious wants a promotion to Major.

[@letyvasquez2025]

I actually did the thought experiment and realized the result is a mental construct of my bias, of which I am completely skeptical.

[@allencrider]

I think. Therefore, I think.

[@rgaleny]

WE;COME TO THE MACHINE!!!!!!!!

[@nickraven2820]

Newton is always portrayed as the leader of the mechanical view in most basic science texts. This view of action at a distance as a destruction of the mechanical view I have never heard so clearly expressed. It does give a clue as to why Newton spent more of his time studying theology than his time spent on science. Of course his theological works do not get much press. Nice upload I learned something. Thank you.

[@dogzdigital]

Newton is also portrayed as the leader in calculus, but I sincerely doubt that he was. When you consider his correspondence with Leibniz, the subsequent conflict and the fact that it was resolved by an institution that Newton sat on the board of, not too mention that Leibniz had a far greater understanding and that today we use Leibniz notation. Newton was a good scientist, he was also very entrenched with the ruling institutions.

[@grumpy9478]

@@dogzdigital so, THAT's how he got that gig as Master of the Mint. maybe no Leibniz, but the guy could calculate.

[@abside30glu]

physicum diei in physiologiam 2:03 finis diei mechanicas 2:05 omnes conantur tollere philosophia 2:07 ratio semper effercio 2:09 In termini simpliciter mechanica 2:10 principiis intelligi possint 2:12 principiis ex principiis, quae videmus 2:15 cum videamus a apparatus ad apparatus partes, AND SO ON AND SO... block of notes antigona fado please!

[@whade62000]

7:17 - 8:17 The trap of this logic is, what if we assume that humans are merely more complex automata. An illusion of free will then would arise not as the result of true free will but because our own, limited human understanding can no longer follow and predict that complexity. So we in fact fall into a very naive error when we use our own capacity to understand as a basis of identifying what has free will and what does not using the limits of our own ability as the identifying device.

[@gradostax]

Can we have a President as smart as this guy please. Not Trump world

[@yellow6100]

Presidents are meant to be bankers puppets .They cant be smart .Sorry

[@duaneanderson9492]

well put and though obvious after someone like you points it, well played.

[@duaneanderson9492]

No ! the gods of (oligarchy) America forbid their hand puppets to have anything other than a sizeable orifice so that the hand may be inserted

[@gattopardodilampeduza3211]

gradostax C'mon! Trump is as a smart as a meatball!

[@defoperator7993]

not everyone is hyper intellectual ...and you can't want for others what they dont want for themselves. it would be so nice though

[@erichuang7524]

Must there be a separation of body and mind? It seems to me that even mind, consciousness, the “soul” can be explained with very logical principles- perhaps beyond our capability of understanding but still logical indeed. To deny this is to reject all semblance of cognitive structuring of the universe. What lies at the heart of everything is the principle that nothing is arbitrary.

[@upublic]

i've listened these bits over and over, and watched the lecture on the Cognitive Revolution, some parts couple of times, and i still don't understand what exactly does Noam mean by Newton exorcising the machine not the ghost (and still being the case to this day). To everyone else, laymen and scientists, it's the complete opposite. I would love if someone could shed more light on Chom's meaning of this :( For instance, why is gravity/gravitation mystical JUST BECAUSE it's an invisible link? ALL contact forces are microscopically invisible yet no one calls them mystical. (by definition, in Newton's time, contact forces were mechanistic, but we know better now). I understand that Noam would respond to this that "PRECISELY, they are ALL mystical for the same reason gravity is!" But then... Noam came to that conclusion BASED on the distinction between contact forces and action-at-a-distance forces. WHY then must we move ALL forces to the mystical bucket instead of the "machine" bucket. We just understand the machine a little better, i.e. that all forces are microscopically invisible. WHY must we turn the tables over and admit "defeat" in face of the mechanistic philosophy (if i'm saying it right; just an amateur here).

[@jwildman95bamf]

I'm with you, and apparently others on this video. Chomsky is the only intellectual I know that embraces monism in that all that there is is the mind. The scientific community seems to only embrace the body, or materialism. If anyone has emailed him about this, please share, and if not this would be a great question.

[@darkstar861]

as i understand what was said, cartesian philosophy was supposed to move philosophical thinking beyond mystical explanation to mechanical explanations. newton reintroduced the mystical as explanation for the unexplainable and it is now a commonly accepted explanation - according to noam.

[@DorothyGTyas]

Jared Wildberger I've been listening to cutting edge physicist Dr. Tom W. Campbell's talks on his BIG THEORY OF EVERYTHING (My Big TOE trilogy). I think his astonishing concepts may be of some value to your query. Cheers'n all the best. 👍😊

[@jltorres6320]

I'm confused. Most of the scientific community embraces monism. Dualism holds that the mind is separate from the brain but somehow controls the brain and therefore the rest of the body but this view defies physics (conservation of matter and energy).

[@upublic]

@Luis, Jared meant to say that Noam holds to "idealist monism" ("there's only mind"). You are right that most of the sci.community embraces monism, but it's the other half, the "physical monism" ("there's only the physical"). I believe that Noam does indeed hold a monist position, but in a strange way: not "idealist" in the sense of spiritual woo-woo, but neither "physical" in the Newton/Decartes' sense. More specifically, if most scientists get rid of the "ghost" part and rename everything "machine" (without getting stuck in defining what "matter" or "physical" is), Noam gets rid of the "machine" and calls everything "ghost" (without going "off-rails" into woo-woo).

[@filibertogarciasi]

I am surprised that you only have 100k subscribers

[@gamingwithslacker]

Where's the full lecture? This is brilliant.

[@karimhasseli4654]

.

[@1996Pinocchio]

It's linked in the description

[@absolutless]

"He's right ya know" - George

[@MeisterJager90]

Oh boy, I just love having Chomsky vids interrupted for unskippable ads for a superhero movie and business software. Boy I sure am gonna buy those products now.

[@Patton001]

If this speech was in Covid era people would break usain bolt’s record in a race to the door

[@zg6406]

🤣🤣🤣 so true

[@jeffsmith1798]

I believe Foucault was in the audience coughing violently each time Chomsky spoke a noun.

[@msaali3179]

philosophy of Descartes : Mostly empiricist, except on mind: 1.Innate structures (mind/body dualism) 2.Human will/choice = ability to digress from inclinations. 3.Creative/innovative properties of language: unbounded, uncaused, yet still appropriate to situation. Newton: Disagreed with cartesian 'body' notion, that everything besides the mind is mechanical and pre-determined The world is unintelligible, due to mystical forces unlike machine, however we can only construct more and more accurate dogmas to deal with it.

[@kylewit924]

Descartes pulled the world in from outside back to ourselves. Sense experience was objectified and held in opposition to ourselves until he thought himself back into himself as a thinking thing. Crazy stuff!

[@dogzdigital]

"I think, therefore you can now read maps". Brilliant.

[@DoubleRaven00]

Love it! Descartes vindicated “the ghost is still there - the machine is gone.”

[@eddievangundy4510]

Whatever. We can talk about Quantum fields, we have equations to describe them, and they aren't mystical in any sense.

[@coolcat23]

It won't take that much longer and AI will demonstrate that there is no ghost at all.

[@DoubleRaven00]

General relativity and Quantum physics have already demonstrated that matter does not exist - at least not in the sense we perceive it. Disliking the words “ghost” or “mystical” is fine, just find another word. “Illusion” perhaps?

[@coolcat23]

@@DoubleRaven00 The fact that cats, unlike quantum objects, cannot be in a superposition of two states (dead and alive) is not an illusion. Matter within the quantum realm is very different to the matter we experience as humans, but that does not make the macroscopic nature of matter an illusion. I don't understand what you mean by general relativity having shown that "matter does not exist". General relativity explained gravity in a new and astonishingly accurate way, but it not challenge "matter" as such, did it?

[@DoubleRaven00]

@@coolcat23 great points! We experience the illusion of reality at our scale. However, there are no particles of matter per se, and location in space is only determined by interfering with the “object.” Relativity says that energy=matter which overturns the basis for a Newtonian mechanical world. Solid “Matter” is an illusion created temporarily by stabilized energy, but it can become pure energy again. Quantum is the next level. I believe it. It also breaks relativity, as well as Newtonian physics. Electrons and photons only have a location in space when observed. Their real state is a cloud or wave of possibilities. We don’t disagree on the surface of these theories, but in the deeper meaning. Quantum theory says the cat is both dead and alive. This disturbed Einstein and Schrodinger(sp?) himself. Yet that’s what quantum theory says. Do you believe it or not? Chompski above is joking about the failure of the mechanical theory of reality - which failed not due to the lack of “ghosts” but due to the fact there is no “machine” per se. Only ghosts. Hilarious joke if understood in the context of science history. Peace and love!

[@andrewgolf1030]

Is this a Ricola commercial?

[@mindmesh7566]

Chomsky, and others of similar mold, are what Aldous Huxley affirmed in the Perennial Philosophy as “cerebrotonic.” For the most part, we - human beings - have been reared on “following” (by social training) people who are either “somatotonic” or “visceratonic.” Leaders who are the latter two are not insufficient as mentors or leaders. On the contrary, they can lead when they are in a “healthy” state (like George Washington - slavery mindset aside - or Julius Caesar; two examples of what I - myself - would see as “visceratonic”).

[@sheilamacdougal4874]

You can see at least 50 videos, maybe 100, of Chomsky telling this same story about gravity from Intro to History of Science 101.

[@oldernu1250]

He’s the adolescent who studied hard for a debate and kept his notes. Saw him in 1969, thought he was more interest in persuasion than truth. Same guy.

[@sheilamacdougal4874]

​@@oldernu1250 The irony is that this whole story doesn't really support his main claim, that the mind is (mental phenomena are) undetermined by the physical. It does undermine the notion that there is a simple mechanical determination, but not that it is a physical determination that includes other now familiar forms of physical causation (electrical impulses and so on). Another extremely well-known fact that Chomsky has repeated probably hundreds of times, often in scarcely related contexts, is that in 19th century America wage employment was criticised as wage slavery. Chomsky is especially fond of sounding radical by saying that slaveowners were right to argue that wage slavery was in some respects worse than Southern slavery. In at least one video here, Chomsky rambles onto this story in a completely unrelated philosophical discussion of free will. I don't object to repeating good arguments or good examples to illustrate a relevant point, but his uses of these stories are often of limited or no relevance and just meant to impress.

[@regaliaretailfashionmerch4314]

@@sheilamacdougal4874 you say so much and yet it amounts to absolutely NOTHING. No doubt you have too limited and diminished a mental capacity brought on no doubt by decades of indiscipline to even grasp an iota of the relevance Chomsky's arguments (disagreeable as they are to me many times)

[@regaliaretailfashionmerch4314]

And why shouldn't he repeat arguments that are still far from being well popularized. Also, if he were just so repetitive as you claim, why is it, that his commentary on world politics IN SPEECH AND WRITING IS CONSTANTLY EVOLVING TO MEET THE REALITIES OF CHANGING SITUATIONS Arguments are repeated because they are so central to someone's vision, the truth, or even relevance. And not all people just pick up on these to imitate Chomsky because we use our own judgements to disagree with him, and us not bringing in others from similar moral bents is not necessarily an affront or disrespect to those names either. How do you function with with such parochialism

[@sheilamacdougal4874]

@@regaliaretailfashionmerch4314 what I say "amounts to absolutely NOTHING"? This isn't the place for me to give reading comprehension tutorials, but I did actually say that Chomsky's dramatic story that every student of history of science knows - while it undermines a mechanistic conception (which we've known for a few centuries) - does not support his main thesis of the mind. I agree that an illiterate imbecile would think that refuting the main thesis of the talk is "absolutely NOTHING". Of course, you could disgree with my refutation. That would be quite different from claiming I said "absolutely NOTHING". But then again, you'd need to have at least an elementary grasp of the arguments, which you evidently lack.

[@user-re5jh6dx4i]

my question is not concern this matter , but other , proffessor what is the variation that distiguish easten Asian accent ,African,Eaurpean ,Arabian from American? 1/in terms of vocal nasal and toungue. 2) in terms of flapping rule. 3/do there some different of creation of speech production as big nose ,small toungue ,or wide throat ? if the word "litterally" pronounce by all those mentioned above ,how each pronounciation is

[@0MVR_0]

There is no such thing as an Asian, African or European accent. An accent is received from the mother tongue and is nothing more than the surface realization of an internalized phonetic input. The reason why people sound so different saying the same thing is due to the phonotactic constraints of the mother tongue i.e. do you stress certain syllables in a particular order.

[@user-re5jh6dx4i]

Thanks Omer , but i think you mean (dailect) .the matter is rather than the written in the books,it may concern (grandiloquence) and pronounciation .how immitation would not be identical to those nativeness?

[@0MVR_0]

No I didn't mean dialect. I meant accent.

[@pbhello]

aren't the "mystical forces" an aspect of a greater mechanism? And, we just don't fully comprehend either.

[@lkyuvsad]

I remember Bob Fleming thoughtfully summarised this lecture on his show- good to see the original though.

[@SteveDadWeeks]

Around 10m the unbounded and undetermined nature of conversation echoes the first two of five attributes of creative speech described in Edge of Words by Rowan Williams. Recommended.

[@TobiasOnQuinks]

What year is this lecture (since it is clearly a much younger Chomsky than today)?

[@carlosbarbosa9062]

paxus calta it looks like a mid 1990s Chomsky

[@ioanstefanhaplea2309]

What is the conference name? Is it available in print too? I would really need the reference, for the bibliography of a research article. Thank you!

[@katsong3302]

MIT class lecture

[@jones1351]

And he was just getting warmed up.

[@donovan665]

Incredible High Density Meaning

[@kixe4875]

I didn't notice coughing till I red one of comments. I could not finish the video after that. It's so true why the stupid person sit there or why no one ask her to leave

[@JohannesFahrenfort-ny7xn]

Marvelous

[@vivaldesque]

The elements of the Newtonian ontology are matter, the absolute space and time in which that matter moves, and the forces or natural laws that govern movement. No other fundamental categories of being, such as mind, life, organization or purpose, are acknowledged. They are at most to be seen as epiphenomena, as particular arrangements of particles in space and time.

[@3dpixel583]

As I understand even Newton aware and admitted that he couldn't fully explained the nature of the force that he proposed. He used mathematics to show the consistency of force to the real world experience, but he couldn't manage to explain the nature of force. That explanation had to arrive by Einstein by the curvature of space (which, strangely return the validity to the mechanical nature of force) and by particles exchange.

[@rfvtgbzhn]

12:46 Einstein somehow returned to a mechanical description. According to general relativity, masses bend spacetime, and this spacetime bending is transmitted with the speed of light. So while gravity in General Relativity still works without contact, it actually uses something physical (spacetime curvature) for transmission and the force is not transmitted instantly.

[@beyondvger3682]

I love your point but even so, I think Noam is acknowledging forces we can't percieve and perhaps never will. But who knows what lies ahead.

[@robinleebraun7739]

I’ve often wondered what Newton would think of my garage door opener. Or a radio controlled drone.

[@Albeit_Jordan]

12:48 don't these mystical forces effectively operate like metaphysical gears and levers though?

[@michaelsly901]

Oh my god, the wise guy…

[@DrSanity7777777]

In Descartes’ Meditations, he is quite explicit that we have no grounds for thinking our rationality is faultless. Our ability to find truth within arguments could just be the trick of some all-powerful demon. As Descartes writes, “how do I know that I am not deceived every time that I add two and three, or count the sides of a square?” So, we cannot rely on our logic. This is why the Cogito - if it is to act as a way out of his skepticism - cannot be an argument. "In 1828 ... [t]he Faust legend obsessed artists and writers; in dozens of works they told the story of the modern predicament: in gaining the power of industry, the world was sacrificing it's soul. It was not the new machines themselves they feared - there were not yet many - it was machine thinking." - Jonathan Hale (The Old Way of Seeing)

[@anaghashyam9845]

Also Cartesian plane and the geometry...

[@JimNobles-gv4ky]

Sounds like Woody Allen

[@somaticjet2717]

8:42 he says we know that as well as we know anything at all. But there a those who argue determinism over phenomenology when it comes to free will. Also he says we have no reason to doubt that Descartes was right in saying free will is the crucial difference between humans and animals. But surely we have no reason to doubt that animals lack decision making faculties. Why assume they are automata? We are animals too.

[@ryublueblanka]

Why are so many Chomsky lectures so difficult to hear? I have my Bluetooth speaker all the way up right now while I shower and all I hear is "garblegarblegarblegurblegurblegarbledmumblemumblemublemumblegarble"... damnit!

[@AYVYN]

I could normalize the audio & remove background static this weekend. I need to do it to Carl Sagan’s lectures as well

[@stupifyingstupedity2112]

Sages are there only to comfort the eyes of those who see the inevitable - not to prevent those who seek it. The precaucious tales of our doom and how to invent it.

[@stupifyingstupedity2112]

Elaborate lies and concise truths

[@buildar8434]

It really hit me hard when he describes how mystical forces are established as scientific accepted theories. Moving my arm creates force on the moon. What other mystical forces apart from gravity are a reality?

[@rillloudmother]

electromagnetism, strong, weak and gravity.

[@weewee2169]

depends how you define reality

[@guillll]

Physics stopped seeing gravity as a force since Einstein (if I understand correctly). Gravity is now understood as a deformation of space-time. Einstein took the "mystical" aspect out of gravity again.

[@ianoliver3130]

​@@guillll no, he just replaced the mystical "action at a distance" force with the equally mystical "curvature of spacetime due to the presence of a large mass" force.

[@casteretpollux]

@@ianoliver3130 What is mystical about that?

[@edwardhanson3664]

Both Descartes, Galileo, and DaVinci were all Rosicrucians and Freemasons, as was Newton, who was an avid student of alchemy. They lived the principle of the seeker: to be a 'walking question mark."

[@turnipsociety706]

13:32 Where does he get the idea that Newton thought it was an absurdity, and what "leading scientists of the time" was Newton condemned by ?

[@lukelee7967]

Chomsky for Secretary of State

[@Dude408f]

This is great. By the way, AI and, by example, chatgpt, can (could?) behave (talk, in this case) like if they had a will (sometimes). A remarkable example would be the guy that chatgpt fell in love. On the other side, we could analyze deeper how humans react and we could discover we’re a little (or much) deterministic than we have thought. In his example, he said maybe a lot of the presents would hail Hitler if someone was threatening them, but others might choose death. Those that would rebel, could it be anyway that we detect them, with, let’s say, 10 minutes anticipation? If we had access to their age, education, experiences, family, culture, state of mind, would it be possible to know how would they react? 🤓

[@medmg570]

can someone explain the triangle thing?

[@MontyCantsin5]

The point brought up about an infant experiencing an instance of a perfect triangle in nature relates to Descartes' notion of innate knowledge (something Chomsky has advocated strongly on a whole host of issues). The crux of the argument is that there are no triangles 'out there' (in other words in the external, or physical, world) because the sides cannot be perfectly straight and the vertices cannot be perfectly sharp. Go down to the level of atoms and quarks and the flaws become even more apparent and totally inescapable. Given this, there must be some innate cognitive capacity within our minds that cause us to see something triangle-like (say in the case of a drawing) as being the thing that in mathematics is called a triangle - with the aforementioned attributes. Descartes, and other subsequent philosophers, have taken this to be evidence that our minds must have properties associated with Euclidean geometry already built into the cognitive system, hence why we structure our perceptions in a particular way and see shapes in nature in an idealised form. All triangles that you have experienced are abstractions.

[@djtan3313]

We r born with triangles, circles, squares, bananas(?) etc already in our heads...

[@craigbrownell1667]

There is no triangle ∆∆

[@dankoppel6271]

Science would have to wait for Einstein's theory of General Relativity to restore the principle of local causality. "Action at a distance" would be replaced by the propagation of gravitational waves, which communicate the positions of a moving body.

[@CooperMiller]

Great lecture! I just wish there hadn't been a whooping cough outbreak in the audience.

[@mexicanlucky]

Interesting how the interesting videos that really make your mind change are not censored, but have the volume really low so you can barely hear what is being said. I'm pretty sure the mayority of people leave before the first half.

[@silentstorm5757]

This also gave me more respect for Leibniz's theory of monads. It preserves Descartes' mechanical world view, while it has no need for a two types of matter. Leibniz found a way to explain everything around him with just one theory.

[@dogzdigital]

Leibniz receives no where near enough recognition. Put Descartes, Leibniz and Da vinci in a room for while with some LSD then send all of their notes to Elon Musk for implementation, could you imagine the output?

[@rlinton123]

Volume is a bit low

[@vivaldesque]

The world view underlying traditional science may be called "mechanistic" or "Newtonian". It is based in reductionism, determinism, materialism, and a reflection-correspondence view of knowledge. Although it is simple, coherent and intuitive, it ignores or denies human agency, values, creativity and evolution.

[@stuckinamomentt]

Cummon Chomsky not every video you have to amaze people ! How did he know all this before google? I want to know more about Newton’s occult science which is supposedly common sense today. What is he referring to when he says unintelligible musical forces? Is it electromagnetism?

[@stuckinamomentt]

My own comment on another thread: your comment is very enlightening in the context of what exactly is the ‘mechanistic’ view Chomsky is referring to. So it’s not a visible vs invisible forces problem; it’s not a direct contact vs at a distance effect problem - it’s the point that some forces don’t make sense; it’s a causality problem. That is what is occult!

[@mikewiest5135]

The precise term for what he is calling "mystical" in physics is "nonlocal." Newton's theory had "spooky action-at-a-distance." Then Einstein gave us a local theory. Then quantum mechanics and Bell showed us spooky action-at-a-distance again, and experiments confirm it.

[@telecasteredtodeath]

Brilliant man and as always super interesting, although that lady coughing her contagion may have been a little off putting for him..

[@VIVALAVERSA]

thought experiement reminds me of kant? didnt he say something like that too?

[@maxahmadi5606]

Noam Chomsky is American Icon of Knowledge and humanity not rich in $$ perhaps, but when he passes loss will in Billions

[@smkxodnwbwkdns8369]

He’s a millionaire

[@jamiehartman3350]

Philosophy places humanity on quite a pedestal when they emphasize that we have free will. What would happen to the definitions of human and animal if it came out that we didn't?

[@yallimsorry5983]

william howard that’s a notion that is ridiculous. Did you choose to write your comment or did you feel compelled by some driving force that automated you? Why even have a word for free will if it’s illusionary? Modern science is in a conundrum; even though we objectively understand how many things are lead by preconscious impulses, we cannot square it with our apparent free choice in making them.

[@billbill3890]

But we most likely don’t have free will but we do have choices.

[@chronomancer8772]

That's why biology is taboo. The theory of evolution shows us that we're animals and anthropology has examples of other human like animals who also created art and were very much like we were. It's also very wishful thinking that animals don't make choices. Even dogs have their own favorite toys that they'll pick over others and parrots can experience depression just like people. Most research into psychology is showing that people don't have nearly as much free will as they think they do. It's mostly a cultural construct based on christianity. If you read the Greek origin myth humans were created along with the animals. in Patowatomic legend humans and animals created the earth together meaning that the land is more important than the creation of life. But in chistianity humans and animals were created separate and animals were subservient. Western philosophy is a good deal off from admitting genesis isn't an account of the nature of the universe.

[@AYVYN]

Regardless of the answer, the majority of people feel they have free-will, just like the majority of people only see wavelengths of light from around 300nm - 600 nm. The subjective is usually just a small part of the truth, true enough that our species has thrived.

[@loveaodai100]

With all due respect to the people who are infinitely more intelligent than I but I don't accept the notion that people have minds while animals do not. Having lived with dogs for more than 60 years and making observations of their behaviors... I am convinced that they have minds which albeit are much less complicated and with less ability to think complicated concepts through... they do have thoughts, dreams and sentiments leading to both predictable and sometimes unpredictable behavior...

[@Kashmoneygodzilla]

Bro I’m so serious I just learned that he’s an ancestor of mine.

[@farcydebop7982]

When he started to mention Hitler, for some reasons, I just couldn't unsee the shadow under his nose.

[@brianearner5092]

Its quite ironic, people who should run things, run from the prospect, given the playing field

[@huntervelicky7502]

adventure, excitement, a jedi craves not these things