Specter of Reason

I. Can you become a great martial artist without breaking a sweat?  In this classic scene from the 1999 sci-fi film, The Matrix, Neo (played by Keanu Reeves) seems to learn Kung Fu by having the information uploaded directly to his brain. If you cannot view the video, here's what we see:  Computer monitors show simple, 3D images of a brain and a martial arts position.  The computer is plugged into Neo, who is strapped to a chair with his eyes closed.  Neo opens his eyes with a noticable exhale, blinks, turns to Morpheus (played by Laurence Fishburne), and says, "I know Kung Fu."  Morpheus leans in, intrigued, and replies, "Show me." Morpheus is not clearly convinced.  Perhaps he is not sure the upload was successful.  Or maybe Morpheus believes that the upload was successful, but that it was only part of the learning process.  The skill has not really been attained until it has been demonstrated. It doesn't matter what Morpheus thought. ...

The more I look, the more I find evidence that TED is propaganda .  It uses factually misleading yet emotionally persuasive and motivational speeches to sell the idea that creative geniuses are changing the world for the better.  It sells itself as a conveyor of knowledge and as access to the world of the intellectual elite.  Here is how TED presents itself  (the bold is from their own Website): TED conferences bring together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes or less). On TED.com, we make the best talks and performances from TED and partners available to the world, for free. . . . Our mission: Spreading ideas. We believe passionately in the power of ideas to change attitudes, lives and, ultimately, the world. So we're building a clearinghouse of free knowledge from the world's most inspired thinkers, and also a community of curious souls to engage with ideas and each other. It'...

I've recently voiced the thesis that TED Talks  are aimed at pseudo-intellectuals and promote a pseudo-intellectual culture.  They do not inform so much as they persuade people into following a cult of personality.  I'm not saying they aren't informative at all. They can be, but I think the information is generally misleading and at the expense of a particular, emotionally-driven agenda.  However, I have not seen a majority of the many, many TED talks that are out there.  I don't want to jump to any conclusions, so I'm only offering this idea as a hypothesis.  To make a stronger argument about TED Talks in general, a lot more Talks would have to be analyzed.  (It is also important to look at how TED Talks are planned, organized and promoted, but I'll save that for another day). I know some people who claim to watch TED Talks because they offer a brief, entertaining glimpse into the future of science and technology.  I question how accurate that ...

In my review of Alfonso Cuaron's film, Gravity , I offered an interpretation of the film's symbolism.  My main idea is that the film is an argument for personal religion.  There are several features of the film that strongly suggest this interpretation, and I didn't mention all of them in my last post.  Even though I didn't enjoy the film, I think it's worth analyzing to try to see how this message is communicated and also to consider how it might resonate with people without them consciously realizing what the message is about. First, let's look at some things Cuaron has said about Gravity : The film was a metaphor of rebirth; literally, at the end, she goes from a fetal position [earlier in the film, when she floats after undressing in the space station], then in the water [shot at Lake Powell, Arizona, with significant postproduction alterations to make it green and lush and butterfly-filled], to come out, crawl, go on her knees, and then stand on her tw...

At film.com, there's a review of the film Gravity that claims it's a " plea for science ," but I think that reviewer is cherry-picking and ignoring important details.  There are some big clues that the movie is, in fact, a plea for religion. SPOILERS AHEAD In the middle of the film, Ryan (Sandra Bullock) complains that nobody has ever taught her how to pray.  Then she does pray (to her fallen comrade), hoping that her daughter is in Heaven waiting for her.  This is after she finds a renewed appreciation for life.  She is now ready to act, live or die.  A leap of faith.  And what does she say after she acts?  "I hate space." The contrast between space and earth is always looming in this film.  While space is empty, desolate, lonely and meaningless, earth is warm, friendly, meaningful and hospitable.  Earth is always in the background, beautiful (as Ryan is often told, though she never acknowledges or notices it), but far away. Space is w...

Godwin's Law seems as old as the Internet itself.  It's the principle that, given enough time, any online discussion will inevitably lead to some mention of Hitler or the Nazis.  Today, however, some people take Godwin's statement as a prescription:  Don't mention Hitler or Nazis in an online discussion (unless you're discussing something specifically to do with Hitler and the Nazis). I recall once, a year or two ago, I made a comparison between Ayn Rand and the Nazis on a friend's Facebook wall.  I think the analogy was that Ayn Rand is to capitalism what the Nazis were to nationalism.  My point, which I made explicitly clear, was that you cannot criticize capitalism by criticizing Ayn Rand, just as you cannot criticize nationalism by criticizing the Nazis.  (Edit: Actually, I think I phrased it this way:  Defending capitalism by defending Ayn Rand is like defending nationalism by defending the Nazis.  But the point is the same.)  I think ...

Author Thomas Frank has written a critical commentary on TED and the literature of creativity.  His thesis is that the literature and TED are engaging in propaganda, selling their audience (identified as the professional-managerial class) the false idea that their own creativity is the source of their financial success and power.  I'm not convinced by Frank's argument, but I think there is something true in what he is saying.  However, I also think he gets something very wrong. I've been thinking a lot about propaganda lately, since I'm currently teaching it as part of my IB English: Language and Literature course.  In my class, we focus on Nazi propaganda (especially an extract from chapter three of  Mein Kampf ) and Walt Disney war propaganda cartoons from 1943, such as "Reason and Emotion." As I explain to my students, the  Mein Kampf extract   and "Reason and Emotion" used many of the same rhetorical strategies (flattery and ridicule, in p...

Provoked by some Facebook posts by Jason Stanley (Yale) and an ensuing discussion with Jason and Michael Morris (Sussex), I've been arguing for a certain interpretation of Plato's distinction between medicine and cookery, or, more generally, between crafts and knacks.  By "crafts" we might take Plato to mean arts or skills, or perhaps even what today would be called "sciences."  The difficult question concerns what Plato means by "knacks," and whether or not they entail a particular kind of knowledge. In Gorgias (463a), Socrates refers to knacks as parts of flattery, which he calls "the habit of a bold and ready wit, which knows how to manage mankind."  In another translation, flattery is defined as "a shrewd, gallant spirit which has a natural bent for clever dealing with mankind."  Both translations indicate that flattery entails knowledge: either it is knowledge how to manage mankind, or it is whatever knowledge is required...

Imagine a community called Storyville, where there are no religious institutions per se, but where various stories are circulated which we would call "religious."  Let's say these are stories from the Bible, such as the story of Job.  In Storyville, the questions might arise:  Are these stories based on facts?  Do they represent some features of the world or our history?  Does the character of Job represent a real person who lived some time in the past?  Does the character of God represent a real person who lived in the past? A denizen of Storyville might respond, "Job may have been a real person, but what sort of person could God have been?  I don't think God sounds like a person at all.  Is God supposed to represent some abstract quality or force of nature?  Maybe God is supposed to be both:  a person, but also some other kind of force of nature, or some quality inherent in nature.  It doesn't seem to make sense, but it's just...

Russell Blackford and Udo  Schüklenk's latest, 50 Great Myths About Atheism , is now available for your Kindle.  Since the school year is just about to start, I doubt I'll have a chance to read it any time soon.  But it looks rather good.  I'd love to hear what others have to say about it. P.S.  I noticed that the Amazon page does not list the authors.  That seems rather criminal to me.

David Chalmers is famous for, among other things, claiming that zombies are conceivable.  Not movie zombies, but zombies of a different sort.  These zombies are beings which are physically and functionally identical to human beings, but which lack a certain kind of conscious experience.  They lack the "what it is like" that is said to characterize our experiences.  Another way of putting it:  They lack phenomenal consciousness. According to Chalmers, zombies act just like us, and that means they talk about things just the way we do.  They therefore have intentionality.  Their behaviours are about things.  It follows that, if zombies are conceivable (i.e., conceptually coherent) then there are intentional states that lack phenomenal content. This seems like a difficult position to hold.  My intuition is that all intentional states have phenomenal content.  I wonder what arguments have been made one way or the other.  The conceiva...

A new piano improvisation entitled "Rustling Leaves."

A lot of people conflate philosophy and religion.  In their devotion to science and rationality, they criticize both philosophy and religion as useless nonsense.  One of the most common criticisms of philosophy is that virtually no substantial progress has ever been made on any issue of philosophical importance.  Another common criticism is that philosophical problems have no discernible consequences for our lives:  It doesn't matter how you respond to them, whether you ignore them or whatever, because they are figments of our imagination and of no practical importance.  On these grounds, it is believed that philosophy and religion are more or less the same.  Sure, philosophers might sometimes give us important tools or insights, just as religious leaders might sometimes give us important moral insights or works of art.  But these came despite the philosophical or religious devotion, and not because of it.  At least, that's what a lot of people be...

As Inside Higher Ed reports, there's been a lot of discussion of Assistant Professor Eric Hedin and Ball State University's approval of his Physics and Astronomy courses, "Inquiries in Physical Sciences," "The Boundaries of Science" and "The Universe and You."  (Jerry Coyne has written most extensively about them  here ,  here  and, most recently,  here ).  The courses apparently share the same basic  syllabus , and if you read it you can see that Hedin has tailored the courses to promote the Intelligent Design movement (which is known for its intimate political and intellectual connections to Christian apologetics).  It is hard to imagine that these courses fairly represent the methods, values, findings and competences of contemporary science. Many critics of Intelligent Design say it shouldn't be subject to discussion in science classes.  I disagree.  I think a science class is the perfect place to debunk ID propaganda.  And i...