with Julia Galef
July 10, 2016 If people don’t have free will, then can we be held morally responsible for our actions? And what would happen to society if we were to collectively shed our belief in free will? In this episode Julia talks with philosopher Gregg Caruso, who advocates a position of “optimistic skepticism” on the topic. Skepticism … Read more
June 26, 2016 Naturalism is the stance that everything that exists in the universe arises from “natural” causes, of the sort observable by science — not supernatural ones. It’s practically a foundational tenet of skepticism. But does it imply that there can be no meaning, or purpose, or morality in the universe? This episode features … Read more
June 12, 2016 Julia chats with the authors of “Algorithms to Live By“, about how to apply key algorithms from computer science to our real life problems. For example, deciding which apartment to rent, planning your career, and prioritizing your projects. In the process, they discuss the assumptions that underlie those algorithms (and what to … Read more
May 29, 2016 It’s the annual live Rationally Speaking episode, taped at the Northeast Conference on Science and Skepticism in NYC! This year features returning guest Jacob Appel, a bioethicist (and lawyer, and psychiatrist). Jacob and Julia discuss various bioethical dilemmas, such as: How do you handle parents who want to withhold medical treatment from their child for … Read more
May 15, 2016 In this episode Julia talks with philosopher of cognitive science Colin Allen about whether fish can feel pain. In the process they explore a cluster of related questions: Are fish conscious, and how could we tell? What’s the difference between pain and suffering? And are there evolutionarily adaptive reasons why animals would have the … Read more
May 1, 2016 Ever make a plan to diet, or exercise, or study, and then — when the scheduled hour rolls around — decide, “Nah, I’ll just put it off another day”? If you said “no,” I don’t believe you! This episode features behavioral psychiatrist (and economist) George Ainslie, who demonstrated the existence of this ubiquitous … Read more
April 17, 2016 For centuries, scientists have wondered what makes humans so much smarter than other species. Some proposed it was the size of our brain (though that didn’t explain why whales weren’t smarter than us); others thought it was the size of our brain relative to our body size (but there were problems with … Read more
April 3, 2016 You’re probably already aware that it’s hard to change someone’s mind with logical arguments and evidence, especially about emotionally charged topics. But are there exceptions? David McRaney, bestselling author of “You Are Not So Smart” (and host of the blog and podcast by the same name) describes his experiences with people who have done … Read more
March 20, 2016 He’s been called a “Data vigilante.” In this episode, Prof. Uri Simonsohn describes how he detects fraudulent work in psychology and economics — what clues tip him off? How big of a problem is fraud relative to other issues like P-hacking? And what solutions are there? Transcript (PDF)
March 6, 2016 You’ve probably heard about cognitive biases — the systematic errors human brains make when we try to reason or make decisions. But what if our biases are actually a sign of rationality? This episode features Tom Griffiths, professor of cognitive science at University of California, Berkeley and the director of the Computational Cognitive … Read more