The Perils of Pop Philosophy

ThousandStars tips a new piece by Julian Sanchez, the guy who, in case you missed it, brought us a succinct definition of the one-way hash argument (of the type often employed in the US culture wars). This one is about the dangers of a certain kind of oversimplifying, as practiced routinely by journalists and bloggers. "This brings us around to some of my longstanding ambivalence about blogging and journalism more generally. On the one hand, while it's probably not enormously important whether most people have a handle on the mind-body problem, a democracy can't make ethics and political philosophy the exclusive province of cloistered academics. On the other hand, I look at the online public sphere and too often tend to find myself thinking: 'Discourse at this level can't possibly accomplish anything beyond giving people some simulation of justification for what they wanted to believe in the first place.' This is, needless to say, not a problem limited to philosophy."

Comments

I think I speak for many of us when I say...

[iamdrscience]

What?

Re:I think I speak for many of us when I say...

[linzeal]

For those still in school; or people like me who never left, I would suggest taking philosophy courses for social science electives if they allow you. A nascent Philosophy of Computer Science is developing and looking for help with the foundations (PDF File).

Philosophy and a sense of direction, often errant is all you got at the borders of any field. WV Quine and Popper have become interlocutors that after many readings I have access to when working on an intellectual task. Reading philosophy for me has brought great minds into contact with my own and given me a bit of humility and a shared sense of purpose I wish I had in my 20's.

Re:I think I speak for many of us when I say...

[postbigbang]

But that's not often the ethos here.

You're supposed to react with your gut, prejudices, and empirical sense of I'm smarter-than-you tact here.

Failing that, say something funny or troll with goatse.

Failing that, add in something pithy, or something that whores karma points.

TFA makes the improper assumption that in various contexts, people give a crap what you think. They blurt out stuff randomly, and look for allies to justify their boorishness and prattle. Having found a mob or a tribe, they then evolve the idea in to a cult like status, reveling in the success of whatever their pseudo-punditry delivers. Blather at best. Hate at worst. Then the idea must be defended, and everything mushrooms with chest pounding and the attempt to stick other crap to the original idea to make it have gravity.

Welcome my friends, to the show that never ends. Come on in, come on in, come on in.

Re:I think I speak for many of us when I say...

[pieisgood]

Giving this a +5 insightful is kind of ironic don't you think?

Re:I think I speak for many of us when I say...

[cain]

As for the "one way hash" argument: while it's certainly true that laymen can be duped by impressive credentials (pretty much anyone can be duped under the right circumstances, layman or not), the whole argument reeks of a peculiar variety of arrogant elitism...

I don't think the "one way hash" argument argument references authority at all. I understood the "one way hash" is a point or line of reasoning which sounds solid and pithy when stated, but under the surface is deeply flawed. This forces the counter argument to have to explain a more complicated line of reasoning - which doesn't convince as easily as the 'one way hash' line of reasoning.

A simple example is "it was very cold last winter, therefore global warming is false". On the surface this makes sense - "yeah, it was really cold last winter, this argument must be correct." The counter argument to this involves graphs and things like "yeah, it was cold last winter - but look at this graph based on ice samples from Greenland for the last thousand years. You'll see that it means that blah blah blah...". Many anti-science arguments are 'one way hashes'.

Re:I think I speak for many of us when I say...

[thtrgremlin]

This reminds me of a conclusion I came to recently; the line between fiction and non-fiction is silly. My wife reads a lot of fiction, and I read mostly non-fiction, but I do read fiction every once in awhile. She proposed a question and it got me to thinking, "What motivates me to read fiction?". What it came down to is that I pick books based on the level of insight they may provide and how much it may challenge what I currently think or believe. For the most part, I find that in non-fiction, but every once in awhile I find it in fiction. Most often this is classics that have stood the test of time.

Random blogs can be interesting or inspiring. The value isn't in what they say, but in how much they make you think or question things. Poorly written or researched opinions rare contain insight or thought provoking questions (as is suggestion FTA). I would prefer that if an article is short to state a problem and propose difficult to answer questions, then leave the reader to search for the answer, because the necessary information to answer clearly is rarely the scope of a blog.

Some people read something and want to read more, others either forget, or just consider it all they need to do to affirm their opinion. This is why I get upset at people that generally criticize wikipedia as a whole. It is great for what it is, and a good place to start to get an idea of what you can learn. If all you ever read is the wiki article on something, then you are going to have the same issue as you would have with any subject for which you only read two pages on. Wiki is what it is and is great, for the thinker, and the non-thinker. Criticize a non-thinker for not thinking, not for the sources. I really liked what the author said about confidence of knowledge and opinions.

Re:I think I speak for many of us when I say...

[Abcd1234]

As for the "one way hash" argument: while it's certainly true that laymen can be duped by impressive credentials (pretty much anyone can be duped under the right circumstances, layman or not), the whole argument reeks of a peculiar variety of arrogant elitism (really more a kind of paternalism) which has plagued academia in general and philosophy in particular for a very long time.

Well, while that's a lovely sentiment, it doesn't actually qualify as a counterargument. Would you care to actually provide one?

Sanchez's hidden assumption that cloistered academics would naturally make the better leaders or judges in arguments is as ultimately deluded as Plato's contention that only philosophers are suited to be kings.

Funny, I don't see how he actually said that (although, I like how you assume all academics are "cloistered"... bigoted much?). He simple put forth the following:

The less educated in a subject you are, the more likely you are to over-estimate your knowledge in that subject area. Combine that with his one-way hash argument (that it's easy to manipulate someone when explaining a complex concept, because truly explaining said concept would require a level of knowledge and detail that's impenetrable to the layman), and it's clear that a layman can be very easily duped.

Therefore, a new type of discussion is needed, one where, rather than arguing a solution to a problem, you discuss all the issues underpinning the problem, and why selecting a solution is hard, thus disabusing said layman of their notion that they are, in fact, educated in the subject area. That way, the layman may be less easy to dupe, as they will be more aware of their own ignorance.

Re:I think I speak for many of us when I say...

[nine-times]

Plato argued in the Republic (through Socrates) that only philosophers were suited to be rulers.

Sorry, but I feel the need to interject something here. If you're reading Plato and thinking that Plato is making clear positive arguments through Socrates, you might want to go back and reread with a more critical eye. There's a lot of evidence all around to suggest that, not only did Plato not agree with a lot of things that he had Socrates saying in the dialogs, but also, within the dialogs, Socrates didn't even believe a lot of things that Socrates was saying. The whole thing makes a lot more sense if you consider Plato's dialogs to be almost like plays, in which Socrates is a very sarcastic and tricky character.

In this particular case, it's not clear that Socrates actually believes that only philosophers are set to be rulers. He's setting up a sort of perfect/utopian society that a philosopher might dream up, and then following through on the logical conclusions and reducing the whole thing to absurdity. In many ways, what he's showing is that dreams of utopian societies eventually lead to horrific situations.

I think the whole "one way hash" argument in the blog post is a little too clever and glib, but it is pointing at a very old and troublesome philosophical question: When a bad/false argument is more seductive than the truth, how do you convince a mass of people of the truth?

Of course that raises other questions about truth and its value. Elsewhere in the Republic, this sort of question proposes the idea that leaders should be willing to lie in such a way so as to lead their people to a good end, at least in those cases where the truth is not persuasive enough. However, this proposition is also shown to be problematic.

Dangers of being an arrogant ass

[syousef]

Locking up knowledge so that only specialists get access is a stupid, destructive, elitist practice that is self defeating (who do you think funds most work???) and detracts from the life we're all capable of leading. Those who Suggest that popular accounts can't be good are just making a poor excuse for their own inability to communicate. Over-simplification isn't the whole problem. Poor communication is.

Most people over the age of about 12 (well 16 in some places) understand that you won't get all the detail from a popular article. Popular articles are about giving us the flavour of what's being discussed. Without them a great deal of human knowledge is complete inaccessible to the masses. Hell, even the most intelligent of us doesn't have time to specialise in every field.

It can be done, or it can be done poorly. Done well people get a flavour for the complexity of the topic, understand the limitations of the popular description, walk away with an appreciation for the topic and perhaps get to chat to other intelligent people about the wonders of it. Take a look at Sagan's Cosmos, Brian Greene's Elegant Universe (whether or not you think String theory is the way forward), any Attenborough documentary (if you can stay awake - I must confess the man's voice is a cure for insomnia which is a pity because I think his documentaries are so well done)

Done poorly Joe Schmoe walks way with a misunderstanding based on poor analogies and either thinks the topic is a total waste of time and money or rhat he could do better at the field with no specialist knowledge. See almost any human interest piece on the news, idiotic wildlife entertainment shows like Steve Irwin's tripe, and all reality TV.

Re:Dangers of being an arrogant ass

[DMiax]

Locking up knowledge so that only specialists get access is a stupid, destructive, elitist practice that is self defeating (who do you think funds most work???) and detracts from the life we're all capable of leading. Those who Suggest that popular accounts can't be good are just making a poor excuse for their own inability to communicate. Over-simplification isn't the whole problem. Poor communication is.

Since the summary clearly states that culture should not be locked up, you completely missed the point. Which is: can an expert (in any field, not just philosofy) divulge and disseminate his/her knowledge without the general public assume they are omniscient experts too?

Note however that the question arises also in scientific/technological matters. For example most Slashdotters assume to be authorities on any of those. Look at all the bad programming/computer administration advice you can get from the comments. (Sending my karma to hell for implying that slashdotters are less than omniscient on computer subjects)

In the end, the article is right and probably more general than that. We non-experts know nothing about climate change and we cannot understand the merit of the debate. A seemingly winning argument for us could be a huge logical fallacy if we knew a little more than that. The only remedy is to put trust in those we call experts, which is difficult because everybody pretends to be one. Bonus points for a working solution.

Re:Dangers of being an arrogant ass

[pjt33]

It's even more messy than that. In many areas (climate change is one, but pretty much any area where people are trying to influence politicians) I know I'm not an expert and don't understand the real issues but I can also see that one or both sides of the debate are depending on invalid or misleading use of statistics. So it's even harder to work out who the experts are, because in their efforts to disseminate their knowledge some step out of their area of expertise and come across as incompetent.

Re:Dangers of being an arrogant ass

[VoidCrow]

> It can be done, or it can be done poorly.

But the point is that for many ideas, the majority of people are not in a position to evaluate whether the exposition is done well or poorly...

Even a topic as superficially obvious as evolution benefits from a basic mathematical intuition and a nodding acquaintance with mathematical complexity. Most popular descriptions I've seen of the evolutionary process characterise it as 'random chance', whereas it's a more complex mechanism comprising the following elements:

• A sieving process - everything that slips through the sieve *dies* or fares less well
• A fitness memory - the set of genomes across a genetically similar population, or an *individual* genome where fitness in not communicated.
• Optionally, a mechanism for distributing a subset of working fitness characteristics throught a genetically similar population (sexual reproduction or sideways gene transfer).
• An underlying randomisation driver in the form of things like cosmic ray damage and other influences that might tend to change the genome data.

So, option (a) random chance or option (b) the more complex system with its attendant subleties?

Option (a) genuinely *does* give irreducible complexity, whereas in option (b), the numbers work and you can use the mechanism to practical effect in genetic algorithms...

Which option sells best when a confident, charismatic person sells it to a typical member of the public? It's the easiest thing in the world to ignore the subtleties inherent to a complex topic. We're set up to do it - if we were not, we'd spend all our time gazing at the intricate designs in the rug and tracing them back to their religious, mathematical, philosophical and social roots. We'd starve or be eaten.

Is it arrogant and elitist to understand something which the majority of people have difficulty with? In the above instance, no-one is hiding the knowledge, and yet there's no shortage of people who doubt evolution. Finally, it's an argument from personal experience, but I'm from a working-class family. The rest of my family would glaze over and say something rude if I tried to talk about this kind of thing. They don't want to know. Ironically, they *do* believe in evolution, but the keyword here is *believe*. Place them in a different context, around glib people with a different agenda, and they'll believe that the Great Marmoset scooped up its poop and moulded it into a patty-cake, and thus we have the world. Forgive me if my arrogant elitist frustration leaks out all over the floor.

Re:Dangers of being an arrogant ass

[addsalt]

The rest of my family would glaze over and say something rude if I tried to talk about this kind of thing.

I think you are getting to the root cause of what I think the article missed. Most people are not interested in actually striving to find out the truth (regardless of what the truth happens to be). Pop philosophy is helping people justify the beliefs they already have, regardless of what it is. To do that, all you need is a plausible sounding argument.

Re:Dangers of being an arrogant ass

[Curunir_wolf]

So, you're saying "just shut up and do all these green things we tell you to, pay your carbon taxes and offsets and inflated energy bill - and everything will be fine. We're the experts and we know what's best?"

I predict that this will work out at least as good as when the "experts" said "just shut up and give us your money to invest - the market will work just like we say it will." And when the "experts" said "just shut up and eat what we tell you and avoid these things we tell you and you will be healthy and live to 100"...

I would say that it is just as important to question the self-appointed experts in any field as it is to defer to their wisdom on the topic. Trusting the "Educators" with public education hasn't improved the public schools, either.

Re:Dangers of being an arrogant ass

[TheTurtlesMoves]

Pay an actor to wear a lab coat when he delivers your message. Have him wear a hard hat and carry a clipboard. Pose him in front of a very large machine, or a pristine meadow. That's where your dollars have their biggest effect.

Reminds me of a funny story. We got a new shiny 1.3Million dollar mass spec machine. The national news paper comes in to do a story. The ask if we can take a photo with "that machine in the background, because it looks more credible as a expensive scientific instrument...".

It was the printer.

The web gives us all a voice

[BadAnalogyGuy]

When Planned Parenthood was founded, many people were disgusted at the thought of an agency dedicated to abortion. Worse, though, was the fact that PP was founded in order to control the population of undesirables, and Sanger, the founder of PP, was especially eager to label non-whites as undesirable.

Now, here's the dilemma. If we take the position that speech itself is relatively useless since anyone can do it, and that only actions are important since only those willing to act will effect true change, then how do we reconcile the good which PP has brought while taking into consideration the completely immoral basis upon which it was founded?

Sanchez is wrong in his supposition that speech itself is wrong. Speech leads to debate, and debate can bring out the truth. The ancient Greek sophists knew this, and thus we have the practice of oratory.

Re:The web gives us all a voice

[Omestes]

Actually Sanger was a eugenics follower. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Sanger#Eugenics_and_euthanasia

Not all good ideas must come from good intentions. Planned Parenthood, in its modern conception might be a good idea, but it was originated from bad ideas.

Sometimes it shocks me how ignorant most of my fellow Americans are of their negative history. This is especially true of eugenics. Hitler actually ADMIRED us, he wrote a letter to Woodrow Wilson claiming as much. It was a big, accepted deal before WWII put a sour flavor into our mouths.

I wish we remembered, since Darwinism is still misused to tragic ends. Socioeconomic Darwinism is still flaunted among the extreme libertarian/Randian /. crowd, even if it is a dire fallacy which lead to some serious negative consequences. those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it.

Re:The web gives us all a voice

[Attila Dimedici]

Please explain the fallacy of Socioeconomic Darwinism without relying on religious terminology.
Granted, one of the groups that were major proponents of applying Darwinism to socioeconomics (the Nazis) was largely wiped out. However, that does not prove the the idea wrong. It just proves that the Nazis socioeconomic program was anti-survival, not that the philosophical underpinnings were wrong.
I believe that the Nazis were wrong because they were evil, but if there is no God, the word evil is meaningless.

Re:I don't see the point in discussing this articl

[Anonymous Coward]

Bear plastic swim pen. Compact fire records handle, bottle papers giant sky on box fro and seventeen.

Schools.

[Celeste R]

There are things to be said about people being able to be stupid. You can't force intelligence on people (except when they're teachable.)

If you want people to be intelligent, go into politics and try to change the system. Chances are: you'll be pressured into not doing it. The system is skewed against the educational sector; and the pay that teachers get reflects that.

Investment in America's future as an intellectual powerhouse is limited at best. Public schools generally teach people enough to -get by-, and not to really understand what's around them. It's only every once in a while that you see a public school that really teaches things like philosophical ethics.

Over-simplistic arguments are the natural result of people who want to be intellectual about things (while doing so with limited knowledge.) If you want them to have more concrete arguments, they have to expand their knowledge. Granted, some people just don't want that, but the vast majority of people wouldn't mind getting it if it was presented to them.

"Because they said so" isn't good enough when it comes to thinking for yourself.

Communication

[siloko]

Over-simplification isn't the whole problem. Poor communication is.

You got it right there, if you can't communicate complex ideas to interested parties outside your field then you don't properly understand your field. Intelligence comes into it but only to a point . . . why use three syllables when one will do!

Re:Communication

[VoidCrow]

> Intelligence comes into it but only to a point . . .

Out of interest, what is that point?

Are you saying that the vast majority of the human race will have a good intuitive understanding of physics if only the argument is put well enough in sufficiently clear english?

Re:Communication

[moeinvt]

" . . .if you can't communicate complex ideas to interested parties outside your field then you don't properly understand your field."

I think it depends what field you're in, and the background of who you're trying to communicate with. An engineer talking to another engineer or scientist in a different field is one thing, an engineer talking to a dental hygienist is something else entirely.

Try explaining transient noise analysis, the hot electron effect or negative bias temperature instability in integrated circuits to a non-technical audience. Even if you start out with an "interested party", they'll turn into an expressionless zombie before you've finished.

It's not always a simple matter of communication skills. Some ideas require a foundation of knowledge, without which, the idea is nearly impossible to conceptualize.

It's not that you're wrong...

[Talisman]

"Discourse at this level can't possibly accomplish anything beyond giving people some simulation of justification for what they wanted to believe in the first place."

The problem I've found, even since my first debate class in 10th grade, is that the vast majority of people have no interest in what the 'right' answer is. They only care that their perspective is correct, and if an inconvenient counterpoint is presented, they discount, rail against, or outright ignore it.

In addition to this, the people presenting the counterpoints often do it in such a condescending manner, any slim hope there was of the other person considering an alternate viewpoint is evaporated in a blast of indignation.

The most productive problem solving I've ever done, and still do, is when I'm surrounded by smart people who don't believe their personal ego should factor into any decision made. We sit down at a table, drink lots of coffee, joke around, and at the end of the day, have solved most of our problems in elegant, efficient ways. We even laugh at our own dumb ideas when we've overlooked something that should have been obvious. I've also been in groups where you are crucified for uttering something that isn't completely accurate. This environment simply leads to a large amount of CYA, because once a person commits to the decision, he then MUST follow through, even if later he realizes it wasn't the best choice, because the environment he's working in is completely unforgiving. Basically if he admits there was a better option, it costs him his job. It's best to not have that type of fear, because no matter how hard you are on people, they will still make mistakes, even the brilliant ones.

The same holds true for personal philosophies; solving the problems that being alive presents. When you are listening to other people, you should actually listen to them. Try to see things their way. Don't bash them, even if you disagree. It doesn't hurt. It can often help. And when you're presenting a counterpoint, be genteel about it. Tact goes a very long way.

The Dude said it best, "You're not wrong, Walter. You're just an ASSHOLE!"

I Like the Sentiment, But ...

[dplentini]

I like the quote on Slashdot, but reading his blog I get the sense that he actively practices what he preaches against. Reducing people and complex issues to simplistic (and usually undefined) categories is the heart of the oversimplification that Sanchez laments. We don't need more fights over how to name our problems; we need to understand them, which means we need to understand our selves.

Cowards

[DarkOx]

If he wants see some over simplification here it is.

There is good, bar, right, and wrong in this world. While not everything is that simply, perhaps not even most things people like him to see nothing but shades of gray everywhere even when their are none. Usually this is because they are afraid to stand up and do the right thing because it might make someone mad, start a war, or God forbid make them appear intolerant.

I for am sick of people like this guy who bring us all this Politically Correct nonsense, which does nothing other than serve to confuse otherwise good people and prevent us from making the choices, which might be hard ones, but we are ultimately required if we care about living in a just world and possibly even our very survival.

Their language may not be classy and they might want for some temperance and timing but at least the unruly mob of bloggers shows a little courage. I would much much rather many of those be our leaders than the lot of sycophants and manikins we have.

Re:Cowards

[Deanalator]

What is so terrible about political correctness? It is simply a list of terms that have become derogatory to certain people in certain areas. If you don't give a shit about offending people, then you have no obligation to stay informed, but there is no need to deride those that are making the effort.

Of course you can't please everyone all the time (I personally have no intention of pleasing the feminists that go into a pseudo uproar when you call them Mrs because the letter "r" implies ownership etc), but it might be a good idea to hold off on the cancer jokes at the next board meeting or cocktail party.

Funny that even the term "politically correct" has become derogatory. Every time I flip through fox news, they seem to be in an uproar about someone being "politically correct". I believe "politically correct" prefers to call itself "tact" these days.

As a side note

[Aceticon]

Here's something interesting:

Following a link from the first article we get:

The Dunning-Kruger Effect: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning-Kruger_effect

which in turn leads us to:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crank_(person)#The_psychology_of_cranks

which pretty much explains the logic behind at least 10% of the posts here in Slashdot.

Re:What has this got to do with IT ?

[Ma8thew]

Yes it is just you. Slashdot is 'News For Nerds'. Not 'News for IT Professionals', or 'News for Computer Science Graduates'. The article's subject has relevance to Slashdot readers, because many of us are well versed in a particular field, and hate it when the media or pundits use a simple argument to convince lay-people of something which is flat out wrong.

Re:new tag needed: verbalmasturbation

[damburger]

ok some random guy writes a piece of verbal masturbation because he can't stand people who have the ability express ideas in such a way that they can actually be understood by others, while clearly demonstrating that he put lots of effort into making sure that his text can't be understood unless by a marginally small & elite portion of society.

Thanks for mashing your fists on the keyboard. It was a valuable contribution that makes us all intellectually richer.

The expression of ideas in the media IS a big problem. Noam Chomsky (some random guy, don't worry about it) has made similar points on the pitfalls of brevity in the media. I have read articles in New Scientist by a scientist discussing how to debate with creationists, in a limited time frame, when they ask short pithy questions which require long answers to refute. It is a widely recognised problem which, to date, hasn't found a satisfactory solution.

The fact is, some things are too complicated to form an informed opinion on without graduate level study. It is OK to have elites. As someone with no medical training, I am very grateful that there are elite surgeons around to perform any procedures on me I might need in the future, rather than some bloke with 'common sense' who saw an episode of Casualty and reckons he can have a go at it.

But hot damn it made him feel great when he used all those sophysticated words!

Being able to spell 'sophisticated' is not a sign of being an intellectual elitist.

Re:I don't see the point in discussing this articl

[Anonymous Coward]

Right iron fold candle. Drift space walking killer down crane. Thistle cage sign white small. Half seek harbour bed with frame flat family hen. Castle help.

Re:Philosophy of Mind

[digitig]

Cutting through the needless walls of text by both Sanchez and Brady, let me summarize the current state of the philosophy of mind:

1) We are little closer to reading off "beliefs" from human brains than we were 30 years ago.

In what sense is that "philosophy of mind"?

2) Media often overgeneralizes the results of neuroscientists.

You could have stopped at "2) Media often overgeneralizes"

3) The brain is still nothing more than a mass of cells.

True. Again, what's that got to do with the philosophy of mind?

4) Religious people have a problem with (3).

Which religious people? I don't know of any who have a problem with that. I know of some who have a problem with the identification of "mind" with "brain", but then I know lots of non-religious people who have the same problem so I'm not sure what you're getting at.

5) Philosophers base their careers trying to argue for or against (3).

Care to name any who do that? I don't know of any; (3) just isn't seen as a philosophical question.

6) More specifically, philosophers think too highly of functionalism

Again, any philosophers in particular? Did you say something earlier about overgeneralisation?

I say this as a philosopher and not a scientist, but having studied these topics for a while, I have more respect for the scientists than the philosophers.

Since you've pretty much only cited science, and called it philosophy (except in (6) where you've overgeneralised) I think it's clear that you have more respect for the "scientists" than for the "philosophers", but what do you think "science" and "philosophy" actually are, and what do you think is their relationship? You seem to see them as rivals, which is odd...

Re:Philosophy of Mind

[Chemisor]

> 3) The brain is still nothing more than a mass of cells.

As a programmer, I must point out the obvious analogy: "the computer is still nothing more than a collection of transistors", and reply that if that were so, nobody would have to argue whether it is better to run Linux or Vista. Philosophers would do much better once they explicitly state that there is a difference between hardware and software, that they are, respectively, the brain and the mind, and that anyone trying to conflate the two is either a con man or an idiot.

Re:Time for philosophers to take a stand.

[Chemisor]

"Isn't it odd? When a politician or a movie star retires, we read front page stories about it. But when a philosopher retires, people do not even notice it."
"They do, eventually."

Re:Philosophy of Mind

[SpeedyDX]

You may want to be more specific. I don't think anyone really argues against (3). The issue isn't whether the brain is a mass of cells, but whether (3a) the mind is anything over and above that mass of cells. Both the physicalist and the dualist can accept (3), but they would vehemently disagree over (3a).

I'm not sure why you think philosophers think too highly of functionalism. It is a philosophy that works for many areas of interest. I personally don't think that functionalism fully captures all the relevant issues in the philosophy of mind, but there is still a coherent and compelling argument from that side. Functionalism can help the physicalist account for subjective experiences like qualia.

I also don't think that it's fair to say that only religious people have a problem with (3) (or more precisely, my revised version, (3a); also, I'm aware you didn't say "only", but given the context, one would likely imply as such). I'm non-religious, but I tend to lean more towards the dualist position. Furthermore, the great empiricist David Hume may have argued against a substantivalist immaterial mind, but given his other philosophical works, I think he would not necessarily disagree with a property dualist position.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that your post shows exactly the problem with which the article is concerned. Incomplete oversimplifications of the matters at hand will tend not to be very substantially rich. I'm sure you have arguments to support your positions, and I have little doubt that they will probably be good arguments, but because you have oversimplified your position, the arguments become weak and insubstantial. In fact, in previewing my own post, my own briefly extended arguments are very philosophically weak as well. The important questions are as follows: Is it possible to reduce philosophically (and perhaps scientifically) complex arguments to newspaper- or blog-sized articles without undermining the sophistication and nuances of such arguments? Is it possible to do so keeping in mind that the readers or consumers of such articles have little to no background information about the matters at hand?

I'm currently working on a side project about the ethics of information dissemination and this is exactly the type of question in which I am interested. Is it ethical for a journalist or blogger or what-have-you (hereafter collectively known as "journalist" for ease) to provide incomplete information? This question is somewhat less controversial, because a journalist's job is, basically, to summarize and disseminate. But is it ethical for a journalist to disseminate incomplete information in a way that disproportionately favours one set of arguments over others? For example, if a study shows that a certain compound that is richly found in food xyz is good for you but other studies show that food xyz taken as a whole is bad for you, is it ethical for the journalist just to mention the first study without mentioning the latter studies? We hear about such stories all the time in headlines such as "Red wine may increase your life span!" or "One aspirin a day may reduce risks of heart attacks!"

To tie it back to your post, was it ethical for you to simplify the issues so much so that it seems to disproportionately favour your conclusion? The article's worries are not unfounded, and your short and succinct post shows exactly why that is so.

Climate Change is a classic appeal to authority

[msevior]

I'm a Physicist but essentially I have to demure to the Climate Modelling experts too.

At first glance it appears that the extra CO2 in the atmosphere will make very little difference to the global temperature.

Why? Well the best models predict an effective increase of 1-2 watts per/m^2 of energy directed back to Eath from the addition CO2.

On the other hand the amount of power radiated into space from the Earth is to first approximation, given by the Steffan-Boltzmann equation.

Power = sigma*T^4

Where T is the Earth's temperature in Kelvin ~ 283 C.

The T^4 means you get a lot of extra radiated power for a very little increase in temperature. Roughly a 0.3 degree increase in temperature for a doubling of the CO2 levels.

To get the 3 - 7 degree increases predicted, you need a really big positive feedback effect from additional water vapour. But additional water vapour also provides clouds which either increase the amount of power reflected back into space or increase the greenhouse effect, depending on where they form.

It's a really complicated problem.

So one can only hope that the authorities have got it right.

Re:Ignorance more freely begets confidence...

[maxume]

Without divinity, I don't see how any of those things are theological (or rather, absent divinity, I don't see what theology brings to them).

I am stupid...

[bartwol]

...and uninformed.

And I vote.

That is all.

Re:Ignorance more freely begets confidence...

[0xdeadbeef]

These questions don't go away just because there's no divinity involved

Meditate upon this statement and perhaps you will be enlightened as to why no one need bother themselves with theology.

Re:And this is all that is required anyway

[tnk1]

Certainly people can be persuaded. It happens all the time.

I used to be a death penalty supporter. Now, I'm not. Of course, I can't put my finger on any one thing that changed my mind, but the arguments were certainly there.

I also used to be significantly more inclined to see offensive war as a legitimate tool of policy, now I don't. Believe it or not, the Iraq war had nothing to do with that, as I honestly expected that a Mideast war was inevitable anyway. I just wish we had been a lot more justified and a lot better at managing the aftermath.

So, yes, people can change their mind. It just doesn't happen suddenly, so you might get the idea that no one is listening. They certainly are.

there's a quote

[circletimessquare]

i don't know who:

"ideas are like assholes, everyone has one, but most of them stink"

99% of the people in your life are full of shit ideas. 99% of what you yourself say is incomplete and ill thought out

the whole point is, only through communication do we develop better ideas. in this sense, the internet is not a step backwards, but a step forwards. that it exposes exactly how awful people's ideas are, this is nothing new or different, its always been this way, probably worse, the quality of people's ideas. what's new and different is that so many people can now work through their philosophical shortcomings on the internet and, if they have an open mind and are not a brain dead partisan hack, they can grow ideologically into a better person

don't lament that so much of humanity, including yourself, is so unenlightened. rejoice that so many strive to be better. how do i know they strive to be better?

because they go online, and communicate. this is the first step towards becoming a better person

if i were 100% certain of my beliefs, i would sit in smug condescension and talk to no one. what would be the point? i already supposedly know everything. only by venturing forth and exposing my beliefs to others are they challenged, and made stronger

as long as people are talking and arguing and being challenged by others, they are becoming better people

so, to paraphrase someone else: welcome to the intarwebs. let a thousand assholes bloom

Re:Ignorance more freely begets confidence...

[Hatta]

It is more about you being awestruck by "simple" questions like why are we here, what is my purpose here if I have any at all, where did we come from, where are we going, etc.

Why do you think people go into science? There's nothing spiritual (i.e. superstitious) about those questions. If you truly want to know the answers to these great questions, you're not going to be satisfied with some fairy tale.

By the way all world religions offer answers to these questions, but are by no means the only answers one can give

Nor are they correct.

One could be scientific about it, and try to answer these question from that perspective, but that kind of analysis usually leaves us cold, feeling small, and somewhat unfulfilled.

Exactly, people cling to religion like a blankie because they don't like the cold hard facts of reality.

I disagree in principle.

[gurps_npc]

I simplify, but basically he is saying that anything worth arguing about gets too complex for the layman to argue about.

No. Wrong.

The things we argue about tend to be very very simple. It is the application to the real world that gets very very complex.

Take abortion for example. The real question is "When do we get a soul?"

The standard arguments make it more complex. You only need to get that complex if you are trying to deal with the real world and counter examples. But the heart of the matter is a simple question, that anyone can hold an opinion on, and can try to prove or dis-prove.

Another great example is say the rule of the law vs a case by case situation. Do we care about the minutia of legal proceedings more than the right/wrongness of the actual actions. Yes, you can get very very specific about whether or not the fact that a man was convicted on an illegal wire tap, should he go free, or variably, a man convicted but later another man proven to have done the crime. But we really are arguing about a basic concept, not the evidence that people cook up to support their viewpoints.

Re:I disagree in principle.

[Abcd1234]

Take abortion for example. The real question is "When do we get a soul?"

Sure, let's pretend that's the question. So, good for you, you just stated it.

Now what?

The article isn't about how hard it is to state the question. Hell, that's relatively easy, presuming you can get everyone to agree. The article is about how hard it is to debate the question and come to a conclusion. Because debating the question is precisely the act of applying it "to the real world", as you put it.

Let's take another example: the origin of species on earth. The question itself is dead simple to state: "Was life on earth created, or did it evolve?" But debating that question requires understanding basic biology, including natural selection and genetics, as well as a grasp of fundamental mathematics and statistics. And that's Sanchez's whole point. If you really want to hold an *informed* opinion about a topic, you need to understand it in depth. And that depth can be so extensive that your average reader will simply be overwhelmed by the detail. Meanwhile, if someone comes along and gives them a nice, glossed over version that *sounds* right, then they'll happily internalize it, even if it's wrong.

And this brings us back to your original statement: that you disagree that "anything worth arguing about gets too complex for the layman to argue about." And my answer to you is that, no, you're wrong. You believe that holding an *opinion* is something a layman can do. Great. You're absolutely right, anyone can hold an opinion. Hell, they may even know how to phrase the question properly. But actually *arguing* their position while actually understanding the issues at hand? Sorry, that's something else entirely.

Re:new tag needed: verbalmasturbation

[Jimmy_B]

And how do we differentiate between elites and retards? Remember that for years we were told that all the brightest mathematicians and physicists were now working on financial derivatives because only "rocket scientists" could understand them.

We differentiate between them by requiring them to have their research published and subjected to peer review. The financial sector preferred to keep secrets rather than publish and never had any peer review, so when they thought they had the brightest mathematicians and physicists, they were only fooling themselves.

There is a way to be unbiased

[phantomfive]

The only way to be unbiased in your writing is if you are sincerely trying to discover the truth. If you are saying, "at this moment, these are what I know the facts to be, and these facts indicate X to be true. Of course, things may change as time passes." This type of writing is more common among businessmen like Warren Buffet, who has strong motivation to be unbiased (because being biased towards anything but the truth will blind you and make you lose money: you will feel the pain of your bias), or great chess players like Reuben Fine, who realizes that the facts on the chess board are more important than any personal desire they have to prove themselves right.

The greatest musicians must develop a certain level of objectivity: they must be able to understand what the notes they play are sounding like, and make adjustments in real time if they are not right. They must understand what their music sounds like to the audience. Of course not all musicians do this, but the closer they get the better they are. This is sometimes called 'developing your ear.'

If you are willing to change your opinion immediately upon finding you are wrong, then you are on the road to unbiasedness. The only way to be unbiased is to have a bias to the truth.

Re:Philosophy of Mind

[FiloEleven]

3) The brain is still nothing more than a mass of cells.

Careful.

I realize that you're probably speaking colloquially here, but you are taking abstraction too far. If the brain is nothing more than a mass of cells, you should have no problem with me scooping yours out of your skull and replacing it with a head of lettuce, which is also nothing more than a mass of cells and therefore equivalent by that standard.

The cells of the brain (and the entire human body) have characteristics that differ significantly from other kinds of cells, and the structure in which brain (and body) cells are organized is important as well. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a philosopher arguing for (3) as it stands. Too much abstraction and generalization leads to absurd conclusions like mine in the paragraph above.

In fact, that is one of the issues discussed in the article. What I wrote above in the absence of common sense sounds perfectly plausible given your assertion. When people in advanced fields do the same thing we can't rely on common sense to show readers the possible flaws of logic, yet in the majority of cases they aren't given enough space to elaborate the concepts upon which they rely instead of glossing over them.

This answers all the posts above decrying that the article is BS because "you should be able to explain it to an interested party." Well, nobody is saying they couldn't if they were given sufficient time or space, but they're not. We should understand this well given the many, many, many instructions to RTFA instead of basing statements or arguments on the summary--the summary does not and often cannot tackle the subject with the same depth as the full article. In the same way, a one- or two-page writeup on global warming, for example, likely cannot convey enough information to inform the reader on which side of the debate has more supporting evidence. (And the fact that I was compelled to write "likely" shows that it is difficult for a layman to even determine the level of detail needed for a good analysis.)

Re:Philosophy of Mind

[Homburg]

The relationship between the physical and the virtual isn't philosophically any simpler than the relationship between the mind and the body, though. If "the brain is hardware and the mind is software" is just a metaphorical way of making the distinction between physical and virtual clear, fine; but it's a mistake to think it tells us any more than that. The problem is, the terminology is likely to mislead us into thinking that the mind is like the kind of software that runs on computers, where in fact there may be no similarity between the two.