The Penultimate “The Beginning of Infinity” episode. Herein we contrast pessimism with optimism - what the conditions are for providing succour to either philosophy and who some of the leaders are. While science writers such as John Horgan, author of “The End of Science” may provide something of an introduction to the ways in which people can conclude “the end is night”, philosophers like Nick Bostrom and Verner Vinge take things further providing academic papers on “the singularity” and “the doomsday argument” and “the simulation argument” - all of which regard people as being but a prelude to something else: a time without or beyond people. The arguments are summarised and countered. I provide my own spin on things, and invoke the work of computer scientist Jaron Lanier, who (while at times writing of a bleak *now*) exhaults people in the same way as David Deutsch via a different method and looks forward to a future where people are ascendant. What does our best science tell us about what is to come? If we are to take seriously our best theories - is there hope? And is there an opportunity to even find fun and funniness in what we are promised for the future? I have some ideas.
Ep 127: The End of Global Order (A response).
Ep: 126 Origins
Ep 125: Livestreams 1, 2 & 3
Ep 124: David Deutsch’s ”The Fabric of Reality” Chapter 6 “Universality and the limits of Computation”
Ep 123: Ask Me Anything 3
Ep 122: ”Work and Heat” - Chiara Marletto’s ”The Science of Can and Can’t” Chapter 6 Readings & Discussion.
(Episode 121) Energy
(Episode 120) Newsletter 10: The Jubilee, Peace, Progress and Policing
Ep 119: Work and Heat: An introduction to thermodynamics (a prelude to Ch 6 of ”The Science of Can & Can’t).
(Ep 118: The Planetary Health Authority)
(Ep 117: Heat, Work, Universality and Exams)
Ep 116: Objective Knowledge
Ep 115: David Deutsch’s ”The Fabric of Reality” Chapter 5 “Virtual Reality”
(Ep 114) Newsletter 3: Manners and Misattributions
Ep: 113 Steven Pinker’s ”Rationality” Chapter 4 ”Probability and Randomness” Remarks and Analysis
(Ep 112) The 3Rs: Reality, Reason and Rationality. Newsletter 1
Ep 111: Probability - Reality, Rationality and Risk
Ep 110: A Tradition of Criticism
Ep: 109 ”Objective Morality I: The Principle of Optimism”
Ep: 108 Steven Pinker’s ”Rationality”Chapter 3 ”Logic and Critical Thinking” - reflections and analysis.
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