Language is a tool for imparting ideas and desires to one another. A living language like English has so many twists and turns in with many words not only being polysemous but also being used in a metaphorically descriptive way rather than relating to any normative use. If you were to tell me the traffic…
Introduction Recently I encountered Daniel Goldman a couple of times on Twitter. The first time was during a discussion about the use of the words atheism, theism, agnosticism, etc. The conversation was pleasant enough, especially when we consider how many of those kinds of discussions go! The second encounter was a discussion about belief, and…
The Rationality Thesis We take a look at the rationality thesis and delve into the rationality debate asking; are humans rational creatures that make performance errors or irrational creatures that sometimes demonstrate rationality? Dave talks about slides in this stream which you can find here: To Be or Not Be Rational – The Video This…
Testified! Today we will be looking at testimony, and whether or not it is worth anything. Are our memories to be trusted, or do they contain lots of false information? Can people create fake memories just by using words? How good are people at remembering other’s faces? We will also be coving off a pet…
Is Mental Illness Real? We are joined by Bearded Heretic to discuss mental illness. Our conversation will include, but is not limited to: What is mental illness? The medical model of mental health Neurosis vs. Psychosis Everyday behaviour and mental illness Other models of mental illness Is Mental Illnes Real? – The Video This SciPhi…
The Psychology of Rejection Humans are a tribal species. It’s in our DNA. We worked together in groups to survive as part of our evolution. We have been guilty of ‘with us or against us’ attitudes for a long time. but how does this affect our beliefs? The outline for tonight’s show can be found…
I’ve spoken about our tribal nature before, often about specific groups like antivaxxers, flat earthers, fundamentalists, fanboys etc but I have also turned that inwards to take a look at atheists and what the ‘new atheist’ movement has become. Let’s first briefly go over the basics so we are sure we are on the same…
When people say “I don’t believe” it is unclear what they are saying. When many folks say this, they are discussing a psychological state rather than disbelief in a normative logical sense. But what does that mean? Logic and Belief Propositions By belief proposition, I am essentially saying believing a proposition to be true, or…
Read More “I Don’t Believe – Conflated and Misunderstood Terms – Volume 5” »
Introduction Free will, do we have it? If we were to ask this question to average believer in God, chances are we would come away with a unanimous, or near unanimous, yes. However, amongst others the answers are more divided. There are those that declare that we do not make our own conscious choices, that…
