Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
Well, Scientific American has published an article that, while on a subject of questionable interest, is at least neither woke nor wrong. The topic is panpsychism, which the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy defines this way: Panpsychism is the view that mentality is fundamental and ubiquitous in the natural world. The view has a long and … Continue reading Scientific American on a philosophical grift: panpsychism
I’ve written a fair amount on this site about panpsychism,, the view that everything in the Universe, including electrons, rocks, and organisms, have a form of consciousness. The “conscious” molecules and atoms are supposed to combine, under certain unspecified and mysterious rules, into brains that have a higher-level consciousness. Voilà: the “hard problem” of consciousness … Continue reading Do electrons behave differently when they’re in brains? Sean Carroll takes Philip Goff apart on panpsychism
I’m heartened to see that other scientists and philosophers of mind I respect, like Sean Carroll and Patricia Churchland, have analyzed the idea of “panpsychism” and found it wanting. As I noted yesterday, adding some of my own criticisms, panpsychism is somewhat of a philosophical fad (or even a religion). It claims that we’ll never … Continue reading Sean M. Carroll shows that panpsychism is unlikely and unnecessary
John Horgan’s opinion piece on the physics theory of “superdeterminism” (which we’ve encountered before in a video by Sabine Hossenfelder), and its relevance to free will, appeared in the latest Scientific American. Click to read the short piece: Although I had (and still have) trouble understanding superdeterminism, it is, as Horgan and Sabine explain, a … Continue reading John Horgan on free will and superdeterminism
Physicist Brian Greene published the book below in 2020, and it appears to cover, well, just about everything from the Big Bang to consciousness, even spiritually and death. Click image to go to the Amazon site: Some of the book’s topics are covered in the interview below, and its breadth reminds me of Sean Carroll’s … Continue reading Brian Greene: We don’t have free will: one idea in a wide-ranging book
The article at hand was published by the Institute of Art and Ideas, a British organization that I hadn’t heard of but is described by Wikipedia thusly: The Institute of Art and Ideas is an arts organisation founded in 2008 in London. Its programming includes the world’s largest philosophy and music festival, HowTheLightGetsIn and the online channel IAI TV, where … Continue reading A good critique of panpsychism but a lousy alternative
I’ve written two critical posts about the ideas of Philip Goff (a philosophy professor at Central European University in Budapest): here and here. In both places (Aeon and NPR, respectively), Goff argues for “panpsychism”—the idea that in some sense the entire Universe is conscious. He waffles on exactly how that consciousness is manifested, or where it … Continue reading Philip Goff returns with panpsychism: now claims that a non-goddy “conscious Universe” explains the “fine-tuning” of physical constants permitting life
UPDATE: Some of the numinous-o-philia might be explained, as reader Michael noted in the comments, by Gleiser’s possession of two Templeton grants worth a total of $3,7 million. __________ The Republicans are calling for National Public Radio (NPR) to be de-funded because of its liberal bent. Well, perhaps it has one, but—with the exception of … Continue reading NPR descends deeper into woo; ineffectually discusses panpsychism
