CD Broad called induction “the glory of science and the scandal of philosophy.” As a matter of habit, we’re all confident that the sun will rise tomorrow morning and that we can predict where the planets and stars will be tomorrow night. But what’s the rational justification for beliefs like this? According David Hume, there is none. Deductive justifications can’t give you new information about the world, and inductive justifications are circular, they beg the question. David and Tamler dive into the notorious problem of induction and some (failed?) attempts to offer a resolution. Plus, an article about toddlers and small children who seem to remember their past lives – what should we make of these reports? And is "remembering a past life" and "being possessed by the ghost of that person" a distinction without a difference? The Children Who Remember Past Lives [washington post.com] Ian Stevenson - criticisms [wikipedia.org] The Problem of Induction [plato.stanford.edu] Salmon, W. C. (1978). Unfinished business: The problem of induction. Philosophical Studies: An International Journal for Philosophy in the Analytic Tradition, 33(1), 1-19.  

David and Tamler crawl up a riverbank, kiss the mud, and dream a discussion of Borges’ “The Circular Ruins.” We sort through various interpretations and allusions, the story as a metaphor for artistic creation, gnostic cosmology, solipsism, eternal recursion, and the unstable boundary between reality and illusion. How does Borges fit all of this and much more in a 5 page story? Plus, Scientific American endorses Kamala Harris – is that a big deal? We look at a study purporting to show that Nature’s Biden endorsement eroded trust in science among Trump supporters. Political endorsement by Nature and trust in scientific expertise during COVID-19 [nature.com] The Circular Ruins by Jorge Luis Borges [wikipedia.org]  

David and Tamler lead off with a breakdown of the new commercial for “friend (not imaginary)” a new AI necklace that takes hikes with you, interrupts your favorite shows, and will be there for your first kiss. Then we talk about a new paper co-authored by VBW favorite Joe Henrich that challenges cognitive science for pretending to be universal without offering evidence. A good discussion punctuated by David’s new theory of the rise of the autism. (TLDL the nerds are having sex).  Friend Reveal Trailer [youtube.com] Kroupin, I., Davis, H. E., & Henrich, J. (2024). Beyond Newton: Why assumptions of universality are critical to cognitive science, and how to finally move past them. Psychological Review. [harvard.edu]

Cornell philosopher David Shoemaker joins us for a long winding journey up to the Overlook Hotel, a DEEP dive on Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining. We tackle all the big questions - is the hotel truly haunted? What if anything does it symbolize? Why are there two Gradys and two sets of daughters?  How does the filmmaking – and the Steadicam in particular - amplify our sense of dread?  Does Jack shine too? How does he get out of the storage closet? Is Shelly Duval’s performance actually brilliant? What the fuck is up with Bill? Should the Overlook have included a land acknowledgment? And lots more. Come listen to us, forever and ever and ever…. David Shoemaker's website [sites.google.com] Wisecracks by David Shoemaker [amazon.com afilliate link] Review of Wisecracks by Kieran Setiya [atlantic.com] The Shining [wikipedia.org]

David and Tamler continue their discussion of Plato’s allegory of the cave. We talk about the connections with mystical traditions including Gnosticism, Sufism, and Buddhist paths to awakening. We also dig deeper into what Socrates calls ‘dialectic’ – what allows this method to journey towards the first principle (the Form of the Good) and then double back to justify the initial assumptions made at the start? And if only philosophers can embark on this journey, why does everyone think of them as useless and corrupt?  Plus we look at some research that attempts to provide empirical support for ‘terror management theory’ which makes us yearn for the unfalsifiability of Ernest Becker’s The Denial of Death. Links Schimel, J., Hayes, J., Williams, T., & Jahrig, J. (2007). Is death really the worm at the core? Converging evidence that worldview threat increases death-thought accessibility. Journal of personality and social psychology, 92(5), 789. [researchgate.net] Many Labs 4: Failure to replicate Mortality Salience Effect With and Without Original Author Involvement [ucpress.edu] Neoplatonism [wikipedia.org] Neoplatonism and Gnosticism [wikipedia.org] Plato's Unwritten Doctrines [wikipedia.org]

Over the years we’ve referred repeatedly to Plato’s cave, Platonic forms, and phrases like “copies of copies” without ever really explaining what we mean by these things. So as part of a new mini-series we’re going dive deeper into Plato’s famous images of the cave, the sun, and the divided line from Republic Books 6 and 7. What are Plato’s forms and how do they fit into the overall structure of his most famous dialogue? How does the form of the good relate to the other forms? What are the mystical elements of the cave metaphor? (Note: this is part one of a two-part discussion). Plus, if we could go back in time and give one piece of professional advice to a younger version of ourselves, what would that be? Plato's allegory of the cave (this has a couple of useful illustrations) [wikipedia.org] Republic (Hackett Classics) translated by G.M.A. Grube [amazon.com affiliate link] (you can get full text PDF files of Plato's Republic for free all over the internet, but this is the version we're using) Let us know where we should hold our 300th episode listener meet-up [surveymonkey.com]

David and Tamler conclude their discussion of Ernest Becker’s The Denial of Death. We talk about Becker’s philosophy of science (does he have one?), his sweeping explanations for strongman leaders, neuroses, mental illness, sexual fetishes, and the refreshing absence of an answer or resolution to the existential paradox at the heart of being human. Plus, a special Pod Save the Wizards intro - we have a political gabfest about Biden, the infamous debate, Kamala Harris, and more… The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker [amazon.com affiliate link] The Denial of Death [wikipedia.org] Let us know where we should hold our 300th episode listener meet-up [surveymonkey.com]

David faces his greatest fear as he and Tamler dive into Ernest Becker’s 1973 Pulitzer Prize winner The Denial of Death. Blending existentialist ideas within a psychoanalytic framework, Becker argues that the ultimate source of human motivation is not the repression of sexual drives (as Freud thought) but our terror of death and the yearning for an immortality we can never possess. This episode focuses on Part One of Becker’s book, and we’ll conclude the discussion in the next episode. Plus are gun owners really dissatisfied with their penis size? We look at the numbers. Hill, T. D., Zeng, L., Burdette, A. M., Dowd-Arrow, B., Bartkowski, J. P., & Ellison, C. G. (2024). Size matters? Penis dissatisfaction and gun ownership in America. American journal of men's health, 18(3), 15579883241255830. The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker [amazon.com affiliate link] The Denial of Death [wikipedia.org] Let us know where we should hold our 300th episode listener meet-up [surveymonkey.com]

David and Tamler dive into the mysteries at the heart of Park Chan-wook’s deeply disturbing masterpiece "Oldboy" (2003). An ordinary man, Oh Dae-su, is imprisoned for 15 years in an old, windowless hotel room. After being abruptly released Oh Dae-su embarks on a mission to discover why he was imprisoned and to get revenge on the man who did it. But does Oh Dae-su really want to know the answers? And is he asking the right questions? (SPOILER HEAVY EPISODE! See this movie before you listen! Available on Netflix in the US.) Plus, how familiar are you with words the words azimuth and espadrille? Turns out that the answer may depend on your gender.  Brysbaert, M., Mandera, P., McCormick, S. F., & Keuleers, E. (2019). Word prevalence norms for 62,000 English lemmas. Behavior research methods, 51, 467-479. Oldboy (2003 film) [wikipedia.org]

It’s an old-school episode as David and Tamler dive into some intriguing research on the origins of cultural differences. Two neighboring communities in communist China were assigned to be wheat farmers and rice farmers. Seventy years later, the people in the rice farming communities showed signs of being more collectivist, relational, and holistic than the people in the wheat farming communities. Plus, we have some questions about a new study on censorship and self-censorship among social psychologists. Links: Clark CJ, Fjeldmark M, Lu L, Baumeister RF, Ceci S, Frey K, Miller G, Reilly W, Tice D, von Hippel W, Williams WM, Winegard BM, Tetlock PE. (2024) Taboos and Self-Censorship Among U.S. Psychology Professors. Perspectives on Psychological Science [pubmed] A fascinating theory about the cultural influence of rice farming now has evidence of causality by Eric Dolan [psypost.org] Talhelm, T., & Dong, X. (2024). People quasi-randomly assigned to farm rice are more collectivistic than people assigned to farm wheat. Nature Communications, 15(1), 1782.[nature.com] Talhelm, T., Zhang, X., Oishi, S., Shimin, C., Duan, D., Lan, X., & Kitayama, S. (2014). Large-scale psychological differences within China explained by rice versus wheat agriculture. Science, 344(6184), 603-608. [science.org]

David and Tamler choose an episode topic that will define the identity and meaning of the Very Bad Wizards podcast going forward – our top 3 existentialist movies. Plus, you’re gonna be shocked to hear this, you might want to sit down, but there has been surprisingly little research on the metaphysics of puns. We look at a recent paper that remedies this appalling gap in the literature – and maybe the biggest surprise of all, Tamler has some nice things to say about it.

David and Tamler talk about Caitrin Keiper’s wonderful sprawling essay on elephant life and society and the many philosophical questions surrounding these extraordinary creatures. What kind of mental states can we attribute to them? Do they have a kind of language? Are they moral? What are our moral duties to them? What accounts for the long-standing taboo against ‘anthropomorphizing’ elephants and other complex non-human animals? And lots more. Plus, a new segment “there should be a German word for this” - we come up with new German words for common phenomena or experiences. And a big announcement in the promo segment about the podcast going forward. Please consider supporting a long-time listener’s attempt to get their family out of Gaza.[gofundme.com] Links: Do Elephants Have Souls? by Caitrin Keiper [thenewatlantis.com]

A Rabbi is found dead in a hotel room, stabbed in the chest. The room is filled with Kabbalah texts and a single page in an typewriter that reads “The first letter of the name has been written.” The celebrated detective and “reasoning machine” Erik Lönnrot suspects a rabbinical explanation but is he seeing patterns that may not be there? David and Tamler get out their pipes, magnifying glasses, and deerstalker hats to unravel another Borges mystery: “Death and the Compass.” Plus a new study on why men make errors about whether women are flirting with them, the latest in our series on studies that employ erotic fiction. Links: A Dress Is Not a Yes: Towards an Indirect Mouse-Tracking Measure of Men’s Overreliance on Global Cues in the Context of Sexual Flirting Pinpointing the psychological factors linked to men's misjudgments of women's sexual interest Death and the Compass by Jorge Luis Borges [wikipedia.org]

We dig into the biggest rivalry in Tamler’s profession, analytic vs. continental philosophy. Are analytic philosophers truly the rigorous, precise, clear thinkers they take themselves to be? And is continental philosophy really just a bunch pretentious charlatans spouting French and German gibberish and writing obscure prose to mask the incoherence of their ideas? We look at a nice paper by Neil Levy that goes beyond the stereotypes and tries to describe and explain the differences between the two schools. Plus, The University of Austin (sic) is back in the news and we have a report from someone who attended one of their Forbidden Courses. This should be so easy but the article has us deeply conflicted about what to make fun of. [Important update: Trixie is on a 5 day streak of no accidents and is a perfect little sweet girl.] Links: An American Education: Notes from UATX by Noah Rawlings Levy, N. (2003). Analytic and continental philosophy: Explaining the differences. Metaphilosophy, 34(3), 284-304.

Phil Ford and J.F. Martel from the great "Weird Studies" podcast join us for a whirling discussion of Edgar Allan Poe’s mesmerizing tale of decadence and disease “The Masque of the Red Death." We also talk about weird fiction more generally, why it’s so suited to the short story genre, how it creates a mood that drips and bursts from the seam of the page. Plus David and Tamler in the opening segment talk about Aella’s data-driven, chart and graph filled birthday orgy. Is she the sex symbol for our times? Links:  My Birthday Gangbang by Aella [substack.com] Edgar Allan Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death" [wikipedia.org] Weird Studies podcast with J.F. Martel and Phil Ford Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW Factor: Chef-prepared, dietitian-approved meals, ready to eat. Sign up today and get restaurant-quality meals made by real chefs delivered to your door. Visit factormeals.com/vbw50 and use code VBW50 to get 50% off your order. 

David and Tamler conclude their discussion of Lee Chang-dong’s "Burning" – we talk about the hunger dance at twilight, Ben’s greenhouse burning habit, Shin Hae-mi’s mysterious disappearance, Lee Jong-su’s clumsy and doomed quest to find out what really happened, and what to make of that final scene. Plus we choose the finalists for our Patreon listener selected episode.

David and Tamler fall under the spell of Lee Chang-dong’s 2018 masterpiece Burning, a movie where nothing is what it seems, or maybe it is. An alienated young man meets what seems like his dream girl from his small town, but she’s about to leave for Africa. Will he take care of her cat? Is there a cat? When she comes back she’s attached (maybe) to a slick rich guy played by Steven Yeun and then she disappears. What happened? What’s real and what’s a pantomime? Adapted from a Murakami short story that’s adapted from a Faulkner short story, this movie warrants a true VBW deep dive, so we had to do it in two parts. This is part 1. Plus another segment of our pet peeves. “Updating my priors,” “Fixed it for you,” faculty governance, and more, these are the things that really grind our gears. Links: Burning (2018) [wikipedia.org] The Elephant Vanishes by Haruki Murakami (containing the short story "Barn Burning) [amazon.com affiliate link] Barn Burning by William Faulkner [wikipedia.org] Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW Factor:  Chef-prepared, dietitian-approved meals, ready to eat. Sign up today and get restaurant-quality meals made by real chefs delivered to your door. Visit factormeals.com/vbw50 and use code VBW50 to get 50% off your order. 

David and Tamler play the old hits – Thomas Nagel and sex robots. In the main segment we talk about Nagel’s essay “Sexual Perversion”, a surprising essay on many fronts (Sartre, erotic fiction, conceptual analysis, much more). What’s the nature of sexual desires? Can we say that some sexual interactions are perversions? Which ones? Can we have a perverse form of a hunger? Plus, a new study examines attitudes about sexual assault by probing for intuitions on assaulting sex robots. It gets more confusing from there. Links: Grigoreva, A. D., Rottman, J., & Tasimi, A. (2024). When does “no” mean no? Insights from sex robots. Cognition, 244, 105687. Nagel, T. (1969). Sexual perversion. The Journal of Philosophy, 5-17.   Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW Green Chef: Get great recipes made from organic produce and premium proteins of the highest quality delivered to your door. Visit Greenchef.com/60vbw, and use code 60VBW to get 60% off, plus 20% off your next two months.

David and Tamler are back for the new year and one of our resolutions was to do more episodes on William James. Today we talk about his account of ‘Attention’ from his 1890 volume The Principles of Psychology – another remarkably prescient chapter that still feels more than relevant today. What is attention and how does it function in the mind? What accounts for the different ways that we attend to things? Does attention help to shape or construct our reality? What is attention’s connection to the will? Does James anticipate predictive coding theory? Plus we discuss the removal of the head of a renowned university for reasons that have nothing to do with the mission of higher learning. Episode Links Chancellor of University of Wisconsin-La Crosse Fired [nbc.com] William James chapter on Attention from Principles of Psychology (1890) [yorku.ca]

An episode interesting from every point of view, we train our eyes on Jorge Luis Borges’ “The Aleph.” The first segment wins the kudos of the learned, the academician, the Hellenist, as we talk about the favorite things we saw this year. The second segment — baroque? decadent? the purified and fanatical cult of form? — dives into the philosophy, comedy, satire, and poignancy of this classic story. Once again, we show our awareness that truly modern podcasting demands the balm of laughter, of scherzo. The finicky will want to excommunicate our discussion without benefit of clergy but the critic of more manly tastes will embrace this episode as he does his very life. "The Aleph" by Jorge Luis Borges [wikipedia.org] Version we read: Collected Fictions by Jorge Luis Borges (translated by Andrew Hurley) [amazon.com affiliate link] Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW Listening.com: Save time by listening to academic papers on the go. Very Bad Wizards listeners get 3 weeks free when signing up at listening.com/vbw Givewell.org: Make your charitable donations as effective as possible. If you’ve never donated through GiveWell before, you can have your donation matched up to before the end of the year or as long as matching funds last. Just go to givewell.org, pick PODCAST, and enter VERY BAD WIZARDS at checkout. 

RETURNING guest Vlad Chituc joins us for a wide-ranging discussion about donating his kidney to a stranger, the effective altruism movement, and his sexuality. Was EA’s turn to ‘long-termist’ goals like preventing evil AI inevitable?  Have they strayed too far from their Peter Singer/Jeremy Bentham inspired roots? And why won’t David and Tamler donate their kidneys? Plus a new article in Nature Climate Change argues that neuroscience can help the environment – can I interest you in some virtual trees? Doell, K. C., Berman, M. G., Bratman, G. N., Knutson, B., Kühn, S., Lamm, C., ... & Brosch, T. (2023). Leveraging neuroscience for climate change research. Nature Climate Change, 1-10. I spent a weekend at Google talking with nerds about charity. I came away … worried. by Dylan Matthews [vox.com] How effective altruism went from a niche movement to a billion-dollar force by Dylan Matthews [vox.com] Stop the Robot Apocalypse by Amir Srinivasan [lrb.co.uk] Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW Listening.com: Save time by listening to academic papers on the go. Very Bad Wizards listeners get 3 weeks free when signing up at listening.com/vbw Givewell.org: Make your charitable donations as effective as possible. If you’ve never donated through GiveWell before, you can have your donation matched up to before the end of the year or as long as matching funds last. Just go to givewell.org, pick PODCAST, and enter VERY BAD WIZARDS at checkout.   

David and Tamler board the train for Hayao Miyazaki’s mystical dreamy coming of age masterpiece Spirited Away. This is a true VBW deep dive. Plus a study by our secret crush suggests we may not be optimizing the value of our conversations. Mastroianni, A. M., Gilbert, D. T., Cooney, G., & Wilson, T. D. (2021). Do conversations end when people want them to?. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 118(10), e2011809118. Spirited Away [wikipedia.org] Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW Listening.com: Save time by listening to academic papers on the go. Very Bad Wizards listeners get 3 weeks free when signing up at listening.com/vbw Givewell.org: Make your charitable donations as effective as possible. If you’ve never donated through GiveWell before, you can have your donation matched up to before the end of the year or as long as matching funds last. Just go to givewell.org, pick PODCAST, and enter VERY BAD WIZARDS at checkout. 

The morality of zoophilia has received shockingly little attention in contemporary ethical discourse…until now. David and Tamler break down the paper “Zoophilia is Morally Permissible” from the latest issue of The Journal of Controversial Ideas. We explore issues of harm, consent, and more… like a lot more. Then we talk about Robert Putnam's classic article “Bowling Alone” (the paper that led to his best selling book) about the decline of civic engagement in American life. Bensto, Fira (Pseudonym) (2023) Zoophilia Is Morally Permissible, Journal of Controversial Ideas, Vol. 3, Issue 2. Putnam, R.D. (1995). Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital. Journal of Democracy 6(1), 65-78. https://doi.org/10.1353/jod.1995.0002. Luhmann, M., Buecker, S., & Rüsberg, M. (2023). Loneliness across time and space. Nature Reviews Psychology, 2(1), 9-23. Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW

It’s the first annual “Concept-Con” – a not at all cringe episode where David and Tamler apply the methods and rigor of analytic philosophy to dissect not one, not two, but four new concepts. We start out with a Gen-Z special “mid” and then after a break we analyze the concept “cool.” After that we have two mystery concepts that we sprung on each other. Spoiler alert – David had never heard of Tamler’s. It’s an episode (we can’t emphasize this enough) that is in no way cringe or corny. Plus some brief thoughts on Israel and Gaza.

David and Tamler conclude their three-part discussion of Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian. We talk about the Judge’s coin trick by the fire and the question of the supernatural in the novel. Next we dive into the imbecile’s “baptism” by the river, and then try to wrap our heads around the cryptic epilogue. Baffled at first, we ultimately arrive at the definitive interpretation of the epilogue’s meaning. Finally we offer Hollywood some suggestions for choosing the director and cast for the long sought-after film adaptation. Plus, we have nothing but praise for this study on measuring passive aggression. We really like it - I mean, we have a couple of issues with the methodology and the survey questions, but no, really, it’s a great paper… for a journal like that… Lim, Y. O., & Suh, K. H. (2022). Development and validation of a measure of passive aggression traits: the Passive Aggression Scale (PAS). Behavioral Sciences, 12(8), 273. [mdpi.com] 21 Questions to Identify a Passive-Aggressive Person by Mark Travers [psychologytoday.com] Blood Meridian [wikipedia.com] Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW

In part 2 of our journey into Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian, Tamler and David talk about the kid and his form of resistance to the judge’s gleeful nihilism - does he (as the man) ultimately succumb at the end of the novel? We also discuss other notable members of the Glanton gang and go deep into several scenes, including the Comanche attack, Elrod’s sad fate, and the tarot reading from the family of traveling magicians. Plus two studies on honesty tell you the best countries to lose your wallet and the U.S. states with a bunch of dirty Wordle cheaters.   Wormley, A. S., & Cohen, A. B. (2023). CHEAT: Wordle Cheating Is Related to Religiosity and Cultural Tightness. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 18(3), 702-709. Cohn, A., Maréchal, M. A., Tannenbaum, D., & Zünd, C. L. (2019). Civic honesty around the globe. Science, 365(6448), 70-73. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_Meridian Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW

In part one of our two-part episode on Cormac McCarthy’s blood-soaked phantasmagorical 1985 masterpiece Blood Meridian, David and Tamler talk about the historical sources of the novel, the cosmic questions the book poses, the capriciousness of the near-constant violence, and the ethical neutrality of McCarthy’s prose. We also get into the religious imagery, the gnostic elements, and the judge – what to make of the judge?  Plus a new meta-analysis refutes the common wisdom that “opposites attract.” But did we ever really believe that anyway?   Thanks to our beloved Patreon supporters for selecting this topic for the listener selected episode! https://phys.org/news/2023-08-evidence-opposites-dont.html Evidence of correlations between human partners based on systematic reviews and meta-analyses of 22 traits and UK Biobank analysis of 133 traits | Nature Human Behaviour https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_Meridian Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW

David and Tamler return to the work of old favorite William James and argue about the 6th lecture (inspired by the French philosopher Henri Bergson) of his 1909 book “A Pluralistic Universe.” James attacks the philosophical habit of elevating unchanging concepts over the continuous ever-changing flux that characterizes raw experience. Concepts, James argues, carves joints where there are none. But why does James trust pure perception (unmediated by concepts) as a true window into reality? Does he want us to return to the blooming buzzing confusion of our infancy? Is his mystical side superseding his pragmatism? Plus, a new study on generosity after receiving a $10,000 windfall leads to a discussion of what we can interpret from null results, and lots more. Dwyer, R. J., Brady, W. J., Anderson, C., & Dunn, E. W. (2023). Are People Generous When the Financial Stakes Are High?. Psychological Science, 09567976231184887. A Pluralistic Universe by William James (Lecture VI)   Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW Rocket Money: Stop throwing your money away. Cancel unwanted subscriptions, and manage your expenses the easy way, by going to RocketMoney.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW

Last December, with Argentina minutes away from a World Cup championship, friend of the show Yoel texted David “congratulations.” David was furious, and soon after (with less than 2 minutes left in extra time) France’s Mbappe scored a game-tying goal to send the match into penalty kicks. (Argentina ended up winning or Yoel might have become ‘former friend of the show.’) David says he doesn’t believe in jinxes at all but his actions suggest otherwise. We talk about a paper on this phenomenon of “half-belief”: when your behavior and your stated beliefs don’t align. Plus Tamler and David take a survey and discover that they lead radically different inner lives.  James Steele's Tweet  Caspi, A., Shmuel, E., & Chajut, E. (2023). A quantitative examination of half-belief in superstition. Journal of Individual Differences. Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW

The Summer of Cormac McCarthy continues – this time we dive into his one piece of non-fiction, the short essay “The Kekulé Problem.” How does our unconscious mind solve problems that conscious deliberation can’t crack? Why does it often work elliptically, in code, rather than giving us the answer directly in language? Is McCarthy right that the unconscious doesn’t trust language because it’s such a newcomer to the human brain? Plus we select the finalists for our listener selected episode – thanks to our beloved patrons for all their terrific suggestions! "The Kekulé Problem" by Cormac McCarthy Pinker & Bloom 1990 Dijksterhuis & Strick 2016 Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW Rocket Money: Stop throwing your money away. Cancel unwanted subscriptions, and manage your expenses the easy way, by going to RocketMoney.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW

A new mini-series with Tamler Sommers and Robert Wright on the range of politically acceptable discourse for a given topic and how this “Overton window” changes over time. This episode is available for free for everyone, the remaining episodes will appear at the Very Bad Wizards Patreon and Robert Wright’s Nonzero Newsletter on Substack. 00:33 What is this new Overton Windows series about? 10:05 Tamler’s connections to Israel and Bob’s experiences there 19:22 What does Zionism mean in practice? 27:35 The shifting Overton window around Israel/Palestine 45:35 The heavy-handed response to the BDS movement 57:13 What the Israel/Palestine discourse says about Overton windows 1:02:09 So where should the boundaries be set  

David and Tamler dive into the Coen brothers’ bleak and beautiful adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s 2005 novel "No Country for Old Men." What’s the underlying philosophy that animates Anton Chigurh? Does he have a code of any kind, or is he just a ghostly symbol of human brutality and a pitiless indifferent universe? Does he represent a new kind of evil or is Sheriff Bell just getting old? What elements, if any, in the film are more dream than reality? And speaking of moral decline, a new Nature study claims that we have the illusory belief that people are getting worse - but can they really establish that it’s an illusion? Mastroianni, A. M., & Gilbert, D. T. (2023). The illusion of moral decline. Nature, 1-8. Mastroianni blog post about the illusion of moral decline No Country for Old Men (movie) [wikipedia.org] Sponsored by:  BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW

A VBW exclusive report! For years David and Tamler have been a little dismissive of fears about cancel culture in academia but now the SJWs have come for one of our own! We welcome back Yoel Inbar to talk about his experience applying for a position at UCLA psychology only to have his candidacy pulled at the last minute because of remarks he made on his podcast (!) about diversity statements. What does this mean for freedom of expression in academia? Should we advise our students and younger faculty to watch what they say when it comes to politically charged topics? Are they really going to start combing through podcast episodes now – is nothing sacred? Plus another case of fraud in psychology comes to light courtesy of the Data Colada guys. Data Colada post about Gino fraud Sponsored by: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW Rocket Money: Stop throwing your money away. Cancel unwanted subscriptions, and manage your expenses the easy way, by going to RocketMoney.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW

David and Tamler dive into the first two parts of Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil which contain some of Nietzsche’s best drive-bys on philosophers like Plato, Descartes, the Stoics, Kant, and Hegel along with beliefs in free will, hard determinism, Christianity, morality, conceptual analysis, objectivity, and the value of truth. We argue about Nietzsche’s metaphilosophy and the implications of thinking that all philosophy amounts to a personal confession by the author. Plus – have David’s prayers been answered? Does quantum theory entail that our consciousness outlives the death of our physical bodies? A blog post about a somewhat recent book says yes!

What’s the meaning of a work of art? Does the text mean just what the author intends it to mean? Does it matter what Kubrick and Arthur C. Clark thinks about the end of 2001? Or is the artist’s interpretation just one interpretation among many once the text is out in the world? We explore the question of authorial intent, and brace yourselves - this is just about as postmodern as David gets. Plus – do we have what it takes to get an invite to the thought criminals club?  Links The Party is Canceled [newyorker.com] Was I Wrong About The Irishman? by Thomas Flight [youtube.com] Authorial Intent [wikipedia.org] Sponsored By: BetterHelp: You deserve to be happy. BetterHelp online counseling is there for you. Connect with your professional counselor in a safe and private online environment. Our listeners get 10% off the first month by visiting BetterHelp.com/vbw. Promo Code: VBW NordVPN: Keep your internet connection safe, and enjoy streaming services when you travel abroad with NordVPN! NordVPN is the best VPN if you’re looking for peace of mind when you use public Wi-Fi, access personal and work accounts on the road, or want to keep your browsing history to yourself. Exclusive! Grab the NordVPN deal ➼ https://nordvpn.com/VBW Try it risk-free now with a 30-day money-back guarantee! Promo Code: VBW

David and Tamler take the first excursion into the work of Haruki Murakami and talk about his short story “Sleep.” A thirty-year-old woman, the wife of a dentist and mother of a young boy, has a terrifying dream and when she wakes up, she no longer needs to sleep. This isn’t insomnia, it’s something else – she has never felt so alive, strong, and awake. She can swim laps for an hour in the afternoon and read Anna Karenina with perfect concentration until dawn. What is this condition? Is it real? What does it tell us about her past, her sense of self, her alienation from friends, family, and her role? This is a banger of a story folks, check it out. Plus - if you had to say one word or sentence to distinguish yourself from an AI, what would you say?

The great Paul Bloom returns to the show to explore the many mysteries of Todd Field’s 2022 film “Tár.” Is it a ghost story? A movie about cancel culture and abuse of power? Guilt? Professional disappointment? The anxiety of getting old, losing touch with youth and reality? Reminds me of my freshman year at Smith… Plus – Paul gets into trouble on Twitter for saying he’s mildly pro-trigger warnings in certain cases. But is he ignoring the science??? Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

David and Tamler talk about William James’ chapter on mysticism from his book "Varieties of Religious Experience." What defines a mystical experience? Why do they defy expression and yet feel like a state of knowledge, a glimpse into the window of some undiscovered aspect of reality? Is Tamler right that David has a little mystic inside of him just waiting to burst forth from his breast? Plus – another edition of VBW does conceptual analysis and we’re sticking with ‘c’ words – this time the definitive theory of ‘creepy.’

David and Tamler deliver a PODCAST episode, one of many that comes from the INTERNET, that you’ll probably listen to through Air Pods or some other kind of WIRELESS HEADPHONES as you go about your day. (Incidentally, the topic of the episode is Marshall McLuhan on how new forms of media profoundly shape our experience and identity, but in a way that makes us focus on the content of the specific medium and not the medium itself.) Plus, can algorithms help to optimize our well-being, and Steven Pinker transforms his ideas into a new asset class of NFTs.

Here’s an episode with something for both of us – a healthy serving of Kantian rationalism for David with a dollop of Marxist criminology for Tamler. We discuss and then argue about Jeffrie Murphy’s 1971 paper “Marxism and Retribution.” For Murphy, utilitarianism is non-starter as a theory of punishment because it can’t justify the right of the state to inflict suffering on criminals. Retributivism respects the autonomy of individuals so it can justify punishment in principle – but not in practice, at least not in a capitalist system. So it ends up offering a transcendental sanction of the status quo. We debate the merits of Murphy’s attack on Rawls and social contract theory under capitalism, along with the Marxist analysis of the roots of criminal behavior. Plus – the headline says it all: Blame The Brain, Not Bolsonaro, For Brazil’s Riots.

David and Tamler get lost in the world of Susanna Clarke’s "Piranesi," a hauntingly beautiful and thrilling novel with echoes of Borges, Plato, C.S. Lewis, and even Parfit. The first part of our conversation is spoiler-free so you can listen to that section if you haven’t read it yet. (But seriously read this book! We both read it in a few days.) Plus, watch out ladies - Sydney the Bing chatbot is coming to steal your man.

Tamler’s earlier self committed to doing an episode on Parfit, and David holds his current self to that promise, which shows how unconvinced David was by Parfit’s skepticism about personal identity. Or something like that. We argue about the value of Parfit’s sci-fi thought experiments and the implications of believing there’s no clear sense of “me.” Plus, we talk about a recent article on aphantasia – the inability to conjure images in your mind – and the question that pops into everyone’s head when they hear about this condition.

It’s the episode that Tamler has been waiting for – a long deep dive into Andrei Tarkovsky’s mysterious masterpiece "Stalker." A writer and professor are led by their guide (Stalker) into a cordoned off “zone” that may have been visited by a meteorite (or aliens) a couple of decades earlier. Their destination – a room in the zone that according to legend grants people their deepest desire, the one that has made them suffer the most. We gush over Tarkovsky’s filmmaking, his use of sound and music, and the richness of the questions this movie raises about meaning, art, delusion, desire, science, and faith. Plus, does having a small penis make you want to buy a sports car? Pre-crisis social psychology is back!

David and Tamler dive into Seneca’s “On the Happy Life” and stoicism, the topic selected by our beloved patreon supporters. Why is stoicism so popular today? What does Seneca actually think about Epicureanism? Can Seneca's philosophy be reconciled with his life as a wealthy Roman aristocrat? Are stoics too cold and detached or is that an unfair caricature? And why can’t David and Tamler fully embrace this undeniably wise approach to life? Plus the return of… GUILTY CONFESSIONS and some favorite things from 2022.

David and Tamler wind their way through another Borges story - "The Immortal"- about a Roman soldier who seeks the secret of immortality and, much to his horror, finds it. Plus some thoughts on the utterly shameless ChatGPT.

We often think of metaphors as poetic flourishes, a nice way to punctuate your ideas and make them more relatable. But what if metaphors aren’t simply tools of language but part of thought itself? David and Tamler “dive into” George Lakoff’s theory of metaphors and “explore” the implications of his view that metaphors shape and constrain the ways we conceptualize our experience of the world. Plus if we’re really living in cancel culture, we might as well do some cancelling. Say goodbye to "Singing in the Rain," Latinx, and punny academic titles among other things. Oh and it’s our 250th episode! It’s been quite a journey. Have we come a long way or are we just spinning our wheels? And for a fun detour, check out our bonus podcast series “The Ambulators” on the great TV series Deadwood.

David and Tamler gild and stain David Hume’s essay “The Sceptic” with their sentiments. If nothing is inherently valuable or despicable, desirable or hateful, then what do philosophers have to offer when it comes to happiness? If reason is powerless, does it all come down to our emotions and “humours”? Or does the study of philosophy and liberal arts naturally lead to a fulfilling and virtuous life? Plus we look at a new non-traditional social psych paper on how we always imagine that things could be better, and tip our caps to the queen of handling Twitter pile-ons (and former VBW guest) – Candy Mom.

In this podcast we examine a recent argument for the view that chess is not, in fact, a game. We discuss the Grasshopper’s claim that all games must have a prelusory goal, as well as Skepticus’ objection to the giant Grasshopper concerning chess. We then turn to a broader analysis of the Suitsian account of games. Does the existence of illusory checkmates offer Grasshopper an avenue for replying to Skepticus? Should we bite the bullet and agree that chess is not a game? What is a lusory attitude? Is Tamler losing his mind? Why is David so giddy? Plus – how should Arthur C. Clarke’s novel "2001: A Space Odyssey" affect our understanding of Kubrick’s movie? And a little more on Kanye.

We welcome Sam Harris back to the show for a deep dive into Stanley Kubrick’s confounding 1968 masterpiece "2001: A Space Odyssey." How long is the Dawn of Man? What does the second monolith do exactly? Why are the humans so banal and expressionless? What are HAL’S motivations? Has he planned his mutiny from the start, or does the Council’s deception make him manlfunction? Or something else? Who is the Council anyway? Was HAL meant to go through the stargate? What is the final leap forward in consciousness? The hotel room, the starchild, all the rectangles, rectangles everywhere, the music – what does it all mean???? Plus Sam has some thoughts about our Rorty episode and David tries to rile Tamler up about Kanye’s antisemitism. note: there's a bit of an abrupt transition between our brief opening and Sam telling a story about Rorty in around the 9 minute mark... couldn't be helped. Special Guest: Sam Harris.

We dive into David Foster Wallace’s sprawling 1993 essay “E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction.” How do TV and new forms of media keep their hold on us when we know at some level that they’re reinforcing our loneliness and passivity? That’s easy, Wallace says, post-modern cool. Flatter me, let me think we’re all in the joke together, give me “an ironic permission-slip to do what I do best whenever I feel confused and guilty: assume, inside, a sort of fetal position, a pose of passive reception to comfort, escape, reassurance.” But in the years since this essay, the TV landscape has completely transformed. Has it transcended its function as a surrogate companion for lonely people, or has it just found new ways to keep us isolated and passive? Plus, we talk about the recent new SPSP guidelines and Jon Haidt’s recent essay on why he’s resigning from the organization. (Sorry, Jon!)

David and Tamler take their first real look at pragmatism via Richard Rorty’s “Solidarity or Objectivity.” Can we discover facts about the world as it “really is,” independent of our own culturally influenced methods of inquiry? If not, does that make us relativists? Is David right about pragamatism being an ass-backward approach to scientific truth, or is he just a pragmatist who’s not ready to admit that to himself? Plus, does "The Little Mermaid" have to be white? What about Clark Kent? And we select the topic finalists for our Patreon listener selected episode.

David and Tamler return to Borges land to get lost in the infinite, this time with his legendary and tragic character Funes the memorious. What would it be like to have perfect memory, to have full access to every perceived detail no matter how trivial? Would life be infinitely richer, with present experience and memory merging into a perfect Heraclitan flow? Or is William James correct to say that one condition of remembering is to forget, and that “if we remembered everything, we should on most occasions be as ill off as if we remembered nothing.”? Plus, we’re sorry, but after 10 years (!) we thought we had the right to get a little self-indulgent and naval-gazey. We do a bit of reminiscing (“though we have no right to speak that sacred verb..”) in the first segment about how the podcast has changed since 2012, and the impact it has made on our lives. Thanks for the memories!

David and Tamler continue their discussion of Leo Tolstoy’s 'Confession.' When we left him last time, the famous author had bottomed out just years after writing two of the greatest novels ever written. Our eventual death, Tolstoy thought, strips life of all meaning and purpose – all answers to the question “so what?”. How does he emerge from this state of suicidal depression? What role does faith or “irrational knowledge” play in his account? What’s the meaning of the cryptic dream at the conclusion of the memoir? Plus, bombarded with this recommendation, we were going to talk about a certain article that came out in Qualitative Research about masturbating to Japanese shota comics – we even had a guest – but had to scrap it. Instead, we discuss a recent study on conspiracy theories that shows that liberals are just as likely to believe in them as conservatives. Mostly we just talk about the conspiracies.

We have a sneak peek for our listeners--the first episode our new Patreon bonus series on David Milch's brilliant (but short-lived) series "Deadwood." In this inaugural edition of "The Ambulators" (we promise the name makes sense), Tamler and David discuss the pilot episode "Deadwood."

David and Tamler find themselves unable to attach rational meaning to a single act in their entire lives. Let’s say we publish more articles and books. What then? What about our kids? They’re going off to college. Why? What for? We think about the future of the podcast. Let’s say we get bought out by Spotify and become more famous than Joe Rogan, Dolly Parton, and even Yoel Inbar -- more famous than all the podcasters in the world. So what? And we can find absolutely no reply. Plus, we take a test to determine whether we can we tell an AI apart from an analytic philosopher. When should we start getting scared of what AIs are gonna do to us, or what we’re doing to them? *Note: the main segment is on the first half of Tolstoy’s great memoir "A Confession," but you don’t need to be familiar with the text to appreciate the discussion for this one.

David and Tamler mask up and wander through the audio and visual orgy of Stanley Kubrick’s final masterpiece Eyes Wide Shut. What is this movie really about? Dreams? Wealth and power? Marriage? Jealousy? Female sexuality? Masculinity issues? The Illuminati? Pedophilia? Sex cults? Prostitution, both literal and figurative? Missing out, always on the outside looking in? Why does Tom Cruise repeat everything? Why is Nicole Kidman such a lightweight? Why can’t a successful Upper West Side couple get better weed? We explore all these themes and more in a film that raises so many more questions than it answers. Plus, a study on masturbation, gender, and sexual dissatisfaction – right in our wheelhouse, or is it?

David and Tamler descend into the dark pits of Hell to look Satan in the eyes and discover the nature of evil. OK…that’s not fully accurate, we just read and talk about a couple of philosophy articles that analyze the concept. What are the features of evil people and acts? Does evil just mean ‘really really really really bad’ or is it categorically different in some way? Can you be evil without ever actually causing harm? Is Tony Soprano evil? Plus we take a "moral alignment" quiz (inspired by role playing games like Dungeons and Dragons). We both want to end up as ‘chaotic good’ but does it turn out that way? And what kind of character is a unicorn?

David and Tamler lose themselves in Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s (pr. ‘chick sent me high’) classic paper on the concept of flow. We talk about the features of flow activities – loss of ego, the merging of your awareness with the activity, and autotelic (not what you think) enjoyment. What makes flow activities so rewarding? Do you need to develop skills over many years to experience them? Do easy and natural social interactions count as flow? Plus as men of pure virtue, we call an audible and choose not to make fun of a recent paper (with a student as lead author). Instead we pilot a not fully formed idea: “Substack Starters." Now that the economy is tanking, do we have any heterodox beliefs that might lead to profitable Substacks?

Ivan Ilyich is a man. All men are mortal. So Ivan Ilyich is mortal. Sure absolutely, that’s true for Ivan Ilyich and for all men. But we’re not Ivan Ilyich and we’re not ‘all men’- so what does this have to do with us? Right? David and Tamler confront their mortality as they discuss Leo Tolstoy’s brilliant and chilling short story “The Death of Ivan Ilyich.” Plus the ‘Why I am leaving academia’ essay has become its own genre. But is this profession really that much worse relative to others?

David and Tamler explore the many variations of simulation theory, the view that our universe is just a computer generated model created by an advanced civilization that has reached “technological maturity.” What does the growing popularity of simulation theories reveal about contemporary life? Are any of the arguments for simulation theory compelling or are they just post-hoc ways of justifying what you already believe on faith? If we are living in a simulation, does that mean we can go around killing people? Would it change anything about how we should live? Rodney Ascher’s (Room 237, The Nightmare) excellent documentary "A Glitch in the Matrix" gets the discussion going. Plus the return of the VBW does conceptual analysis segment - a careful, rigorous, systematic inquiry into the concept “cringe.”* *Note: if you think the opening segment is itself cringe, that’s because we’re doing seventh dimensional Zoomer meta shit and you just didn’t get it.

We welcome Paul Bloom to talk about the first season of "Severance," the new mind-bending and mind-splitting TV series on Apple TV+. What happens when you separate your home life from your work life? Do you create a completely different person? Is it a form of self-slavery? How important is autobiographical memory to your identity? And what’s the deal with the break room… and the goats? Plus, what happens when you combine the obsessions of evolutionary psychology with the methodological problems of social psychology? You (finally) get an explanation for the female orgasm. Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

Panpsychism didn't give us river spirits or mischievous sootballs, so this time we go straight to the source - a defense of animism, and in a top 10 analytic philosophy journal. Could a failed argument for the existence of God establish the existence of trees and mountains with “interiority” and “social characteristics”? Tamler wants to believe, but is the argument that'll push him over the edge?  Plus – speaking of top journals, a doozy of social psych article: Is forgiveness better than revenge at rehumanizing the self? Let's check the voodoo dolls to find out. Tamler is delighted by David’s reaction to this one. 

David and Tamler conclude their discussion of "The Trial," Franz Kafka's darkly comic vision of an opaque and impenetrable bureaucracy that comes for us all in the end. Plus we interrupt our previously scheduled opening segment because apparently something happened at the Oscars last week.

David and Tamler wander through the bewildering dream-like world of Franz Kafka’s "The Trial." In part one of a two-part discussion we discuss the circumstances of its publication, the various interpretative approaches that can be taken to the novel, and all the ways that Kafka’s prose gets under your skin, making you feel what’s happening even if you don’t fully understand it. Recorded in the decidedly un-Kafka-esque location of Nosara, Costa Rica – thanks to the Harmony Hotel for having us back! Plus – Social Psychologists for Peace send an open letter to Vladimir Putin urging him to reverse course on the tragic invasion of Ukraine. Putin seems intent on toppling the Ukranian government but has he considered Sherif et al (1961), Tajfel (1977), Festinger (1954), and Brewer (1991)?

It’s the topic voted on by our beloved Patreon patrons, panpsychism! David and Tamler delve into the resurgent debate over whether consciousness is the fundamental stuff that makes up the universe. We hoped we might be entering Miyazaki land - river spirits, benevolent radishes, a universal mind. But is this just the same old philosophy of mind debate with different words? Are there any stakes to this debate or is it purely terminological? Plus – we answer some last-minute questions from listeners on dissertations, Ukraine, pseudoscience, and the music from "The Shield."

Many of us think that art is subjective, but at the same time it seems like some artistic judgments are better than others. Do you think Crash deserved to receive an award for Best Picture? Did you like Season 2 of Ted Lasso? Well you’re wrong. So how do we reconcile these two conflicting attitudes about art? David and Tamler turn to David Hume’s classic essay Of the Standard of Taste (link in notes) for help. Will Pizarro finally see the error of his ways on Straw Dogs? Plus a doozy of a medical ethics paper – should we allow people to change their legal age if it doesn’t match their "biological" and "emotional" age?

David and Tamler sink deeper and deeper into Melancholia, Lars von Trier’s harrowing and stunningly beautiful depiction of depression, anxiety, and a wedding reception that just won’t end. They bring Freud’s “Mourning and Melancholia” into the conversation and confront the question: what if the depressed and anxious people are right? Plus Whoopi, M&Ms, baby brain waves, Rogan – we empty out the opening segment Slack.  Note: We recorded the opening segment before the latest development in the Joe Rogan story, but we briefly address that in the promo segment right after the break.

We think racism is wrong but what about “lookism” – a bias that favors attractive people over unattractive ones? If it’s wrong to judge people by the color of their skin, what about judging people for something that is only skin deep? We talk about two pieces today, a forthcoming philosophy article by William D’Allesandro “Is it Bad to Prefer Attractive Partners” and the Ted Chiang story “Liking What You See: A Documentary.” Plus we select the topic finalists for our beloved Patreon listener-selected episode. Interesting list this time around!

David and Tamler confront their shadows and dive into Carl Jung’s theory of the collective unconscious. What are the central differences between Jung and Freud? What did Jung mean by archetypes and what’s his evidence for their centrality in the human psyche? How can we integrate elements of our unconscious and avoid projecting them onto the world? Can Jung’s ideas tell us anything about culture wars and relationships? Plus, an fMRI study on offensive humor – I thought you were stronger Batman!

David and Tamler dive into David Foster Wallace’s celebrated and surprisingly earnest Kenyon College commencement speech “This is Water”. How can we escape the prison and prism of our (literally) self-centered perspective? Can we choose to adjust our natural default settings, take a break from our running inner monologue, and pay attention to what’s in front of us right now? Is DFW appealing to Buddhist ideas or something more general that you can be found across all spiritual traditions? Plus we ask the AI ethics program “Ask Delphi” some tough moral questions (spoiler alert: "just the tip" is "rude"), and almost get into a big fight about the potential of AI ethical robots (but we’re saving that argument for a future episode).

First, it’s the return of the annual drunken Thanksgiving segment! Tamler and based wicked stepmom Christina Hoff Sommers fight about JFK, systematic racism, corporations, and how to pronounce valium. (We find more common ground than usual though on Covid and Havana Syndrome.) Then podcast auteur Barry Lam joins David and Tamler to talk about David Lewis on time travel, the new season of Barry’s excellent podcast Hi-Phi Nation, and then a deep dive on maybe the best time travel movie of all time - Shane Carruth's mind-melting cult classic "Primer." Special Guests: Barry Lam and Christina Hoff Sommers.

David and Tamler talk about the often rancorous debate among cognitive scientists and evolutionary psychologists over whether the mind is modular -- composed of discrete systems responsible for vision, reasoning, cheater detection, sexual jealousy, and so on. David and Tamler (mostly David) describe the history of the debate, then dive into a recent paper (Pietraszewski & Wertz, 2021) arguing that virtually all the disagreement is the product of a conceptual and methodological confusion – that the two sides are operating with different levels of analysis and talking past each other as a result. Plus, we REALLY tried not to talk about the University of Austin thing for the whole opening segment. We had another topic lined up and everything. It just didn’t work out. Cicero would understand. Bari Weiss stans might wanna skip to the main segment.

VBW favorite Paul Bloom joins us to talk about the pleasures of suffering, flow states, Sisyphus, meaning, and dating questions. Check out his new book The Sweet Spot which comes out today! Plus what are NFTs and why does everyone hate them?

David and Tamler dive into Ingmar Bergman’s 1966 masterpiece Persona, a film about two (?) women, Elisabet, a famous stage actress who has stopped speaking, and Alma the chatty young nurse assigned to care for her at an island cottage. What happens when the roles we play as parents, spouses, friends, and colleagues start to feel like dishonest performances, an endless series of desperate lies? Can we escape to an inner sanctum of truth and authenticity? Or is that putting on another mask, playing yet another part, telling a different set of lies? We offer some tentative interpretations of this rich and baffling film. Get that boy a normal sized sheet!  Plus we share some thoughts about the Chappelle special… 

David and Tamler don black turtlenecks and light up a couple of Gauloises to talk about Jean Paul Sartre's classic essay “Existentialism is a Humanism.” Why are choices so fundamental to our experience? What does Sartre mean when he says that “existence precedes essence”? Why does he try to shoehorn universalizability into a view that’s clearly hostile to it? Plus, how much free time is good for you? Is that even the right question?

David and Tamler wind their way through the long-requested “Meditations on Moloch” by Scott Alexander, a comprehensive account of the coordination problems (personified by Allan Ginsberg’s demon-entity Moloch) that lead to human misery and values tossed out the window. Does Alexander’s rationalist conception of human nature ignore the work of VBW favorites like Joe Henrich and Robert Frank? Is he a little too friendly to the neo-social Darwinism view of some guy named Nick Land? And oh no, why does he have to go transhumanist at the end?! Plus, we talk about the unique comic vision of Norm Macdonald and why we loved him.

In honor of Labor Day, David and Tamler dive into two works by Karl Marx - "The Communist Manifesto" and "Estranged Labor." What is Marx's theory of historical change? Why does capitalism produce an alienated workforce? What role does philosophy play in maintaining the status quo? Plus, fraudulent data in a famous study about dishonesty and former guest Dan Ariely is under investigation.

It’s a Borges bonanza! David and Tamler dive into two stories: “Emma Zunz” and “Borges and I.” The first seems like a straightforward daughter revenge story (Tamler’s favorite genre), but Borges being Borges there are layers of doubt and fuzziness about what exactly is going on. “Borges and I” may be less than a page, but it has us questioning our identity, the relationship between private and public selves, and what happens to when you release a work out into the world. Plus, back to social psychology. Are you a picky eater? Then people think you suck at sex. We are not sure who is recording this podcast.

David and Tamler go deep on Michael Haneke’s unnerving psychological thriller Caché. An upper middle class French intellectual couple receives mysterious videotapes of the exterior of their house, forcing them to confront their past and present. Can we run from our history? Or will it always find a way to break through? And who’s sending the tapes? Plus, VBW does conceptual analysis - what does it mean to be “corny”?

David and Tamler hit the books and cram for their beloved Patreon listener-selected episode – this time on Thomas Kuhn’s “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.” David thinks Kuhn is a great sociologist of science but recoils at the relativistic tenor of the final chapters. Tamler loves anything that makes David recoil. Plus, should we give more weight to the advice of people on their deathbed? Or should we nod politely and get back to working for that promotion…

We’ve promised you for years that we would do an episode on apologies and never got to it until today. So we both want to say from the bottom of our hearts: we’re sorry. We recognize we’ve let so many of our listeners down, and we feel just awful if you were offended by the delay. We hope this episode will be just one small step towards regaining your trust. Plus, of all the evo-psych articles in the world, this one might be the evo-psychiest: “Oral Sex as Infidelity Detection.”

David and Tamler argue about the philosopher L.A. Paul’s ideas on “transformative experiences” – big life decisions that will change you and your values so much that our normal decision-making models break down. Tamler is fully on board and hopeful for philosophy, but David sees Paul’s view as a threat to his precious rationality. Plus, we tackle the greatest existential threat to human civilization in history: critical race theory. Why are people on all sides so intent on misunderstanding it?

Tamler welcomes social psychologist David Pizarro of Cornell University to the podcast to talk about his recent article (along with Raj Anderson, Shaun Nichols, and Rachana Kamtekar) on “false-positive emotions.” When agents commit accidental harms, we typically tell them they shouldn’t feel too guilty, it’s not their fault, it was out of their control, and so forth. At the same time, we don’t want them to let themselves off the hook right away either. They shouldn’t feel guilty, but also they…should. What’s behind these mixed messages and attitudes? Are we looking for information about their character? What kind? Plus, a new algorithm can predict someone’s political orientation with 72% accuracy based on one profile photo (either from Facebook or a dating app). Is Big Brother around the corner?

We’ve done deep dives on three of his stories, and now THE MAN HIMSELF, multi-award winning science fiction author Ted Chiang, joins us to explore the post-apocalyptic world of the video-game SOMA. You play Simon Jarrett, a man who goes for a brain scan in Toronto and wakes up a 100 years later in an underwater research facility, the last remaining hope to preserve human consciousness from extinction. Pizarro confronts his worst nightmare, a first-person experience of stepping into a transporter-style scenario. We talk about how video games can make philosophical problems come alive, what “fission-cases” tell us about personal identity (Tamler’s note: this really should count as our Parfit episode), what it’s like to be conscious without a body, the problem with thought experiments, and lots more. Plus, a new evo-psych study on why bullshitting is adaptive – convince people you’re smart and save energy while you do it! Special Guest: Ted Chiang.

Canada’s leading Russian literature scholar Yoel Inbar joins us to try to make sense of Gogol’s 1836 short story “The Nose.” A nose goes missing from a Russian official’s face and winds up in the barber’s loaf of bread. A few hours later, the nose has rocketed up the social hierarchy and denies his connection to the official. What’s going on? Is Madame Alexandra Grigorievna up to something? Plus we can’t say how but we got access to submitted abstracts for the new Journal of Controversial Ideas. We read a few of them in the opening segment, and let’s just say this journal is living up to its name. Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

"Sometimes I think of my death," Akira Kurosawa said, "I think of ceasing to be...and it is from these thoughts that Ikiru came.” David and Tamler explore what it means to truly live in Kurosawa’s 1952 masterpiece about a bureaucrat in postwar Japan who learns that he will die from stomach cancer within six months. Plus a new study provides evidence for what every pet owner knows: dogs get jealous. And a shocking revelation about Harvard legends Kohlberg, Rawls, and Nozick.

Journalist, podcaster, and rapper Jesse Singal joins us to talk about his new book The Quick Fix, positive psychology (scam?), cancel culture in the media and academia (overblown?), Substack incentives, and lots more. Plus David and Tamler argue about the epistemology of ghosts. Special Guest: Jesse Singal.

VBW favorite Paul Bloom joins us to talk about William James’ account of instinct and its parallels to the nativism/empiricism debates in developmental psychology today. Also discussed: Richard Dawkins trolling philosophy, the ghost in Tamler’s kitchen, and why William James’ 130 year-old writings make psychologists sad about the present state of their field. PLUS - do you wish you were closer to your non-romantic partners?  Well, strap on your gloves, grab a washcloth, it’s time for exactly 15 minutes of orgasmic meditation. Note: we had to use backup audio for Tamler and Paul in the second segment. The sound quality isn't as good as normal, sorry about that. Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

We’ve always had nothing but praise for neuroscientists and their work, and today is no exception. We talk about a fantastically rich and ambitious essay by Erik Hoel that offers a theory of dreams and connects it to storytelling, the self, and the importance of maintaining a distinction between art and entertainment. So eat shit MCU - Martin Scorsese was right! [ed. note: this statement not endorsed by David]. Plus another first segment wasted on Twitter culture war nonsense. Does adapting an MLK quote trivialize the civil rights movement? And it’s Adam and Eve, not gender fluid Potato Head and another gender fluid Potato Head. Or something. We don’t fucking know.

David and Tamler wander through the maze of Room 237, the great documentary by Rodney Ascher about five people and their views about what Stanley Kubrick’s "The Shining" is really about. When do interpretations become conspiracy theories? Why does Ascher never show us the faces of the interpreters? What is about Kubrick that invites obsessive and confident theorizing on the meaning of his movies? Sometimes a paper tray is just a paper tray. Or is it? Plus Tamler vents about the winter storm and mass power outages in Texas last week…

David and Tamler return to the TCU (Ted Chiang Universe) to talk about his short story “Hell is the Absence of God." How would we behave if we had unequivocal proof of God, heaven, hell, and angels? Would that answer our questions about meaning and purpose and justice? Or would those same questions reappear in a different guise? Plus, the hard problem of breakfast, Jewish Space Lasers, and more…

Ever wonder why you’re still listening to VBW all of these years? Or why you check your phone 50 times a day? Or why you put on your pants the same way every morning? (If you still wear pants these days.) David and Tamler talk about William James’ essay on habits, why they’re so powerful, and how you can make your nervous system your ally instead of your enemy. Plus, a shocking new neuroscience study reveals that we remember and share funny stories more than boring ones.

The legendary Houston Ballet dancer Lauren Anderson (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lauren_Anderson_(dancer)) joins us to talk about the Atlanta Episode “Juneteenth” (Season 1, Episode 9), a hilarious exploration of race, class, identity, and carrying around your sister’s underwear. But first David and Tamler share some thoughts on the topic on everyone’s mind right now…Bean Dad. Oh yeah and the Capitol riot. Pour yourself a Hennessy or some Emancipation Eggnog and enjoy. Special Guest: Lauren Anderson.

Philosopher Agnes Callard joins us to talk about Plato and his dialogue the Gorgias. Why did Plato write dialogues – are they the best way of presenting arguments? Is Plato cheating when characters contradict themselves by making dumb concessions, or is this part of his method - inviting readers to participate in the debates? Why does the Gorgias end on such a sour note, with Socrates giving long speeches after saying that long speeches shouldn’t be allowed? Plus we talk about Agnes’ recent op-ed in the New York Times, and David and Tamler tackle a new construct: The Tendency for Interpersonal Victimhood.

A phosphorescence casts a pale sickly glow on David and Tamler as talk only in verbs and pronouns about H.P. Lovecraft’s 1927 story “The Colour Out of Space.” What is this creature or substance that has color only by analogy, that spreads through earth and water driving man, animal, and vegetation into a madness, not as they ought to be…? What gives the story its terrifying power and its avenues for endless interpretation? Plus, does meditation make you a spiritual narcissist? We talk about a new social psychology article that even David can’t defend.

David and Tamler dive deep into the psychology and epistemology of conspiracy theories. What makes people so prone to believe in complex malevolent plots that require meticulous organization and utter secrecy at the highest levels of power? Are some conspiracies like [REDACTED] and [REDACTED] more plausible than [REDACTED] give [REDACTED] for? And what about [REDACTED]? Do [REDACTED] mislead [REDACTED] by making us think [REDACTED]? How are we supposed to [REDACTED]? Plus, we do some navel gazing, reflecting on what we love and have struggled with over 200+ hundred episodes of [REDACTED].

David and Tamler celebrate their 200th episode with bourbon and a return to their potty humor roots. First we talk about holes, zoom dicks, and the election. Then we relitigate our bitter debate (from episode 45 (http://vbw.fm/45)) over gender, toys, and balanced play diets. Have we matured over all these years? Well it’s not for us to say…

David and Tamler check out some recent work in metaphysics and applied ethics. Does playing a Nina Simone song sideways show that Einstein was wrong about spacetime? Does a Dali painting nailed to the wall backwards have intrinsic value (see figure 1)? Is childhood bad for children? Do you have to be a child before you're an adult? Are we kidding? Is this a joke? We don't know but don't play this podcast sideways or it may lose its aesthetic value.

David and Tamler explore Thomas Szasz’s provocative and still relevant 1961 book “The Myth of Mental Illness,” the topic selected by our beloved Patreon supporters. When we think of mental disorders as “diseases,” are we making a category mistake? Are we turning ordinary “problems in living” into pathologies that must be treated (with pills or psychoanalysis)? Does this model rob us of our autonomy in direct or indirect ways? Plus, with VBW 200 only 2 episodes away we give our top 3 dream guests, and David dons his punditry cap to break down the first presidential debate, which already seems like six months ago.   

The psychologist Yoel Inbar has always tried to imbue his work with a sort of interiority, and now he joins us for a deep dive into Charlie Kaufman’s baffling and distressing new film “I’m Thinking of Ending Things.” Why does Jessie Buckley’s name and career keep changing? What’s going on with the dog? Why are the parents unstuck in time? Don’t worry you’ll get home, we have tire chains in the trunk. Plus, aliens, open science, and the illuminati. It’s all connected. Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

She’s beautiful, smart, funny, and head over heels in love with you. There’s only one problem – she’s from a possible world, not the actual one. What we thought would be a funny opening segment idea turns into a semi-serious discussion of Neil Sinhababu’s 2008 article “Possible Girls.” Plus David and Tamler share some thoughts on teaching in normal times and today.   

David and Tamler dive into the most celebrated and philosophically rich scenes in Dostoevsky’s masterpiece "The Brothers Karamazov." Alyosha gets in the middle of a rock-fight, Ivan Karamazov makes a devastating moral case against God, and the Grand Inquisitor convicts Jesus Christ of heresy against the church. (Note: this segment is the second of an upcoming five episode VBW miniseries on The Brothers Karamazov – more info on that to come very soon!) Plus one of us has a milestone birthday... [Special note from Peez: Stick around after the closing music to hear VBWs most frequent guests Paul Bloom and Yoel Inbar talk to David about Tamler behind his back.]

David and Tamler welcome special guest Chris Matheson - co-writer of the "Bill and Ted" movies and author of "The Story of God" and "The Buddha’s Story" - to talk about religion, immortality, comedy, Freud, and why the secret ingredient to good satire is love.  Plus David and Tamler do a conceptual analysis of stoner movies and discuss their favorites.  Special Guest: Chris Matheson.

David and Tamler want to go old school and discuss a classic Frankfurt paper on free will. But do they want to want that? Are they free to want what they want to want? Are they free to will what they want to will or to have the will they want? And if that’s not Dr. Seuss enough for you, shouting “FUCK” increases pain tolerance but what about shouting “TWIZPIPE”?

David and Tamler dive into “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote,” a very funny Borges story that also raises deep questions about authorship, reading, and interpretation. What would it mean for the same text to be written by two different authors more than three hundred years apart? Is this story the post-modernist manifesto that literary critics like Roland Barthes believed it to be? Or is the narrator in the story just a delusional sycophant, a victim of Menard’s practical joke – and the story by extension, a practical joke by Borges on the post-modernist movement to come? Plus, My Little Pony fans finally confront their Nazi problem. 

A lotta anger out there right now, but does it do more harm than good? Is anger counterproductive, an obstacle to progress? And even when it is, can anger be appropriate anway? We talk about two excellent articles by the philosopher Amia Srinivasan criticizing anger's critics. Plus we express some counterproductive anger of our own at the IDWs response to the protests.  

David and Tamler talk about police violence, the protests, and Harry Frankfurt's journal article turned bestseller ”On Bullshit." Plus we dive into a comic masterpiece of late capitalism: the University of Oregon's brand guidelines.

David and Tamler dive into Sigmund Freud’s world of unconscious drives, death instincts, and thwarted incestuous urges in his classic text “Civilization and its Discontents.” If society has made so much progress, why are human beings perpetually dissatisfied? Can religion help us or is it a big part of the problem? What’s really going on when you piss on a fire to put it out? Also: how seriously should we take Freud today given some of his wackier ideas? And is he a psychologist, a philosopher, or something else entirely? Plus we select the finalists from a huge list of suggested topics for the Patreon listener-selected episode!

Socrates was ugly and tired of life, so he made a tyrant of reason. Philosophers are mummies who hate the body and the senses. Reason is a tricky old woman. Morality is a misunderstanding. Kant is a sneaky Christian. And don't even get Nietzsche started on "free will" or the "self" - just excuse for priests to punish people, a hangman's metaphysics. David and Tamler dive into Friedrich Nietzsche's Twilight of the Idols, a fascinating set of aphorisms brimming with passion, provocation, questions without answers. Plus, a professor is sanctioned for sex talk with his students - fair or coddling foul?

With a global pandemic and a collapsing economy upon us, it's time to ask ourselves some tough questions. Sex robots or platonic love robots - what are you more excited for? If you walked in on your partner with one of them, which would make you more jealous? Are you male or female? Can evolutionary psychology explain sex-linked preferences for sensitive, empathetic Alexas? We then dive into the shadowy echo-filled streets of post-war Vienna - and talk about one of our favorite movies, a true noir classic: The Third Man.

The legendary Peter Singer joins us to talk about effective altruism, AI, animal welfare, esoteric morality, future Tuesday indifference, and more. I mean, it’s Peter freakin’ Singer - what more do we need to say? Plus, the explosive ‘one or two spaces after a period' debate: has science resolved it? Special Guest: Peter Singer.

David and Tamler begin by talking about the question on everyone’s mind right now – are we obligated to be pansexual? Then, since many of us have more free time on our hands these days, we thought it might be a good idea to revisit Bertrand Russell’s essay (published in Harper’s Magazine) “In Praise of Idleness.” How did workaholism become the norm? Why do we see working insanely long hours as a virtue, a moral duty rather than a necessity? Would more leisure make us more fulfilled and creative or just bored? We also discuss Daniel Markovits’ book "The Meritocracy Trap" - when life is a non-stop hyper-competitive grind from preschool to retirement even among the elites, is anyone happy?

Here's something that might help with the Coronavirus blues: we're releasing our latest Patreon bonus episode for everyone. In this (unedited) episode, Tamler and David talk about their Top 5 Deadwood characters. If you've seen the show, let us know if you agree or disagree, or if we should go fuck ourselves. And if you haven’t watched it yet, you might have some time on your hands for the next month or two - there’s almost no better way to spend it than watching Deadwood. Enjoy!

David and Tamler start off talking about the infamous Richard Dawkins eugenics tweet. What does it mean for eugenics to “work”? And given the sensitive nature and horrific history of eugenics, is it wrong to raise the topic even if you’re just focused on the science? Hey we’re just asking questions, man… Then, huge baseball fan that he is, David insists that we talk about the massive Houston Astros sign-stealing scandal and cheating in sports more generally. When is bending the rules just part of the game (“if you ain’t cheatin’ you ain’t tryin’”) - and when is it really wrong? Why does the use of technology make cheating seem more dishonorable? Why weren’t the Astros players punished since they were the driving force behind the scandal? And why are apologies so hard on twitter?

VBW favorite Paul Bloom takes a short break from his Sam Harris duties to help us break down the Coen Brothers' ode to uncertainty, A Serious Man. Does inaction have consequences? Can you understand the cat but not the math? Why are there Hebrew letters carved into the back of a goy's teeth? Dybbuk or no Dybbuk? Why does God make us feel the questions if he’s not gonna give us any answers? Plus, Paul defends the psych establishment against critiques from the podcast peons at Two Psychologists Four Beers and Very Bad Wizards. Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

Podcasting legend Yoel Inbar (from Two Psychologists Four Beers (https://fourbeers.fireside.fm)) joins us to break down Tal Yarkoni's "The Generalizability Crisis,” the paper that launched a thousand Twitter wars. Psychologists make verbal claims about the world, then conduct studies to test these claims - but are the studies actually providing evidence for those claims? Do psychological experiments generalize beyond the the strict confinments of the lab? Are psychologists even using the right statistical models to be able to claim that they do? Does this debate boil down to fundamental differences in the philosophy of science - induction, Popper, and hypothetico-deductive models and so forth? Will David and Tamler ever be able to talk about a psych study again without getting into a fight? Plus ahead of tonight's New Hampshire primary, expert political analysis about what went down in Iowa. Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

Our whole lives we’ve been frauds. We’re not exaggerating. Pretty much all we’ve ever done is try to create a certain impression of us in other people. Mostly to be liked or admired. This episode is a perfect example, Tamler pretending to be a cinephile (check out his four favorite pieces of 2019 “pop culture” in the first segment), David trying to connect with the people (Baby Yoda, Keanu Reeves etc.) – and of course what could be more fraudulent than a deep dive into a David Foster Wallace story, rhapsodizing over the endless sentences, the logical paradoxes, the seven-layer bean-dip of metacommentary (Jesus Christ I’m surprised there aren’t like eight footnotes in this episode description), and meanwhile the Partially Examined Life dudes refresh their overcast feeds and wonder through the tiny keyhole of themselves how David and Tamler have sunk so low that they’d ramble on about “Good Old Neon” like a couple of first year Comp-Lit grad students trying to impress that girl who works at the Cajun bakery.

Eleventh Century Japan. A samurai and his wife are walking through the forest and come across a bandit. The bandit attacks the samurai and has sex with/rapes his wife. A woodcutter finds the samurai, stabbed to death. Who killed the samurai and with what? What role did his wife play in his death? Kurosawa gives us four perspectives, told in flashbacks within flashbacks. Who’s telling the truth? Is anyone? Can we ever know what really happened? A simple story on the surface becomes a meditation on epistemological despair. Plus, your lizard brain is out to get you and you only have 90 seconds to stop it!

David and Tamler wrap up the decade with an episode on trash-talking that morphs into a debate over the value of experimental inquiry. Participants in a lab put more effort into a slider task after they’re insulted by a confederate. Do experiments like these tell us anything about trash-talking in general? Can it explain the effect of Mike Tyson telling Lenox Lewis he’d eat his children, or of Larry Bird looking around the locker room before the 3-point contest saying he was trying to figure out who’d finish second? Can it tell us how football players should talk to their opponents? Does it give us a more modest but still valuable insight that we can apply to the real world? This is our first real fight (or disagreement) in a while. Plus, some mixed feelings about Mr. Robot Season 4 Episode 11 and some tentative predictions (recorded before the finale which aired by the time this episode is released). Happy holidays!

David and Tamler happen across Jorge Luis Borges’ “The Zahir” and now they can’t stop thinking about it. What is the ‘Zahir’ – this object that can take many forms and that consumes the people who find it? What does it represent? Is it the fanaticism of being in love? The ever-present threat (and temptation) of idealism? A subtle critique of Christian theology? Is the Zahir a microcosm of everything? Why is Borges so obsessed with obsession? Plus, it’s the annual drunken end-of-the night Thanksgiving ‘debate’ between Tamler and IDW stepmother extraordinaire Christina Hoff Sommers. Topics raised and then quickly dropped include Bernie for President, Melinda Gates, critic reviews of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and more. Stay tuned for the end when Christina finds her “notes”. (And for special cameos from David Sommers and Eliza).

Tamler learns something new about menstruation. David weighs in on the democratic debates and the impeachment hearings. Then we map the various social and political factions onto the factions in our respective fields. Who are establishment neoliberals of philosophy, and who are the white feminists? What about the IDWs of psychology – and the Chads and Stacys? Finally we get serious and break down the article by Alan Fiske in Psychological Review called “The Lexical Fallacy in Emotion Research.” Does language affect how we understand the emotional landscape? Do the words we happen to use deceive us into thinking we have “carved nature at its joints”? What is a natural kind anyway when it comes to emotions? Plus, after the outro, a quick unedited Mr. Robot discussion of the revelation in season 4, episode 7.

David and Tamler discuss famous 'split brain' experiments pioneered by Roger Sperry and Michael Gazzaniga. What happens when you cut off the main line of communication between the left and right hemispheres of our brain? Why under certain conditions do the the left and right brains seem like they have different abilities and desires? What does this tell us about the ‘self’? Do we have two consciousnesses, but only that can speak? Does the left brain bully the right brain? Are we all just a bundle of different consciousnesses with their own agendas? Thanks to our Patreon supporters for suggesting and voting for this fascinating topic! Plus, physicists may be able to determine whether we’re living in a computer simulation – but is it too dangerous to try to find out?

We try (with varying success) to wrap our heads around Thomas Nagel’s classic article “What is it Like to be a Bat?" Does science have the tools to give us a theory of consciousness or is that project doomed from the outset? Why do reductionist or functionalist explanations seem so unsatisfying? Is the problem that consciousness is subjective, or is it something about the nature of conscious experience itself? Is this ultimately an epistemological or metaphysical question? What are we talking about? Do we even know anymore? Plus, the return of Mr. Robot! We talk about the big new mystery at the heart of the new season.

Is character destiny, or can fluky decisions or tiny shifts in weather patterns fundamentally change who we are? Does the existence or non-existence of alternate universes have any bearing on freedom and responsibility? David and Tamler conclude their discussion of Ted Chiang’s “Anxiety is the Dizziness of Freedom” along with another very short piece by Chiang called “What’s Expected of Us” that was first published in Nature. Plus, do you have low likability in the workplace? It could be because you’re too moral and therefore not that funny. But don’t worry, we have a solution that’ll help you increase your humor production and likability with no reduction in morality. All you have to do is listen!

David and Tamler dive back into the Ted Chiang well and explore the fascinating world described in "Anxiety is the Dizziness of Freedom." What if you could interact with alternate versions of yourself - versions that made different choices, had different jobs, or different partners? Would you get jealous of your other selves if they were more successful? Would you want them to be unhappy so you could feel better about your own choices and path? If your alternate self was in a good relationship with a woman, would you try to track down the version of that woman in this world? If you made an immoral choice but your other self made the moral one, what does that say about your character? And what does it say about free will and responsibility? So many questions, such an interesting story - turns out we need to dedicate another segment next time to conclude the discussion. Hope you enjoy it! If you haven't bought Exhalation (https://amzn.to/2p1hKBo) (Ted Chiang's new collection) We can't recommend it highly enough. This is the last story in that collection. Plus – we select the topic finalists for our beloved Patreon listener-selected episode. Will Denial of Death make the cut again?

David and Tamler start out with a discussion of the new Chappelle special and the negative reaction from many critics. Is Chappelle trolling his audience? Has he lost touch with the powerless people he used to champion? Or have critics missed his larger point, and failed to approach the new special as an art form? Then they address the latest development in the literature around Benjamin Libet's famous study that, according to some people, proved that free will doesn't exist. How did that study get so much attention in the first place? Tamler proposes a Marxist analysis. Plus, David teaches Tamler how to pronounce Bereitschaftspotential antisemitically. This episode is sponsored by Simple Habit.

David and Tamler dive back into the Bible, this time to the perplexing and poetic Book of Job. What does this book have to say about the theodicy, the problem of evil? Why does Job (and his children) have to suffer so much just so God can prove a point to Satan? Are the speeches of Job's friends meant to be convincing? Does Job capitulate in the end? Does God contradict himself in the last chapter? What’s the deal with Elihu? So many questions, not as many answers – maybe that's why it's such a classic. Plus, "transhumanism" – dystopian wet dream or perfect moral system of the future based on logic, reason, and code? (Always code).

Is social psychology just a kid dressing up in grown-up science clothes? Are the methods in social psychology--hypothesis-driven experiments and model-building--appropriate for the state of the field? Or do these methods lead to a narrowing of vision, stifled creativity, and a lack of informed curiosity about the social world> David and Tamler discuss the strong methodological critique of psychology from two of its leading practitioners - Paul Rozin and Solomon Asch. Plus, food porn, real estate porn, outrage porn, and David's personal favorite - power washing porn.

David and Tamler try to control their emotions (with varying success) as they go deep into Franz Kafka's masterful novella "The Metamorphosis." What kind of a story is this? A Marxist or religious allegory? A work of weird fiction? A family drama? A dark comedy? Why does a story about a man who turns into a giant insect get under our skins so much? Plus a study that links insomnia to our fear of death. What a cheerful summer episode! (Actually we're fairly proud of this one... As always we suggest reading the text before you listen or soon after). This episode brought to you by Prolific.co (http://www.prolific.co/verybadwizards), and by the support of our listeners.

It's Part 2 of the Lebowski vs. Pulp Fiction showdown. This time we focus on the Dude, Walter, Donny, and most importantly Jesus Quintana. (Nobody fucks with the Jesus). What's the ethos of this stoner masterpiece? Is it a nihilstic movie? A deconstruction of masculinity? A cannabis infused Daoist parable? And is it fair to compare these two classics from the 90s? Fair? Who's the fucking nihilist you bunch of crybabies! Plus - trolling. What is it? Why do people do it? Can works of art troll their audience? And is there such a thing as a benign troll?

There are only two kinds of people in the world, Pulp Fiction people and Big Lebowski people. Now Pulp Fiction people can like Big Lebowski and vice versa, but nobody likes them both equally. Somewhere you have to make a choice. And that choice tells you who you are. In the first episode of this two-parter, David and Tamler make that choice – and then go deep into the themes, performances, and philosophy of Tarantino’s iconic 90s classic Pulp Fiction. What’s the meaning of a foot massage? What counts as a miracle? Is failing to disregard your own feces a sufficient condition for a filthy animal? We have a lots to talk about, and time is short. So pretty please, with sugar on top, listen to the fucking episode. This episode is sponsored by Blinkist (http://www.blinkist.com/verybadwizards) and by all of our supporters.

Memory is highly selective and often inaccurate. But what if we had an easily searchable video record of all our experiences and interactions? How would that affect our relationships? What would it reveal about our characters and our sense of who we are? Is there a kind of truth that can’t be determined by perfect objectivity? David and Tamler dive deep into Ted Chiang’s amazingly rich and poignant short story “The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling” which explores how new technologies shape individual and group identities.

Sam Harris returns to the podcast to talk about meditation and his new Waking Up meditation app. What are the goals of mindfulness practice - stress reduction and greater focus, or something much deeper? Can it cure David's existential dread? Tamler's fear of his daughter going away to college? Can sustained practice erode the illusion of self? Is that even something we'd want to do? What if it diminishes our attachment to people we love? And what is the self anyway? Is Sam a defender of panpsychism? So many questions... Plus, the ethics of creating talking elephants by curing them of their autism through bonding and possibly mounting. (Seriously.)

David and Tamler argue about William James' classic essay "The Will to Believe." What's more important - avoiding falsehood or discovering truth? When (if ever) is it rational to believe anything without enough evidence? What about beliefs that we can't be agnostic about? Are there hypotheses that we have to believe in order for them to come true? Does James successfully demonstrate that faith can be rational? Plus, a philosopher at Apple who's not allowed to talk to the media - what are they hiding? And why are academics constantly telling students that academia is a nightmare?

David and Tamler are pulled into Ursula K. Le Guin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas." Omelas is a truly happy city, except for one child who lives in abominable misery. Is that too high a moral cost? Why do some people walk away from the city? Why does no one help the child? Why does Le Guin make us create the city with her? Plus, we talk about our listener meetup in Vancouver, and a new edition of [dramatic music] GUILTY CONFESSIONS. Note: if this episode strikes you as too puritanical, then please add an orgy.

As parents we like to think we have an impact on our children - their future, their happiness, the kinds of people they turn out to be. But are we deluded? Dave and Tamler are joined by empathy's kryponite, the great Paul Bloom, to talk about Judith Rich Harris's view that parents matter a lot less than you might think (while genes and peer groups matter a lot more than you might think) . Plus, what the connection between art and morality? Should we support "cancel culture"? Is it wrong to play Michael Jackson's P.Y.T. (spell it out) on the radio? What about the Jackson 5? And what about art that is itself immoral? You're not gonna believe this but Louis CK gets mentioned. Thanks to our beloved Patreon supporters for suggesting and voting for this topic! Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

The less we know, the more we know it. David and Tamler talk about the notorious Dunning-Kruger effect, which makes us overconfident in beliefs on topics we're ignorant about and under-confident when we're experts. Plus, we break down an evolutionary psychology article on why poor men and hungry men prefer women with big breasts. Trust us, it's a really bad study. We're sure about it.

David and Tamler dive into the book of Ecclesiastes, an absurdist classic that is somehow also a book of the Bible. Is everything meaningless, vain, and a chasing after the wind? Are humans just the same as animals? Are wise people no better off than fools? Will God judge us after we die, rewarding the good people and punishing the shit-heels? What if there is no afterlife and this is all we get? How should we deal with our pointless, unjust existence? Plus we return to our opening-segment bible— Aeon—and talk about an argument for replacing jealousy with...wait for it…compersion.

Poor and black defendants have more legal rights than ever, but that didn't stop mass incarceration. Why is that? We talk about a paper by Paul Butler called "Poor People Lose: Gideon and the Critique of Rights." Plus, we answer the question that’s on everyone’s mind: how to live as an anti-natalist. And Tamler is appalled to discover David's anti-natalist leanings.

David and Tamler talk about the invasion of dual process theories in psychology. Why do we love theories that divide complex phenomena into just two categories? Is there any evidence to back up these theories? Are we distorting our understanding of the mind and morality? And what we can do to get out of this mess? Plus, Liam Neeson, moral pet peeves, and oral ethics.

David and Tamler continue their discussion of Dostoevsky's funny, sad, philosophical novella Notes From Underground. We focus on part 2 this time - three stories from the Underground Man's past - and explore what the stories tell us about his existentialist rants in part 1. Is he consumed with guilt over his treatment of Liza? Is he ashamed of his social awkwardness, low status, and self-destructive behavior? Or is he a narcissistic proto-incel suffering from an especially acute case of spotlight effect? (As usual, the answer is probably some combination of all these and more.) Plus, we select the finalists for our Patreon-listener selected episode. Thanks to everyone for their support!

We’re sick men. We’re spiteful men. We’re unpleasant men. We think our livers are diseased (especially Tamler’s). So we talk about Dostoevsky’s wild, complex, stream of consciousness masterpiece Notes From Underground. For this episode we focus on part 1 of the novella, and the philosophy behind it. Is the underground man an existentialist hero affirming his freedom in the face of a deterministic hyper-rationalist worldview? Or is he a lonely man consumed with guilt and self-loathing, constructing a pretentious post-hoc rationalization of his character and behavior? Plus, the American Psychological Association just issued guidelines for how to treat men who embrace traditional masculine ideologies. Is the backlash justified? This episode is brought to you by Eero (http://www.eero.com/verybadwizards), Curiosity Stream (http://www.curiositystream.com/vbw), and the generosity of listeners like you.

David and Tamler dive deep into Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 hallucinatory classic, Vertigo. Why does this movie seem to gain stature among critics and academics every year? Is this a really a exploration of Hitchcock's own obsessions and sexual repression? Is it a story about filmmaking and celebrity? Or is it just a twisty noir thriller about a man who has no job and can't kiss to save his life? Plus, some thoughts about bad reviews on Rate My Professor and why it's hard to get feedback about job performance in academia.

In the famous words of the idealist philosopher George Berkeley, “To exist is to be perceived.” Our ideas and perceptions are the fundamental objects in the universe; there is no real world beyond them. Hume wrote (I think) that Berkeley’s arguments don’t admit of the slightest refutation, and they don’t inspire the slightest conviction. On Earth, that may be true. On Tlön, it’s false – the people there are “congenital idealists.” Their language, philosophy, literature, and religion presuppose idealism. It’s their common sense. And their philosophy starts to encroach on their reality. But what happens when we read and hear about Tlön – can their idealism invade our “real” world? Will we start to lose our metaphysical bearings? David and Tamler talk about Borges’s invasive, unsettling story “Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius.” Please listen so we can exist! (And speaking of things that may or may not exist, we also discuss the metaphysics of holes.) This episode is brought to you by GiveWell (http://www.givewell.org) and the generous support of our listeners.

David dies for science’s sins and addresses the failed replication of one of his studies (conducted with three former VBW guests) by the Many Labs Project. But first, the guys try to gauge their intuitions about the phenomenal experience of their molecule-for-molecule mirror reflection duplicate in a universe with a non-orientable topology. Could this spell doom for e-categoricalism? Plus, the annual Thanksgiving tradition: IDW star and Factual Feminist Christina Hoff Sommers and Tamler argue over drinks about standpoint epistemology, political correctness, and lingerie. This episode is brought to you by Audible (https://www.audible.com/verybadwizards), Givewell (http://givewell.org), and the generosity of our supporters. Special Guest: Christina Hoff Sommers.

Tamler and David continue their Nagel-gazing by discussing another essay from Mortal Questions: "Ruthlessness in Public Life." Why do we treat the immorality of politicians, military leaders, and others in power differently than the immorality of individuals? Why does it seem less aversive to shake the hand of someone responsible for the death of thousands of civilians through military action than it does to shake the hand of a serial killer who has merely killed dozens? Are the rules we use to judge the moral atrocities of public officials different from the ones we use to judge private atrocities? Do they have the same basic foundations? Plus, we satisfy our listeners bloodlust by arguing about the new "Journal of Controversial Ideas" (because it would be cowardly not to). This episode is brought to you by Givewell.org (http://www.givewell.org), and by the private morality of our generous supporters.

There was me, that is Tamler, and my droog, that is David, and we sat in our living rooms on Skype trying to make up our rassoodocks what Stanley Kubrick's a Clockwork Orange was really about? Free will? We didn't think so. Punishment? Yeah but what about punishment? And what about the old ultraviolence - can it still shock us in the modern age? Then suddenly we viddied that thinking was for the gloopy ones and that the oomny just, like, press record and start the podcast. Slooshy well, my brothers, slooshy well. This episode is brought to you by our beloved Patreon supporters and www.givewell.org.

What better way to celebrate our 150th episode than to bring back our favorite guest – Paul Bloom! We riff on a series of topics: the new “grievance studies” hoax, sex robot brothels, perverse desires, and perverse beliefs. Then we get a little navel gazey (OK maybe more than a little) and talk about podcasting as a form of media and discussion, good teaching, and what we’ve learned about our listeners and ourselves. (Note: the audio may sound a little echoey towards the end because of how far we’ve crawled up our own asses.) This was a fun one, enjoy! Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

Is living forever a good thing? Could we maintain our values and personal attachments throughout eternity? Would we be motivated to accomplish anything? Can we make sense of a human life that doesn't have a fixed endpoint? We try to alleviate David's paralyzing fear of death by examining two articles - one on how immortality is worse than we think, and the other providing evidence that dying might be better than we think. Plus,we examine some famous thought experiments - if they were porn. And a special bonus: after the outro music, Eliza Sommers joins her Dad at to give her theory about Twin Peaks: The Return (contains spoilers). Special Guest: Eliza Sommers.

Tamler wades into a Twitter controversy about Serena Williams - could this be his fast-track pass into the IDW? And since we're talking about that, why not throw in a discussion of Louis CK's surprise set at the Comedy Cellar? In the second segment, we step outside of last week's social media culture wars to discuss "But I Could Be Wrong," a paper by philosopher George Sher from Rice University. What happens once we realize that our moral convictions are often not better justified than the convictions of people who disagree with us? Does that mean it's no longer rational to act on them? And is the problem deeper for moral beliefs than it is for empirical or aesthetic beliefs?

Oxford philosophy professor Will MacAskill joins us to talk about effective altruism, moral uncertainty, and why you shouldn’t eat your grandmother (even if consequentialism is true). How should we act when we’re not sure which moral theory is the right one? Can we formulate a guide for behavior, modeled on decision theory, that maximizes expected moral value? How do we assign credences to ethical (as opposed to empirical) claims? Why has effective altruism become so popular, so fast, yet at the same time seem off-putting to many people? Plus, Tamler faces a dilemma when narrating his audiobook, and Dave is the Louis CK of his own backyard. 0:00 - 25:41 Tamler's dilemma and Guilty Confessions. 25:41 -31:15 Break, contact info, updates, thanks to our listeners and supporters. 31:16 -1:43:19 Wil MacAskill interview. Special Guest: William MacAskill.

Is being a sports fan irrational? Does it lead to more suffering than happiness? David and Tamler discuss a recent study that suggests the answer is "yes." But does the study really capture the benefits of being fans? More generally, does science have the tools to truly measure the costs and benefits of rooting for your favorite teams? Plus, we talk about The Nation apologizing for publishing a poem written in Black English Vernacular, and introduce a dramatic new segment: "Guilty Confessions."

David and Tamler go deep into Borges’ labyrinth to discuss the fascinating, multi-dimensional story “The Garden of Forking Paths.” What is the underlying reality of this story? What demands does Borges make of his readers? What is Borges telling us about time, freedom, war, and art? Is the story itself a maze for readers to wander and lose their way? We don’t have all the answers, but it was one of our favorite discussions in a long time. Plus, we give some brief non-spoiler opinions about Boots Riley’s movie "Sorry to Bother You," but a spoiler-filled Patreon episode is coming soon.

David and Tamler try to wrap their heads around Jorge Luis Borges' “The Library of Babel” – a short story about a universe/library that contains every possible book with every possible combination of characters. How many books would this library contain? Would some of the books justify our lives (if we could find them)? Can we know whether a book is deeply meaningful or deeply misleading? Why are the librarians so alone and so consumed with anguish? Wouldn’t we all just end up just looking for the porn books? Plus, we talk about the ethics of doing research on data drawn from the Ashley Madison leak. Life is short, listen to this episode.

David and Tamler tackle the topic selected by their Patreon supporters - the psychology of personality. What are the different dimensions of personality that distinguish one person from another? How many dimensions are there - do the Big Five capture all of them? Do we share some of these differences with other species? Why don't personality psychologists include moral character traits? Plus - are you curious about your partner's true political commitments? No problem, just install a periscope in your toilet.

In what has to be the most somber VBW to date, David and Tamler welcome Harvard psychologist Matthew Nock to the podcast to talk about suicide and other forms of self-harm. Matt tells us what we know – and what we don’t know - about the causes of suicide and the ways to prevent it. In the first segment we talk about the recent exposé of Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment. Were the guards told to be brutal? Were the prisoners never aware that could have left the study at any time? What is Tamler going to do about the Zimbardo interview in A Very Bad Wizard the book? Is David going to continue teaching it in his intro psych course? And does Yoel Inbar need to preregister his beers? Special Guest: Matthew Nock.

David and Tamler tackle the topic of implicit bias and the controversy surrounding the implicit association test (IAT). What is implicit bias anyway? Does it have to be linked to behavior in order to truly count as a "bias"? Has the IAT been overhyped as a reflection of individual or group prejudice? And why is the debate on this topic so depressing? Plus, some deep thoughts on the intellectual dark web, how to join it, and what the analogy is supposed to reflect.

Honor shmonor, David and Tamler return to their repugnant roots for this one. First, we pay an overdue homage to the great anonymous blogger and twitter-redeemer Neuroskeptic. We pick a few of our favorite pithy tweets and crazy science article links from his @neuro_skeptic twitter account. Topics include: How much would you pay for porn? Should we be stereotyping zoophiles? Animal or fist - how to distinguish? And what do the left and right brain actually do? In part 2, we discuss an experiment that aims to finally answer the question: do our judgments in sacrificial dilemmas (like the trolley problem) -actually- predict our behavior? Plus, we find out live (on tape) if David is a Laurel or a Yanni - or is he a Samantha? Thanks to our sponsor www.awaytravel.com.

It took two tries (the first one led to a big non-productive fight), but David and Tamler end up with a good discussion of honor and its connection to identity, pride, and personal relationships. Why have we rejected honor in favor of dignity? What are the costs and benefits of doing that? How do people "find themselves" in an industrialized anonymous society? What should you do when someone insults your sister and you're playing in the final of the World Cup? The seminal paper by Peter Berger "On the Obsolescence of the Culture of Honor" (along with Tamler's new book) was the launching point for the discussion (links to both in show notes). This episode is brought to you by Simple Contacts.

Award-winning screenwriter and medieval philosophy scholar Yoel Inbar joins us for a deep dive on the Charlie Kaufman/Michel GondREY masterpiece Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. When relationships go bad is it better to believe they never happened? What is the nature of memory, how is it constructed, and is it possible to zap them out existence with an Apple IIe? Will Tamler have a more optimistic take on the ending of the movie than David? (Hint: yes) Also--only two more weeks to preorder Why Honor Matters and get your free bonus episode! Upload your receipt here (https://www.basicbooks.com/titles/tamler-sommers/why-honor-matters/9780465098873/) Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

Why are we always attracted to people who mock us, resist our advances, and play hard to get? Maybe because it’s extra satisfying when you finally get them to… appear on your podcast. In our first live episode (recorded in San Antonio), the philosopher Shaun Nichols joins us to discuss his recent article “Death and the Self”. You might think that Buddhist conceptions of the self as illusory would reduce their fear of death (after all, if there’s no real self, why worry about it ceasing to exist?). But the evidence collected by Shaun and colleagues suggests exactly the opposite. Why would that be? Plus, David and Tamler choose six finalists for the Patreon listener selected episode (did Jordan Peterson make the list?), and we announce a special bonus for people who pre-order Tamler’s forthcoming book "Why Honor Matters." Special Guest: Shaun Nichols.

From Very Bad Wizards to Megyn Kelly Today back to Very Bad Wizards, Laurie Santos has traveled the typical trajectory of the celebrity academic. Laurie joins us to talk about her cult status after creating the most popular course in Yale University history: Psychology and the Good Life. Why are we so bad at predicting what will make us happy? What makes it so hard to do the things we know are good for us? Why are young people more stressed, anxious, and overworked than they used to be? And how can we nudge ourselves into living better lives? Plus we take a test for determining the virtues that come easiest to us and the ones that come.. harder. This episode is sponsored by Audible and Casper. Special Guest: Laurie Santos.

David and Tamler take a break from complaining about psychological studies that measure utilitarianism to complain about the moral theory itself. We talk about one of the most famous critiques of utilitarian theories from Bernard Williams. Does utilitarianism annihilate our integrity--our unity--as people? Would trying to maximize well-being fracture our identities, and swallow up our projects, motivations, and moral convictions--the same convictions that make utilitarianism seem appealing in the first place? Is it ultimately self-defeating as a moral theory? Plus, we talk about the adventures of Tamler's based step-mom Christina Hoff Sommers' at Lewis and Clark law school. Will David stay woke?

It's been 5 years since Molly Crockett has been guest on VBW. During that time she's completed a post-doc at University College, London and become a professor at Yale University. And we're...well, we're still doing the podcast. Today Molly joins us to talk about moral outrage in the age of social media. Has the outrage changed now that we express so much of it online? Does it contribute to polarization and social division, or give a voice to the less powerful? How can we harness the benefits of online outrage while minimizing the costs? Plus, Dave and Tamler perform an exorcism on the unholy offspring of evolutionary psychology and trolleyology. Special Guest: Molly Crockett.

David and Tamler talk about the nature of death. Is being dead a bad thing? If so, what makes it bad? How can anything be bad for a subject that no longer exists? We didn't have a problem with oblivion for the thirteen billion years before we were born, why fear it now? Plus, a discussion about the "it was all a dream" trope in TV and film. Why is it so infuriating in some works but not others?

What's the best way to build self-control, patience, productivity, and delayed marshmallow eating? For decades psychologists and economists have told us to develop traits like willpower and grit. But psychologist David DeSteno describes a better, easier, and more effective path--the emotions. We talk to David about his new (not-self-help) book "Emotional Success," which argues that the emotions of gratitude, pride, and compassion can help us fulfill long-term goals and (as a special bonus) make us happier and better people. Plus, David and Tamler take a quiz that measures how utilitarian they are, and you won't believe the results!!! (Actually, you will.) This episode is sponsored by Casper. Visit www.casper.com and enter offer code BADWIZARDS to get $50 toward select purchases. Special Guest: Dave DeSteno.

David and Tamler break down two episodes (with full spoilers) from the new season of Charlie Brooker's bleaker-than-bleak Netflix series Black Mirror. First up, "The USS Callister," a Star Trek parody that becomes a meditation on fandom, humiliation, and cowardly revenge. Next we talk about "Black Museum" - could it be the final episode of Black Mirror? Should it be? After four seasons of indicting humanity, has Charlie Brooker turned his critical lens on himself? Plus, you thought it was bad for children to tell lies, but it turns out that it's good! This episode is brought to you by RXBAR. Visit www.rxbar.com/wizards, and enter promo code "BADWIZARDS" at checkout for 25% off your first purchase.

In this Very Special Boxing Day edition of the podcast, Tamler and David welcome back honorary Third Wizard Paul Bloom to discuss his latest article in the New Yorker about dehumanization and cruelty. Is it really the case that we dehumanize in order to harm others? Or does most violence actually require us to view others as fundamentally human, agentic, and capable of true suffering? But first, we discuss the stages of Star Trek transporter cognition, whether Paul and David are closet-dualists, and whether the process of choosing a Dalai Lama suffers from p-hacking concerns. (And between segments we give our brief, spoiler-free thoughts on Season 3 of Mr. Robot). Happy Chanukah, Kwanzaa, New Year, and Merry Christmas to all! Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

David and Tamler assert their autonomy as individuals by discussing their favorite dystopian works of art. Rebelling against a repressive regime, they refuse to sacrifice their privacy, uniqueness, and reproductive freedom. Through sheer force of will - the human spirit - they triumph over the pressures to ... wait what? You want me to take that pill? Okay, can't hurt. Aaahhhhh. So happy... So content... Must keep order. When the individual feels, the community reels. I am you, and you are I. I am you, and you are I. Plus, a real-life trolley problem! (Or is it?)

David and Tamler keep their Nagel streak alive, discussing the essay "The Fragmention of Value" from his collection "Mortal Questions." How should we address our fragmented moral landscape, with multiple sources of value that can't be reduced or systematically ordered? Does this make all of our moral decisions arbitrary? Plus, we talk about Louis CK and in a Thanksgiving tradition special guest Christina Hoff Sommers rejoins the podcast in a moderately drunken debate with Tamler about a possible sex panic. Special Guest: Christina Hoff Sommers.

David and Tamler dip back into the Thomas Nagel well, and discuss the problem of "moral luck." Why do we blame drunk drivers who hit someone more than drunk drivers who make it home OK? Why do we judge people for things that are beyond their control (when we have strong intuitions that uncontrollable acts don't deserve blame)? Does moral luck ultimately swallow all of our behavior? Can we truly embrace the view that "actions are events and people are things" or are we stuck with another unsolvable clash of competing perspectives (just like the problem of absurdity)? Plus, Dave exposes himself on the Partially Examined Life, Tamler self-censors, and somehow we discuss Hollywood harassment and stand-up comedy without mentioning Louis CK. (But only because we recorded this episode about five hours before the NY Times story broke.)

Is life meaningless? Are humans just glorified dung beetles, pushing around our piles of poop with no greater purpose? What would it take for life to actually be meaningful? In this episode, Tamler and David discuss Thomas Nagel’s essay on the sense of meaninglessness and absurdity that can so easily creep into human existence (with a special emphasis on the work of Camus and the philosophy of Rick and Morty). But first we tackle even more important questions about the human condition such as, why is it easier to detect the size of a hole with your tongue than with your little finger? And which moral "dilemmas" are actually moral no-brainers? (In the process, we even solve the problem of free speech on campus. You’re welcome.)

What do we mean when we say someone is angry? Can we identify anger (or any other emotion) via facial expressions, physiological changes, or neural markers? Is anger simply a feeling, something that happens to us, or does it involve a judgment? How much control do we have over our emotions, and can we be responsible for them? We talk about the work of Lisa Feldman Barrett and Bob Solomon. Plus, Tamler engages in conceptual analysis on Star Trek transporter beliefs (yes you read that right) and David is too stunned to argue.

Do you think of your life as a story? Does your life have a narrative structure or form? Do you identify with your past selves and your future selves? If not, can you live a good life, a moral life, an authentic life? Can you feel guilt, regret, and resentment? Plus, speaking of stories, we talk about a new study suggesting that books with anthropomorphic animals can't teach moral lessons to kids.

It’s Part 2 of the Patreon listener selected episode! David and Tamler continue their discussion on intelligence from our last episode by tackling the radioactive topic of group differences and IQ. Are there reliable differences in IQ across races? Given that IQ is strongly heritable, and that racial categories are based (in part) on biological differences, does it follow that group differences in IQ are due to biological differences across racial groups? (Could only a politically motivated science-denier conclude otherwise?) David argues that biological explanations for racial differences in IQ are based on a fundamental misunderstanding of genetics and race. It’s a complex argument, so if you start listening, please finish! (Oh and @VBWNoContext on Twitter, take a vacation, you’ve earned it!). Plus, more on neuroscientific explanations, and Tamler relates his experience of Hurricane Harvey.

David and Tamler do their best to talk frankly about intelligence and IQ research. (It's our Patreon listener-selected topic! We probably would never have chosen this one on our own...). Is intelligence a meaningful, definable concept? Can we reliably test for it? How much of the variability in IQ across individuals is due to heritable factors? Are people with higher IQ happier, wealthier, or healthier than people with lower IQ? And why is this topic so controversial anyhow? Plus in the intro segment Tamler and David discuss why you probably don't need fMRI to know what your dog wants, and why cognitive neuroscience seems to confuse otherwise intelligent folks. (Note: This is Part 1 of our discussion on intelligence. In Part 2 will delve into the slightly more controversial topics of IQ, race, and gender).

Guest Yoel Inbar joins David and Tamler to break down David Lynch’s dreamy masterpiece Mulholland Drive. (FULL SPOILERS – watch before you listen!) What’s real and what’s illusion? What happens when our illusions unravel? How do expectations affect our experience? How can artists use our expectations to manipulate our emotions? Come for the questions, stay for the answers – or at least for more questions. Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

Special guest Robert Wright joins the podcast to discuss his latest book "Why Buddhism is True." What is the Buddhist conception of not-self? When we become aware that the boundaries between us and the world are fluid, what is the “we” that arrives at this insight? Can daily meditation make you less of a dick? How does evolutionary psychology bear on these questions? Plus, Dave horrifies Tamler with his new hipster habit. Special Guest: Robert Wright.

What happens when we discover why we believe the things we believe? What if we discover that our values are the product of our cultural tradition, or personal experience, or natural selection? Should we be more skeptical of our values once we learn their history? Plus, data on Google porn searches reveal that you're all a bunch of sick fucks.

David and Tamler try to put the topic of campus politics to bed once and for all – with limited success. First, we get into a big fight about the prevalence and danger of political correctness in American universities. We junked that recording, and tried to distill our best points into a new one. (Trust us – it was for the best.) We also narrow down all the topic recommendations from our beloved Patreon supporters to five finalists. In the second segment, James Lindsay (co-author of the "Conceptual Penis" hoax) joins us to talk about why he thinks the hoax was more successful in exposing gender studies than some of their critics (including us) have suggested.

David and Tamler break down a recent classic in the philosophy of mind: "The Extended Mind" by Andy Clark and David Chalmers. What is boundary of your mind? Is it contained with your body, or does it extend to the external environment--to your laptop, notebook, smartphone and more? Is this a purely terminological question, or one with practical and moral significance? And what is the role of intuition in providing an answer? Plus, Dave shares an email alerting him to the psychological trauma of male circumcision along with an exciting all-natural method for restoring the foreskin (that was stolen from us as infants).

David and Tamler break down the latest small-stakes academic controversy--yes the one about conceptual penises. Does the recent "Sokal-like" hoax expose the ideological extremism of gender studies? Or does it show that certain portions of the "skeptic" community are susceptible to the same biases as their opponents? In the main segment they discuss the problems with measuring pain, pleasure, and happiness. When your doctor asks you to rate your pain between 1 and 10 and you say a 7, does your '7' reflect the same subjective experience as another person's '7'? (That depends--have you experienced childbirth?) How can we get more accurate readings of pain and pleasure across different people with different experiences? Most importantly, which number gets you the Vicodin?

David and Tamler go ambulance chasing for scandals in their own fields. Inspired by a tweet from Jay Van Bavel, they argue about which of their disciplines--philosophy or psychology--is more completely and irredeemably fucked. Is the recent controversy at the feminist philosophy journal Hypatia diagnostic of larger problems in philosophy? Can the replication crisis ever be solved? Can philosophy return to studying the big questions? What can psychologists actually discover about the human mind? Warning: this episode features a more respectful and mature dialogue than some VBW listeners may be comfortable with.

Somehow, after 113 episodes David and Tamler have never done a top 5 movie episode about revenge (so unbelievable that we had to double-check). That changes today. Among the things we learned: good revenge movies are harder to find than we thought, revenge (at least, movie revenge) is messy, and David knows at least one movie that Tamler has never heard of. Plus, should Jews be celebrating the killing of Egyptian first borns? Or atoning for it? (Or perhaps just pouring out a little more wine at Passover?)

David and Tamler break down what may be the best argument that it's rational to believe in God: Pascal's Wager. (No, we're not just trolling our Sam Harris listeners.) Does the expected value of believing in God outweigh the probability that you're wrong? How does belief work--can you just turn it on and off? What if you believe in the wrong God? This leads to a wide-ranging discussion on decision theory, instrumental rationality, artificial intelligence, transformative experiences, and whether David should drop acid. Your brain AND your future self will love this episode!

For four years Tamler has been bitching about Gettier cases without even explaining what they are or why he hates them. That ends today. David and Tamler talk about the famous paper that challenged the (widespread? non-existent?) notion that knowledge is, and only is, justified true belief. We talk about the so-called skeptics about knowledge that Gettier inspired, then discuss the real skepticism that Descartes examined with his evil demon thought experiment. Plus, you know how you're in a monogamous relationship because of science? Well, turns out that science may be flawed....

In Part 2 of our episode with film scholar Yoel Inbar (AOS: Quebecois New Wave Cinema), we break down the philosophy and psychology of the movie Arrival. [Note: Massive spoilers, see the movie first!] Does our language shape our perception of reality? Would you have a child that you knew had a short time to live? What color is 'fuschia'? Why does right-wing radio make you want to dynamite alien spacecrafts? For Part 1 of this episode, see https://verybadwizards.fireside.fm/110 Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

Any time the topic is campus politics there's a good chance we'll have to record more than once. True to form, David and Tamler yelled at each other for most of the first attempt to discuss the Middlebury College incident while special guest Yoel Inbar wept quietly in the corner. We did a little better the second time but the whole recording session took so long that we have to release it in two parts. In part one we talk about the most popular porn search terms by U.S. State and then wade into the Charles Murray protest at Middlebury. In part two (coming next week) we do a deep dive on the movie Arrival (so if you haven't seen it yet you have one more week!) Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

David and Tamler return to their repugnant roots to talk about Cornell's refusal to hire conservative faculty, Milo getting disinvited from CPAC, and a case in Canada involving child sex dolls and a bottle of lube. Then they launch into a discussion of moral pluralism. Do competing values ultimately reduce to a single set of moral principles? What defines and justifies the boundaries of pluralism? What should you do when your Amish friend is getting bullied? Plus, more lube.

Inspired by a recent article, David and Tamler try to figure out what's behind our aversion to moral hypocrisy. Why do we have such low opinions of people who don't practice what they preach? Shouldn't we be happy that they promote the views we agree with? Plus we respond to an email about how to come up with ideas for research. (Hint: ask Paul Bloom). Note: this episode was recorded before the greatest comeback and sporting event in human history. (Editor's Note: I'm sure Donald Trump is as happy as Tamler is about the Superbowl. Just sayin'.)

The philosopher and pride of Bakersfield, CA Manuel Vargas joins us to talk about culpability under conditions of oppression. How should we treat wrongdoers when their actions and character are shaped in part by their oppressive circumstances? Is it disrespectful not to blame oppressed people for their bad behavior? Can being oppressed make you more culpable in some circumstances? And what's the point of holding people culpable anyway? Plus, the differences between "Hispanic" and "Latino/Latina/Latinx" and an exciting announcement: VBW merch! Special Guest: Manuel Vargas.

David and Tamler take a break from moral grandstanding to talk about moral grandstanding. How often do we moralize to make us look respectable? Does grandstanding make us more cynical about ethical debates? Does it contribute to outrage exhaustion and increased polarization? Most importantly, who does it more, David or Tamler? Plus: some of our favorite answers to this year's Edge.org question. (You can read the paper by Justin Tosi and Brandon Warmke on the links page.)

David and Tamler go back to basics--discussing a paper (Victoria McGeer on responsibilty and Strawson) and arguing about restorative justice. What is the function of attitudes like resentment and anger? Do they presume anything metaphysics of agency? Why is Josh Greene trying to erode the moral scaffolding of society? Plus we talk about the latest Aeon troll piece on why sexual desire is wrong.

Paul Bloom takes some time away from his "Waking Up" appearances to join us for a very special movie episode: our top three films about empathy. Can movies help us understand the experiences of people who live completely different lives? Do serial killers need empathy to effectively torture their victims? Does empathy make you want to blow up the world, or lead naked men into black liquid-y voids? Plus Paul and David try to bully Tamler into watching "Westworld." Also, buy Paul's new book (link below) "Against Empathy"! [Note: this episode is heavy on the spoilers. If you're worried, check the links below--they contain the titles for each movie in the order discussed on the podcast]. Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

It’s the Thanksgiving episode! David and Tamler give thanks to their listeners and Patreon supporters with an episode chosen by our top Patreon subscribers (it was the most enjoyable election we've had all month). It was close, we had a bunch of great suggestions (that we'll refer to for upcoming episodes), but the winner was this topic from Bryan Farrow: "In the vein of the Republic and Rationalia, I want to hear Peez and Tamler draft a constitution for "Oz", a sovereign state that maximizes whatever they cherish most. (Honor and porn, presumably.)" Bryan’s wish is our command. Welcome to “Honoraria” and “Puerto Rico”, currently at war over the five paragraph essay. Plus, Dave relates how it feels to get the bulk of the critical feedback for once. And we talk about a few other things we’re grateful for – including students who don’t try to bullshit us, “honeybuns”, academic PEDs -- and Tamler says a few words about his Mom.

David and Tamler stumble their way through talking about the election results, how Trump got elected, the role of racism, sexism, the liberal bubble, complacency, economic anxiety - and find they're just as confused as everyone else. In the second segment, we lighten things up a little (really!) and discuss the Black Mirror episode "San Junipero" (available on Netflix). Spoiler talk so try to see the episode before listening.

Why do we call Mozart a creative genius? He created his music, but do we also think that he created himself? How do we determine who deserves praise as an artist? What about athletes? What standards do we use - do they involve a strong notion of free will that’s incompatible with determinism? If not, why should we think that moral praise and blame require agents to act with that sort of free will? David and Tamler argue over how much we can learn about moral responsibility from our responsibility practices in the domains of arts and sports. Plus, it’s Halloween – time to rev up the campus culture wars. Do concerns about “cultural appropriation” amount to a “war on Halloween”?

David and Tamler have their 100th episode hijacked briefly before taking it back like Wesley Snipes in Passenger 57. To celebrate the milestone Tamler pops some champagne, Dave sips his high priced Ivy League bourbon, and we both take a quiz designed by MIT that assesses our moral worldview and determines how driverless cars should be programmed. In the second segment we answer a bunch of questions our listeners submitted on Facebook and Twitter for an AMA. (We didn’t get to all of them, and some were cut not because they were bad questions but because our answers were incoherent. But we did our best.) Plus, has David changed his mind about Straw Dogs? How would we argue if we switched positions in our big fights? And we expose the vast Partially Examined Life conspiracy that keeps us down in the iTunes (and Linux) ratings. Special Guests: Eliza Sommers and Isabella Pizarro.

David and Tamler tackle three topics on their last double digit episode. First, should a middle school perform "To Kill a Mockingbird" even if they have to use bad language the "n-word," and talk about sexual assault? Tamler relates a story involving his daughter (who was supposed to play Scout) and a playwright who refused to allow his play to be censored. But when it comes to drama, middle school's got nothing on social psychology. Next, David and Tamler break down the latest controversy surrounding Princeton psychologist Susan Fiske's leaked column about the bullying destructo-critics and methodological terrorists that are challenging the establishment in the field. Finally, they give a spoiler-filled analysis of season 2 of Mr. Robot, a polarizing season for many fans. Tamler's suffering from a little theory fatigue, but David blows his mind with his explanation of what's really going on with the Dark Army and F-Society. Have you ever cried during sex?LinksTo Kill a Mockingbird stage play [stageagent.com]Mob Rule or the Wisdom of Crowds? Susan Fiske's forthcoming column in the APS Observer [verybadwizards.com]Andrew Gelman's blog post about Susan Fiske's column [andrewgelman.com]Ioannidis, J. P. (2005). Why most published research findings are false. PLoS Med, 2(8), e124. [plos.org]The Hardest Science blog by Sanjay Srivastava (@hardsci)sometimes i'm wrong blog by Simine Vazire (@siminevazire)The 20% Statistician blog by Daniel Lakens (@lakens)Too Many Cooks [youtube.com]Bitcoin explained and made simple [youtube.com]Key generation [wikipedia.org]

David and Tamler break down the biggest question in moral philosophy -- can we derive value judgments from a set of purely factual claims? Like the Scottish Philosopher David Hume they're surprised when the usual copulation of propositions 'is' and 'is not' suddenly turn into conclusions in the form of 'ought' and 'ought not.' And what's the deal with all these copulating propositions anyway? Aren't they a little young for that?  Do propositions practice safe copulation?  Is proposition porn about to be the new fad? They also talk about Moore's Open Question Argument, which introduced the term "naturalist fallacy," and respond to angry criticism over last episode's Rationalia segment.     LinksListener C. Derek Varn's blog post: "The Dogmatic Slumber of Neil deGrasse Tyson" [symptomaticcommentary.wordpress.com]Hume's Moral Philosophy [Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy]Is-ought problem [wikipedia.org]GE Moore's Moral Philosophy [Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy]Open-question argument [wikipedia.org]The Naturalistic Fallacy [wikipedia.org]

Do you have strong views on climate change, taxes, health care, or gun control? Do you think the evidence and reason support your side of the debate? How do you know you’re right? David and Tamler discuss a recent paper by Dan Kahan and colleagues showing how prone people are to make errors in processing information to favor positions they are predisposed to believe. And even more shocking: the higher your numeracy skills, the more prone you are to fall prey to this bias. So how do we correct for this? Can we know anything at all with any confidence? Could it be that 'Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret' in not in fact a completely accurate depiction of how young girls think about puberty? Plus, we decide whether to join Neil deGrasse Tyson as a citizen of Rationalia. To paraphrase Mr. T, I pity the newscasters!LinksReflections on Rationalia by Neal deGrasse Tyson [facebook.com]Vulcan learning pods from Star Trek (2009). [youtube.org]Kahan, D. M., Peters, E., Dawson, E. C., & Slovic, P. (2013). Motivated numeracy and enlightened self-government. Yale Law School, Public Law Working Paper, (307). [uoregon.edu]Ditto, P. H., & Lopez, D. F. (1992). Motivated skepticism: Use of differential decision criteria for preferred and nonpreferred conclusions. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63(4), 568. [phi.org]

So where are you? You’re in some house. What am I listening to? Sounds like the radio. Is it the radio? No, you’re not allowed to use that language on the radio. What are they talking about? A movie, it’s called "Memento." Have I seen that? I think so, yeah. Who are these people? Hey I recognize that voice, that’s Paul Bloom! I took his Coursera course before the accident, it was awesome! What’s he doing talking to these guys? One of them sounds like he has a tampon down his throat. Hey wait, this is starting to get interesting. Personal identity, the search for purpose. All right, let’s settle in... So where are you? You're in some house. What am I listening to? Sounds like the radio...LinksPaul Bloom [campuspress.yale.edu]Memento [imdb.com]Christopher Nolan [imdb.com]Everything you wanted to know about "Memento" by Andy Klein [salon.com]Kania, A. (Ed.). (2009). Memento (Philosophers on Film Series). Routledge. [amazon.com affiliate link]Clive Wearing: Man without a memory [youtube.com]Patient H.M. (Henry Molaison) [wikipedia.org]Christina Starmans [christinastarmans.com] Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

Hello friend, did you come from the Berenstein with an 'E' universe? Or have you lived in the Berenstain with an 'A' universe? David and Tamler try to make sense of what's going on in Season 2 of Mr. Robot (Ep.1-5). You're gonna want to dig through your vomit for adderall for this one.LinksThe Berenstain Bears [wikipedia.org]The Berenstein Bears: We Are Living in Our Own Parallel Universe [woodbetween.world]On the Berenstein Bears Switcheroo [woodbetween.world]

We all remember the famous iTunes review calling David and Tamler "repugnant." (And the T-shirt/mugs are coming soon, we promise!) But what did the reviewer mean by that? Was he calling us "immoral"? Did he actually feel disgust when he listened to the podcast? And if so, was there wisdom in his repugnance--did the feeling offer any moral insight about the podcast's value? How did an emotion that originally evolved for pathogen avoidance get into moralizing business anyway? And why do white people kiss their dogs? Plus, an illuminating two week old discussion about the election, and Tamler finally comes around to defending a Kantian position—“the cart-egorical imperative” LinksKass, L. R. (1997). The Wisdom of Repugnance: Why we should ban the cloning of humans, the. Val. UL Rev., 32, 679. [stanford.edu]Very Bad Wizards Episode 7: Psychopaths and Utilitarians Pt. 2 [verybadwizards.com]"Freedom" internet blocking app [freedom.to]Dolly the cloned sheep [wikipedia.org]Kelly, D. (2011). Yuck!: the nature and moral significance of disgust. MIT Press. [amazon.com affiliate link]Sommers, T. (2013). Review of "Yuck: The Nature and Moral Significance of Disgust." The Philosophical Quarterly, 63(250), 172-174. [verybadwizards.com]Pizarro, D., Inbar, Y., & Helion, C. (2011). On disgust and moral judgment. Emotion Review, 3(3), 267-268. [peezer.net]Exaptation [wikipedia.org]Pinker on Kass--"The Stupidity of Dignity" in New Republic May 28 2008. [newrepublic.com]Do I Need an Umbrella? [doineedanumbrella.com]Cthulhu For President [cthulhuforamerica.com]

Dave and Tamler don’t agree about much, but one thing they do share is an affinity for character-based approaches to ethics. Using Tamler’s interview with Georgetown Philosopher Nancy Sherman as their guide (link to chapter included), they discuss two ancient perspectives on how to develop good character and live happy, virtuous lives: Aristotle's and that of the Stoics. Why did Aristotle focus so much on friendship and what happens when those friendships get too "watery"? Are emotions crucial for developing virtues or are they “so much mist on the windshield?” Are the stoics right that we shouldn’t get attached to things that are beyond our control? Plus, a new Twitter account has David and Tamler polishing their CVs, and a request for listener suggestions for our 100th episode.Note: We recorded this episode after the police shootings in Baton Rouge and Minneapolis but before the shootings of the police officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge. We talk a bit about the violence, but not about what happened after Minneapolis.LinksVery Bad Wizards No Context (@vbwnocontext)Effective altruism [wikipedia.org]Nancy Sherman Homepage [nanycsherman.com]Nancy Sherman "Navigating our Moral World." In Sommers, T. (2016). A Very Bad Wizard: Morality behind the curtain. Routledge. [verybadwizards.com]

Scandinavian film scholar Yoel Inbar joins the podcast for a deep dive on the Swedish film Force Majeure, a darkly funny meditation on what our instinctive behavior in a moment of panic can reveal about our characters and relationships. The story: while having lunch on a ski slope in the French Alps, a family believes that an avalanche is bearing down on them. Just as it seems the avalanche is going to hit them, the father (Tomas) grabs his phone and gloves and runs indoors, abandoning his wife Ebba and two children. How does the family reckon with this incident? Is the act itself unforgivable, or is it Tomas’s behavior afterwards that makes him despicable? How blameworthy is Tomas for his display of cowardice? Is it even cowardice since he didn’t have time to think about it? What’s the deal with that creepy janitor and all the tooth brushing scenes? Why can’t Yoel and Tamler agree about the answers to any of these questions? Plus, more on the Redskins and Tamler tells an embarrassing story from his past.LinksYoel Inbar [yoelinbar.net]On that one awkward sex scene from The Americans [vulture.com]Scandinavia [wikipedia.org]Force Majeure [imdb.com]Louie Season 1 Episode 9 "Bully" [imdb.com] Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

David and Tamler continue their intermittent “classic paper series” with an episode on Jonathan Bennett’s “The Conscience of Huckleberry Finn” (published in 1974—before the reason vs. emotion debate was all cool again). Using fictional and historical examples, Bennett raises a number of questions that are central to our understanding of human morality, such as what ought to guide our behavior--human sympathy or moral beliefs? Do emotions like empathy/sympathy have judgments built into them? Are these emotions dumb? Is morality dumber? Why was Jonathan Edwards such an asshole? Plus, we talk about the implications of a poll that suggests that most Native Americans aren’t offended by the name “Redskins” for the Washington D.C. NFL team.Episode LinksNew poll finds 9 in 10 Native Americans aren’t offended by Redskins name by By John Woodrow Cox, Scott Clement and Theresa Vargas [washingtonpost.com] Bennett, J. (1974). The conscience of Huckleberry Finn. Philosophy, 49, 123-134. [earlymoderntexts.com]The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn [wikipedia.org]Heinrich Himmler [wikipedia.org]Jonathan Edwards [wikipedia.org]Pizarro, D. (2000). Nothing more than feelings?: The role of emotions in moral judgment. Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 30, 355-375. [peezer.net]

Inspired by a recent ProPublica report on racial bias in an algorithm used to predict future criminal behavior, David and Tamler talk about the use of analytic methods in criminal sentencing, sports, and love. Should we use algorithms to influence decisions about criminal sentencing or parole decisions? Should couples about to get married take a test that predicts their likelihood of getting divorced? Is there something inherently racist about analytic methods in sports? Plus, David asks Tamler some questions about the newly released second edition of his book A Very Bad Wizard: Morality Behind the Curtain.LinksMachine Bias by Julia Angwin, Jeff Larson, Surya Mattu and Lauren Kirchner [propublica.org]Mission Impossible: African-Americans & Analytics by Michael Wilbon [theundefeated.com]A Very Bad Wizard: Morality Behind the Curtain [amazon.com affiliate link to the Kindle version of 2nd edition. Eight new interviews. And an all-new foreword by Peez.]Paperback version of the 2nd edition (currently only available on the publisher's website) [routledge.com]

David and Tamler have their first real fight in a while over an article defending "social mixing"--distributing babies randomly across families such that no infant is genetically related to the parents who raise them.. Then they discuss a study published in Science in 2013 in which participants could earn money if they agreed to let mice be killed in a gas chamber.  Do free markets threaten our moral characters and cause us to abandon our principles? What are mechanisms behind this phenomenon when it happens? And why does David hate mice so much?Episode LinksMaus by Art Spiegelman [wikipedia.org]If babies were randomly allocated to families, would racism end? by Howard Rachlin and Melvin Frankel [aeon.co]Falk, A., & Szech, N. (2013). Morals and markets. Science, 340, 707-711. [sciencemag.org].pdf available here [gtcenter.org]

David and Tamler welcome author and environmental science professor Jennifer Jacquet to the podcast to discuss the pros and cons of shame. What's the difference between shame and guilt? Is shaming effective for generating social progress or getting tax cheats to pay up? Is twitter shaming on the rise or on its way out? And what does David do when he's alone in the dark?But before all of that, David and Tamler introduce a new way to support the podcast--through our Patreon account (patreon.com/verybadwizards). Plus, we discuss the retraction of a press release announcing that a professor agreed to referee a journal article (!) And can one passage get Tamler, the eternal optimist, to hate philosophy?LinksVery Bad Wizards are on Patreon [patreon.com]Sociology faculty member publishes book chapter [psu.edu]Penn State retracts press release about sociologist reviewing an article. [retractionwatch.org]A very confusing paragraph [verybadwizards.com]Bradley, B. (2009). Well-being and death. OUP Oxford.Jennifer Jacquet [jenniferjacquet.com]Is Shame Necessary? by Jennifer Jacquet [amazon.com affiliate link]Congratulations, you have an all male panel! [allmalepanels.tumblr.com]Racists getting fired [racistsgettingfired.tumblr.com]Shame (movie) [imdb.com]Babies (movie) [imdb.com] Special Guest: Jennifer Jacquet.

David and Tamler celebrate Passover with a high-spirited episode on guns, revenge, liberals, being offended, the fear of death, and whether kids have a right to be loved. Thanks to all you listeners for emailing your questions, comments, and complaints--this was a fun, energetic discussion. Plus, a blast from the past from an unusually alert Pizarro: Michael Shannon reading a sorority letter.  But won't somebody please think of the children???!! LinksMr. Robot Season 2 premiere date [usanetwork.com]Michael Shannon reads sorority letter [youtube.com]George Rainbolt's review of "The Right to be Loved" by Matthew Liao [npdr.nd.edu]The Right to be Loved by S. Matthew Liao [amazon]The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker [wikipedia.org]A History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell [wikipedia.org]The Story of Philosophy by Wil DurantRick and Morty [imdb.com]Marijuana is Kosher [npr.org]Louis CK on the Bill Simmons podcast [youtube.com]Is Shame Necessary? by Jennifer Jacquet [amazon.com affiliate link]Jennifer Jacquet [jenniferjacquet.com] 

We hit the jackpot with this one! Economist Robert Frank (you may remember him from such episodes as The Greatest Books Ever Written) joins David and Tamler to talk about his new book Success and Luck: Good Fortune and the Myth of Meritocracy. What role does pure chance play in making or breaking our careers and lives? Are effort and talent enough to succeed, or does the ball need to bounce our way? Where do we get our will-power and talent--is that ultimately a matter of luck as well? And what happens when we reflect on the lucky breaks we've received in our lives? Does it make us happier and more generous? Or do we feel like our accomplishments have been taken away? Plus a brief discussion of the Frank's revelatory 1988 book Passions Within Reason, and of some recent studies about how we convey our commitment to cooperate.     LinksRobert Frank [johnson.cornell.edu]Robert Frank interviewed on Fox News by Stuart Varney [video.foxbusiness.com]Ronald Coase [wikipedia.org]Everett, J.A.C., Pizarro, D. A. & Crockett, M.J., (in press). Inference of Trustworthiness from Intuitive Moral Judgments.  Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. [papers.ssrn.com]Passions within Reason by Robert Frank [amazon.com affiliate link]Frank, R. H., Gilovich, T., & Regan, D. T. (1993). The evolution of one-shot cooperation: An experiment. Ethology and sociobiology, 14, 247-256.Desteno, D., Breazeal, C., Frank, R. H., Pizarro, D., Baumann, J., Dickens, L., & Lee, J. J. (2012). Detecting the trustworthiness of novel partners in economic exchange. Psychological science, 23, 1549-1556. [pdf from davedesteno.com]Frank, R.H. (2016) Success and Luck: Good Fortune and the Myth of Meritocracy. [amazon.com affiliate link] Special Guest: Robert Frank.

We know that criminal punishment has consequences, both good and bad, and that many people think that offenders deserve it. But what does punishment mean? What is society trying to express in the way it punishes criminals? And since people from all sides of the political spectrum agree that the prison population is way too big, is there a way to convey that meaning with alternative forms of sanctions? David and Tamler discuss Yale Law Professor Dan Kahan's classic paper "What do alternative sanctions mean?" that addresses these questions. But first, Tamler gets sanctimonious about other people being sanctimonious about guns on campus. At the risk of angering "that student," we "go there."  LinksUniversity of Houston Faculty Devises Pointers on How to Avoid Getting Shot by Armed Students by Elliott Hannon [slate.com]A PowerPoint Slide Advises Professors to Alter Teaching to Pacify Armed Students by Rio Fernandes [chronicle.com]Kahan, D. M. (1996). What do alternative sanctions mean? The University of Chicago Law Review, 63(2), 591-653. [law.yale.edu]Moskos, P. (2013). In defense of flogging. Basic Books. [amazon.com affiliate link]

Philosophers can be funny and funny movies can be philosophical. David and Tamler welcome frequent VBW guest and arch-enemy of empathy Paul Bloom to discuss their five favorite comic films with philosophical/psychological themes. Groundhog Day was off-limits for our top five (we would've all chosen it) so we start by explaining why it's the quintessential movie for this topic.Links[all movie links are to imdb.com]Paul's Top 5The Big LebowskiShaun of the DeadThe Man with Two Brains/All of MeStranger than FictionBeing ThereTamler's Top 5Defending Your Life/Lost in AmericaModern TimesSeven Psychopaths/In BrugesBarton Fink/Sullivan's TravelsPurple Rose of CairoDavid's Top 5Office SpaceDr. StrangelovePinker, S. (1999). "The Doomsday Machine" in How the mind works. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 882(1), 119-127.BrazilTrading PlacesMr. SkinThe Princess Bride Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

David and Tamler talk about the perils of trying to step outside of your own perspective in ethics, science, and politics. What do Rawls' "original position" thought experiment, Pascal's Wager, and Moral Foundations Theory have in common? (Hint: it involves baking.) Plus, what movies (and other things) would serve as a litmus test when deciding on a potential life partner? What might liking or not liking a certain film, book, or TV series tell you about a person, and whether or not the relationship would work? And what sexual position is it rational to choose under the veil of ignorance? (It's a night episode...)LinksPart 1: Litmus TestsThe Bad News Bears (1976) [imdb.com]A Confederacy of Dunces [wikipedia.org]Drive [imdb.com]Every Frame A Painting--Drive: The Quadrant System [youtube.com]Ferris Bueller's Day Off [imdb.com]The Far Side [wikipedia.org]Frank [imdb.com]Hustle and Flow [imdb.com]Jackie Brown [imdb.com]Key and Peele [imdb.com]Miracle of Morgan's Creek [imdb.com]The Office (UK) [imdb.com]Pulp Fiction [imdb.com]Spaghetti Western [wikipedia.org]ADR (Automated Dialogue Replacement/Dubbing) [wikipedia.org]Sullivan's Travels [imdb.com]Spellbound [imdb.com]Slapshot [imdb.com]What We Do in the Shadows [imdb.com]Part 2: Williams, B. (1981). Rawls and Pascal’s Wager. Moral Luck, 94-100. [verybadwizards.com]Moral Luck [amazon.com affiliate link]Moral Foundations Questionnaire (30-item) [moralfoundations.org]

David and Tamler continue their series of breaking down a classic essay/article in their fields. For this installment, David assigns Tamler Anthony Greenwald's fascinating 1980 review article "The Totalitarian Ego." What do totalitarian regimes, scientific theories, and your own cognitive biases have in common? As it turns out, quite a bit. Why do egos rewrite our memories, preserve our beliefs in the face of contradictory evidence, and make us think we're way more important than we are? And how does Thomas Kuhn fit into all this? Plus, we read a few of our favorite iTunes reviews.LinksAudience video of Society for Personality and Social Psychology 2016 Session on Moral Purity with Kurt Gray, Jon Haidt, David Pizarro (courtesy of Kate Johnson) [youtube.com]Greenwald, A. G. (1980). The totalitarian ego: Fabrication and revision of personal history. American psychologist, 35, 603. [verybadwizards.com] 

David and Tamler take a break from their main jobs as TV critics to talk about a masterpiece in political philosophy: "Two Concepts of Liberty" by Isaiah Berlin. While they both celebrate the style and substance of this classic essay, in a startling twist Tamler praises conceptual analysis and David expresses a few misgivings about his Kantianism. What is the elusive idea of positive liberty, and  how can its pursuit lead to totalitarian rule?  When is it more important to buy boots than read Russian poetry? And why is David still so depressed by pluralism? Plus, coddling in Wisconsin? And another famous set of social psych studies is accused of biting the dust.  LinksIn Wisconsin, Efforts to End Taunting at Games Lead to Claims of Coddling By Mike McPhate [nytimes.com]Take my Breath Away by Berlin [youtube.com]Cortex Podcast Episode #20 [relay.fm]Amy Cuddy "Your Body Language Shapes Who You Are" TED Talk [ted.com]"The Power of the Power Pose: Amy Cuddy's Famous Finding is the Latest Example of Scientific Overreach" By Andrew Gelman and Kaiser Fung [slate.com]Berlin, I. (1958) “Two Concepts of Liberty.” In Isaiah Berlin (1969) Four Essays on Liberty.Oxford: Oxford University Press. [verybadwizards.com]Positive and Negative Liberty [plato.stanford.edu]Freedom: Block Distractions

Hello, listener. Hello, listener? That's lame. Maybe I should give you a name, but that's a slippery slope. You're only in my head. Or maybe we're in your head. Are you listening to this with headphones?Shit. It's actually happened, I'm talking to imaginary listeners.  What I'm about to tell you is top secret, a conspiracy bigger than all of us. There's a powerful group of people out there that are secretly running the world. I'm talking about the guys no one knows about, the guys that are invisible. The top 1% of the top 1%, the guys that play God without permission. That's right, it's the Partially Examined Life guys. And now I think they're following me.Special guest Yoel Inbar joins us to talk about the best show of last year. Warning: This episode is full of spoilers. Do not listen until you've seen Season 1 of Mr. Robot.LinksMr. Robot IMDBWikipedia Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

It's our last episode on campus protests and political correctness for a while, we promise! But it's a fun one.  David and Tamler welcome two guests on the opposite side of the debate spectrum. Recent Yale Alum, cognitive scientist, freelance writer, (and writer of novel-length emails) Vlad Chituc joins both of us to defend the Yale protests, provide some context, and explain why the good people at FIRE are hypocritical about free expression. In the middle segment, Tamler talks with his notorious stepmother and "factual feminist" Christina Hoff Sommers (author of "Who Stole Feminism?" and "The War Against Boys"). They argue over whether the new political correctness poses a serious threat to campus climate, whether it is even "new," and over whether one is obligated to smoke weed on Joe Rogan's podcast. Plus, Tamler gets all huffy about the panic over terrorism, and we read some email responses to VBW Episode 78 ("Wizards Uprising").  Oh, and we have a recording a date set for the Mr. Robot episode!LinksVlad Chituc [vladchituc.com]Christina Hoff Sommers [aei.org]"Fear in the Air, Americans Look Over Their Shoulders" [nytimes.com]The Coddling of the American Mind [theatlantic.com]Who Stole Feminism by Christina H. Sommers [amazon.com affiliate link]The War Against Boys by Christina H. Sommers [amazon.com affiliate link]"CDS Appropriates Asian Dishes, Students Say" [oberlinreview.org]  (ht/@brittanyepage) Special Guests: Christina Hoff Sommers and Vlad Chituc.

Special guest Valerie Tiberius joins us to talk about values, well-being, and friendship. What role should reflection play in the good life? What about emotion? How can we make our values more consistent and sustainable? Do we know our friends better than we know ourselves? Plus, are philosophers experts? Experts of what? What are the boundaries of our discipline? And what motivates a gay Mormon to stay in the Church? In the first segment, David and Tamler list a few things they're grateful for on Thanksgiving, including you, the listeners (awwwwww...)LinksNational Thanksgiving Turkey Presentation [wikipedia.org]Valerie Tiberius personal website [sites.google.com]Tiberius, V. (2012) Cell Phones, iPods, and Subjective Well-Being. In Brey, P., A. Briggle & E. Spence (Eds.). The good life in a technological age. Routledge. [verybadwizards.com]Desire theories of well-being ( from Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry on Well-Being) [plato.stanford.edu] Special Guest: Valerie Tiberius.

David and Tamler return to the minefield of campus politics and talk about recent events at Yale, Missouri, and Amherst. Are the protests are long overdue response to systematic oppression and prejudice? Or is this new generation of students coddled, hypersensitive, and hostile to free speech? A little bit of both? Can our hosts get through this episode without fighting?   LinksThe New Intolerance of Student Activism by Conor Friedersdorf [theatlantic.com]President Peter Salovey's statement to Yale community [news.yale.edu]2015 University of Missouri Protests [wikipedia.org]Amherst College Uprising (with list of demands) [amherstuprising.com]Vlad Chituc (@vladchituc) [vladchituc.com] 

Special guest Eric Schwitzgebel joins David and Tamler to discuss the moral behavior (or lack thereof) of ethicists. Does moral reflection make us better people, or does it just give us better excuses to be immoral? Who's more right about human nature--Mencius or Xun Zi? What did Kant have against bastards and masturbating? Plus, we talk about jerks, robot cars, and killing baby Hitler. (Godwin's Law within 1:42--might be a new record for us). LinksEric Schwitzgebel publications.  (Has links to all the discussed papers).Why Self-Driving Cars Must be Programmed to Kill  [technologyreview.com]Bonnefon, J. F., Shariff, A., & Rahwan, I. (2015). Autonomous Vehicles Need Experimental Ethics: Are We Ready for Utilitarian Cars? [arxiv.org]Mencius [wikipedia.org]Xun Zi [wikipedia.org]"The Philosophical Problem of Killing Baby Hitler." [vox.com]Why it's Unethical to Go Back in Time and Kill Baby Hitler. [forbes.com] Special Guest: Eric Schwitzgebel.

David and Tamler list three things they've changed their minds about in their careers. (This episode was recorded before Episode 75, but that one was way too long already.) What does Tamler think about X-phi these days? Has Dave lost his faith in the power of reason? What the hell is 'non-cognitivism'? Plus, Dave disagrees with John Hodgman about the metaphysical property of a hot dog. And a couple of listener shout-outs, including giving credit to a listener for giving us a topic idea we discussed without realizing she had suggested it in an email weeks ago. LinksEthical Expressivism (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy)Moral Anti-Realism (Stanford Encylopedia of Philosophy)John Hodgman on the hot dog/sandwich debate.  (NY Times Mag)"Perspectives on P.F. Strawson's "Freedom and Resentment." (Really good introduction by Michael McKenna and Paul Russell.)

Dave and Tamler celebrate their 75th episode by welcoming six BFFs of the podcast and asking them to share the biggest thing they've changed their minds about in their professional careers. You'll hear Dan Ariely on our moral duty to take science into the real world, Laurie Santos on the the role of neuroscience in explaining psychological findings, Yoel Inbar on what it means to do good science as a psychologist, Eric Schwitzgebel on his metaphysical epiphany about materialism, Nina Strohminger on breaking-up with priming research, and Sam Harris on Artificial Intelligence and its perils, and his recently changed views about vegetarianism. (Sadly, we had a technical glitch with the audio when we recorded our most-frequent guest Paul Bloom, but we'll bring him on again soon.) Plus we play some hilarious mash-ups, raps, and voicemails sent in from listeners.Links to info about our GuestsDan ArielyLaurie SantosYoel InbarNina StrohmingerEric SchwitzgebelSam Harris Listener-Created Music in this Episode Special Guests: Dan Ariely, Eric Schwitzgebel, Laurie Santos, Nina Strohminger, Sam Harris, and Yoel Inbar.

David and Tamler return after an end of summer hiatus to finally talkabout the ethics of deception….eventually. But first they break downa recent article in the journal Science documenting an attempt to replicate100 recent psychology experiments. What does it mean that justover 1/3 of the studies were successfully replicated? Is socialpsychology in crisis or is this just how science works? Will Davidsomehow try to pin the blame on philosophers?Plus--a brief and almost certainly regrettable foray into the AshleyMadison hack, the neuroscience of lying to your kids about Santa, and we announce a new way to contact us to help celebrate our 75th anniversary.LinksAuthors, Shitload of (2015) Estimating the reproducibility of psychological science, Science, 39. The Bayesian Reproducibility Project  post by Alexander Etz [alexanderetz.com]Harris, S. (2013). Lying. Four Elephants Press. Buy on AmazonBok, S. (2011) Lying: Moral choice in public and private life. Vintage, 2011. Buy on AmazonSanta on the Brain by Kelly Lambert [nytimes.com]James Randi (aka "The Amazing Randi") [wikipedia.org]An Honest Liar anhonestliar.com (Available on Netflix in the U.S.)The Honest Truth about Dishonesty [amazon.com affiliate link] (Dis)Honesty – The Truth About Lies [thedishonestyproject.com]Exit Through the Gift Shop [wikipedia.org]F for Fake [imdb.com]

In what is possibly our most repugnant first segment ever, David and Tamler break down the ethics of zoophilia and investigate the true nature of consent. In the second segment we answer some listener emails and address our first question in our new capacity as International Ethics Experts.™  If your family is religious, how honest should you be with your children about your non-belief? Do the comforting aspects of religious belief outweigh the fears and anxieties? What’s the deal <Seinfeld voice> with Christians and hell?Plus, sex-ed from a female perspective, a brief nostalgic trip to The Electric Company, and David overcomes his horror of self-promotion to thank some people for praising the podcast. LinksTop 25 Podcasts for Men [hiconsumption.com]People Behind the Science podcast episode featuring David [peoplebehindthescience.com]Radio Tatas! Episode 37: "In a Row?!?" (their review of VBW starts at around the 30:00 mark) [radiotatas.libsyn.com]Cecil the Lion [wikipedia.org]New York Court: Chimps Are Still Property, Not People [npr.org]The Electric Company Intro [youtube.org]Suggestions for our listeners for the next podcast episode: Santa on the Brain by Kelly Lambert [nytimes.com]James Randi (aka "The Amazing Randi") [wikipedia.org]An Honest Liar [anhonestliar.com] (Available on Netflix in the U.S.)The Honest Truth about Dishonesty [amazon.com affiliate link] (Dis)Honesty – The Truth About Lies [thedishonestyproject.com]F is for Fake [imdb.com] 

It finally happened: David and Tamler welcome special guest Joshua Weisberg to the podcast to talk about Turing machines, Chinese Rooms, and AI. What does it mean for a machine to acquire intelligence? What is the proper test? How much processing power would it take? Do computers shed light on how human beings think? Why is John Searle trapped in a Chinese room, anyway? Plus, a spoiler-filled discussion (beginning at 58:20) of the recent movie Ex Machina. David tries to assert his feminist bonafides but Tamler takes Eva's side, proving once again that he is the real feminist. And we have a quick 5-minute discussion of Mr. Robot Episode 4 (beginning at 1:24) and respond to a couple of emails from the authors of the Inside Out article we discussed in our previous episode. LinksTuring Test [wikipedia.org]Chinese Room thought experiment [wikipedia.org]Artificial Intelligence [wikipedia.org]Weisberg, J. (2009). It stands to reason: Skynet and self-preservation. In Irwin, W., Brown, R., & Decker, K. S. (Eds.) Terminator and philosophy: I'll be back, therefore I am (Vol. 13). John Wiley & Sons.Ex Machina [IMDB.com] Special Guest: Josh Weisberg.

David and Tamler go deep into the best TV show of the summer, "Mr. Robot. They talk about the moral ambiguity of its central character, the distorted vision of reality it portrays, and play a round of "Real or Not Real" with all the main characters. Plus, what the swooning critics ignore about Pixar's "Inside Out"--its irresponsible failure to reference the relevant literature in cognitive science and philosophy of mind.     LinksTwo philosophers explain what Inside Out gets wrong about the mind [vox.com]The James/Lange theory of emotion [wikipedia.org]Mr. Robot [IMDB]Unreliable Narrator [wikipedia.org]Shoot the Dog Trope [tvtropes.org]  

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens, papers by Williams and movies from Sweden. Long graphic novels that celebrate being. These are a few of our favorite things. Dave and Tamler offer some moral psych-themed recommendations to help you get your summer off to a good start. Plus, is porn bad for you now that it doesn't come in brown paper packages tied up in string?LinksPornucopia by Maria Konnikova [aeon.com]Maria Konnikova on Twitter [twitter.com]Zhana Vrangolova [zhanavrangolova.com]BooksDaytripper by Fabio Bá and Gabriel Moon [amazon.com affiliate link] [comixology link]Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro [amazon.com affiliate link]MoviesForce Majeure [imdb.com]Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter [imdb.com]Academic PapersKahane, G., Everett, J. A., Earp, B. D., Farias, M., & Savulescu, J. (2015). ‘Utilitarian’ judgments in sacrificial moral dilemmas do not reflect impartial concern for the greater good. Cognition, 134, 193-209.Williams, B. A. O., & Moore, A. W. (2006). Philosophy as a humanistic discipline. Princeton University Press. [verybadwizards.com]TV ShowsMr. Robot [usa.com]Louie [imdb.com]Deadwood [imdb.com]The Americans [imdb.com]Sherlock [imdb.com]Podcast (David's Extra)Robot or Not? Podcast [incomparable.com]

Dave and Tamler try to figure out what we talk about when we talk about objectivity. In past episodes we’ve claimed that logic and science (when it isn't fraudulent) are objective. Tamler has claimed repeatedly that "Louie" is an objectively better TV show than "Jessie." Dave is constantly claiming that Kant is objectively the best philosopher. But to be honest, we say these things without being exactly sure what we’re saying.  Today we try to be sure--only to get more confused. Plus, we get into a big fight over trigger warnings, the Kipnis affair at Northwestern, and other related issues. (The infamous Episode 45 was an ecstasy-fueled love fest in comparison.) However, we have spared our listeners the drama, and have only included a few lowlights. If you listen closely, you can even hear Tamler apologize. LinksSexual Paranoia Strikes Academe by Laura Kipnis [chronicle.com]Laura Kipnis Is Cleared of Wrongdoing in Title IX Complaints [chronicle.com]Title IX [wikipedia.org]For Tamler's views on the campus climate and the Kipnis fiasco, check out his comments on this post. [leiterreports.typepad.com]

Dave drags Tamler into the nerd abyss by making him watch an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation (“Tapestry,” from the 6th season. It's available on Netflix instant in the US, and likely worldwide on many sites of varying legality). We talk about the themes of the episode: regret, risk aversion, the arrogance of hindsight, and the dream of living your past “knowing what you know now.” What are the things that shape our character? Should we embrace our mistakes or would we change something if we could? How should we think of our lives--as one long continually unfolding story or as a series of unrelated episodes?And speaking of regret, we reflect on our comedy episode and some listener dissatisfaction (we agree with much of it) and talk about yet another fraudulent study with sexy results.  Plus, Dave finally learns what ‘chuchma’ means.    "Science Retracts Troubled Gay Marriage Study." [retractionwatch.com]"Michael Lacour Responds to Critics." [latimes.com]"The Strangest Thing about Lacour's Response" (nymag.com)Star Trek: The Next Generation. "Tapestry" [en.memory-alpha.wikia.com] Best Episode Ever #30: Star Trek: The Next Generation [craveonline.co.uk]Patrick Stewart on Extras [youtube.com]  

Dave and Tamler break the cardinal rule of comedy by trying to analyze it. What are the origins and functions of humor? Can a theory explain what makes us laugh? Is humor entirely subjective? Why would anyone find Mr. Bean funny? Plus, we lose some geek cred by confessing some iconic comedians that we never liked, and ask why the American Psychologist Association loves to torture people.LinksReport Claims American Psychological Association Secretly Supported Torture Policy [time.com]The philosophy of humor [iep.utm.edu]Key and Peele: Gay Wedding [youtube.com]Key and Peele: Awesome Hitler Story [youtube.com]Goodfellas: How the Fuck Am I Funny? [youtube.com]Steven Wright: Birthday Present [youtube.com]Hannibal Burress: Pickle Juice [youtube.com]George Carlin on Fat People [youtube.com]Jerry Seinfeld on Airport Security [youtube.com]Louis CK: Pig Newtons [youtube.com]Curb Your Enthusiasm: Rash [youtube.com]Eddie Murphy: Barbecue [youtube.com]Bill Burr on Trying to Buy a Pumpkin [youtube.com] 

Special guest Yoel Inbar (author of Hitchcock’s Women: From Margaret Sullivan to Tippi Hedren) joins us to talk about Hitchcock’s long take masterpiece/gimmick Rope. Based loosely on the case of Leopold and Loeb, Rope tells the story of two young men who have read Nietzsche and decide to murder a schoolmate in order to cement their Übermensch status. Did they read Nietzsche correctly? Is conventional morality nothing but a construct to keep the inferior masses in line? Are professors accountable for what they teach? (Please God, no.) Plus, we delve deeper into Julie and Mark’s motivation, and Yoel plays a round of “Does the government deem this trademark scandalous?”  LinksYoel Inbar [yoelinbar.net]Very Bad Wizards Episode 22: An Enquiry Concerning Slurs and Offensiveness [verybadwizards.com]Rope [IMDB.com]Leopold and Loeb [wikipedia.org]Leopold and Loeb's Criminal Minds (Smithsonian Magazine)The Leopold and Loeb Trial Page (UMKC Law)Paul Gauguin [wikipedia.org]The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham [wikipedia.org]Nietzsche's Moral and Political Philosophy [plato.stanford.edu]Damasio, A. "Remembering When," Scientific American, 2002. [antonellapavese.com]What's the matter with a little brother sister action? by Tamler Sommers [psychologytoday.com]

Holy crap, it's the apocalypse!!!!  ...for philosophy. Maybe. Has this 2500 year old discipline become too technical, too disconnected from the real world? Is it just a handmaiden to the sciences? (Which would make Tamler Dave's handmaiden.) And what the hell is conceptual analysis? Plus, a short excerpt of Tamler's interview with Simon Blackburn, and definitive proof that worms have free will (sorry Sam). And only one more week to buy our t-shirt!LinksFree Will? Analysis of worm neurons suggest how a single stimulus can trigger different responses [sciencedaily.com]Strawson, P. F. (1962). Freedom and resentment. [princeton.edu]Doomen, J. (2015). The end of philosophy. Think, 14(39), 99-109. [verybadwizards.com]For a Non-Ideal Metaphysics by Justin Smith [jehsmith.com] Concepts [plato.stanford.edu]Harry Frankfurt says Philosophy is in the Doldrums [http://leiterreports.typepad.com]Simon Blackburn's Website [phil.cam.ac.uk]

Dave and Tamler talk about the human tendency to believe in a just world. Why do we have the belief? Does it make us less motivated to fight injustice? How does it connect to our beliefs about free will and punishment? Plus, the SAE incident—a case where the twitter mob did some good? And Tamler changes his mind about Harmony the Hamster.      LinksAs Two Oklahoma Students Are Expelled for Racist Chant, Sigma Alpha Epsilon Vows Wider Inquiry [nytimes.com]Just World Hypothesis [wikipedia.org]System Justification [wikipedia.org]The Future of The Culture Wars is Here, and it's Gamergate [deadspin.com]Lerner, M. J., & Simmons, C. H. (1966). Observer’s reaction to the “innocent victim”: Compassion or rejection? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 4(2), 203–210. [MIT.edu]Clark, C. J., Luguri, J. B., Ditto, P. H., Knobe, J., Shariff, A. F., & Baumeister, R. F. (2014). Free to punish: A motivated account of free will belief. Journal of personality and social psychology, 106(4), 501. [sharifflab.com]Sommers, T. (2007). 4 The Illusion of Freedom Evolves. Distributed Cognition and the Will: Individual Volition and Social Context, 61.Pizarro, D.A. & Helzer, E. (2010). Freedom of the will and stubborn moralism. In Baumeister, R.F., A.R. Mele, and K. D. Vohs (Eds.) Free will and consciousness: How might they work? (pp. 101-120) Oxford University Press. [peezer.net]Sartre is Smartre [vimeo.com]

Sam Harris gets back in the VBW ring for another round on moral responsibility, ethical theories, and the grounds for our obligations to other people. Are we at a genuine stalemate when it comes to blame and desert? Is Tamler a closet consequentialist? Is Sam a closet pluralist? Why is Dave such a big Wagner fan? Plus, Twitter shaming: what is it good for? Settle in, get comfortable, pour yourself a drink, you’re in for the long haul on this one.LinksHow One Stupid Tweet Blew Up Justine Sacco's Life [nytimes.co]The Moral Landscape by Sam Harris [samharris.org]Value Pluralism [plato.stanford.edu]Bill Burr vs. Philly [youtube.com] Special Guest: Sam Harris.

Dave and Tamler discuss a new study that, according to Tamler, offers decisive support for restorative approaches to criminal punishment (the only problem is he didn't read past the introduction). And speaking of justice, we talk about "White Bear"--the most disturbing episode of the UK series Black Mirror that doesn’t involve sex with a non-kosher animal.  (Note: Massive spoilers for this episode of BM--watch before listening.  Available on netflix, amazon prime.)LinksBlack Mirror, "White Bear" episode [imdb.com]Ultimatum Game [wikipedia.org]Justice Porn [reddit.com]Fehr, E., & Gächter, S. (2002). Altruistic punishment in humans. Nature, 415(6868), 137-140.FeldmanHall, O., Sokol-Hessner, P., Van Bavel, J. J., & Phelps, E. A. (2014). Fairness violations elicit greater punishment on behalf of another than for oneself. Nature Communications, 5.

Dave and Tamler take a break from blame and responsibility to tackle a much easier subject: meaning in life. We discuss Susan Wolf's new book "Meaning in Life and Why it Matters," and play some excerpts from Tamler's recent discussion with her. Plus, we list some of our favorite listener-suggested drinking game ideas so far. (The contest for the free T-shirt is still open--send in your ideas before the next episode!)  LinksMeaning in Life and Why it Matters by Susan Wolf [amazon.com affiliate link]Billie Pritchett on the Sam Harris and Free Will discussion. [bpritchett.blogspot.com] (Highly recommended!) The Heaven's Gate Cult [wikipedia.org] Special Guest: Susan Wolf.

Dave and Tamler argue some more about the role of emotion and intuition in blame judgments, and then offer some moral psychology-related recommendations for your New Year’s viewing and reading pleasure. Plus, can you turn listening to VBW into a good drinking game? Offer some suggestions and win a free Very Bad Wizards T-shirt!  LinksTamler's early defense of free will skepticism:"Darrow and Determinism" [naturalism.org]"No Soul? I Can Live with That. No Free Will? AHHHHH!!!" [psychologytoday.org]"Free Will Skepticism in Action" [naturalism.org]Tamler's interview with Galen Strawson [believermag.org]The Objective Attitude [philpapers.org]Daniel Miessler on Sam Harris vs. Very Bad Wizards [danielmiessler.com]The Sceptic by David Hume [econlib.org]Paul Russell’s Free Will, Art, Morality [verybadwizards.com]Locke [imdb.com]The Subjective Effects of Nitrous Oxide by William James [erowid.org]Kahan, D. M., Peters, E., Dawson, E. C., & Slovic, P. (2013). Motivated numeracy and enlightened self-government. Social Science Research Network. Available: http://ssrn. com/abstract, 2319992.Black Mirror [imdb.com]Snowpiercer [imdb.com]Snowpiercer-Left or Right [everyframeapainting.tumbler.com]Logicomix: An Epic Search for Truth [amazon.com affiliate link] Meaning in Life and Why It Matters by Susan Wolf. Princeton University. Press, 2010. [amazon.com affiliate link]

Bestselling author and friend of the podcast Sam Harris joins Tamler and Dave for a marathon podcast. (Seriously, pack two pairs of astronaut diapers for this one). We  talk about the costs and benefits of religion, dropping acid in India, and the illusory nature of (a certain kind of) free will. Then we go at it on blame, moral responsibility, hatred, guilt, retribution, and vengeance. Sam thinks these are antiquated responses based on a belief in spooky metaphysics, Tamler thinks they are important components of human morality, and Dave just wants everyone to get along and be reasonable (like that nice Kant fellow). Time markers (roughly)0:00-47:00 Intro and costs and benefits of religion47:00-77:30 Drugs, the self, free will77:30-- Blame, guilt, vengeance, moral responsibility, desert. LinksSam Harris [samharris.org]Waking Up: A guide to spirituality without religion by Sam Harris [amazon.com affiliate link]Daniel Dennett reviews "Free Will" by Sam Harris [naturalism.org]Sam Harris responds to Dennett's Review of "Free Will" [samharris.org] Special Guest: Sam Harris.

Film critic, VBW regular, and social psychologist Yoel Inbar joins David and Tamler to talk about Spike Lee's controversial 1989 film, Do the Right Thing, a movie about a day in the life of a small Brooklyn community on the hottest day of summer, and how the day's events lead to a race riot. Which characters in the film deserve our sympathy? (Maybe all of them?) Who was Spike Lee criticizing with his depiction of the characters in this community? Why did Mookie start the riot at Sal's? Was his action justified? Was starting the riot the "Right Thing" that Spike Lee was referring to in the title? Twenty five years after its release, how much have things changed? [Please note: we recorded this episode before the Ferguson verdict, which is why--despite some parallels--we don't refer to the verdict or the aftermath.]LinksDo the Right Thing [imdb.com]Do the Right Thing Scene: Insults [youtube.com]Do the Right Thing Scene: RIP Boom Box [youtube.com]Do the Right Thing Scene: Just Off the Boat [youtube.com]When Spike Lee Became Scary by Jason Bailey [atlantic.com] The Boondocks [wikipedia.org]Uncle Remus [wikipedia.org]Lyrics to Black Korea by Ice Cube [rapgenius.com]Do the Right Thing and Night of the Hunter Side by Side [youtube.com]The movie ends with the following two quotes: Violence as a way of achieving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. It is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. The old law of an eye for an eye leaves everybody blind. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding; it seeks to annihilate rather than to convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys a community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends by defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers. - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I think there are plenty of good people in America, but there are also plenty of bad people in America and the bad ones are the ones who seem to have all the power and be in these positions to block things that you and I need. Because this is the situation, you and I have to preserve the right to do what is necessary to bring an end to that situation, and it doesn't mean that I advocate violence, but at the same time I am not against using violence in self-defense. I don't even call it violence when it's self-defense, I call it intelligence. - Malcolm X Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

David and Tamler talk about a new study that links your belief in free will to the fullness of your bladder. How do our bodily states influence our metaphysical commitments? What's the best way to measure beliefs about free will? Can you get your prostate checked without having someone stick something in your private areas? Plus, an exclusive look at the shocking truth about social psychology experiments.  LinksThe Philosophical Implications of the Urge to Urinate by Dan Ladkin, Scientific American Ent, M. R., & Baumeister, R. F. (2014). Embodied free will beliefs: Some effects of physical states on metaphysical opinions. Consciousness and Cognition, 27, 147-154.Free Will and Determinism Scale (Rakos, Laurene, Skala, & Slane, 2008, Behavior and Social Issues).  

Following up their discussion of moral villains, Dave and Tamler argue about what makes a moral hero. Tamler defends Sharon Krause’s view that honor values can motivate heroic behavior. Dave accuses Tamler of being inconsistent (nothing wrong with that) and slightly Kantian (NOOOOOO!!!). In the final segment, we’re back on the same page fawning over Susan Wolf’s paper “Moral Saints.” Plus, are drunks more likely to be utilitarians? And why does Dave hate Temple Grandin?LinksThe Cold Logic of Drunk People by Emma Green [theatlantic.com]Duke, A. A., & Bègue, L. (2015). The drunk utilitarian: Blood alcohol concentration predicts utilitarian responses in moral dilemmas. Cognition, 134, 121-127. [sciencedirect.com]Wolf, S. (1982). Moral saints. The Journal of Philosophy, 419-439. [verybadwizards.com]Krause, S. R. (2002).  Honor and democratic reform (Ch. 5) [verybadwizards.com]. In Liberalism with honor [amazon.com affiliate link]. Harvard University Press. 

Paul Bloom joins us to talk all things villainous -why we sometimes root for the bad guys, why we admire them even when we don't, why they are much more compelling than some of our heroes.  Then more evidence that we're really a movie podcast at heart: we list our top 5 villains and antiheroes from TV and film.  Plus, more on the benefits of religious rituals and how to make a sitcom about Himmler.    Our Top 5 VillainsPaul Bloom Todd Alquist (Breaking Bad)Barney Stinson (How I Met Your Mother)The Joker (The Dark Knight)Bridgette Gregory (The Last Seduction)Agent Smith (The Matrix)Tamler SommersDaniel Plainview (There Will be Blood)/Tony Montana (Scarface)Willie (Bad Santa)Tommy  (Goodfellas)Alonzo Harris (Training Day)Go-Go (Kill Bill Vol. 1) David PizarroTom (Tom & Jerry)Keyser Soze (The Usual Suspects)Vic Mackey (The Shield)Harry Lime (The Third Man)Hal 9000 (2001 A Space Odyssey)Clips: "You need people like me.  The bad guy." "I'm sorry Dave.  I'm afraid I can't do that." From 2001: A Space Odyssey [youtube]"Come on Mr Ed.  Let's see it." From The Last Seduction [youtube]"A good narcotics agents loves his narcotics." From Training Day.  [youtube]"I loved a woman who wasn't clean."  "Mrs. Santa?"  "No, her sister."  From Bad Santa [youtube]"He showed these men of will what will really was." From The Usual Suspects. [youtube]"Funny how?" From Goodfellas [youtube] Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

Tamler and David get bullied into talking about "anti-natalism," (the view that it is unethical to bring a being into existence), and to defend our ethical position as "breeders." Well, one of us defends it, at least. The other one? Well, you'll have to judge for yourself... Along the way we discuss how much pleasure you would need to equal the pain and suffering you've experienced, the joy of pooping (especially while on E), and Tamler explains why he calls David a Kantian, and why he thinks it's such an insult. For those who have missed the arguing, it's back on this one. LinksAnti-Natalism [wikipedia.org]Ecclesiastes 4:2-3 [usccb.org]: And those now dead, I declared more fortunate in death than are the living to be still alive. And better off than both is the yet unborn, who has not seen the wicked work that is done under the sun. "No Life is Good" David Benatar.  [Philosopher's Magazine]Don't Have Any Children, by David Benatar [moreintelligentlife.com]David Benatar Radio Interview (MP3) on 702.co.zaEvery Conceivable Harm: A Further Defence of Anti-Natalism by David Benatar [squarespace.com]Baumeister, R. F., Bratslavsky, E., Finkenauer, C., & Vohs, K. D. (2001). Bad is stronger than good. Review of general psychology, 5(4), 323. [Thanks to listener Brian Erb]

Dave and Tamler take a shot at answering the question: what is an evolutionary psychologist? Is it just a psychologist who believes in evolution? (No.) Is it a psychologist who embraces a computational, modular theory of the mind? (No. Well, maybe…we’re not sure.) Are they psychologists who are part of a cult that fanatically endorse evolutionary explanations for every aspect of human judgment and behavior? (No! Well, most of them aren’t, anyway.) So what are they? And why do they generate so much hostility?Plus, we go back to Genesis (the real story of how we evolved) to offer another thought experiment: what is it like to be Adam and Eve before eating the forbidden fruit? What is it like not to know good and evil? And we give our aspiring playwright listeners a perfect idea for a one-act play: Abraham and Isaac walking down the mountain after the aborted sacrifice.LinksThe Tree of the Knowledge of Good & Evil [wikipedia.org]The Leviathan [wikipedia.org]E.O. Wilson [wikipedia.org]Sociobiology [wikipedia.org]Burke, D. (2014). Why isn't everyone an evolutionary psychologist? Evolutionary Psychology and Neuroscience, 5, 910.Making birds gay with science!: Adkins-Regan, E. (2011). Neuroendocrine contributions to sexual partner preference in birds. Frontiers in neuroendocrinology, 32(2), 155-163.Just-so stories [wikipedia.org]Waist-hip ratio [wikipedia.org]"A natural history of rape: Biological bases of sexual coercion" by Thornhill and Palmer [wikipedia.org]Buss, D. M., Larsen, R. J., Westen, D., & Semmelroth, J. (1992). Sex differences in jealousy: Evolution, physiology, and psychology. Psychological science, 3, 251-255.Satoshi Kanazawa [wikipedia.org]

Experience Machines, Chinese Rooms, Original Positions, and Ice Buckets.  ("I don't know what you have in mind for this evening Homer, but count me out!")  Dave and Tamler continue their discussion on thought experiments--how they can be effective, the difference between their use in philosophy and psychology, and how they can spin out of control like deadly viruses and become the disease they were trying to cure. Plus, do our motives matter when it comes to raising money for charity? LinksChinese Room thought experiment [wikipedia.org]Turing Test [wikipedia.org]Ice bucket challenge [alsa.org]Weird Al Yankovic does the Ice Bucket Challenge [youtube.com]Flight of the Conchords "Pro-Aids" [youtube.com]Rawls' Original Position [plato.stanford.edu]The Veil of Ignorance [wikipedia.org]Press Your Luck "No Whammies!" [youtube.com]Behaviorism [wikipedia.org]Logical positivism [wikipedia.org]

Episode Audio Dave and Tamler talk about the value and purposes of thought experiments in philosophy and science. Does the trolley problem tell us more about moral psychology than how people make judgments introlley problems? Can an imagined scenario about two balls refute an almost two thousand year old theory of falling objects?  When young virgin Dave learned all the physical facts about sex, did he learnanything new when it finally happened?  All this and more in Part One of our two part episode on this topic.LinksThe experience machine [wikipedia.org]Mary the color scientist [wikipedia.org]Zombies [wikipedia.org]Qualia [wikipedia.org]The Violinist from "A defense of Abortion" [wikipedia.org]The Ship of Theseus [wikipedia.org]Newcomb's Paradox [wikipedia.org]Ring of Gyges [wikipedia.org]Peter Singer's thought experiment [wikipedia.org]Veil of Ignorance [wikipedia.org]Galileo's Balls [philosophical-investigations.org]Tamler's Zombie Paper

Dude, do you ever think about how, like, we could be all be in the Matrix? Seriously, no no, dude, I'm being serious. It's like, none of this might be real, you know? Actually we don't know. We honestly can't believe we made it to 50 episodes, so we must be brains in a vat. But we play along and celebrate with...a movie episode! We list our five favorite films about the subjective or questionable nature of reality. Our only rule: we couldn't choose The Matrix.  Listen to this episode--your Mom says it's psychologically taut.LinksKramer, A. D., Guillory, J. E., & Hancock, J. T. (2014). Experimental evidence of massive-scale emotional contagion through social networks. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Rashomon (David) [imdb.com]Exit Through the Gift Shop (Tamler and David) [imdb.com]Banksy on "Life Remote Control" (clip, youtube.com)Paul Bloom on art and forgery [ted.com]Spirited Away (Tamler) [imdb.com]My Neighbor Totoro (David) [imdb.com]Mr. Snuffleupagus [wikipedia.org]Adaptation (Tamler) [imdb.com]Donnie Darko (David) [imdb.com]Stories we Tell (Tamler) [imdb.com]Waking Life (David) [imdb.com]Robert Solomon [wikipedia.org]Mulholland Drive (Tamler) [imdb.com]Tamler's Honorable MentionsPrimerDark CityEternal Sunshine of the Spotless MindMementoThe Truman ShowRosemary's BabyThe ShiningPurple Rose of CairoThe ConversationShutter IslandSome SPOILER ALERT LinksTim Minchin summarizes Donnie Darko in song [youtube.com]Everything you were afraid to ask about Mulholland Drive by Bill Wyman,  Max Garrone, and Andy Klein [salon.com]

Special guest Walter Sinnott-Armstrong joins the podcast to explain how his theory which desperately needs a new name ("contrastivism") can dissolve most of the fundamental problems and paradoxes in philosophy.  We also talk about psychopaths--what they are and what we can do about them.  But first we read and respond to an angry piece of fan mail (ok, maybe 'fan' is not the right word) from Sam Harris, trashing us--mostly Tamler--for our comments on VBW 45 about the new atheists. LinksSam Harris debates Andrew Sullivan [samharris.org]Richard Dawkins on the harm of fairy tales (read until the end) [telegraph.co.uk]Walter Sinnott-Armtrong's Home Page [duke.edu]Sinnott‐Armstrong, W. (2008). A contrastivist manifesto. Social Epistemology, 22(3), 257-270. Sinnott-Armstrong, Walter. (2006) It's not my fault: Global warming and individual moral obligations. Advances in the Economics of Environmental Resources 5, 285-307.The Memory of Jurors: Enhancing Trial Performance by Anders Sandberg, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, and Julian Savulescu. Special Guest: Walter Sinnott-Armstrong.

Dave and Tamler take a mulligan and try to resolve their conflict about restorative justice.  Do restorative processes lead to more just outcomes than other approaches? Is it more vulnerable to instances of prejudice and bias? Is revenge a form of restorative justice? Also, on this episode: can being sexist get you killed in a hurricane? Are replication attempts a form of bullying? And why is Dave hoarding gefilte fish in his pantry?LinksEd Yong on Hurricane Study [phenomena.nationalgeographic.com]Scatterplot blog on hurricane study [scatter.wordpress.com]Simine Vazire on "Repligate" [sometimesimwrong.typepad.com]Restorative Justice online [restorativejustice.org]"Restorative Justice in Texas: Past, Present, and Future."  by Mark Levin [texaspolicy.com]Bridges to Life [bridgestolife.org]Michelle Anderson The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness [amazon.com]

Tamler and David leech off of their listeners and dedicate an episode to their favorite comments, questions, and criticisms from the past few weeks (but not before Tamler goes on a rant about bicycle helmets). Included in this episode: Does doing research on hypothetical moral dilemmas actually say anything about how people would act in real life? Do people make different moral judgments in their native language than in a more recently acquired language? Do Tamler and David only appeal to intuitions when it's convenient for the view they are defending? Do they hold "barbaric" views about justice and revenge? Does doing philosophy make your life better? And, perhaps most importantly, why do we seem to mention porn on every episode? LinksBicycle helmet effectiveness [wikipedia.org]Tamler's appearance on The Partially Examined Life podcast [partiallyexaminedlife.com]Axons and Axioms podcast [axonsandaxioms.com]Spacetime Mind podcast [spacetimemind.com]A valuable site if you're interested in putting together your own podcast: Dan Benjamin's Podcasting Handbook [podcastinghandbook.co]If you like the music we use, you can listen/download here: soundcloud.com/peezismynamePea Soup Blog [peasoup.typepad.com]Qualia [wikipedia.org]Judith Jarvis Thomson's "A Defense of Abortion" [wikipedia.org]Entranced by Reality by Ian Corbin (Review of "A Life Worth Living: Albert Camus and the Quest for Meaning" by Robert Zaretsky). [theamericanconservative.com]Iranian killer's execution halted at last minute by victim's parents by Saeed Kamali Dehghan [theguardian.com]Academic Articles MentionedBartels, Daniel M. (2008), "Principled Moral Sentiment and the Flexibility of Moral Judgment and Decision Making," Cognition, 108, 381-417. [uchicago.edu]Costa, A., Foucart, A., Hayakawa, S., Aparici, M., Apesteguia, J., Heafner, J., & Keysar, B. (2014). Your Morals Depend on Language. PloS one, 9(4), e94842. [plosone.org]Gold, N., Colman, A. M., & Pulford, B. D. (2014). Cultural differences in responses to real-life and hypothetical trolley problems. Judgment and Decision Making, 9, 65-76. [sjdm.org]Special thanks to listeners (in order of question-appearance) Jakub Maly, Mark Ellis, Derek Leben, Jennifer Cohen, Rob Sica, Larson Landes, Billie Pritchett, Dave Herman, Otakar Horak, Monique Oliveira, Paul Bello, and Dag Soras. 

May I have your attention please? Will the real Josh Knobe please stand up? Will the real... [you know what, screw this--we're just dating ourselves.] X-phi phenom Josh Knobe rejoins the podcast to talk about the true self, naked people, gay preachers, and the Talmud. Plus, what happens when Tamler takes a sleeping pill by mistake in the afternoon and goes on Facebook? Why do you have get so drunk on Purim? And Dave discovers a Google-assisted loophole that allows you to be an immoral shit your whole life and get away with it.  LinksJoshua Knobe's home page [yale.edu]XXX: 30 Porn-Star Portraits by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders [amazon.com affiliate link]Gray, K., Knobe, J., Sheskin, M., Bloom, P., & Barrett, L. F. (2011). More than a body: mind perception and the nature of objectification. Journal of personality and social psychology, 101, 1207. [yale.edu]Moral Scrupulosity [wikipedia.org]Newman, G. E., Bloom, P., & Knobe, J. (2014). Value Judgments and the True Self. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 40, 203-216. [verybadwizards.com]Frankfurt on the Hierarchical Will: Frankfurt, H. G. (1988). Freedom of the Will and the Concept of a Person (pp. 127-144). Humana Press. [verybadwizards.com]"Tarred and Feathered" episode of "This American Life," covering a man who started a support group to keep pedophiles from victimizing children. [thisamericanlife.org]Purim [wikipedia.org]Simchat Torah [wikipedia.org]Pizarro, D.A., Uhlmann, E., & Salovey, P. (2003). Asymmetry in judgments of moral blame and praise: The role of perceived metadesires. Psychological Science, 14, 267-272. [peezer.net]Cohen, A. B., & Rozin, P. (2001). Religion and the morality of mentality. Journal of personality and social psychology, 81, 697. [upenn.edu]Newman, G. E., Lockhart, K. L., & Keil, F. C. (2010). “End-of-life” biases in moral evaluations of others. Cognition, 115, 343-349. [yale.edu] Stupid Sexy Flanders! Special Guest: Joshua Knobe.

A British tabloid article about kids, brains, and spatial skills somehow provokes the biggest argument ever on the podcast. Dave and Tamler get into it about gender, toys, properly rounded brains, and balanced "play diets." Is Dave a sanctimonious toe-the-line academic liberal?  Is Tamler a Fox-News watching, mysoginist genetic determinist? Do they actually disagree about anything? Plus Dave takes Tamler back after his fling with Partially Examined Life,  and we discuss whether the new documentary The Unbelievers the atheist version of God is Not Dead?LinksThe Partially Examined Life podcast, and Tamler's Precognition of Ep. 93. [partiallyexaminedlife.com]Girls and boys DO have different brains – should they have different toys? by Rachel Carlyle [express.co.uk]The Unbelievers [unbelieversmovie.com]My Growing Disappointment with the New Atheist Movement: A Review of the The UnBelievers.  Ami Palmer.  [missiontotransition.blogspot.com]Nosek, B. A., Banaji, M. R., & Greenwald, A. G. (2002). Math= male, me= female, therefore math≠ me. Journal of personality and social psychology, 83, 44. [briannosek.com]Cvencek, D., Meltzoff, A. N., & Greenwald, A. G. (2011). Math–gender stereotypes in elementary school children. Child development, 82, 766-779. [washington.edu]

David and Tamler argue about the use of autonomous robots and drones in warfare.  Could it lead to less suffering during wars and afterwards? Would nations be motivated to design robots that behave ethically on the battlefield? Can David get through an episode without mentioning Star Trek? Plus, Tamler distances himself from the villainous philosophy professor in the new movie God is Not Dead and David complains about the growing number of porn journals.  LinksKnowledge is Power Program (KIPP) [kipp.org]God's Not Dead [imdb.org]Arkin, R. C. (2010). The case for ethical autonomy in unmanned systems. Journal of Military Ethics, 9(4), 332-341.Kahn, P. W. (2002). The Paradox of Riskless Warfare. Philosophy & Public Policy Quarterly, 22(3), 2-7. [yale.edu]Singer, P. W. (2009). Wired for war: The robotics revolution and conflict in the twenty-first century. Penguin. [amazon.com affiliate link] "A Taste of Armageddon" Episode 23, Star Trek (The Original Series) [wikipedia.org] Moral Machines in the Military Sphere by Dr. Paul Bello. http://robotsandyou.eucognition.orgBio: Paul Bello joined the Office of Naval Research as a Program Officer in the Warfighter Performance and Protections Department in May of 2007.

Dave and Tamler talk about a recent study that seems to support the view that "justice is what the judge had for breakfast" (or at least how long ago the parole board had breakfast), and that makes Tamler question his position on widening judicial discretion in criminal justice.  In the second segment David tries to work out his guilt about manipulating consumers into buying stuff for whatever shadowy organization employs him (BEWorks!), and we discuss the ethics of nudges in government and consumer marketing. Should the government frame issues like organ donation in ways that will benefit society? How much of a threat are nudges to our autonomy? Should Apple take steps to ensure that people can control themselves when making in-app purchases? Tamler even comes up with a "theory," which means that there must have been something wrong with him. Please note that portions of the audio during the second segment are little spotty, likely due to a hex or poltergeist in one of the microphones.  We'll have that worked out for the next episode.  Enjoy!     (For the handful who have asked--if you like the music David makes for the podcast, you can listen/download to your heart's content at www.soundcloud.com/peezismyname).LinksDanziger, S., Levav, J., & Avnaim-Pesso, L. (2011). Extraneous factors in judicial decisions. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 108(17), 6889-6892. [pnas.org]"Prisoners of our own resources" by Jonathan Levav, TEDx Rio de la Plata [youtube.com]Capestany, B. H., & Harris, L. T. (2014). Disgust and biological descriptions bias logical reasoning during legal decision-making. Social neuroscience, 1-13. [tandfonline.com]Asymmetric Dominance (Decoy Effect) [wikipedia.org]Opting-in vs Opting-out of organ donations [nytimes.com]The evil stuff people do with in app purchases and games [ibtimes.com]

Can a fully determined creature deliberate? How big a role does conscious reasoning play in moral judgment and everyday life? Are we responsible for our thoughts and actions? Paul Bloom rejoins us against his better judgment to discuss his book "Just Babies" and his recent article in The Atlantic that set the internet on the fire and riled up the likes of Sam Harris and Jerry Coyne.  Plus, what's the difference (if any) between getting into a Star Trek transporter and getting an axe to the head, and why does David know so much about boy bands?LinksJust Babies by Paul Bloom [amazon.com-vbw affiliate link]The War on Reason by Paul Bloom [theatlantic.com]Jerry Coyne replies to Paul Bloom's Article [whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com]Bloom replies to Coyne [whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com]Tamler is the only one who realized he has a face for radio.  Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

Dave keeps trying to explain to Tamler that we're not a movie podcast, but somehow they're doing another podcast about movies. This time they each list their top 5 movies featuring moral dilemmas. Also, Tamler tries to rationalize the Woody Allen controversy, Ozymandias from Watchmen says "screw you Paul Bloom," Dave confuses Maggie Gyllenhaal with Droopy, and for the second time ever we have to censor something one of us (Tamler) says. Put on your astronaut adult diapers, folks, it's a long one. LinksDylan Farrow's Story [nytimes.com]Woody Allen Speaks Out [nytimes.com]The Woody Allen Allegations: Not So Fast [thedailybeast.com]"It's shockingly easy to create false memories" by Cara Laney [thedailybeast.com]Elizabeth Loftus [wikipedia.org]Watchmen Graphic Novel [wikipedia.org]The Vengeance Trilogy [wikipedia.org]Droopy Dog [wikipedia.org]Maggie Gyllenhal looks like Droopy Dog [cheezeburger.com]"Hard Determinism, Punishment, and Funishment" by Saul Smilansky [philosophycommons.typepad.com] Tamler's Top 5 (links all go to IMDB.com)The Third ManSympathy for Mr. VengeanceIn BrugesLa Femme du Boulanger (The Baker's Wife)Gone Baby GoneDavid's Top 5 The Dark KnightWatchmenMinority Report3:10 to YumaExecutive DecisionTamler's Honorable MentionsMovies that couldn't be talked about without spoilers:Oldboy (Park Chanwook's not fucking Spike Lee's).MotherThe Maltese FalconSevenMovies too close to personal identity SolarisShutter IslandSo close...Beast of the Southern Wild.3:10 to YumaThe Dark KnightCasablancaThe InsiderDonnie BrascoMaltese FalconShaneDo the Right ThingPrincess Mononoke

Jesse Graham joins us for part 2 of our discussion on the nature of morality, and his recent paper on Moral Foundations Theory. He highlights the key components of MFT, defends himself against our accusations of weaseling out of the normative implications of MFT, champions "Synechdoche, New York" as one of the greatest films ever made, and comes out of the closet as a rationalist. Also in this episode, Tamler begins to defend Sam Harris (you read that right) from Dan Dennett's criticisms of Harris' Free Will--and then we pull back and realize that we need to devote a whole episode to Dennett's review.  LinksDan Dennett's review of "Free Will" by Sam Harris [naturalism.org]Free Will by Sam Harris [amazon.com affiliate link]Jesse Graham's lab website [usc.edu]Moral Foundations Theory: The Pragmatic Validity of Moral Pluralism by Jesse Graham et al. Synechdoche, New York   (RIP Phllip Seymour Hoffman!) Special Guest: Jesse Graham.

Dave and Tamler bounce back this week after having to trash the last episode. Does morality ultimately boil down to a single principle (such as harm or justice), or is there more to ethical life than is dreamt of in the minds of philosophers? We settle this question once and for all in the first of a 2-part episode in which we discuss Jesse Graham et al's recent paper on Moral Foundations Theory. (Jesse Graham himself will join us for part 2).  Plus: how liberal is this podcast?  We'll give you the precise percentage after taking a Time.com quiz that purports to measure political leanings, (and which includes that perennial litmus test of political preferences: is it OK to come home and find your partner watching porn?)     LinksCan TIME predict your politics? [science.time.com]Moral Foundations Theory: The Pragmatic Validity of Moral Pluralism Foundations Theory (in press, Advances in Experimental Social Psychology) by Graham, J. et al [usc.edu]Old School [imdb.com]"Boy, I've Put You in a Really Tough Spot, Haven't I?" by Woody Allen [onion.com]

Who is the real you? What happens to your identity when your body gets cloned or reconstituted with all the same memories and character traits? Does society construct our true selves or repress them? Can we ever escape our pasts and become different people?   Dave thinks conceptual analysis and arousal measuring devices can solve all these problems but allows Tamler his dream of temporarily becoming the host of a movie podcast. They list their top 5 favorite movies about personal identity. Plus, do they have to eat still more crow--this time from Sam Harris?       LinksPersonal Identity [plato.stanford.edu]Google Glass [youtube.com]Tamler's Top 55. Fight Club4. A Clockwork Orange3. Infernal Affairs2. Moon1. A History of ViolenceDavid's Top 55. Blade Runner4. Vertigo3. Looper 2. Groundhog Day1. Back to the FutureHonorable MentionsSolaris (Russian version)Being John MalkovichMementoMy Fair LadyAll of MeZelig One Flew Over the Cuckoos NestSpirited AwayThe PrestigeShutter IslandUnforgivenSide EffectsAny Star Trek Movie

The guest we've been waiting for--Nina Strohminger--joins us to talk about the connection between disgust and humor, cheap laughs, moral character and personal identity, and the British opt-in plan for porn.  Plus: how psychologists measure erections and Dave goes Platonist about the form of hilarity. Tamler's daughter should have issued an extra strong disclaimer for this one.LinksNina Strohminger [ninastrohminger.com]David Cameron Proposes Porn Filter [thedailybeast.com]Strohminger, N. and Nichols, S. (in press). The Essential Moral Self. Cognition. Special Guest: Nina Strohminger.

Our most irresponsible episode ever!  Dave and Tamler talk about two reviews of a book they haven't read--Joshua Greene's Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap Between Us and Them--and feel only a little shame.   (Since the recording, at least one of us has finished the book).  Can Greene successfully debunk all non-utilitarian intuitions?  Does Greene have a dark enough view of human nature?  What would an ideal moral world look like?   Will Dave ever stop making fun of Tamler's haunted boy haircut?  We answer all of these questions and more.  Plus we respond to a listener's email and read a couple of our favorite iTunes reviews.LinksMoral tribes: Emotion, reason, and the gap between us and them by Joshua Greene [amazon.com]Joshua Greene's website [harvard.edu]Why can't we all just get along? The uncertain biological basis of morality. Robert Wright reviews "Moral Tribes" for The Atlantic.You Can't Learn About Morality from Brain Scans: The problem with moral psychology. Thomas Nagel Reviews "Moral Tribes" for the New RepublicIf you don't already have it, Tamler's interview with Joshua Greene and Liane Young in his book A Very Bad Wizard is worth the read [amazon.com]On Debunking (Tamler's five part series of posts at Eric Schwitzgebel's blog The Splintered Mind)*book links are amazon affiliate links. They are the same price for you but sends a few pennies our way. 

Dave and Tamler talk about the influence of character judgments on attributions of blame. What is the function of the blame--to assign responsibility or to judge a person's character? Is it fair that we blame douchebags more than good people who commit exactly the same act, or is it yet another cognitive bias that should be avoided? Plus we delve into the Richie Incognito hazing story (maybe a little early since the story has developed) and Tamler tries to figure out how to teach the Gospels to students who know roughly 100 times as much about them than he does. Links"The Miami Dolphins and Everything that Will Never Make Sense." by Andrew Sharp.  (grantland.com)Interview with Richie Incognito (youtube.com) Gospel of Matthew [wikipedia.org]Synoptic Gospels [wikipedia.org]Pizarro, D.A. & Tannenbaum, D. (2011). Bringing character back: How the motivation to evaluate character influences judgments of moral blame. In M. Mikulincer & Shaver, P. (Eds) The Social psychology of morality: Exploring the causes of good and evil. APA Press.  A recent chapter on character and moral psychology that David wrote (with Roy Baumeister) just to be able to talk about comics and porn : Superhero Comics as Moral Pornography. In R. Rosenberg (Ed.) Our Superheroes, Ourselves. Oxford University Press.Tannenbaum, D., Uhlmann, E. L., & Diermeier, D. (2011). Moral signals, public outrage, and immaterial harms. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 47(6), 1249-1254.

Special guest Will Wilkinson joins the podcast to talk about whether fiction makes us better people, and to discuss his recent Daily Beast article that trashed Dave's profession and livelihood. Also, Dave and Tamler try to make sense of Ancient Greek justice in a myth about incest, adultery, daughter-killing, husband-killing, matricide, cannibalism, and trash talking to disembodied heads.     LinksAgamemnon [wikipedia.org]Will Wilkinson [wikipedia.org] The Will Wilkinson article that hurt David's feelings [thedailybeast.com]Hurt Feelings by Flight of the Concords [youtube.com] Does great literature make us better? by Gregory Currie [nytimes.com] Reading literature makes us smarter and nicer by Annie Murphy Paul [time.com]Want to learn how to think? Read fiction by Tom Jacobs [psmag.com]In Pursuit of Happiness Research [pdf] by Will Wilkinson    Special Guest: Will Wilkinson.

Special guest Laurie Santos (Psychology, Yale) joins us to talk about what animal cognition can tell us about human nature. Why are other primates better at resisting the misleading influence of others than humans? Is conformity a byproduct of our sophisticated cultural learning capacities? Are we more like Chimpanzees or Bonobos? Why does Dave spend so much time writing Smurf fan fiction? [Smurf you, Tamler. -dap]. Also, Dave and Tamler talk about a scathing review of Malcolm Gladwell's new book, and Eliza Sommers poses the question of the day. This was a fun one. LinksComparative Cognition Laboratory [yale.edu]Laurie Santos and Jesse Bering on The Mind Report [bloggingheads.tv] Buy Jesse Bering's latest book "Perv: The Sexual Deviant in All of Us" [amazon.com affiliate link]Philospher's Pipe (a directory of podcasts related to philosophy) [philosopherspipe.com]Smurfette [wikipedia.org]Horner, V., & Whiten, A. (2005). Causal knowledge and imitation/emulation switching in chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and children (Homo sapiens). Animal cognition, 8(3), 164-181.Kovács, Á. M., Téglás, E., & Endress, A. D. (2010). The social sense: Susceptibility to others’ beliefs in human infants and adults. Science, 330(6012), 1830-1834. True Bonobo Love [youtube.com]Bonobos vs. Chimps [youtube.com] What does the fox say? [youtube.com] "The Trouble With Malcolm Gladwell."  by Christopher Chabris [Slate.com]."Christopher Chabris Should Calm Down" by Malcolm Gladwell [Slate.com]   Special Guest: Laurie Santos.

Part II of our discussion on Rai and Fiske (sort of):  We answer a listener's email and in the process get into an episode long argument about moral intuitions, psychological facts, the implications of moral disagreement. Before that, we talk about the recent study about testicles and parenting.  We don't play small ball on this one. LinksTesticular volume is inversely correlated with nurturing-related brain activity in human fathers [pnas.org]"Study: You May be a Terrible Dad Because You Have Enormous Testicles" "Aw Nuts!  Nurturing Dads Have Smaller Testicles, Study Shows""Want to Know if Your Partner Will Be a Good Dad?  Measure His Testicles." Frances Kamm [wikipedia.org]Reflective Equilibrium [plato.stanford.edu]Doris, J. M., and Plakias, A. (2008). “How to Argue about Disagreement: Evaluative Diversity and Moral Realism.” In Walter Sinnott-Armstrong (ed.), Moral Psychology, Volume 2: The Cognitive Science of Morality. Cambridge: MIT Press 

In the first of a two-part episode, we discuss one of our favorite recent papers--Tage Rai and Alan Page Fiske's 2011 paper on how social relationships shape and motivate our moral emotions and judgments.  We also talk about Sam Harris' $20,000 Moral Landscape  Challenge, and whether there's any real chance of convincing him that the arguments he made in The Moral Landscape (first published in English in 2011) are wrong. LinksSam Harris' Moral Landscape Challenge [samharris.org]Alan Fiske's overview of Relational Models Theory [sscnet.ucla.edu]Tage Rai's research [kellogg.northwestern.edu]Rai, T. S., & Fiske, A. P. (2011). Moral psychology is relationship regulation: moral motives for unity, hierarchy, equality, and proportionality. Psychological review, 118, 57-75. [irsp.ucla.edu] 

Dave and Tamler celebrate their one year anniversary and 30th episode with one of their least cynical episodes yet.  They talk about 5 philosophy/psychology(-ish) books that influenced and inspired them throughout the years.  They also respond to a listener email that accuses them (mostly Tamler) of being "reckless and irresponsible" in their discussion of responding to insults.   Episode Links (Please note that the Top 5 links below are to purchase books through amazon.com via the Very Bad Wizards amazon affiliate account) Tamler's Top 5 5. The Razor's Edge 4. Culture Of Honor: The Psychology Of Violence In The South (New Directions in Social Psychology)/Humiliation: And Other Essays on Honor, Social Discomfort, and Violence 3. The Extended Phenotype: The Long Reach of the Gene (Popular Science) 2. Passions Within Reason: The Strategic Role of the Emotions 1. Jacques the Fatalist and His Master (Penguin Classics) David's Top 5 5. Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman 4. Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid 3. The Modularity of Mind: An Essay on Faculty Psychology 2. Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies 1. Passions Within Reason: The Strategic Role of the Emotions Honorable MentionsRevenge: A Story of Hope.  Laura BlumenfeldMortal Questions by Thomas NagelThe Fragility of Goodness by Martha NussbaumNot by Genes Alone: by Peter Richerson and Richard BoydThe Principles of Psychology by William JamesDescartes Error by Antonio DamasioBeyond Good and Evil Thus Spoke Zarathustra The Open Society and Its Enemies by Karl PopperThe Hedgehog and the Fox by Isaiah BerlinEthics: Inventing Right and Wrong by J.L. MackieFinally...David shows Richard Dawkins "Lemon Party"  

Dave and Tamler try to artificially bulk up their expertise on the ethics of performance enhancing drugs and end up raising a lot more questions than they answer.  Why do we condemn certain methods for boosting performance on the playing field and praise others?  Why is it OK to train at high altitudes but not in hyperbaric chambers that simulate high altitudes?  Why is Lance Armstrong a villain and Graham Greene (who wrote many of his most famous novels on benzedrine) a hero?   Is there genetic therapy to cure haunted child haircuts, and if there is, how can Tamler get access to it?  Of course, no discussion on PEDs would be complete without clips from South Park and Sanford and Son.  Also, David misremembers Lyle Alzado as a regular on an 80's sitcom because of a single appearance on "Small Wonder."  We probably should have taken some podcast enhancing drugs for this one.  LinksPerformance-enhancing drugs [wikipedia.org]Benzedrine [wikipedia.org] What do Auden, Sartre, and Ayn Rand have in common? Amphetamines [slate.com] Lyle Alzado [wikipedia.org] "Turin Sample: The nonsense of Olympic doping rules" by William Saletan [slate.com] "Brain Gain: The underground world of 'neuroenhancing' drugs"  by Margaret Talbot [newyorker.com]Adderall [wikipedia.org]Modafinil (Provigil) [wikipedia.org] "A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems"  -Paul Erdos  [amphetamines.org]Up the down steroid [southparkstudios.com] Sanford and Son: "Gorilla Cookies"  [youtube.com]  

Dave and Tamler try their best to do a show without guests--we talk about moral persuasion, motivated reasoning, and whether it's legitimate to use emotionally charged rhetoric in a philosophical argument. Plus, we describe how students proceed through the "Stages-of-Singer," and Tamler finally defends himself against Dave's slanderous accusation of hypocrisy about animal welfare. LinksThomson, J. J. (1971). A defense of abortion.  Philosophy & Public Affairs,1, 47-66.Marquis, D. (1989). Why abortion is immoral.  The Journal of Philosophy, 86(4), 183-202.Ditto, P. H., & Lopez, D. F. (1992). Motivated skepticism: Use of differential decision criteria for preferred and nonpreferred conclusions. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 63 (4), 568.Ditto, P.H., Pizarro, D.A., & Tannenbaum, D. (2009). Motivated Moral Reasoning. In B. H. Ross (Series Ed.) & D. M. Bartels, C. W. Bauman, L. J. Skitka, & D. L. Medin (Eds.), Psychology of Learning and Motivation, Vol. 50: Moral Judgment and Decision Making. San Diego, CA: Academic Press.Dawson, E., Gilovich, T., & Regan, D. T. (2002). Motivated Reasoning and Performance on the Wason Selection Task. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 1379-1387.Sam's House, an orphanage in Nepal [sams-house.org] The identifiable victim effect [wikipedia.org] Tamler's mediocre TEDx talk on Moral Persuasion [youtube.com]10 Classic South Park Impressions (including Sally Struthers) [youtube.com]*musical breaks in this episode stolen from DJ Premier and Jay Electronica. Please don't sue.  

Our streak of very special guests continues!  Philosopher Eddy Nahmias joins the podcast to us why people mistakenly think they're not morally responsible, and how his new study casts doubt on Sam Harris's "pamphlet" on free will.  Eddy also describes his new project (with Toni Adleberg and Morgan Thompson) on why women leave philosophy.  Plus Dave and I discuss some reasons for having children, and eat a little Partially Examined Life crow. Links "Name five women in philosophy.  Bet you can't." Tania Lombrozo, [npr.og] "Do Women Have Different Philosophical Intuitions than Men?" Eddy Nahmias (philosophyofbrains.com) "Is Neuroscience the Death of Free Will?' Eddy Nahmias.  [nytimes.com] Eddy on Bypassing [agencyandresponsbility.typepad.com]Edd trashing Tamler's Book [agencyandresponsbility.typepad.com]     Special Guest: Eddy Nahmias.

Psychologist and author Jesse Bering joins us to talk about evolutionary psychology and his forthcoming book Perv.   In the relatively uncontroversial part of the episode, we ask if homophobia is an adaptation and if women have evolved rape defenses.  After that, sex with animals, sex with bookshelves, foot fetishes, amputee fetishes, falling down the stairs fetishes... I don't know, just listen.  Or maybe don't.  Jesse Bering [jessebering.com]  Perv (pre-order)  by Jesse Bering [amazon.com]"Darwin's Rape Whistle," by Jesse Bering [slate.com] "Natural Homophobes?" by Jesse Bering [scientificamerican.com] The Belief Instinct by Jesse Bering [amazon.com]Why is the Penis Shaped Like That?  by Jesse Bering [amazon.com]"I think you're some kind of deviated prevert."  [youtube.com]  Special Guest: Jesse Bering.

Josh Knobe, the Michael Corleone of experimental philosophy, joins us to talk about taking philosophy into the lab and the streets.   We discuss how people moralize everyday concepts like intention, causation, and innateness.  Dave wonders if X-phi people are just doing social psychology, and Tamler tries his best to get Josh mad with his critique of Josh's experimental work on free will.  He might have succeeded but that argument had to be cut a little short this time.  We'll have to have Josh back for the rematch!  LinksExperimental philosophy Anthem [youtube.com]Experimental Philosophy [fun 3 minute overview, youtube.com] The Experimental Philosophy webpage. Josh Knobe's webpage Person as Scientist, Person as Moralist by Joshua KnobePhilosophy meets the real world  [slate.com] In Memoriam: The X-Phi Debate by Tamler Sommers [Philosophers Magazine] Experimental Philosophy and Free Will: An Intervention by Tamler SommersExperimental Philosophy [wikipedia.org] Using the Knobe effect as an implicit measure of homophobia:  Inbar, Y., Pizarro, D.A., Knobe, J., & Bloom, P. (2009). Disgust sensitivity predicts intuitive disapproval of gays, Emotion, 9, 435-439.    Special Guest: Joshua Knobe.

Paul Bloom joins us in the second segment for a lively discussion about the value of  empathy as a guide our moral decisions.  And in our first scoop, we talk about Paul's new book (coming in November) Just Babies: The Origin of Good and Evil ,  racist babies, and how 80s sitcoms changed the world.  In the first segment, Dave and Tamler face the music and try to respond to a listener's criticisms of their episode on slurs and offensiveness (Episode 22) .  LinksThe Baby in the Well: The Case Against Empathy by Paul Bloom [newyorker.com] Descartes' Baby  by Paul Bloom [amazon.com]Jesse Prinz "Is empathy necessary for morality" [subcortex.com] Pizarro, Bloom, and Detweiler-Bedell on the empathy, disgust, and the moral circle [peezer.net] Pre-order Just babies: The origins of good and evil by Paul Bloom [amazon.com]Louis CK: My Life is Really Evil.    Special Guest: Paul Bloom.

Dave, Tamler, and special guest Yoel Inbar break down Sam Peckinpah's brilliant (at least according  to one of us) 1971 film Straw Dogs.    They talk about the notorious rape scene, the meaning of the final siege, standing up to Cornish townies, and whether the urge to respond to insults is rational in in modern society.  Also: Yoel and Tamler go another round in their debate about statistics and grad school. LinksStraw Dogs [imdb.com] Yoel Inbar [yoelinbar.net] "The Power of Straw Dogs" [dailybeast.com] Edward Copeland on Straw Dogs [eddieonfilm.blogspot.com]"Home Like No Place: Peckinpah's Straw Dogs."  [criterion.com] Musical interlude courtesy of Monibeatz  [http://monibeatz.bandcamp.com/] Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

In what might very well be the last episode before we're pulled off the air, Tamler outlines his data-free "theory" of what makes something offensive. What makes a joke about race, ethnicity, gender, disability funny sometimes, and deeply hurtful at other times? What makes Louis CK so goddamn funny and Andrew Dice Clay just...an asshole? Is Family Guy racist? Throughout the episode, David defends the victims of hatred and is a voice of empathy and reason, while Tamler drops the c-word multiple times, jumps to racist conclusions, and makes fun of David's partial Arab heritage. LinksLouis CK and his friends discuss the word f@**%tWikipedia on F**** and C*** [wikipedia.org]Bill Burr on the c-word [youtube.com]Andy Ihnatko's podcast on 5by5.tv, where he discusses why Family Guy is not funnyThe Troubling Viral Trend of the “Hilarious” Black Neighbor by Aisha Harris [slate.com] 

Dave and Tamler shrug off inside baseball concerns and argue whether to go to grad school, what to do when you get there, and share horror stories about the job market.   Also, Tamler explains why the sorority sister who wrote the infamous email is a "civil rights visionary," Dave refuses to say "c*#t punt," and listener contributions from Boomer Trujillo, Yoel Inbar, Rachel Grazioplene, Dave Tucker, and Nina Strohminger. LinksMichael Shannon Reads Sorority Letter [funnyordie.com]David Ortiz Pregame Speech [youtube.com] Twitter beef"Thesis Hatement" by Rebecca Schuman [slate.com]"Thesis Defense" by Katie Roiphie [slate.com] The Impossible Decision by Joshua Rothman [newyorker.com] VBW Bonus content: Dave and Yoel inbar on the "replicability crisis."

Dave and Tamler begin with a brief, heartfelt discussion about the Boston Bombings.  Tamler talks about why Patriots' Day and the Boston Marathon mean so much to a kid growing up in Boston.  They speculate a bit about the motive behind the attack and ask why the perpetrators didn't come out and claim responsibility.  In the second and third segments, Molly Crockett joins us to challenge Fiery Cushman for the prize of classiest episode ever.  She tells us about her research on the effects of serotonin depletion on retributive behavior, and how it was reported as "Chocolate and Cheese help you make better decisions" in the popular media.  We talk about the responsibility that scientists have to make sure that their studies are reported properly, and how brain research can (despite David's previous claims) help shed light on human nature and behavior.  Also: Tamler mangles the pronunciation of roughly 14 brain regions, Dave yearns for the days when restrictions of human experimentation were non-existent, and both Dave and Tamler subtly and then not so subtly try to get Molly to hook them up with...molly.  Enjoy!LinksDirty Water by the Standells [youtube.com]Patriots' Day [wikipedia.org]Molly Crockett  [mollycrockett.com]Crockett, M. J., Clark, L., Tabibnia, G., Lieberman, M. D., & Robbins, T. W. (2008). Serotonin modulates behavioral reactions to unfairness. Science, 320, 1739.Serotonin [wikipedia.org]Striatum [wikipedia.org]DMT [wikipedia.org]   Special Guests: Fiery Cushman and Molly Crockett.

Re-recording a not-so-tragically lost episode (it kinda sucked), Dave and Tamler talk about the things they hate most about philosophy and psychology.  But first they discuss a blog post by a Rochester professor that wonders why it's not OK to rape someone who's passed out.  Also: same-sex marriage, telling dirty jokes to your daughter, Meredith Baxter Birney, Lifetime movies, how to eat crawfish, and Dave takes a bold, even heroic, stand by criticizing a Republican senator.     LinksIn honor of our 19th episode, some Paul Hardcastle for you..Opening clip: Bridge on the River Kwai [youtube.com] Economist: Rapists reaping rewards of passed out girls  [gawker.com]Molly Crockett's TEDx Talk on Neuro-Bunk  [TED.com]Friendship and Freedom (blog post, Flickers of Freedom--Tamler and Saul Smilanksy get into it about the "dubiousness" of gratitude in the comments )The Ikea Effect [hbr.org] Paul Bloom and David talk about social psychology's dismissal of reason [bloggingheads.tv] Donate to Oxfam. It will feel good.  And then afterwards... 

Joe Henrich joins the podcast to tell us that we know nothing about his work and that how we got to teach a class in anything is absolutely amazing.   We continue our discussion from Episode 17 about his critique of the social and behavioral sciences in "The Weirdest People in the World" and his work in small scale societies on fairness norms.  We also talk about the weird American obsession with happiness, monkeys throwing cucumbers, and why some people reject "hyper-fair" offers of more than the half the pot in the ultimatum games.  Links"I happen to have Marshall Mcluhan right here."   (From Woody Allen's Annie Hall.)  Longer HD version hereJoe Henrich UBC.ca | Wikipedia The Machiguenga [wikipedia.org] Henrich on Brosnan and DeWaal's capuchin inequity aversion study. Chicha [wikipedia.org] How much money would it take for you to kill a puppy? [liveleak.com] Relevant papers are listed in the notes for Episode 17: Learning About Bushmen from Studying Freshmen?   Special Guest: Joe Henrich.

Thousands of studies in psychology rely on data from North American undergraduates. Can we really conclude anything about the "human" mind from such a limited sample-- especially since Westerners are probably more different from the rest of the world's population than any other group?  We talk about Joseph Henrich and colleagues' critique of the behavioral sciences in their paper "The WEIRDEST People in the World."    David offers a defense of psychology, arguing that it's usually not the goal of lab studies to generalize findings to all humans in the first place.  Also, Tamler  gives a brief, heartfelt, completely non-awkward rant about monkey torturer Harry Harlow and David defends the practice of electrocuting baby monkeys for no reason. LinksThe Gods Must Be Crazy [IMDB.com]Bushmen [wikipedia.org]Homo Economicus [wikipedia.org]The Ultimatum Game [wikipedia.org]Müller-Lyer illusion [wikipedia.org]We aren't the world [psmag.com]Harlow studies [wikipedia.org]Henrich, J., Heine, S. J., & Norenzayan, A. (2010).The weirdest people in the world. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 33, 61-83.Henrich, J., Boyd, R., Bowles, S., Camerer, C., Fehr, E., Gintis, H., & McElreath, R. (2001). In search of homo economicus: behavioral experiments in 15 small-scale societies. American Economic Review, 73-78.Mook, D.G. (1983). In Defense of External Invalidity. American Psychologist, 38,379-387. 

For those who thought our most uncomfortable topics were behind us, on this episode we are joined by David's childhood friend Damani McDole [facebook.com] to discuss several potentially offensive topics surrounding race and justice in America, such as slavery, reparations, affirmative action, and the use of the N-word. When Damani mounts an economic and moral defense for reparations for the descendants of slaves, David prefers to point to the difficulties in deciding who gets paid ( someone who's 1/16th descended from slaves? Jamaican-Americans? African immigrants?) and who should be responsible for paying (only people whose descendants benefitted from slavery? all non-slave descended taxpayers?). Tamler proposes (taking a note from Lenny Bruce) that if we use the N-word often enough it will lose its sting, and decides to practice what he preaches. And Damani reveals a surprising theory about race and geography (surprising for a Black man, at least) that leaves Tamler awkwardly speechless. For those who are visually inclined: here's a one-minute set of behind-the-scenes clips from our Google+ Hangout:Links Nigger [wikipedia.org]Leonardo DiCaprio bleeds for his role in Django Unchained [cinemablend.com]Lenny Bruce- Are there any niggers here tonight? [youtube.com] 60-year old white man slaps Black baby  [thesmokinggun.com] The truth about 40 Acres and a Mule [theroot.com]The "great migration" of American Blacks out of the South [inmotionaame.org]1811 Louisiana Slave Rebellion [theroot.com]Maya Angelou and Dave Chappelle on Iconoclasts [sundancechannel.com]Bonus: Dave Chappelle imagines reparations [youtube.com]  Special Guest: Joseph Damani McDole.

You don't need to be a psychologist or a philosopher to enjoy a good, old-fashioned bitch-fest. In the first of a two-part episode (no single compact disc, 8-track, or LP could hold all our complaints), Tamler and David list two of the things that bug them about their respective fields. We take issue with bad writing, brain worship, meaningless questions, and psychologists' obsession with the number two. Enjoy and try not to hold it against us. LinksSimpsons clip on philosophy majors [youtube.com]Peter Hacker on philosophy [leiterreports.typepad.com]Business-speak buzzwords [wikipedia.org]Dual process theory [wikipedia.org]Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman [amazon.com]Dual-Process Theories in Social Psychology [amazon.com]Gettier Problem [wikipedia.org]Seduced by the flickering lights of the brain by Paul Bloom [seedmagazine.com] 

In a break from tradition, we recorded a 25-minute episode on the morality of tattletaling, snitching, ratting, and whistleblowing. We discuss why these people seem especially despicable (except for maybe "Bubbles" from "The Wire" and the guy from "The Insider"), and David gets Tamler to agree that he'd never turn him into the police. We also puzzle over the existence of porn theaters, and the origins of the expression "flip a bitch." LinksStop Snitchin' campaign [wikipedia.org]Bubbles (character from "The Wire") [wikipedia.org]Time Magazine Persons of the Year: Whistleblowers [time.com]Ingram, G. P., & Bering, J. M. (2010). Children’s tattling: The reporting of everyday norm violations in preschool settings. Child development, 81, 945-957.Obie Trice feat. Akon "Snitch""Dry Snitching" [urbandictionary.com] 

Our classiest episode yet (OK, that's not saying much, but still...)--Psychologist Fiery Cushman joins us for a discussion about collective punishment and collective responsibility. We use Fiery's recent paper on the practice of "beaning" in baseball (punishing one player for a teammate's offense by throwing a 95 MPH fastball at the player's head) to illustrate the phenomenon. Is the "innocent" player being punished because he is somehow morally responsible for his teammate's offense?  Or does deserve have nothing to do with it?  Also in this episode: listener feedback (sort of, we're just psyched to have a Norwegian stand-up comic as a listener), and Fiery solves the 3,000 year-old problem of moral responsibility just so he can get out of Dave's hotel room.  LinksFiery Cushman [brown.edu]Beanball [wikipedia.org]Hatfield-McCoy Blood Feud [wikipedia.org]Major League (1989) [imdb.com]Revenge: A story of hope, by Laura BlumenfeldBlood Revenge, by Christopher Boehm"The Two Faces of Revenge: Moral Responsibility and the Culture of Honor." T Sommers."John Kruk and Desert." [Flickers of Freedom blog post]

Dave and Tamler square off the role of the victim in criminal punishment and find little to agree about. Tamler defends the restorative justice approach, while Dave expresses skepticism about its value and worries it might even be damaging. Arguments ensue, but be sure to stick around for the third segment as it features an unusually focused and productive discussion--for them anyway.Also discussed:  the best character on "The Wire," the startling specificity of KG's trash-talking, and a listener calls us out on not justifying the meaningfulness of life. LinksFamily Guy- Breaking Bad (and The Wire)  [youtube.com]The Wire- Omar in court [youtube.com]Restorative Justice [wikipedia.org]Christie, N. (1977). Conflicts as Property. British Journal of CriminologyGreg Ousley is sorry for killing his parents. Is that enough? [NY Times magazine]"The Caging of America" by Adam Gopnik.  [New Yorker]"Can Forgiveness Play a Role in Criminal Justice?" [NY Times magazine]

Social psychologist Yoel Inbar joins Tamler and David to discuss Clint Eastwood's masterpiece of the Western genre, "Unforgiven." The discussion includes the nature of revenge, the requirements of justice, the rules of nicknaming, and who or what was being referred to as  "unforgiven" in the movie's title.LinksUnforgiven (1992): IMDB, Wikipedia PageIf you haven't seen "Unforgiven," don't worry : Story Spoilers Don't Spoil Stories Actor Saul Rubinek [wikipedia.org] Relevant Book about moral character by a couple of great social psychologists: Out of Character: Surprising Truths About the Liar, Cheat, Sinner (and Saint) Lurking in All of Us Special Guest: Yoel Inbar.

Does life have meaning if there is no God? Why should I be a good person if there's no reward or punishment waiting for me in the afterlife? Why does religion seem to make people happier and healthier? Dave and Tamler heroically try to answer these questions without being stoned. Other topics include Dave's paralyzing fear of death, bad times on mopeds, and the pros and cons of naming your daughter Chlamydia. They almost get through the episode without having to censor something--but not quite.  LinksWoody Allen's "Love and Death" Paul Bloom- Does Religion Make You Nice? [Slate.com]Follow-up reading on religion and health (for the slightly academically inclined)- Powell, L. H., Shahabi, L., & Thoresen, C. E. (2003). Religion and spirituality: Linkages to physical health. American Psychologist, 58, 36.Pascal's Wager [wikipedia.org]Albert Camus [Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy]The Problem of Evil. [Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy]"Yes but subjectivity is objective."Collateral 

After discussing some listener feedback about the movie Swingers, Tamler and David talk about two classic experiments in social psychology: the Milgram Experiments and the Zimbardo Prison experiment.  They discuss the power of the situation, its influence on recent philosophy, and whether there is room given the evidence to believe in moral character and virtue. Also, Tamler admits to his former struggles with hard core street drugs, and Dave ponders which prison gang would be most accepting if he had to serve hard time.Links"Swingers," Directed by Jon Favreau [metacritic.com]The Milgram Experiment [Wikipedia.org]Video clip of a replication of the Milgram Experiment [youtube.com]The Stanford Prison Experiment [Wikipedia.org]Short video on Stanford Prison Experiment [youtube.com]Asch Conformity Experiment [youtube.com]Jon Doris "Lack of Character" [amazon.com]

In a Very Special Episode of Very Bad Wizards, Dan Ariely joins David to chat about cheating, character, teling your significant other about kissing someone at a conference, and the importance of moral rules.  Tamler and David sandwich the chat with a discussion about the US Presidential election, the irony of moral psychologists making people do bad things, and end with a full-blown argument about what it means to say that something is morally wrong, and whether that's an interesting question. LinksBuffy/Angel Crossover Viewing GuideSir Ian McKellen on Ricky Gervais' "Extras"Eric Dondero's Democrat Boycott.Eric Dondero on who he would save: A family member who's a democrat or a republican child molester.  Dan Ariely's podcast--"Arming the Donkeys""The Honest Truth about Dishonesty" on Amazon.comTamler's favorite kind of epistemologyThe debate about moral wrongness that Tamler thinks is stupid and David finds intriguing.  Special Guest: Dan Ariely.

After a clip from The Third Man, Dave and Tamler continue their discussion from Episode 6 on Ted Bundy, utilitarians, and trolley problems. They also talk about Tamler’s TED talk envy, inappropriate acts with trees, and make a plea for more listener feedback. The second segment begins with the long-awaited return of the ‘eat the poo-poo’ clip, but this time in a somewhat relevant context. Dave and Tamler then discuss the role that emotions play in moral judgment and the role they should play. If we feel disgust at someone’s behavior,  does that mean the behavior is morally wrong? Tune in to find out…LinksThe Third Man Ferris Wheel Scene (maybe Dave will see this movie one day) Dave’s TEDx talk, bumped up to TED (129,000 views)Tamler’s TEDx talk, not as much bumping up.  (676 views) “Consequentialist are Psychopaths” The Splintered Mind  blog postEat the poo pooYuck by Dan Kelly"Grime and Punishment." Brief review of disgust and moral judgment from The Jury Expert by Yoel Inbar (the brains--and brawn--behind all the disgust work) and David P.

Tamler contemplates ending it all because he can't get 'Call Me Maybe' out of his head, and Dave doesn't try to talk him out of it. This is followed by a discussion about drones, psychopaths, Canadians, Elle Fanning, horrible moral dilemmas, and the biggest rivalry in Ethics: utilitarians vs. Kantians.   Links"Why I Refuse to Vote for Barack Obama." by Conor Friedersdorf"Why I Refuse to Refuse to Vote for Obama" by Robert Wright.Dave's study "The Mismeasure of Morals"The write-up of Dave's study in The Economist: "Goodness Has Nothing to Do With It"

Dave and Tamler continue their discussion about their favorite topic.  They talk about the evolutionary origins of retributive behavior, cross-cultural differences in revenge norms, and the proportionate punishment for someone who gives your wife a foot massage. They also play a clipfrom an interview they conducted in Nosara with local attorney Andres Gonzalez about the Costa Rican treatment of the criminals they call ‘pobrecitos.’Links“Would you give a man a foot massage?”  Robert Frank’s Passions Within Reason, one of the best books of the last 100 years.Tamler’s article “The Two Faces of Revenge” Dave’s post for the Harmony Blog: “How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Become a Philosopher-in-Residence.”

Dave allows Tamler to rant about Sam Harris’s strawman attacks on moral relativism before launching into discussion about revenge, justice, True Grit, and Michael Dukakis. Though they differ on many issues, Tamler and Dave agree that it’s hard to satirize a guy with shiny boots.  LinksSam Harris in the Huffington Post.“Brute force is better with Nazis.” The answer that launched a series of Bush presidencies.“This ain’t no coon hunt.”·Justice and Honor, Tamler’s Psychology Today blog post."Partial Desert" blog post at Flickers of Freedom.

Tamler and Dave discuss recent work in philosophy and psychology about the differences in moral values and practices across cultures. We talk about the implications of moral diversity: does  it mean that we cannot criticize that practices of other cultures? How should we regard moral disagreement? Are there objective “truths” in ethics? Somehow we need to play clips from The Big Lebowski and Pulp Fiction in order to resolve these questions.Links"No Donnie, these men are nihilists, nothing to be afraid of."Interview with Jon Haidt."Pigs are filthy animals"

Tamler and David discuss whether giving up our belief in free will makes us more likely to abandon our moral standards. Links“You Can’t Handle the Truth!” Jesse Bering “Scientists say free will probably doesn’t exist, but urge: “Don’t stop believing!”  Excellent accessible description of the Vohs and Schooler study that we discuss. Tamler’s blog post in Psychology Today criticizing the pessimistic views of Smilansky and Vohs and Schooler: "No Soul?  I can live with that.  No free will?  Aaahhhh!".  “Eat the poo-poo.”  “Like ice cream…”  Josh Knobe on free will and experimental philosophy.  Tamler's dialogue on some of the problems with current experimental work on free will: "Free Will and Experimental Philosophy: An Intervention."“I want him dead!  I want his family dead!”  Uhlmann, Zhu, Pizarro & Bloom  “Blood is Thicker: Moral Spillover Effects Based on Kinship”

Dave and Tamler start out talking about the new wave of skepticism about free will and moral responsibility in the popular press from people like Sam Harris and Jerry Coyne.  Neuroscience figures heavily in their arguments, but Dave and Tamler agree that neuroscientific data adds little of substance to the case other than telling us what we already know: human beings are natural biological entities.  Dave also accuses Tamler of being a hipster philosopher for abandoning a view once it got popular. Next, we talk about what kind freedom we need to have in order to deserve blame and punishment. Do we need to create ourselves out of the swamps of nothingness? Dave comes out as a Star Trek nerd and asks whether we're all, in the end, like Data the android.  They also wonder whether a belief in free will is all that's keeping us from having sex with our dogs.  Finally,  Dave grills Tamler about his new book on the differences in attitudes about free will and moral responsibility across cultures. After seeing how long they've been carrying on, they then agree to talk about all the stuff they left out in the next episode.    LinksCoyne, J.  “Why You Don’t Really Have Free Will.”Sam Harris. “Free Will.”Eddy Nahmias.  "Is Neuroscience the Death of Free Will?"Galen Strawson "Luck Swallows Everything."