THE BLOG @ PHILOSOPHERS' CORNER
THE BLOG @ PHILOSOPHERS' CORNER
Democracy and the Judiciary
09
Feb 2007
In one way, it seems obvious that the court system -- especially judicial review of the acts of the legislative and executive branches of government -- is, in one way, a bulwark of our constitutional democracy. That was a point made clearly and forcefully by a past Dean of the Stanford Law School, athleen Sullivan, who was our guest on Capitol Hill when we did a show on Separation of Powers.
Read moreTruth and Bullshit
27
Jan 2007
A distinction worth making, I think, is between cases in which the truth is important because the subject matter involved is itself important, independently of whether people know or care about it, and cases in which the truth is only derivatively important, because philosophers or others care about it, and if we get something wrong we will be in some sort of trouble with these people.
Read moreAmerican Pragmatism
14
Jan 2007
Like any philosophical "ism," pragmatism lends itself to easily-refuted straw-man characterizations; and in any case, no doubt, there are inferior (short-sighted, self-serving, hard-nosed, unprincipled) forms of pragmatism. But the various views of Peirce, James, Dewey, Mead, and others are more sophisticated than one might think after reviewing such shallow characterizations.
Read moreChildren as a Philosophical Problem
17
Nov 2006
Children certainly pose a lot of problems -- but are they philosophical? Coincidentally I gave a few lectures on John Stuart Mill's great little book On Liberty recently to Stanford frosh. In thinking about that book one philosophical problem about children comes up, for Mill thinks the central principle of liberty he argues for in the book does not apply to children.
Read moreClayton's Afterthoughts
28
Oct 2006
posted by Phil Clayton Dear Ken, Thanks for your post this morning about reasons for (and against) belief in God. And thanks to you and John for having me on the show this morning. A few very brief responses to today’s program on "Believing in God" and to your blog:
Read moreHow Can Smart People Still Believe in God?
27
Oct 2006
Many smart, reflective scientifically literate people obviously still do believe in god. Thankfully (or unthankfully, depending on your perspective) religious belief is not merely the province of anti-scientific, anti-modern fundamentalists who take every word, comma and period in some sacred text -- like the Bible or the Koran -- to be the sole and authoritative truth about just about everything.
Read moreMusic, Meaning, and Emotion
18
Sep 2006
What distinguishes music from non-music? The world is replete with sound -- both man made sounds and the sounds of nature. Many of these sounds are quite beautiful -- the cries of various animals, the sound of the ocean, the whistling wind, the human voice, the majestic boom of the space shuttle as it rockets into space. But only a few of the sounds with which the world is replete count as music. Is there anything deep to say about what distinguishes music from non-music?
Read more100 and Counting
28
Aug 2006
It's really been quite an experience, first trying to get the show on the radio, then trying to shape the show into a distinctive art form, and then trying to grow the show. When we started out, John and I really had no idea what we were getting ourselves into or what was possible and what was impossible. I really didn't realize what a conservative, risk-averse medium public radio was. Plus I didn't realize how hard it is to make good radio. Nor did I realize how difficult it could be to combine the virtues of radio with the virtues of philosophy.
Read more"Beautiful" and the Metaphysics of Beauty
13
Aug 2006
People argue whether beauty is objective or subjective. But what would it mean for it to be one or the other? A good example of something subjective would be: tasting good to Bob. If something tastes good to Bob, it’s because of Bob’s subjective experience of it. It depends on the subject. An objective property would be: being 5 kg. Anything 5 kg has that mass independently of any subjective experience of it. It’s in the object. Tomorrow’s episode of Philosophy Talk is on athletic beauty—beauty in sports.
Read moreThe Future of Philosophy
03
Aug 2006
Here are what I take to be some deep truths about philosophy. First philosophy currently is, has always been, and probably will always be a fragmented discipline. There is really no one thing that philosophers do and not much that unifies the mulipliticity of different things that philosophers do. Philosophy is what people who call themselves philosophers do. And people who call themselves philosophers do all sorts of things.
Read moreWhy I am not a Stoic!
25
Jul 2006
I don't profess to fully understand stoicism. I never read much stoic philosophy before now. I did read the Enchiridion by Epictetus as an ndergraduate, but frankly, it left me pretty cold at the time. I couldn't relate to it at all. Maybe that's because as a young man, I was pretty non-stoical.
Read morePhilosophy Talk Moves to Sunday
25
Jul 2006
We're back in the studio after our trip to DC. DC was great fun and we had a great time doing our show in the Capitol Building. There wasn't exactly a huge turn-out. Unfortunately, invitations to the event didn't go out until pretty late in the game, and of those who RSVP'ed that they were coming, there were a fair number of no-shows. But still, the audience was quite engaged and engaging. Kathleen Sullivan was a truly dynamite guest. The program will probably air in November, the Sunday before election day. It wa
Read moreOdds and Ends
24
Jun 2006
Our limited forray into podcasting via the Stanford Itunes experiment has been a great success. Lots and lots of folks, though, have expressed the wish that we would podcast all of our episodes. Well, we're about to make those wishes come true. We're currently in negotiations with two podcasting services. We will probably sign a contract with one or the other in the next week or two.
Read moreWhat the Imagination is For
29
May 2006
The imagination is a pretty cool thing, but also in some ways puzzling. On the one hand, it seems sometimes to give us cognitive acquaintance with real possibilities. A kid from Hope Arkansas imagines growing up to be president of the United States. And lo and behold that kid does grow up to be president. So some of the things that we merely imagine are really possible. And it's arguable that the imagination teaches us that they are possible.
Read moreMy summer reading
14
May 2006
I don't really have anything to recommend, per se, but the weird assortment of matter through which I am wading may be of interest to those of you who have an interest in that sort of thing. I don't have the disposable income I once did, so most of my reading comes from second hand stores, garage sales, the Internet, and the library - once I replace the paperback the library claims I lost (GREAT PLAINS, by Ian Frazier).
Read moreDoes Truth Matter?
03
Apr 2006
Let me say a few things about the value of truth to get today’s conversation started. First, it seems to me that truth is a very good thing. We think science is grand because it reveals deeper and deeper truths about nature. We typically would much prefer to know and be told the truth than to be told a lie. We hardly ever say to ourselves, “I know that false, but I choose to believe it anyway.” To believe something is to believe it’s true.
Read moreStrange Behavior (Or: On Watching Sports—a follow-up to Tuesday’s show on basketball)
30
Mar 2006
Aristotle’s characterization of man as the rational animal will seem flattering, if you think about many behaviors we people engage in regularly. While many people in our society are overworked, short on knowledge, and pressed for time, many of us take time out to watch unusually tall individuals get together in groups to hurl a spherical object through a suspended ring. These tall individuals get dressed in outfits with shiny colors and are glorified for the ability to hurl the sphere through the ring. Whole buildings fill up with people who want to watch the hurling of the sphere and pay good money to do so, often sacrificing the valuable time and money they could have used for more sensible things like food and shelter.
Read moreWe need your help!
27
Feb 2006
We at Philosophy Talk are proud to have offered something uniquely valuable to the radio world over the past two and a half years. It's been an incredible adventure. When we started, many people in radio took our ideas with a very large grain of salt. "Philosophy on the Radio?" they asked incredulously. "Two academics as co-hosts? A stream of professional thinkers, rather than journalists or politicians or entertainers as your guests?" "It will never work!" "No one will ever listen!"
Read moreEducated Insolence
27
Feb 2006
Stand-up comics often bemoan the fact that "everyone's a f**king comedian!", and its true: every one appreciates humor (to some degree) and most are capable of generating some form of spontaneous humor. But this very ubiquity makes humor harder, rather than easier, to understand formally, since humor assumes many guises and operates with subtle differences in myriad contexts.
Read moreNot so deep thoughts about humor
27
Feb 2006
Why do birds fly? Because they don't like to walk. That was a joke made up by my granddaughter Erin when she was three. She had learned the form of one kind of joke, without quite mastering the part about being funny. She made up jokes non-stop for about three hours, most of them even less funny than the above, regaling those trapped in the car with her, while turning blue from laughing so hard at them herself.
Read moreThoughts on the Doubling of Consciousness
06
Feb 2006
We all carry around two self-conceptions. Imagine having amnesia. The amnesiac knows whose mouth he has to put food in to relieve his hunger; he knows that things detected visually are things that he sees; he knows that the aches he feels belong to his body. So, in one sense, he knows who he is; his most basic self-concept, as the person whose pains he feel, whose hunger he can relieve by eating, whose environment he learn about by the deliverance of sense, remains.
Read moreLegislating Values: A Reprise
30
Jan 2006
I don’t think the legislature is morally or rationally obligated to advance legislation only on the basis of public reasons. One can, though, read the non-establishment clause of the constitution as requiring legislation to have a basis in public reason. But whatever the precise legalities, I think there are very strong practical reasons for the legislature to refrain from adopting any narrowly sectarian rationale for its laws.
Read moreScience: The Big Kahuna
22
Jan 2006
I have to admit that I mostly applaud the scientific overthrow of cultutral formations based on illusion, superstition, error, authority and the like. Still, I think that the "destructive" side of science is too often overlooked or greeted with a shrug by those like me who fully and completely endorse the canons of scientific rationality. It is not obvious to me that our ability to reform our culture and society can keep pace with the ability to undermine archaic forms.
Read moreThe Best of Philosophy Talk Podcast
22
Jan 2006
You now have three ways to listen to past episodes of Philosophy Talk. As always, we will continue to archive each episode in a streamable format. On our archive pages, you will find not just our past shows but a plethora of helpful links that make each archive page a valuable resource.
Read moreThe Nature of Science and the ID Debate
20
Jan 2006
The question "what is science?" always becomes more pressing when debates about evolution and creationism are going on. Even though the question is actually a bit of a mess, it suddenly becomes tempting to try to offer a short, concise description of science that can be used to guide decisions about what should and should not go onto high school curricula. Often, the first thing people draw on is Karl Popper's account of science, based on the idea of falsifiability.
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