Robinson's Podcast - Robinson Erhardt

Latest Episodes:

101 - Paul Bloom: Freud, Mental Illness, Psychoanalysis, and Cognitive Biases Jun 13, 2023

Show notes

Paul Bloom is Brooks and Suzanne Ragen Professor Emeritus of Psychology at Yale University and Professor of Psychology at the University of Toronto. He works quite broadly in psychology, and studies how children and adults make sense of the world, with special focus on pleasure, morality, religion, fiction, and art. Paul is the author of seven books, most recently Psych: The Story of the Human Mind, some of the topics of which constitute the subject of this episode. More particularly, Paul and Robinson discuss Freud’s legacy in contemporary psychology, mental illness, human rationality and irrationality, and the roots of motivation. Paul has also recently been producing a fantastic podcast with his friend and colleague David Pizarro—also called Psych—that covers many of the topics in introductory courses to psychology, and it comes highly recommended.

Psych (Book): https://a.co/d/eYNR4q7

Psych (Podcast): https://psych.fireside.fm

Paul’s Website: https://paulbloom.net

Paul’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/paulbloomatyale

OUTLINE

00:00 In This Episode…

01:10 Introduction

06:09 Writing Psych

08:30 What is Mental Illness?

23:40 Freud versus Contemporary Psychology

36:31 Psychoanalysis versus Contemporary Therapeutic Modalities

52:13 Is Man THE Rational Animal?

58:24 The Psychological Roots of Our Irrationality

01:17:46 The My-Side Bias and Political Gridlock

01:24:47 The Psychological Roots of Human Motivation

01:52:24 Susan Carey

Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com

Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.

100 - Steven Pinker: Rationality, Enlightenment, and Free Speech Jun 11, 2023

Show notes

Steven Pinker is Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. He is an experimental cognitive psychologist who writes on language, mind, and human nature. In this episode—the hundredth of Robinson’s Podcast (!)—Robinson and Steve talk about his recent book Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters (Penguin, 2022), which is linked below. More particularly, they discuss rationality’s evolutionary basis, how it is subverted by conspiratorial thinking and other dimensions of the “mythology mindset”, how it relates to enlightenment and human progress, and the state of free speech at Harvard and in the academic world at large.

Rationality: https://a.co/d/9N2uFyr

Steven’s Website: https://stevenpinker.com

Steven’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/sapinker

OUTLINE

00:00 In This Episode…

00:58 Introduction

06:31 The Importance of Rationality

10:16 The Connection Between Language and Rationality

14:18 Rationality and Human Progress

20:09 The Evolution of Rationality and Irrationality

34:08 Conspiracy Theories and the Mythology Mindset

40:13 The Madness of Crowds

49:42 Free Speech, Enlightenment, and Rationality

55:55 Free Speech Versus Social Justice

01:03:03 Academic Freedom at Harvard

Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com

99 - Nancy Sherman: Stoicism, Military Ethics, and War Jun 09, 2023

Show notes

Nancy Sherman is Distinguished University Professor and Professor of Philosophy at Georgetown University. Before that, she taught at Yale and did her graduate work in ancient philosophy at Harvard University. Nancy has worked broadly across value theory and ancient philosophy, writing on such varied topics as military ethics, moral psychology, the emotions, and Stoicism. The occasion for this episode is Nancy’s recent book, Stoic Wisdom: Ancient Lessons for Modern Resilience (Oxford, 2021), which is now available in paperback, and linked below. Nancy and Robinson discuss what contemporary takes on Stoicism get wrong—they miss the emphasis on connection and community—as well as the relationship between Stoicism and Aristotle, the military, and mental health.

Stoic Wisdom: https://a.co/d/7UAGj8i

Nancy’s Website: https://www.nancysherman.com

Nancy’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/drnancysherman

OUTLINE

00:00 In This Episode

00:44 Introduction

03:20 Nancy’s Interest in Stoicism and the Military

10:35 Stoicism and Life Hacks

21:00 Aristotelian and Stoic Ethics

30:05 Stoic Metaethics

34:33 Stoicism and War

45:19 Stoicism and Military Education

51:57 Nancy’s Mental Health Experience

59:43 Stoic Wisdom

Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com

98 - Dani S. Bassett & Perry Zurn: Curiosity, Philosophy, and Network Theory Jun 07, 2023

Show notes

Dani S. Bassett is the J. Peter Skirkanich Professor of Bioengineering at the University of Pennsylvania. Perry Zurn is Provost Associate Professor of Philosophy at American University. Dani and Perry both do a great deal of interdisciplinary work within their fields, but Dani is best known for her work in systems neuroscience, while Perry’s research is primarily in political philosophy. The subject of this episode, however—though systems neuroscience and political philosophy both make their appearances—is Dani and Perry’s book, Curious Minds: The Power of Connection (MIT, 2022). While it wouldn’t be immediately apparent from their different fields of study, Dani and Perry are in fact identical twins, and they write that their book “represents the thought of one mind and two bodies” as they explore the nature of curiosity from both philosophical and neuroscientific perspectives, developing an account of curiosity that stresses the relationship between ideas and people. Robinson, Dani, and Perry discuss complex systems, how curiosity has been studied from a variety of different academic perspectives, the three curiosity-embodying archetypes they have identified, knowledge networks, large language models, and more.

Curious Minds: https://a.co/d/3MeVY7m

Dani’s Website: http://www.danisbassett.com

Perry’s Website: https://www.perryzurn.com

Dani’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/DaniSBassett

Perry’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/perryzurn

OUTLINE

00:00 In This Episode…

00:52 Introduction

03:42 Human Curiosity?

06:07 Complex Systems

07:22 Curiosity from a Psychological Perspective

13:09 A Network Account of Curiosity

18:40 Foucault and Great Lakes Philosophy

29:39 Building Knowledge Networks

43:08 Walks through Knowledge Networks

57:25 Curiosity, Large Language Models, and Education

Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com

97 - Brian Leiter: Karl Marx, Ideology, and Historical Materialism Jun 04, 2023

Show notes

Brian Leiter is Karl N. Llewellyn Professor of Jurisprudence at the University of Chicago Law School, founder and Director of Chicago’s Center for Law, Philosophy & Human Values, and is best known in the philosophical world for his work on Nietzsche and legal philosophy. He is the founding editor of the Routledge Philosophers book series, Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Law, and Philosophical Gourmet Report, which is the canonical—as well as extremely helpful and illuminating—ranking of philosophy departments and PhD programs in the English-speaking world. He also maintains the world’s most popular philosophy blog, Leiter Reports. In this episode, Robinson and Brian discuss Karl Marx and a current book he is co-writing with Jaime Edwards for the Routledge Philosophers book series. Among the topics they discuss are Historical Materialism, ideology, Marx’s critique of capitalism, and exploitation. Brian’s latest book is Moral Psychology with Nietzsche (Oxford, 2021).

Brian’s Website: https://www.brianleiter.net

Brian’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/BrianLeiter

Leiter Reports: https://leiterreports.typepad.com

Moral Psychology with Nietzsche: https://a.co/d/3dJZBeZ

OUTLINE

00:00 In This Episode…

00:50 Introduction

06:38 Brian’s Interest in Marx

13:22 Historical Materialism

33:06 Big Business and Diversity

40:16 Ideology

58:04 Is Historical Materialism True?

01:01:45 Exploitation

01:11:38 Is Brian a Marxist?

96 - Jody Azzouni: Knowledge and Skepticism May 31, 2023

Show notes

Jody Azzouni is Professor of Philosophy at Tufts University. While Jody is best known for his nominalist stance in the philosophy of mathematics, he is also an author of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. This is Jody’s third appearance on the show. On his first appearance, episode #45, he and Robinson spoke about the debate between nominalists and platonists in the philosophy of mathematics, Jody’s own deflationary stance, and some adjacent concerns about ontological commitment in both formal and informal languages. On his second appearance, episode #75, they spoke about logic, natural languages, and formal languages, and mathematics. And in this episode, they shift topics entirely, discussing Jody’s upcoming book, Challenging Knowledge, which develops an original account in epistemology that seeks to thwart skeptic challenges, and which also builds off of Jody’s most recent book, Attributing Knowledge: What it Means to Know Something (Oxford, 2020).

Jody’s Website: https://jodyazzouni.com

OUTLINE

00:00 In This Episode…

01:11 Introduction

04:31 Jody and Epistemology

09:17 Foundationalism, Coherentism, and Infinitism

17:37 Knowledge and Usage

30:37 Metaknowledge and Introspection

41:43 Sortability and Traceability

50:49 Starting Place Epistemology

59:06 Cartesian Skepticism

01:06:00 Pyrrhonic Skepticism

01:14:16 The Difficulty of Epistemology and Mathematics

01:18:32 Internalism and Externalism

01:22:47 Fallibility

Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com

95 - Achille Varzi: What Is Mereology? May 28, 2023

Show notes

Achille Varzi is the John Dewey Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University and Bruno Kessler Honorary Professor at the University of Trento. He is a renowned metaphysicist and logician, and widely regarded as the world’s leading mereologist. Achille—or Varzi, as he is affectionately known around the halls of Columbia’s philosophy department—is also an immensely important philosophical figure for Robinson, and a prior denizen of this podcast multiverse (see episode 47 for Achille’s introduction to metaphysics and nominalism). In this installment, however, Robinson and Varzi delve deep into the history, logic, and metaphysics of mereology, the theory of parts and the parthood relation. For a more in-depth and rigorous discussion of the material covered in this episode (because yes, this is in fact possible!), check out Achille and A.J. Cotnoir’s fantastic monograph on the subject, linked below:

Mereology (Oxford, 2021): https://a.co/d/gFKrO3U

Mereology (SEP): https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mereology/

Achille’s Website: http://www.columbia.edu/~av72/

Correction: Achille mistakenly refers to Verity Harte, author of Plato on Parts and Wholes, as Valery Harte.

OUTLINE

00:00 In This Episode…

1:02 Introduction

4:44 Achille’s Start in Mereology

8:19 The Etymology of Mereology

18:00 What is Mereology?

20:03 Ancient Mereology

30:04 Medieval Mereology and the Liar Paradox

47:33 Husserl’s Formal Ontology

1:10:28 Leśniewski and the Formalization of Mereology

1:21:25 Whitehead, Leonard & Goodman, and the History of Mereology

1:34:26 The Language of Mereology

1:39:44 Mereology and the Axiomatic Method

1:47:46 More on the Language of Mereology

1:52:37 The Mereological Formalism

2:16:42 Composition

2:29:35 Misconceptions about Mereological Fusion

3:01:10 Gunk, Junk, and Hunk

3:10:15 Applications of Mereology

3:15:50 Mereological Pluralism

3:31:43 Mereotopology and the Ordering Axioms

Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com

94 - Alva Noë: Art, Philosophy, and The Entanglement May 26, 2023

Show notes

Alva Noë is Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Department of Philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley, where he researches the philosophy of mind—primarily focusing on perception and consciousness—and the philosophy of art. In this episode, Robinson and Alva discuss the latter, for while Alva is already the author of two books in the area—Strange Tools: Art and Human Nature (Farrar Strauss and Giroux, 2015) and Look: Dispatches from the Art World (Oxford, 2021)—June 23, 2023 will mark the release of a new work, The Entanglement: How Art and Philosophy Make Us What We Are (Princeton University Press). Robinson and Alva touch on topics from all three works, including the interrelationship between art, philosophy, phenomenology, and neuroscience.

Alva’s Website: http://www.alvanoe.com

Alva’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/alvanoe

OUTLINE

00:00 In This Episode…

00:38 Introduction

04:08 Mind and Art

10:05 Knowledge and Making

18:39 Attention and Rembrandt

31:28 Viewer and Creator

41:29 Art as a Philosophical Practice

47:00 Neuroscience

57:09 The Entanglement

01:17:15 Phenomenology, Art, and Analytic Philosophy

Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com

93 - Havi Carel: The Phenomenology of Illness May 23, 2023

Show notes

Havi Carel is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Bristol, where she studies illness and its relationship to philosophy. Her research draws largely on phenomenology, a philosophical approach most closely associated with the Continental tradition of philosophy, and that relies heavily on perception and experience. In this episode Robinson and Havi discuss her own illness, LAM, and how it affects her own work, along with many other topics related to illness, such as Freud, mental health, and breathlessness.

OUTLINE

00:00 In This Episode…

01:24 Introduction

03:31 LAM and Illness

08:14 Continental Philosophy, Analytic Philosophy, and Phenomenology

22:12 Illness, Sickness, and Disease

26:36 Limitations of Writing on Phenomenology and Illness

42:34 Illness and Philosophy

51:03 Freud and the Phenomenology of Illness

56:41 Breathing and Breathlessness

Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com

92 - Joan Bagaria: What Is Set Theory? May 21, 2023

Show notes

Joan Bagaria is ICREA Research Professor in the Department of Experimental Sciences and Mathematics at the University of Barcelona. He is a mathematical logician who works in set theory, which is the branch of mathematics that not only specializes in the investigation of infinity but serves as the foundation for the rest of mathematics—what this means, and its implications, are explored in the episode. Joan and Robinson discuss all things set theory, beginning with its origins in the mind of Georg Cantor, its development in the 20th century, some philosophical questions, and some current outstanding problems. They also briefly touch on Catalan independence, a topic dear to Joan’s heart. Joan’s Twitter: ⁠https://twitter.com/BagariaJoan⁠ Set Theory: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/set-theory/ The Early Development of Set Theory: https://plato.stanford.edu/cgi-bin/encyclopedia/archinfo.cgi?entry=settheory-early OUTLINE 00:00 In This Episode… 01:01 Introduction 06:18 Joan and Set Theory 09:11 The Development of Set Theory 21:08 Naive Set Theory and Axiomatic Set Theory 30:52 Zermelo-Fraenkel Set Theory with Choice 46:35 Metaphysics and Epistemology 01:03:06 Set Theory as the Foundation of Mathematics 01:09:48 The Continuum Problem 01:16:13 Settling the Continuum Problem 01:35:21 Alternative Set Theories 01:43:37 Alternative Foundations 01:47:53 Catalan Independence Robinson’s Website: ⁠http://robinsonerhardt.com⁠ Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.

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