The Dawdler’s Philosophy is a Podcast about Ideas. One co-host a “scientist” and one a “philosopher”, each sharing a basic orientation for high-density, low-drama, apolitical, opinionated but dogma-free, relaxed, and hopefully entertaining intellectual engagement.
“I suppose most scientists—most authors—have one piece of work of which they would say: It doesn’t matter if you never read anything else of mine, please at least read this.” Richard Dawkins wrote that in a note to a 1989 paperback edition of his book The Extended Phenotype. Ryan appeals Read more…
There may not be philosophy-free science, but there *is* radical-free philosophy. Harland tries it out for as long as he can in this episode on the possible differences between science and philosophy. Buckle your chin straps, Truth Seekers! 00:04:50 – Science? Philosophy?/Thought experiments/Provisionalism vs Definitionalism 00:42:48 – Modes of Indeference/Progress Read more…
If we’re lucky, we’re able to add a little sumptin’-sumptin’ to the end of the line. Maybe it’s a good twist or we bring more than a few threads together. But every once in a while someone comes along and braids so far ahead they leave us all behind. Perhaps Read more…
So, this guy Enrico trolled humanity once and it’s left us reeling ever since. This week the Dawdlers discuss the implications of this troll and explore a few threads on why we don’t get no satisfaction from our attempts to catch signals emitted by extraterrestrial intelligences. A hope and a Read more…
This time the Dawdler’s examine Daniel Dennett’s book “Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking” (2013). Regardless of all that, these two tools think they think. Topics explored are philosophical zombies, Occam’s Razor, black boxes, and sorta operators. Do you smell that? It’s the sweet potpourri of Dennettian thinkadinks. -Dawds Read more…
Typically, people may describe a “wide-ranging” podcast conversation as covering topics from A to Z to あ. Maybe that’s the case for those podcasts. Us dawdlers? Eh… Ryan thinks this episode is on the psychology of “over”-population and Malthusian growth dynamics. Harland thinks Ryan just doesn’t like being one-of-many and Read more…
The free world is kind of a mess right now. Seems we’ve lost something in a trade or hit a wall. We’re so team oriented sending and receiving messages is like exchanging alien signals. Naturally, if we are to decode these strange outbursts, it’s time to get innovative. We have Read more…
Once again, Earth gets the bullet too! This episode the Dawdlers yammer on about Mass Extinction. Ryan is trying not to screw up and Harland is working on his impromptu pun skills. Hopefully something is learned but likely it’s just not nothing. Oh, and we’ve now a little ditty. Enjoy Read more…
Hey you! Yeah you, dummy. You know what time binding is? No? Good! We (Ryan) don’t either. This episode the Dawdlers get in over their heads with Alfred Korzhybski’s General Semantics. Well, Ryan is in over his head. Harland just can’t get his out of his bum. Badum ching! Rim Read more…
Hot topic alert! This episode the Dawdlers pull focus on planet Earth. They talk about Earth processes, especially climate. I guess one could say this is the climate change episode. Yaaay! Earth gets the bullet too! BUT they spend much of their time on the science and much less on Read more…