In this episode we discuss margin haunting in light of the Decoding the Gurus "gurometer." Then we tour a couple frameworks Ryan has come up with for margin haunting. Plus we unveil a neologism you will want rush out right away and use in the world as soon as you learn it! Yes!

HAVE A GREAT DAY

-Dawds

00:03:23 - Evaluation of margin haunters with Decoding the Gurus podcast “gurometer.”

00:44:42 – Margin haunters are substandard to any paradigm.

01:09:01 – Wave fronts, memetic drift, and memetopoles.

"But HOW!?" you ask.

With the seasons...

And you thought it was all footnotes. Silly philosopher...

Next episode: 10 things Ryan hates about devil's advocacy! Jk.

-Dawds

#1 Maps & Legends - Chapter Maps

#2 Show, Don't Tell, Nonfiction-style 

#3 Style & Substance - Epigraphs

#4 In The End - Footnotes & Endnotes

#5 Size Matters - Book Length

#6 E-mail Is Fine - Interviews & Narratives

#7 Story Time - Stories, Yes; Dialogue? Nah

#8 Apology Unaccepted - Using kid gloves with the reader around technical material.

#9 The Elephant In The Room - Little-to-no acknowledgement about popular and comparable ideas.

#10 Big Words, Little Context - Using uncommon phrases, words, and acronyms without giving them the appropriate context and slowing the pace and flow of the reading.

That's why they're doing a review of some core ideas. Now that they have 27.7 listeners they have to onboard all 26.7 of you newbies! 

They cover a framework they call "Modes of Inquiry." Then there's Ryan's baby, "Episodic Synchrony." And last, and very much least, Dr. Ought-opus and his idea, NME skepticism. Catch 'em all while you can!

And tell your friends!

Outside, triple masked, and 20 feet apart,

The Dawdlers

I should really not Dawdle too long and get back to him, lest remain least on the list of priorities!  

Feel free to listen in, dear old friends.  

In this new kind of episode Ryan Writes Harland a "letter." Will Harland write back?

In 1959, author and scientist, C.P. Snow, gave a lecture on what he saw as a problem in the West. Two intellectual and influential cultures had formed and become entrenched; one, a literary culture and the other, a scientific one. If they had anything in common, it didn’t matter for the commitments they had made to their respective vocations were too great to be bridged without great effort.

In this episode the Dawdlers discuss the lecture and the state of its themes in our current age.

Equality, egalitarianism, opportunity. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. For whom do these bells toll?

Is it a good dream? And does one “have to be asleep to believe it”?

In this long short, the Dawdlers take on a request from a listener and discuss “The American Dream.”

An analysis of Thomas Nagel's 1974 paper "What is it Like to Be a Bat?", which initiated "decades of confusion" in the philosophy of mind literature, and gave us the phrase still in use today "what-it's-like"-ness as a pseudo-definition for consciousness.  

They consider some of Mr. Watts' most controversial opinions with oodles of juicy quotes.  

As is the nature of considering the centrality / marginality of thinkers, many guests come to the party this week, but Alan has always loved an audience!  

Wrap up your kashaya, assume the lotus, and get yer enlightenment-- sucka!

00:00:00 - 00:16:40 - Margin Haunters vs. Flat Earthers / Membership to the Clubhouse

00:16:40 - 00:21:10 - Watt a Man

00:21:10 - 00:50:00 - Watts' Attacks on Virtue, Morality, Honesty, and Capitalism  

00:50:00 - 01:16:11 - Watts the Philosophy of the Dawdle / (Ir)Responsibility / Creativity

01:16:11 - End - Watts' "The Book on the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are" / Ryan's Frustrations

This week we talk about Richard Rorty’s “Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature”. In Part 1 of this topic (WHAT!?) there are plenty of misgivings, mischaracterizations, and misunderstandings along the way. But we keep retuning to this framework of ours: the modes of inquiry (E3: Triamond Joy!). These include overseeing, truth seeking, and game playing (and engineering but Harland has yet to come around to it). Rorty wants to scrap much of it. Por qua?

Let’s play some games!

-Dawds

Bury those ear buds deep in your ears! It’s about to get virtual!

-“The Dawdlers”

In this episode you will be treated to a Pre-Covid discussion had back in December of 2019 that these Dawdlers were too lazy to knit together into a fine piece of auditory (f)art. The topic? Religion and explanations for its creation and subsequent changes.

Enjoy your lockdowns. Oh, and don’t forget to treat others the way you wish to be treated. And if you wish to be treated like shit then too bad for the others, amirite?

-Dawdlers

00:04:21 – Defining terms // What is Religion? // What is culture?

00:12:48 – Asking questions // Tinbergen’s “Four Questions” // Origin, spread, and maintenance // Traits – morphology, physiology, behavioral, life history

00:23:05 – Hypotheses // David Sloan Wilson’s “Adaptive vs. Non-Adaptive” framing // Adaptive Hypothesis (AH) 1: “The Watcher” // AH2: “The Organism” // AH3: “The Parasite” // AH4: “The Useful Fiction” // AH5: “The Echo” // Non-Adaptive Hypothesis (NH) 1: “The Dinosaur” // NH2: “The Blind Matthew”

01:17:09 – Winners & Losers // Everything is happening, everyone’s a winner // Ameliorating fear makes sense and shit just happens…

This time we use a twitter thread Ryan saw that raised some flags for him. It’s a thread discussing what might best be described as discussing the business of science. Yuck! Though sources aren’t really cited and quotes aren’t given, we still end up where always do anyway. Something like, “The hustlers are dead! Long live the hustlers!!” SAD!

Lots of love!

Dawds

This week the Dawdlers discuss the notions of luck and karma and the preference for inhabiting systems—especially social systems like, y’know, SOCIETY—that reward good deeds.

Wouldn’t it be nice…

This time Harland asks the question: Is there any way for us provincial primates—with all our adaptations for dealing with smaller scales—to address planetary-sized problems?

We discuss from there topics ranging along the lines of logistics, motivational strategies, and hopelessness and helplessness.

Unfortunately, we are the mercy of this pan-troglo-demic. What else are we at the mercy of that is of our own making?

-Dawds

Then celebrate by doing the ma-corona! [moves: go to beach, dig hole in sand, stick head in]

But we come back to you now at the turn of the tide. This time Ryan asks a question and Harland gets it wrong (of course). But we're ok. Are YOU ok?

Let's talk about how the world will end then, shall we?

What does?

Dinosaurs…

Happy Harrahdays,

-Dawdlers

Ryan thinks it’s the extent to which we combine ("meat", cheese, bun - see!?). In this episode we Dawdlers discuss this in this “short long” and will perhaps revisit it again sometime.

Join hands and feel our infinite combinatorial power, people!

-The Dawdlers

~~~

00:01:13 – Ryan’s deep passions // A way in // Physics and the humanities and nothing in between!!!

00:06:58 – Without further ado, another story // Ubiquitous combination // Human exceptionalism?

00:12:54 – Cognitive combinatorialism // A simple definition // Conceptual blending/integration // Possible worlds

00:28:32 – A framework // Analogy and categorization // Actions and conditions // Shark test bites // It’s the extent to which we combine that’s different about us

00:39:57 – Biotic exceptionalism, not human exceptionalism // Photosynthesis comparison // Waste, extinction, and niche construction

In this episode, we Dawdlers discuss Jacques Derrida’s idea “Hauntology.” Not an easy philosopher to understand, we do our best to work out what spooks a Frenchman. In the end, this was but a first foray into the thoughts of an intellect that dealt in as much enigma as he did in misunderstanding.

Happy Halloween you cavity-riddled chompers!

-Dawds

P.s. Be warned, there’s some narration in this one.

~~~

00:03:40 – First narration interruption

00:04:54 – Background to Derrida and Deconstruction

00:10:43 – (Metaphysical) Hauntology // Temporal and ontological disjunction // Melody example // Specters of Marx // Commodity/value example // The word itself

00:26:17 – (Cultural) Hauntology // Mark Fisher’s “Ghosts of My Life” // The slow cancellation of the future // Anachronism

00:33:15 – Second narration interruption

00:34:51 – (Cultural) Hauntology cont’d // Role in society and economy // Another Einstein-Brian Greene spacetime loaf idea comparison

00:51:54 – Harland asks, “So what?”

00:52:53 – Third narration interruption

00:53:52 – Ryan’s answer to Harland’s question // Part 1: improving judgments and decision making // Part 2: Hauntology is a symptom of important human cognitive processes // Conceptual blending // Arthur Koestler’s Buddhist monk riddle // Foreshadowing the next episode

The primary intent is to provide a pragmatically, anthropologically useful interpretation of current usage while not relying on a putatively unsupportable definition that includes notions like 'meaning' or 'speaker intentions', or other conceptual frameworks that Harland doesn't like. 

Instead it hopes to accord smoothly with physicalism and functionalism, which the Dawds suspect are probably the best models we have available at this time.  Let's try to bring philosophy of language into closer consilience with the rest of our intellectual edifice! 

~The Dawds

The Principia Discordia Online:

https://principiadiscordia.com/book/1.php

In this Short, we discuss Harland's disdain for the phrase and its strange loopiness.

Song: Can't Get Used To Losing You

Artist: Andy Williams

Enjoy their conversation with Dr. Frankish as Harland and Keith plumb the depths of their degrees of eliminitivism on consciousness.

Song: Ritual of a Take

Artist: Fresh Cut Orchestra

Been a bit, but the Dawdlers are back. And, yes, things change but we’re still the same ol’ Dawdlers. Yer welcome.

This week enjoy our exploration of some mind bending philosophical musings from philosopher Nelson Goodman. Ryan thinks a scientific orientation can help. Harland thinks philosophy can find more problems for him. Nelson thinks these are just versions.

00:02:00 – Introduction to the topic // Equations grazing in a field // Worldmaking

00:42:20 – Versions // Memes and “felt stubbornness” // Conservatism and progressivism // Change is required for stasis and safe is dead

01:00:07 – Grue // Metamorphosis // The “two cultures” tension (aka, “science vs. philosophy”) // Science and philosophy can undermine each other’s independence

01:36:15 – Choke by Sonn

Gould wrote the quote above a couple times in different articles. Ryan likes it because he thinks it can apply to systems in general. Thus, to remain the same in function, systems should change their structure provided there are changes in their throughput.

In organisms this happens with changes in scale. To get bigger and taller on Earth’s surface, an animal’s legs must also get thicker. Otherwise, gravitational acceleration will break them as they buckle under the mass of the body above.

But nature does not ask a five gram shrew to stand as tall as a ten foot elephant either. Its muscles could hardly move its legs. Yet sometimes, society asks its citizens to do similar feats by moralizing the damn prosocial empaths into feeling as if they’re not doing enough.

Well, to that, *we* say, “Enough!” Enjoy this bitchfest about personal accountability.

-Dawds

Song: How I’ve Missed You; Artist: TIM

In this episode, Ryan brings to the table a recent exchange between two evolutionary biologists, David Sloan Wilson and Massimo Pigliucci (https://letter.wiki/conversation/34). These two have been involved in much development of the field and it’s always a treat to see such engagement about topics not so completely related to the present moment. This time, the two VIPs spar over the application of multi-level selection theory to cultural evolution and the Dawdlers attempt to explore it further.

That said, we are the Dawdlers and we can be goofy and silly and, well, not always super charitable. But, Ryan at least, hopes listeners think of our takes and views the way a comedian’s impression of another person is sometimes a sign of appreciation and not scorn.

Let yourself be bashful, we’re flirting with a mode of discourse seen much less these days. 

00:03:20 – Ryan’s nostalgia for this episode’s context // A disagreement between David Sloan Wilson and Massimo Pigliucci on Twitter and Letters.wiki

00:09:10 – The letters // Ancient Greek alerts // Guilt trips and gadflies

00:20:56 – Massimo opens the doors for a bigger picture // What is reproduction? What is a group? What is an individual? Whence memes?

00:37:49 – A fidelity and permeability framework for evolutionary change // Harland is having a difficult time understanding Ryan’s genius

00:58:39 – MLS1 and MLS2 // Penguin huddles // Perhaps the Peloponnesian War is an MLS1 scenario

01:13:36 – Conscious volitional decision making

01:17:31 – “Falling Fast” by Cheeki

Repeatability is a most productive bias.

This week the Dawdlers do a little Short on depression. Don't?...enjoy this?

In this episode, we Dawds discuss sociopolitical revolutions and the effectiveness of protests and movements that hope to precede them. We meander through various texts and ideas that have come about from the study of such historically significant (and insignificant) events.

But in the end there are more questions than answers.

-Dawdlers

00:02:56 – Ryan starts it off with some anecdotal shlock about protests he’s seen // A proportional analogy // Power, etc.

00:25:05 - The Arab Spring and Occupy movements // The effectiveness of protest

00:37:53 – Understanding revolution // A unified theory of revolution // New approaches to protest // Memes as the leaders

01:14:17 – Structuralism // Median age theory of revolution // Resource enrichment episodic synchrony (again and again!!) // Early 20th Century high school movement

01:36:56 – Socrates on democracy

01:48:58 – The Sunflower Revolution // vTaiwan // Consensus making

02:02:53 – Breaking the cycle // What do we want?

In this Short, the Dawdlers use Thomas Nagel's 1971 paper "The Absurd" as a guide for a discussion of the meaning of life (or something like that). Enjoy the discussion or cry yourself to sleep while listening. It doesn't matter. Nothing does!!

-Ye olde Dawdlers

This was the sentiment Ryan witnessed at an evolution conference a few years back. On the one hand, it is a condemnation of the state of originality in science. And, on the other, it is a commendation of its resourcefulness. But why the need for such resourcefulness? What’s the problem?

In this episode the Dawdlers talk about the state of ideation in the world today and the possible undercurrents that are determining its low quality.

Pinch pennies, not yourself. You’re awake in this nightmare. We’re naming names, people!!

00:00:00 – Dawdlers dawdling

00:05:48 – Ideas are of low quality in a Gilded Age

00:10:47 – Framework I: Secular cycles // Gilded ages // Dawdlers & hustlers

00:33:12 – Framework II: Resources enrichment // Tolerated variation // Technology as a resource

00:47:17 – Elite overproduction & fragmentation // Billionaires today are like the ancient Greek gods

00:57:20 – The Intellectual Dark Web, billionaires, and conspiracy!! // Dogmatists are easily manipulated

“The” Dawdler’s

00:04:27 – Housekeeping (Sammy Harris-style)

00:17:06 – The Epistemological State of Human Prehistory

00:30:14 – Hominine Lineages

00:36:21 – Stone Toolmaking

00:47:03 – Control of Fire (and Its Effects)

01:16:06 – A Toolmaking Origin of Language

01:24:40 – Migrations

01:37:35 – Megafaunal Mass Extinctions

01:49:14 – The Holocene & Anthropocene (Lightin’ Rounds!)

Two things: In this episode 1) Ryan nerds out while Harland lends intermittent support and 2) this is the first part of a two part series some (specifically Ryan, for fear of being alone in his appreciation of this topic) may say is the “boring part”. The next part, then, is the “exciting part” where we’ll go into (actual) human evolution, the megafuanal mass extinction, and the aftermath of our psychopathic devotion to world domination.

Bundle up, people! Yer about to face into some cold, hard facts!

00:02:36 – Introduction to the topic

00:06:05 – Geological time primer

00:16:09 – The physical environment

00:47:25 – Pleistocene ecology and evolution

You might consider yourself able to live without working, seeing yourself eating simple meals and meeting friends on easy adventures without a thought toward responsibility.

Or maybe you have a dentist appointment tomorrow and you hate the dentist because they always make you feel bad about yourself.

Or maybe you're gonna watch a movie in 5 minutes and you're excited because you've heard it's good and it's been a while since you saw a good one.

In all these cases you think you are in the future. But can you be IN the future? What is the future anyways? Tune in and see what we Dawdlers think!

We Dawdlers take a dip into the book Surfaces and Essences by Douglas Hofstadter and Emmanuel Sander on the significance of analogy-making in thinking.

00:04:40 – The book itself

00:14:30 – The man himself // Form and content

00:18:06 – The form of the content // The main thesis

00:25:15 – Analogy and category // Category, concept, and classification

00:32:22 – Aristotelian and Wittgensteinian styles

00:37:02 – What makes all “A’s” the “same”? // Conceptual skeletons at the gist level

00:43:26 – Ryan derails the discussion (homology)

00:50:06 – A test of analogies (?) // Aesthetics in analogy-making // Analogy-making is quasi-arbitrary

01:03:22 – Ryan derails the discussion once more (homology again)

01:15:31 – Influences on encoding // Organs of perception, etc. // A “biology” of convenience

01:27:44 – Ryan’s natural history of Doug’s abstractions on cognition

01:34:35 – Intelligence via analogy-making

01:39:01 – Einstein’s analogical quantum leap

The only way to comprehend what mathematicians mean by Infinity is to contemplate the extent of human stupidity. ~Voltaire

Present audience excepted-- surely --but Carlo Cippola, George Carlin, and Jonathan Swift aren't the only ones who think that there's a bit too much Stupidity exhibited by the human race.  In this week's Short, the Dawdlers join the chorus.  

The Dawdlers return to the theme of Haunting the Margins. This time they take a trip with Terence McKenna, the late hallucinagenic experimentalist of the 20th Century. Uncle Terence had loads of ideas and a remarkably lucid penchant for expressing them.

A man of his time who is worth our time.

McKennas, the Anderson's of Ireland (the Johnsons of Ireland is already taken by the O'Briens. But let's face it, the O'Briens are merely the Grants of Sweden, so...).

00:03:50 - Terence McKenna, the man

00:06:37 - The theme of Haunting the Margins, review

00:10:47 - HTM characterizations // humor // taboo // radicalism // career // populism //marginal to who? // associates?

00:52:47 - Harland's mandatory insertion of radical skepticism

00:58:20 - T McK's ideas // the Logos

01:16:10 - Time Wave Theory

01:34:32 - Stoned Ape Hypothesis

02:03:53 - Margin haunters are too awesome

This episode, the Dawdler’s ask: are all fallacies created equal? Well, hard to say if we learned about possible answers to that question as much as we did about ourselves. We meander through confidence illusionists, Ryan’s issues with fallacy call-out culture, ad hominem “focus shifting” in fallacy claims, Harland’s appeal to “don’t hate the player, hate the game” counterpoint to Ryan, the fallacy fallacy, and much, much less. Anyway, by the end Ryan shuts down and Harland won’t shut up.

We’ll laugh about this later, right?

The Dawdlers

In this episode the Dawdlers (well, Harland, mostly) try their best to explain why a cherished method and paper are inconsistent and are representative of bad philosophy. It's a famous paper too. Not sure how famous the method is.

What are these things, the paper and the method? Why, Edmund Gettier's paper "Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?" and Herman Cappelen's "method of cases" from "E22: A Farewell to Armchairs", of course! Here is but another example of philosophers using intuition to form the better part of their reasoning.

Back to class, everyone. Recess is over.

00:07:00 - Gettier claims JTB is Insufficient for Knowledge - Gettier Cases - Smith and Jones and the 10 Coins

00:16:33 - The use of Intuitions by Gettier & its illegitimacy - Broken Clocks & Sustained Objections

00:26:44 - The Gettier Problem - JTB+ - Ryan thinks it's ugly

00:37:44 - Patches: No False Beliefs - No Defeaters - Causal Connection

00:47:50 - A trip through Fake Barn County to Reliablism - The Lottery Problem - The Tracking Theory & Possible World Semantics

01:05:20 - Aesthetics Returns, Philosophy & Silliness

01:11:15 - Normative Semantics of Epistemic Terms

01:32:00 - You gotta start somewhere

Whence progress?

Do we make progress with ideas, and if so, does it not require a "terrible beauty" as a means of initiation?

In this episode the Dawdler’s use Sabine Hossenfelder’s book “Lost in Math” as a guide to explore where, if anywhere, we ought to place appeals to beauty in our intellectual searches. It’s a theme that has surfaced now and again on the podcast and here the Dawdlers take a bit of a plunge.

Settle down with your inner chimp. It’s about to get unreasonable.

00:06:43 – Topic Introduction

00:12:54 – Philosophy of Aesthetics? // Two Theses on Taste

00:22:44 – G.E.P. Box’s Scientific Feedback Loop

00:26:16 – Falsifiability vs. Unplausifiability // Constraints on the Foundations of Physics

00:37:36 – Arguments from Beauty/“Naturalness” // Symmetry Stuff

00:52:24 – Biases

00:56:00 – Harland and Ryan duke it out about aesthetic concerns in ideas?

In this episode we Dawdlers try to critique how intuition is used in philosophy. Fair warning however. Harland gets pretty chimpy and Ryan enjoys Harland's chimpy-ness perhaps a little too much.

Doesn't matter if you lean in or lean back. Either way, your armchair is being sold on Craigslist tomorrow. 

-The Dawdlers 

00:02:20 - The Armchair Activities, Intuition, Herman Cappelen's Philosophy Without Intuitions & Centrality: What is 'Intuition', How central to philosophy, Is that 'good'/'bad'?

00:22:30 - Cappelen's Questions to the Centralists, Epistemic Hedging, Trophy Problems, Common Ground

00:31:18 - 'Intuitive Plausibility' vs. Conditionals vs. Proofs, Intellectual Egos

00:41:00 - Argumentation Norms and Intellectual Progress, Chimp Warning, Hilary Putnam's Reason, Truth, and History

00:45:30 - Putnam's Intuitionalistic Methodology: Artistic Ants, Twin Earth Dendrology, & Brains in Vats

00:53:50 - Intuition Pumps, Similarity, Representation, & Reference, Sleight of Mind

01:10:10 - Monkeys on Typewriters & Intrinsic Meaning, Causal Theory of Reference, Alternative Intuitive Teleologies

01:22:45 - Putnam Butchers Turing

01:32:12 - Throwing Putnam at Cappelen, An Argument for Centrality

01:43:50 - Ryan puts Harland on the spot to make a bunch of irresponsible snap judgments

This week the Dawdlers present a discussion from an earlier time than the present moment. It's a conversation they've been meaning to have but not really sure when to have it. But they did...eventually.

The topic? An Edge.org annual question: 2005's What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove it?

Harland and Ryan wax on about some things they think fit the bill, but not until after Harland rewords the question to meet their Dawdler perspective.

We all have our trust in ourselves. Let's hope it doesn't make us into overly prideful fools of the double-down.

00:05:00 - An Edge.org question / A Harlandonian re-wording

00:17:21 - Harland's First Claim / Grok talk / Subclaim: language is unlimited

00:32:31 - Ryan's First Claim / Edge question respondents talked about aliens and brains alot

00:43:00 - Harland's Second Claim / Anything is possible / There are no laws of the universe / tendency vs. habit

01:01:35 - Ryan's Second Claim / "new" geological ideas

01:27:54 - Harland's Third Claim / SMIILE

01:42:02 - This topic is tailor-made for Harland to get radical / Episode devolves into math talk

They don't know philosopher Keith Frankish's birthday, but he doesn't think you have consciousness either even if he doesnt say it explicitly. C'mon Keith!! It's the Dawdlers' birthday!! Jerk.

Here's deep birthday vibe dives into a piece Keith wrote about Illusionism and Consciousness.

-Dawds

00:00:00 The Great Silliness: Keith Frankish's Consciousness as Illusion

00:06:58 Provocative v. Defensible Claims, Definition of Consciousness, The Hard Problem

00:13:39 The Illusion Problem, Realist v. Illusionist Theories, Psychokinesis example

00:24:25 Phenomenal v. Access Consciousness, What-its-like-ness

00:28:36 Quasi-phenomenal properties, Penrose triangle & Operating System User Illusions

00:40:55 Representations, Interpretations, & Counting transductions

00:50:13 Zombies & What-its-like-type-II, How quasi-phenomenality works in illusionism

00:57:51 Arguments against Realism & for Illusionism, Epiphenomenalism & Occam

01:07:20 Qualia & the Alien Ashtrays, Objections to Illusionism considered

01:28:46 Illusionism v. Eliminativism, Harland's Metaphilosophical Argument

01:39:57 Ryan's Big Question: Why do people care about what they care about?

The Dawdlers discuss the positive side of this dichotomy through a paper by the mid-to-late 20th Century statistician George E.P. Box. Here, he forays into the big vistas of Science and Statistics with his mantra in hand--"All models are wrong, but some are useful." Through discussions of an exemplar, the infamous early 20th Century “scientist” (who was also his father-in-law), R.A. Fisher, Box unpacks the statistical insights of his century's deepest dives into epistemology.

Bring an extra pair of socks, muck rakers, things are about to get saturated.

00:02:26 – Science and Statistics by G.E.P. Box / Box’s bumper sticker / Ryan has no plan / More “what is science?” shit

00:19:50 – What is statistics? / Qualitative data

00:33:56 – Who is R.A. Fisher? / Experimental design / Basic concepts in statistics

00:58:32 – Using English to express math / Mathematistry and cookbookery / Trying to control complicated systems

01:10:32 – Does one need advanced math to address complicated problems / Ryan wants to know how to speak math equations well in English / Thinking in words vs thinking in pictures

01:26:10 – Harland has two things to say still / Harland is paranoid Box is talking about him / Mathematical modeling

This time the Dawdlers wanna get each other’s take on whether or not everyone has a “right” to their own opinion. Do they? Should they? What does that even mean? Listen to find out what they think and let them know what you think.

What's *your* take?

What if someone had this type of talent, but for thinking? How might it look? What is a correct and (nearly) complete thought? A good candidate for the worker bee of thinking might be Ludwig Wittgenstein. In this episode, we Dawdlers focus on this dying man's thoughts on common sense and the external world.

Help yourself to the questions because there are no answers.

The Dawdlers

00:03:58 - Wittgenstein the Life & Times - The Two Phases of W-'s Thought

00:12:34 - Wittgenstein of the Tractatus v. Wittgenstein of the Investigations

00:19:55 - G.E. Moore's "Proof of an External World"

00:38:07 - G.E. Moore's "A Defense of Common Sense"

00:47:48 - W- First Pick for My Team! - Because he's a Thinker, That Boy!

01:11:25 - Wittgenstein Wrestling His Inner Skeptic

01:33:30 - Language, Epistemology, & Other Infinite Games

02:03:08 - Hinge Epistemology

Ryan has kids. Kids have diseases and general poor hygiene. Thus, Ryan has diseases and sometimes poor hygiene. But he loves ‘em, those little rascals.

In this episode, the Dawdlers explore this kind of parental affection, but for ideas. How much affection should we give to our brain children? The discussion centers around a little old paper that holds the key! And the key is as Harland says, “The Method”. In this case, it is the method of multiple working hypotheses.

So drink plenty of fluids, get some rest, and prepare to have more children. Or get out of the business of decision making entirely.

-The Dawds

00:05:07 - T.C. Chamberlin

00:11:44 - Working Hypotheses, Ruling Theories, & the Parent/Child Metaphor

00:25:40 - Multiple Working Hypotheses, Ethology v. Psychology

00:35:00 - Chamberlin's Geological Examples

00:43:50 - Ryan Loves Evolution & Punctuated Equilibria

00:59:36 - The Null Hypothesis

01:05:05 - The Aim of Science, Truth & The Noble Lie

01:23:23 - Fact & Interpretation & Measurement & Language

01:39:06 - The Paradox of Choice

01:48:30 - Single Child Households & the Masters of Ruling Theories

Unremitting travelers rarely play it safe. How could they? They are in motion. Momentum is both a liberator and a killer. But these adventurers just don’t care. They are obsessed. They are possessed. They are living on the edge…

Here, The Dawdler’s Philosophy presents a new theme: Haunting the Margins. We focus on individuals who do the unpopular thing and “get weird”. And they’re nearly always ahead of the ever-hackneyed curve to not become normal in their time even though some may think they are. Nay, they be margin haunters, outlaws, and criminals of the mainstream milieu. They may not all be original in ideas, but they are all original in their actions.

First up: Robert Anton Wilson.

Here’s to “Maybe”.

00:07:00 – Margin Haunting, Inc.

00:22:39 – RAW, the Man

00:30:00 – Margin Haunter Attributes/Margin Haunter Conditions

00:46:46 – The Incorrigible Optimist/Model Agnosticism

01:18:06 – Discordianism, Expanded/Correct Answer Machines

01:36:16 – Generalism/Drugs & Openness

Richard Dawkins wrote that in a note to a 1989 paperback edition of his book "The Extended Phenotype". Ryan appeals to this sentiment when it comes to the idea he outlines in this episode. Poor Harland has to sit and listen to Ryan talk about his “big idea”; one of resource-driven evolution that either drags a population down where a relic gets new life or pushes it up where abundance begets abundance, the results of which are sometimes the formation of new modes and new lineages.

The Dawdlers

00:06:03 – Animal figurines/Diversity & Diversification/Ryan’s “My Story”/Being Different

00:24:38 – Episodic Synchrony

00:46:10 – Impoverishment & Enrichment/Growth Stages/Rate of Increase*

01:13:38 – Anthropogenic Systems/Agritourism/Elite Overproduction

01:40:24 – Examples/Apple Maggot Flies/Cupuladriid Bryozoans/Kelp Gulls/Melanopsid Gastropods

02:19:59 – Harland thinks Episodic Synchrony is Obvious/Convergent Memetics/Harland’s Seal of Approval

02:25:04 – The Prevalence Argument for Episodic Synchrony

*Too late, a mortified Ryan now realizes a slip of his tongue when he said (over and over) “reproductive rate” instead of “rate of increase” or “per capita rate of change” [Forehead slap]. GET IT RIGHT, RYAAAANN!!!

Buckle your chin straps, Truth Seekers!

00:04:50 – Science? Philosophy?/Thought experiments/Provisionalism vs Definitionalism

00:42:48 – Modes of Indeference/Progress

01:02:26 – “Social” science/Wolf packs & bears/Singer-songwriters & jazz musicians/Science is data collection, philosophy is everything else/The structure of scientific papers/Philosophy of statistics vs philosophy of science/Calculus is bullshit

01:30:52 - Radicalisuuuuuuuuuuuhm

Until then we just have to try and keep moving forward, try to understand. This episode is just one of those attempts.

00:14:42 - Nihilism (Active & Passive)/Morality (Master & Slave)/Articulating Darwin/The Herd/Virtue/More Herd

01:06:55 – Truth, Faith, and Philosophers/The Skeptics/Every Judgement is from a Perspective/Belief

01:40:23 – Will to Power/Life/Flux/Holism: Relation & Effect (There are No Things-in-Themselves)

02:01:23 – The Man, The Mountain, The Madness

Grab your ankles if you want, but get comfortable at least. It may be a while before you’re “visited”.

00:07:45 – Fermi’s Paradox/Kardeshev Scale/Civilization Types

00:25:00 – More Fermi/Drake Equation/Lost Amazonian Tribe Analogy

00:46:30 – The Great Filter/Phil Niche Theory/Goldilocks Thinking/Money

01:46:45 – White House Lawn Scenarios

Do you smell that? It’s the sweet potpourri of Dennettian thinkadinks.

-Dawds

00:08:24 – Thinking Tools

00:39:32 – Folk Psychology, etc.

00:51:21 – Heterophenomenology and Zombies

01:15:01 – The Tuned Deck and Two Black Boxes

01:39:09 – Ryan does not Understand Dennett

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 is heavily invested in the narrative of Lockean individualism or something. Whatever the case may be, they cover a wide range of topics from—Hey, look! Sections!

00:04:45 – Thomas Malthus stuff

00:13:34 – Paul Ehrlich/Tragedy of the Commons

00:20:38 – Ryan’s Lament/The Psychology of “Over”-population

00:35:28 – Harland’s Reverse/Back to Ecology

00:58:26 – Human Exceptionalism/Growth Curbs (eh-heh-heh…)

01:02:39 – Back to Psychology

01:34:02 – What is a Population?/Shit Related to Offspring/Harland Being Radical

As one can probably surmise from the title, this episode is about arguing. We explore some of Harland's thoughts and ideas on the middle ground between dogmatic appeals to truth and defeatist egalitarianism. You may not be entitled to your own facts, but you do have the capacity for building an argument through premises and conclusions!

Listen up, extremists!

-The Dawdlers

00:04:00 – Argumentation Theory as the middle way between Dogmatism and Epistemic Egalitarianism / Preferring Agreement to Disagreement 00:11:15 – Descriptive v. Normative Argumentation Analysis / Argument “In the wild” v. Argument Institutionalized / Charles Wilard 00:21:45 – Some Basic Concepts of Argumentation Theory: Pro/Con, Pragmatic Speech Acts/Propositions, Enthymemes, Resolve/Settle 00:38:15 – Domesticated Primates, Munchausen’s Angels, & Impossible Gods – Idealization in Engineering Helps Chimps Transcend Animal Limitations 00:50:30 – What is Argument? / Some Definitions Compared / Normative Semantics 01:14:10 – The Argument Argument / The Procedure: Claims, Premises, Conclusions, Definitions, Logic, Reasoning / Ham & Eggs v. Ham & Cheese 01:26:05 – Reasonable People Can’t Disagree / I/O Concordance Given Successful Communication / Tending Toward Resolution 01:43:45 – The Burden of Proof / Are any Topics Off-Limits?

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 the Good Death,

The Dawdlers

This episode the Dawdlers get in over their heads with Alfred Korzybski’s General Semantics. Well, Ryan is in over his head. Harland just can’t get his out of his bum. Badum ching! Rim shot! Pun intended.

Anyway, it’s the thought that counts and the thoughts count mostly when spoken properly. And that’s what this episode is all about.

Don’t forget to thank us.

-Da Dawds

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 the politics. So if you came in wanting to hear the familiar repetition in the echo chamber, y’ain’t gonna find it! Well, maybe you will, but with much less emotional emphasis, fear mongering, and triggered sobbing.

Buckle your chin straps, folks. It’s about to get technical.

Anyhoo, this topic is a take on skepticism. Some may say it’s radical. Harland would probably be fine with that. But in any case, it is—we think—important. Trying to change the world here folks…One. Chimp. At a time.

Cheers,

The Dawdlers

This time we talked about the idea of emergence and naturally, its counterpart, reductionism. Of course, supervenience was all thinking it’s host to this party like Rick Moranis in Ghostbusters, “Hiya doin’! Why don’t you have some of the brie. It’s at room temperature. You think it’s too warm in here for the brie?” But never mind, we soon bailed on that party.

Nearly as many names get dropped as threads in this full-on geek-out sesh on radical metaphysics.  Make no mistake, we wrestle with the big ideas-- and this tag-team don't tap-out.  Nevertheless, the ideas usually get us on points.    

Our number one fan  brought a friend. Things are really starting to get going.

Also, we're at Harland's deeeeeep in Minnesota. It's basically Canada. And Canada is basically the North Pole. And the North Pole is where Santa lives. And that is NOT NORMAL. :-)

In this episode the Dawdlers go deep into lesser known territory: original ideas. Truth Seekers, Game Players, Overseers, and Engineers are united in a unique interpretive mechanism for evaluating contributions to inquiry. Our number one fan is present but we tried to reduce the constant cheering using tek-nah-luh-gee. Unfortunately, this means Harland sounds like he has a cold or is talking through one of those cardboard tubes in a roll of paper towels. Ryan sounds great, as usual. Fans. Amirite? Or is it “arwerite”? Whatever…

Harland and Ryan tackle Stephen J Gould and Richard Lewontin’s paper “The Spandrels of San Marco” and discuss adaptationism’s benefits and flaws in evolutionary biology.

This is a topic we thought we could shoot off. Well…hard to tell…it’s hard to tell if we just fucked off or if we got anywhere. Maybe we get somewhere in some places. Hopefully this is more than just listening to two people talk and making no sense (especially Ryan). Our best to all those involved who had little say in the matter other than saying anything at all. It’s a lesson in how not to record a conversation intended for an audience larger than zero. Also, about two-thirds of the way through we are visited by our biggest fan who shouts over us the whole time.

P.S. This is not an apology…we think…no, we’re sorry.

P.S. This is episode zero. Why? We don’t know! Guess it’s a thing we Dawdlers are not up to date on like those Hustlers out there.

P.P.S. In this episode you will hear great pauses of unedited connection failures and foolish people talking about their failings. Naturally, a podcast is where this should be channeled.