Very Bad Wizards

Tamler Sommers & David Pizarro
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Very Bad Wizards

Very Bad Wizards is a podcast featuring a philosopher (Tamler Sommers) and a psychologist (David Pizarro), who share a love for ethics, pop culture, and cognitive science, and who have a marked inability to distinguish sacred from profane. Each podcast includes discussions of moral philosophy, recent work on moral psychology and neuroscience, and the overlap between the two.

  1. NOV 12

    Episode 296: The Other CRT

    David and Tamler share a few brief thoughts on the election and then raise some questions about Tucker Carlson being attacked by a demon as he slept in the woods with his wife and four dogs (still don’t believe in ghosts, people?). In the main segment we talk about one of the most popular measures in social psychology – the cognitive reflection test (CRT). Originally designed to identify differences in people’s ability to employ reflection (system 2) to override their initial intuition (system 1), this three-item measure has mushroomed into its own industry with researchers linking CRT scores to job performance, religious belief, conspiracy theorizing and more. But what psychological attribute is this test supposed to measure exactly, and how can we determine its validity? And has the dual process system 1/system 2 framework outlived its usefulness?  Tucker Carlson was totally mauled by a demon and not scratched by his dogs [youtube.com] Frederick, S. (2005). Cognitive reflection and decision making. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 19(4), 25-42. Blacksmith, N., Yang, Y., Ruark, G., & Behrend, T. (2018, July). A Validity Analysis of the Cognitive Reflection Test Using an Item-Response-Tree Model. In Academy of Management Proceedings (Vol. 2018, No. 1, p. 18090). Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510: Academy of Management. Erceg, N., Galić, Z., & Ružojčić, M. (2020). A reflection on cognitive reflection–testing convergent/divergent validity of two measures of cognitive reflection. Judgment and Decision making, 15(5), 741-755. Meyer, A., & Frederick, S. (2023). The formation and revision of intuitions. Cognition, 240, 105380.

    1h 3m

  2. OCT 29

    Episode 295: Guess Who's Coming to Dinner

    David and Tamler hop into their Scooby Van and drive into Tobe Hooper’s mad and macabre horror classic The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.  How does this endlessly imitated movie still have the power to scare the shit out of people fifty years after its release? We talk about the sounds, smells, heat, and sweat (but not so much the blood) that pour out of the screen. And we dare to ask the question: are the Sawyers – a family of craftsmen and artists, committed to sustainability and fine dining – actually the victims here? Plus we take and fail a test to see if we can identify fake Republicans and Democrats.  Hart, M., & Nazarian, N. (2024) Season's mis-greetings: why timing matters in global academia. Nature. Both Democrats and Republicans can pass the Ideological Turing Test [experimental-history.com] The Ideological Turing Test [ituringtest.com] The Texas Chain Saw Massacre [wikipedia.org]

    1h 34m

  3. OCT 8

    Episode 294: The Scandal of Philosophy (Hume's Problem of Induction)

    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.

    1h 14m

  4. SEP 24

    Episode 293: Who Is the Dreamer? (Borges' "The Circular Ruins")

    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]

    1h 26m

  5. SEP 10

    Episode 292: Boundary Issues

    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]

    1h 15m

  6. AUG 27

    Episode 291: Shoe Shining

    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]

    2h 12m

  7. AUG 6

    Episode 290: Blinded by the Light (Plato's Cave Pt. 2)

    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]

    1h 37m

  8. JUL 23

    Episode 289: Shadows on the Wall (Plato's Cave Pt. 1)

    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]

    1h 12m
See All (300)

Hosts & Guests

4.8
out of 5
2,584 Ratings

About

Very Bad Wizards is a podcast featuring a philosopher (Tamler Sommers) and a psychologist (David Pizarro), who share a love for ethics, pop culture, and cognitive science, and who have a marked inability to distinguish sacred from profane. Each podcast includes discussions of moral philosophy, recent work on moral psychology and neuroscience, and the overlap between the two.

Information

  • Creator
    Tamler Sommers & David Pizarro
  • Years Active
    2012 - 2024
  • Episodes
    300
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2023 Tamler Sommers and David Pizarro
  • Show Website
    Very Bad Wizards

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