ToKCast Brett Hall
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- Society & Culture
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This is a podcast primarily about the work of philosopher and physicist David Deutsch and related matters (such as Popperian epistemology). I read from and comment upon the books ”The Beginning of Infinity” & ”The Fabric of Reality” (both by Deutsch), ”The Science of Can & Can’t” (by Deutsch’s collegue Marletto) and ”Rationality” by Pinker (so far). In addition I make stand alone episodes about topics like resources, environmentalism, economics, science, philosophy, epistemology (especially explanations) and reason broadly.
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Ep 212: Livestream 3, June 28 2024
More questions, more lengthy and more verbose than ever. Enjoy, or drift of to sleep with me ;)
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Ep 211: Livestream 2, June 26 2024
Fear not! ToKCast is not becoming a pure Q&A "show". This is literally a kind of "break" for me that I find easy and I note the listeners find fun. Today's a little shorter and - here's some of the topics covered!
00:00: David Deutsch mentioned on Lex Fridman
04:15: Dennis Noble debates Richard Dawkins on the selfish gene
16:47: The goal driven life and AI
27:51 Self similarity - minds and universes
34:39: The hard problem of consciousness and Popperian epistemology
41:30: Wave particle duality
53:53 The fun criterion - and some reflections on responsibility and “toil”.
1:05:44 - Communication and the difficulty thereof between people
1:07:13 - Roger Penrose and the universality of (quantum) computation (or Taking Theories Seriously…)
1:13:35 Book recommendations. -
Ep 210: Livestream - Question, Answer and repeat for 2+ hours
I put out a call on Twitter/@X for questions and got a deluge. Between those and more from YouTube itself - this is the result ranging over predicting the future, through to theories of learning, AGI and AI, optimism and epistemology - many of the major hits and more.
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Ep 209: Rational Decision Making
Riffing on Karl Popper and David Deutsch (especially). A broad overview, covering lots of the basics of "social" or "rational" choice theory, Bayesianism (again!), misconceptions, good ideas and bad. Errors my own as always.
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Ep 208: David Deutsch’s ”The Fabric of Reality” Chapter 11 ”Time: The First Quantum Concept” Part 3
Here we explore the distinction between classical notions of time (including spacetime physics) as approximations to how time is understood in the multiverse. How perfectly deterministic laws lead to subjective unpredictability. Consequences for free will, questions about what happened before time began (or after it ends), new discoveries since the publication of The Fabric of Reality was published in 1997 and David's subtle alterations to phrasing between The Fabric of Reality and The Beginning of Infinity (in particular with reference to identical vs fungible and how tossing "fair" coins in our universe isn't 50/50 heads and tails. If you would like to discuss any of the content in this video with me at length, sign up to Airchat at https://www.air.chat where I am active daily answering people's questions and engaging with those interested in the work of David Deutsch and associated thinkers and ideas explored in his work, wider physics, philosophy and everything.
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Ep 207: Variations on a Conjecture
If you are distracted by, or simply prefer a version without, the background music - you can find that here: https://youtu.be/xSbqTTs1nl0
My preferred version is here: https://youtu.be/2IneL4VpShE as there are some helpful (though not essential) visuals.
This is about knowledge creation and the the commonalities between the two forms known (evolution (by natural selection) and explanatory) and the differences between them. It teases out and synthesises some of the work of Darwin, Popper and Deutsch on these matters of what creativity means. I also consider the place of prediction and prophecy and the "urge" to know what the future will hold. This is sometimes the dividing line between optimism and pessimism.
You can support this ongoing exercise in optimism, exposition and encouraging rapid progress by following the links here: https://www.bretthall.org/ Thankyou for any and all support. Know it is much appreciated.
Customer Reviews
Spectacular. Jaw dropping. Mind expanding.
Brett’s work distilling and clarifying how to think about complex philosophical and scientific ideas has dramatically shifted my worldview. This podcast and subsequent reading of the applicable books has expanded my toolset for critical thinking beyond anything I ever experienced in college or graduate school. I cannot recommend this podcast highly enough; it is my favorite of all time. Brett, thank you, and please keep it up!
Useful and engaging
Brett takes physicist concepts and breaks them down in a clear and engaging way, a must listen!
Extraordinarily useful.
I’m a non-physicist (a busy physician, with only very basic knowledge of physics) who is very much interested in understanding the reality of our universe. I have found David Deutsch to be one of the most fascinating writers I have ever come across, and his ideas have inspired me and changed some of my most basic conceptions of objective reality. His theories (and books), however, are so dense with revolutionary thoughts that they require time and commitment to understand and digest. That’s where Brett Hall’s podcast comes in. To me, it has been an indispensable companion to the chapters in DD’s books. My strategy has been to listen to Brett’s corresponding episode before and after reading each book chapter. Brett is himself an amazing intellect who really excels at explaining and putting into context the various concepts in DD’s work. Very helpful, I’m a big fan of both of you.