In this special live episode recorded at the 2012 Northeast Conference on Science and Skepticism, Massimo and I discuss the “simulation argument” — the case that it’s roughly 20% likely that we live in a computer simulation — and the surprising implications that argument has for religion. Our guest is philosopher David Kyle Johnson, who is professor of philosophy at King’s College and author of the blog “Plato on Pop” for Psychology Today, and who hosts his own podcast at philosophyandpopculture.com. Elaborating on an article he recently published in the journal Philo, Johnson lays out the simulation argument and his own insight into how it might solve the age-old Problem of Evil (i.e., “How is it possible that an all-powerful, all-knowing, and good God could allow evil to occur in the world?”). As usual, Massimo and I have plenty of questions and comments!
Is “rational” spirituality a contradiction in terms? In the latest episode of the Rationally Speaking podcast, Massimo and I try to pin down what people mean when they call themselves “spiritual,” what inspires spiritual experiences and attitudes, and whether spirituality can be compatible with a naturalist view of the world.
Are there benefits that skeptics and other secular people could possibly get from incorporating some variants on traditional spiritual practices — like prayer, ritual, song, communal worship, and so on — into their own lives?
We xamine a variety of attempts to do so, and ask: how well have such attempts worked, and do they come with any potential pitfalls for our rationality?
New video blog: “How to Want to Change your Mind.”
This one’s full of useful tips to turn off your “defensive” instincts in debates, and instead cultivate the kind of fair-minded approach that’s focused on figuring out the truth, not on “winning” an argument.
In RS #54 — dubbed “The isms episode” — Massimo and I ask, “Is the fundamental nature of the world knowable by science alone?”, looking at the issue through the lenses of a series of related philosophical positions: determinism, reductionism, physicalism, and naturalism. All of those “isms” take a stance on the question of whether there are objectively “correct” ways to interpret scientific facts — like physical laws, or causality — and if so, how do we decide what the correct interpretation is? Along the way, we debate the nature of emergent properties, whether math is discovered or invented, and whether it’s even logically possible for “supernatural” things to exist.
In my latest video blog I answer a listener’s question about why rationalists are more likely to abandon social norms like marriage, monogamy, standard gender roles, having children, and so on. And then I weigh in on whether that’s a rational attitude to take:
Sports fan? This might describe you. Not a sports fan? This will help you make fun of the sports fans! Everyone else who just doesn’t care either way, here’s a neat psychology study for you.
You’ve probably noticed that when a team wins, their fans are more likely to wear their jerseys around. Since the New York Giants beat the New England Patriots 21-17 in the Superbowl last night, I’ve seen a bunch of proud Giants fans gloating on Facebook. But it’s not just the bragging, it’s the way they brag.
It turns out that sports fans will actually change the words they use based on whether their favorite team won or lost. Once again, I turn to the impeccable Mitchell and Webb to illustrate the tendency:
I love that retort: “Remember when we were chasing the Nazis in Raiders of the Lost Ark?” Movies don’t inspire the same tribal attitudes that sports do, but Mitchell’s rant does highlight the absurdity of using the word “we” in this context.
It’s not just anecdotal. Mitchell and Webb are describing an actual social phenomenon: Even if they have nothing to do with the results, fans are more likely to use “we” pronouns when their favorite team is doing well.
Robert Cialdini called it Basking in Reflected Glory. In an attempt to gain social standing, we try to associate ourselves with success.
Basking in Reflected Glory
Conducting a creative study (pdf), Cialdini and his researchers called college students and asked them how their school’s team had done in a particular game. When describing victories, 32% of the students referred to the team as “we” – “We won,” “We beat them,” etc. In contrast, only 18% used the word “we” when talking about their school’s team losing.
Makes sense, right? People wanted to be seen as part of a winning group. But it gets better.
Cialdini added a twist to his study: before asking about the football game, he asked the students six quick, factual questions. Regardless of their answers, they were either told that they’d done well (gotten five correct) or poorly (gotten only one out of six correct). He hypothesized that the students who were told they’d failed would be more likely to grasp at straws to regain social status.
When the numbers were separated out, the tendency was clear: Almost all the increase in “we” pronouns was from the students who lost prestige by being told they’d failed.
Likelihood of using “we” pronoun(%)
“Succeeded” on Test
“Failed” on Test
Mean
Describing Win
24% (11/45)
40% (16/40)
32% (27/85)
Describing Loss
22% (9/41)
14% (6/42)
18% (15/83)
Students who were given a dose of self-esteem didn’t change their language based on whether their team won or lost.
But students who felt embarrassed? They were much more likely to latch onto a winning team and distance themselves from a losing team.
So you know all those Giants fans posting status updates on Facebook saying “We won!” or “We’re number one”? Ask them why their self-esteem is so low that they need to Bask in Reflected Glory.
That’ll show ’em.
[Title changed after posting from “How Football Scores Actually Change The Way We Talk”]
In Episode 53 of the Rationally Speaking Podcast, Massimo and I take on parapsychology, the study of phenomena such as extrasensory perception, precognition, and remote viewing. We discuss the type of studies parapsychologists conduct, what evidence they’ve found, and how we should interpret that evidence. The field is mostly not taken seriously by other scientists, which parapsychologists argue is unfair, given that their field shows some consistent and significant results. Do they have a point? Massimo and I discuss the evidence and talk about what the results from parapsychology tell us about the practice of science in general.
It’s so counter-intuitive that it’s called Braess’ Paradox: How can closing a road actually make everyone’s commute shorter? You would think that blocking a route would be an inconvenience, but under some circumstances it’s actually for the best.
Doesn’t sound right, does it? Here’s the situation: Assume drivers are rational and intelligent. I know, that’s a stretch – I grew up around DC. But bear with me. If there are multiple paths that people can take, they should in theory find an equilibrium between them. If one path has less traffic and takes less time, more people will switch to it until it loses its advantage. If one path starts longer than the others, nobody will use it until the other paths get congested enough to make it worth it.
So how can an extra path actually make the average commute time longer? Shouldn’t an extra path just give people more options to choose from, and ultimately find the best equilibrium?
The Situation:
It turns out that when some roads are more prone to traffic than others, it can create Braess’ Paradox. Imagine that some roads aren’t as affected by traffic – I picture these as the local roads with traffic lights. They add a fixed amount of time to your commute, say 45 minutes. The other roads are heavily dependent on traffic – these highways can either be wonderfully fast or a mess of stop-and-go congestion, depending on how many other people are on them. The average time it takes to drive on them is the number of cars over 100.
Let’s say there are 4000 cars driving from the start to finish. Without the connector (dotted in the diagram), an equilibrium forms where half the drivers (2000 cars) take the top route through A, and half take the bottom route through B. The highway takes 2000/100 = 20 minutes, and the local road takes 45 minutes. So half the population spends 45 minutes on a local street, followed by 20 minutes on a highway, and the other half of the drivers spend 20 minutes on a highway, followed by 45 minutes on a local street. Everyone gets to their destination in 65 minutes. Nobody has any incentive to switch.
But what if a new connector is opened between A and B, allowing people to go straight from one highway to the other? Now everyone thinks to themselves, “Hey, why spend 45 minutes on a local street when I could spend 20 minutes on the highway? I’m going to take the route Start –> A –> B –> Finish, and shave 25 minutes off of my commute time!”
Of course, if everyone thinks that way, there are now double the cars on each highway than there were before, and it’s half as fast: now each highway takes 40 minutes, not 20 minutes. That’s still 5 minutes less than the 45 minutes it takes to drive on the local street, though, so everyone still has an incentive to take the highway.
So in the end, how has the connector affected people’s commutes? Everyone’s commute used to be 65 minutes; now, everyone’s commute is 80 minutes. And to make it stranger, there’s no better path to take – anyone considering switching to their original route would be looking at an 85 minute drive.
How does this happen?
How can opening a new, super-fast connector make commutes worse? It comes down to the price of anarchy and people’s selfish motivations. With the connector open, each set of cars has the option to clog up the other half’s highways – saving themselves 5 minutes but adding 20 minutes to the other guys’ commute.
It’s like the prisoner’s dilemma: Each driver has the motivation to take the highways, even though it damages the overall system. Without the connector, nobody is allowed to “defect” for personal gain. In the traditional prisoner’s dilemma, it would be like a mafia boss keeping all his criminals anonymous. Without the option to rat each other out, criminals would avoid the selfish temptation and the entire system is better off.
Braess’ Paradox isn’t purely hypothetical – it has real-world implications in city planning. According to this New York Times article titled What if They Closed 42d Street and Nobody Noticed?, “When a network is not congested, adding a new street will indeed make things better. But in the case of congested networks, adding a new street probably makes things worse at least half the time, mathematicians say.” That’s shocking. My intuitions about how traffic works were way off.
In this special live episode recorded at the 2012 Northeast Conference on Science and Skepticism, Massimo and I discuss the “simulation argument” — the case that it’s roughly 20% likely that we live in a computer simulation — and the surprising implications that argument has for religion. Our guest is philosopher David Kyle Johnson, who is professor of philosophy at King’s College and author of the blog “Plato on Pop” for Psychology Today, and who hosts his own podcast at philosophyandpopculture.com. Elaborating on an article he recently published in the journal Philo, Johnson lays out the simulation argument and his own insight into how it might solve the age-old Problem of Evil (i.e., “How is it possible that an all-powerful, all-knowing, and good God could allow evil to occur in the world?”). As usual, Massimo and I have plenty of questions and comments!
Sports fan? This might describe you. Not a sports fan? This will help you make fun of the sports fans! Everyone else who just doesn’t care either way, here’s a neat psychology study for you.
It’s so counter-intuitive that it’s called Braess’ Paradox: How can closing a road actually make everyone’s commute shorter? You would think that blocking a route would be an inconvenience, but under some circumstances it’s actually for the best.
