thesumofparts
Very interesting debate about God, evolution, free will, consciousness and death.
Daniel Clement Dennett is a prominent American philosopher whose research centers on philosophy of mind, philosophy of science and philosophy of biology, particularly as those fields relate to evolutionary biology and cognitive science. He is currently the co-director of the Center for Cognitive Studies and the Austin B. Fletcher Professor of Philosophy at Tufts University. Dennett is also a noted atheist and advocate of the Brights movement.
Robert Wright is an American journalist, scholar, and prize-winning author of best-selling books about science, evolutionary psychology, history, religion, and game theory, including Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny, The Moral Animal, and Three Scientists and Their Gods: Looking for Meaning in an Age of Information. He is a visiting scholar at The University of Pennsylvania and Schwartz Senior Fellow at the New America Foundation.
Source
Robert Wright interviews Daniel Dennett (2 of 8)
Jewish interpretation of Gen is done without reference to Jesus or the Newtestament… of course it's different. Jesus isnt thier messiah/savior.. neither to muslims. The only point is within Xian doctrine Gen. and the fall of man are directly related to jesus and his death. I already showed you why with Corinthians 15:22.
Romans 5:12 –Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men
Adam=Fall Jesus=Save to Xians
Now you dont know what im talking about after so many replies on the matter? Retreating? Im just addressing your early stupid statement. The one by which you were grouped as an idiot, the one you mistook for being grouped as a theist. Its was the the topic that I hadnt realized was already addressed when I 1st posted by someone else. it was a tangential point, one you seem to be conceeding. Thx for playing, you lose.
No you moron, you were talking to theologies as the relate to evolution when you said:
"every major denomination of every major world religion has their idea of a god doing just that (kickstarting the big bang) – i do not know of a single one that discounts evolution for a second".
So your Theological knowledge comes into question because the relationship you posit is FALSE! Even those who accept evo basically do so with huge DISCOUNTS making it into a hollower version.
'I declare victory' ? Nah man. Mr. Dennett is tired of the subject, you can see it.
You can tell Dennet is tired of this shit.
What a douche bag. This is not an interview. This guy is trying to get his say in and Dennet barely gets to speak. Horrible.
The "interviewer" is tragic.
Yeah, the interviewer is terrible. I've seen him do interviews with other people and he basically tries to constantly upstage the person who's supposed to be emphasized in the interview. He puts the spotlight on himself and always talks more than the interviewee.
@flight75 — What? This is more like a lazy afternoon at coffee shop discussion. I much prefer this to the "Hitchens Club" sophistry matches that have become so popular on youtube.
This is not intended to be a "spot light on the interviewee" type interview. This is more or less a spotlight on Robert Wright's disagreements with Dennett. There are plenty of youtube clips giving Dennett more air time. For all of its apparent awkwardness, think this 'interview' does what it was supposed to do.
I agree.
But in a sense that is kind of what I was looking for. A discussion between Wright and Dennett where Wright satisfies himself rather than an audience. It is like we are overhearing a lazy afternoon discussion at a coffeehouse where Dennett has consented to being cross-examined by a new kid on the block who has genuine questions for him. Not saying you @shade1978x were doing this but I think this interview is being unfairly judged for not being something it was never intended to be. I like it.
i just need to scream right now, I have only watched like 3 mins into this but… ROBERT WRIGHT!!, PLEASE STOP APPEARING ON DEBATES YOU ARE AN EMBARRASSMENT!!, Dennett is to intelligent for you, you cant use your stupid word-quirks on him. And yes, this is a debate camouflaged as an "interview". Stupid
Did he say "Watch and animal grow from a single germ cell" ?
Because you can imagine it doesn't make it so. Dennet concedes at the outset that you can't prove a negative, so I really don't understand why wright spends so much time trying to show that Dennet can't disprove God's existence.
@Malbrojia
So why did your god not predict, the downfall of man and not create then?……seems to me your god had no idea what would happen, and has been juggling with all his mistakes since he made man, hardly suprising seeing the creator is imperfect….you only have to look a creation
gettin beter now! they clearly dont like each other!! lol
@devante11
Totally agree. When did it become my god? I'm as militant-2-fist-fighting-Atheist as they come. You must be misreading the conversation.
@Malbrojia
Actually this is just a fine example, of people fighting who is true or not, saying no im true, no im true, no different than in bible days of fiction 🙂 humans repeat history
6:25 – the sigh says it all.
Dan Dennett is so smart. I love the way he patiently, modestly, thoughtfully explains his point of view. He seems like he'd be a great guy to talk to over coffee.
Christ, this Robert Wright guy is fucking unbearable. Poor Dennett.
robert wright is usually quite… BRIGHT… but he's boring the shit out of dan
@pprimmuss this idiot? that idiot is robert wright, 27th on the foeign policies website top 100 global thinkers… conversing with him like this is a great way for dennet to get his ideas out and the feedback helps the viewers. we need to encourage argument and debate, not discourage it plz.
Robert Wright is rather mirage-like here. Don't like philosophical stuff. The point around halfway when they talk about whether design is possible (either because or despite how embryos develop, depending on where Wright's swirling mind is), well maybe it is – but is it testable. 'That becomes empirical' there you go. It isn't testable. What would design look like? What would a lack of design look like. We can be happy that design is absent, but Wright doesn't want to go there.
The probability of intelligent life depends on the stability of the environment within the planet followed by the solar system, galaxy, and universe each with increasing or decreasing stability. Robert Wright tries to quantify the probability of intelligent life restricted to evolution without environment restrictions which is a key component to the design of the evolved form of every specie. i.e. if dinosaurs were not wiped out it would have been a different story…many possibilities.
Why are there all these pissed off comments about Wright? I'm a fan of Dennett but I also like Wright and isn't the point that we want to have open discussions and an exchange of ideas? It's not very encouraging to see these kinds of comments because I'm interested in that, and yet when it seems to happen with someone people really like (i.e. Dennett) people start getting a bit nasty. Isn't that what we dislike about creationists and religion in general?
@CambridgeHeights Oh, sure. But then there are degrees of 'challenging' which might be counterproductive to an interview. Wright comes across throughout as needlessly eager to try to get Dennett to make certain concessions which Dennett rejects (patiently and ("I'll say it again slower, I guess")) suggesting he sees it as a competition. One piece of evidence for this is that he declared 'victory' after the interview in an piece entitled 'Planet with a Purpose' (seriously; google it).
@CambridgeHeights Incidentally, an excellent series of 'challenging' interviews (in the best sense) is to be found in Sue Blackmore's book Conversations on Consciousness, where she's just just as interrogative whether she's talking to Dennett, or Searle, or Block or Chalmers. If you liked the philosophy of mind sections of this interview, you'll love it.
@evilsatanbox – not sure I would agree, Robert Wright did a pretty good job with him too, especially on consciousness
Dennett is kind of weak, I wish he were more like Hitchens, and stood his ground a little more boldly.
Btw I agree on the respect point, meaning a quality of intellectual submission. I have my own phrase: respect the individual inherently, all else is earned. This reminds me that while I take on bored the points Dennett makes about phony *respect*, he is talking about interpretations of reality, not the person.
I also consider it the height of respect to just do what were doing now–exchanging ideas in a civil way. Not to say that PCSs dont deserve their ridicule tho
Denette is overlooking the fact that intelligence is a result of the universe and a symptom of it.. so how an intelligence interprets, predicts, and avoids is actually just as "inevitable" as the actions that are being predicted to take place, but nothing is inevitable except for death and life. There is, in quantum physics, an obvious example of spontaneity that keeps everything from being predictable.. but it certainly doesn't imply independent free will.
It doesn't matter how low the probability is.. think about it.. even if you don't have infinite universes you still have an infinite amount of time for the magic to happen.. and its not like life would have to wait on this thing either.. time doesn't exist if its not measured. just like you didn't have to wait to be born. I can't really explain myself well here there is low area to comment but I hope you get my gist.
wright talks too much. let the guest talk you dit!
probabilifier.
Maybe because in this clip Wright's ideas are fallacious. For example the process described as natural selection is circular. One chooses a certain feature that is said to be a key feature for survival of that or that species. But that feature is selected as a survival feature because it help the organism survive. " Suppose we say that even in Andromeda ‘the fittest will survive’ we say nothing, for ‘fittest’ has to be defined in terms of ‘survival’” (Smart 1959, 366)
All I got from that was that you're conflating natural selection with 'survival of the fittest'. Natural selection is a three-pronged mechanism that requires diversity of forms, differences in their effects on reproduction, and heritability. Survival of the fittest is an antiquated expression.
I agree with you, i am a "evangelic atheist" if you will, and i enjoy watching these types of debates/conversations between two highly intelligent and knowledgable people. It is this type of discussion that furthers our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.