Stephen Fry & Steven Pinker on the Enlightenment Today (May 25, 2018)

21 thoughts on “Stephen Fry & Steven Pinker on the Enlightenment Today (May 25, 2018)”

1. Thank you for this.

2. Thank you for all your nonstop knowledge, devotion in addition to advanced learning to sustain my mission to getting more consciously cognizant and spiritually connected.

3. "I've got it, I've got it, I've got it… Oh I've lost it again!!" 1:12:15

4. From 1:03:00 – 1:05:00

   The points made by Fry are very similar in nature, if we examine the issues normally raised when people nowadays [overly] like to explain things by ANALOGIES and parables, those things, even if they do illustrate things a BIT better need to always be clarified as SIMILITUDES and not EQUALITIES …
   so you have people saying things like "In the SAME way that cats do this humans like to …" and the fact is that IT IS NOT THE SAME.
   Or they say " I like to compare that [whatever they are talking about] to driving a car, and how you constantly have to make adjustments…." And even if this ILLUSTRATES the points, they are NOT the Same!!

   So damn many people automatically think it is EXACTLY the same as the analogy, and they think they understand the issues because of it.

   AN ALALOGY IS JUST AN APPROXIMATION, even if it is a good approximation.
   For some people using analogy is understandable if not excusable, but it is absolutely not excusable from INTELLECTUALS.

5. All the things spoken of here are very interesting, but for those who have always liked to read and explore, these ideas are 30-40 years old. I am very glad Pinker is spreading them more, but even in these interviews the interviewers keep asking the SAME QUESTIONS, and I wonder if ON THESE BOOK TOURS OR IN JORDAN'S PRESENTATIONS, it were possible to make the questions progressively harder and deeper, and if someone gets "lost" somehow or someone asks a previous or ALREADY ASKED question which he answered in PREVIOUS interview of the SAME tour, the person asking the question can be referred to it, and thus the rest of the audience who has kept up and followed it all can get deeper answers….

   For example in this interview Pinker answered the Placebo word as not being sophisticated but it used to be, which he has answered and used in many other interviews numerous times already, and he uses it because he is being asked the SAME questions every time. The world is getting better and here are the statistics he has used many many times already FROM PREVIOUS BOOK TOURS… If we get a small new point in every interview that's saying too much. The whole thing is over an hour long, and it could be A LOT more worthwhile if in every successive interview he were to be asked new or deeper questions.

   Sorry if this pisses off anyone, but it is just a comment. In case you didn't catch it from what I just said, I LIKE Pinker and Fry, otherwise I wouldn't have clicked and watched the whole thing.

6. More propaganda …. Mr Pinker apparently lives in a bubble.. He is not aware of the conditions in which we live in latin america… ¡Outrageous! Enlightenment…. My ass….

7. 56:59 Stephen Fry's thoughts on Jordan Peterson

8. Take a shot each time Pinker says "Indeed."

9. These ideas are indeed tired and out of date. Take the entropy trope. The argument that the UNIVERSE displays the same features as a closed system: a tendency towards increasing entropy, is predicated on the BELIEF that we have correctly determined the boundaries and character of the universe.. This is preposterous. Physics can't currently unify quantum and gravitational theories, and we are supposed to accept that this fractured field of study has illuminated all possible energies and all possible processes, such that the Declaration of The Inevitable Heat Death of the Universe can be confidently made.

   Furthermore, actual physicists are still arguing about whether the universe is a closed or open system, so the Heat Death hypothesis is merely that, a hypothesis, which was introduced in 1850 when the laws of Thermodynamics were first deduced.

   Pinker should know this. This is elementary and I am shocked that a public intellectual is carrying on as if Heat Death, or the inevitable increase in entropy, is a fact.

10. If I could bottle the charm of Stephen Fry… I'd still be poor because I would end up hording it all for myself. swoon

11. "On the other hand"

12. a linguist talking of entropy…..

13. It's just unfortunate that Pincard thinks that Canada is enlightened and a place where everyone is doing fine. The way the government treats veterans is still appalling, the refusal to enforce border security, the rise in terrorism of both Islamic and Incels, the amount of discrimination against men has risen drastically, the complete disregard for rationalist thought, continual Monopoly control by media companies and telecoms. The list can go on and on. And places like Denmark aren't doing much better. The Nordic countries certainly have pleasant safety nets for society but they are going bankrupt at an incredible rate, the influx of immigration has corresponded to an increase in rape and assault. There's a lot of ignorance in the political left leaning people these days.

14. Two great men!

15. As to Pinker's comments about poverty it seems to me he's saying. "Oh it exists but its not as bad as you might think so get use to it." But of course being a celebrated intellect he's not going to suffer such grievances. So its all good!

16. Exactly what I was thinking, but couldn't express so clearly. Thank you gentlemen.

17. I wonder how many times Pinker says "Ah"

18. Stephen Pinker – never grew up from sophomorism. A thoroughly futile man.

19. CHOMSKY IS "A SEVERE LEFTIST",OK ,AND A JEW HATER. MOSTLY.

20. Man, Stephen Fry is only 7cm shorter than me. He's huge even discounting the fat!

21. There are lots of differences between the sexes, which are barely significant but are overblown by their mere repetition – like spatial awareness. The average man scores better than the average woman, but these averages are extremely close, meaning that almost half the men underperform the average woman. That is what gets perverted when we talk about gender differences – we put way too much weight on them.

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