Mind Chunks

Justin Weinberg

January 31, 2023

Mind Chunks
by Pete Mandik

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6 Comments

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V. Alan White

3 years ago

Another gem!

Pete Mandik

3 years ago

Reply to V. Alan White

Thanks, Alan!

Ted Parent

3 years ago

This has to be among the very best Mind Chunks ever.

Pete Mandik

3 years ago

Reply to Ted Parent

Thank you, Ted!!

Thorsten Sander

3 years ago

Brilliant, though I don’t really understand why Descartes is holding that tiny box in step I & IV.

Pete Mandik

3 years ago

Reply to Thorsten Sander

It’s a piece of wax, and the text got too cluttered so I omitted explicit mention of it. Easter egg detected!

Heap of Links

Asking “How did I get here?” may help us reflect on the nature of personal identity in ways that asking “Who am I?” cannot — Marya Schechtman's 2024 Central Division Meeting Presidential Address
“Collecting is a game, but what kind of game? It is an imperfect information game of acquisition” — a theory of collecting, from Steven Hales
“A general human tendency: to overestimate how far we have come in the progress of human knowledge” — a lengthy interview with Thomas Nagel
“Many couples do not survive trauma like this” — A profile of Susan Brison—who was brutally attacked in 1990, and who wrote about it in Aftermath—and her husband, Thomas Trezise, who has now written his own book stemming from those events
“Bad AI Consciousness Takes” Bingo Card — Henry Shevlin's area of specialization is becoming a popular topic in popular discourse, and he can't stand the "cavalcade of terrible takes"
Does the principle of sufficient reason imply panpsychism? If it does, do we then ponens or tollens? — Sam Kimpton-Nye on these questions and the "demand for intelligibility"
PTSD flashbacks may be harmful, but they may also be helpfully “resupplying phenomenal experience” to those who, owing to trauma, are “grasp alienated” — Michaela McSweeney on trauma and "madness-as-strategy"
A look at the very first issue of Mind — Brett Mullins surveys its articles on the occasion of the journal's 150th anniversary
The most bizarre plagiarism-related story ever — featuring: a death, an investigator, a dissertation, a mysterious red book, and more
New data on earnings by major and university — though not all universities
“AI poses two different existential threats to [our] valuing practices” — Jordan MacKenzie offers an account of why negative judgments about AI taking over our creative and caring activities are justified
“Submission” is a humorous clicker-style game about starting a career in academic philosophy (or not) — created by Nat Hansen
“The best investment in education is to become the most human human—a challenging, fulfilling, exciting pursuit that connects us across generations” — an interview with Christa Acampora, philosopher and dean of Arts & Sciences at UVA
“What would happen if we tried to live without the mythology of agency at all?” — It's worth pondering, since "agency is just an internal command hallucination," says Alexander Douglas
“Reading List” is a free Mac app for keeping track of papers to read — philosophy PhD student Hayden Kajercline created this productivity tool for researchers, with help from Claude
How should we react to scary predictions about AI? “First: by asking questions” — "If you believe predictions uncritically, it amounts to obeying in advance," says Carissa Véliz
“I feel unbelievably lucky that I was able to make philosophy my profession” — Karen Ng reflects on her path into philosophy, at #first-genphilosophers
The ordinary concept of knowledge “doesn’t work at all the way philosophers said it does” — a round-up of studies shows how weird the philosophers' version of the concept is
1000 or so psychiatrists were asked to diagnose standardized clinical case vignettes. “Two doctors agreed on the diagnosis only 55% of the time” — What does this tell us about psychiatry? Or about other fields in which experts disagree?
Where Aristotle taught Alexander — "this newest dig may be the most revealing yet, offering insight into the specifics of Alexander the Great’s education"

All Links →

Latest Comments

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I’m not sure we’re in serious disagreement. The really crucial thing about an AI detector is that it doesn’t show false positives, so that if it says “AI”…
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Pretty confident! I think it's likely that AI will dominate in all analytic philosophy domains by 2030, but the terms of the bet are unreasonably charitable to me…
Daniel Greco on AI Use in STEM and Philosophy Dissertations
I think the caveats you include at the end of your (1) are in some tension with (2). I use Pangram and I think it's quite good; it's…
David Wallace on AI Use in STEM and Philosophy Dissertations
Substitute “Claude” for “your dissertation director”, and not a few PhDs have a form not too different from this. (Which again is my point about implementation being what…
GVAponte on AI Use in STEM and Philosophy Dissertations
How about if Claude dictates a list of interconnected ideas, I write down what I gather, and write a dissertation, all by myself, based on those notes: Am…
Tenured Realist on AI Use in STEM and Philosophy Dissertations
This is a bit off topic from the post but I'm curious to hear what people think of the following scenarios. Would you say the AI use described…
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Reminder: The comments policy says of LLMs, "please do not submit comments written in whole or in part by these tools."
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Georgia Southern also does Philosophy After Dark' at a local brewery (!): https://www.griceconnect.com/lets-eat/philosophy-after-dark-builds-community-through-timely-and-timeless-questions-10373344.
MBW on AI Use in STEM and Philosophy Dissertations
Not so worried – it's also in Pangram's interest to continue the arms race. Their AI can fight the chatbots, and when it's not useful, we won't rely…
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Check out Philosophy In Pubs, Liverpool, England – https://www.philosophyinpubs.co.uk/schedule/all/schedule https://philosophyinpublic.co.uk
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I never said anything about long term policy. At present, AI detection works, and we can make policy based on that. As and when the technological situation changes,…
Nick on AI Use in STEM and Philosophy Dissertations
But as you hint, isn't there just a simple argument against long-term reliance on any such tools as Pangram? In the long run, someone will surely reverse-engineer any…

Mind Chunks by Pete Mandik

Mind Chunks
by Pete Mandik