Zach clarifies his position in the ongoing "philosophy vs. science" fights, poses a question to Julia and Massimo about the ethics of offensive jokes, and discusses BAHFest, his "Bad Ad Hoc Hypotheses" conference lampooning evolutionary psychology, not to mention his movie, "Starpocalype."
Somehow along the way, the three take a detour into discussing an unusual sexual act.
Zach's pick: "Solaris" by Stanislaw Lem.
Enjoyed the podcast very much. Thanks! I'm also a big fan of SMBC.
ReplyDeleteGreat pick! Love me some Lem :)
ReplyDeleteYou may want to edit the beginning of the episode synopsis; you spelled his name Weinesmith.
ReplyDeleteAnyways, another great episode guys, and keep up the great work.
I've been meaning to read Solaris, it's on my "to read" sci-fi pile alongside Gibson and Vonnegut. It's just easier to watch the film (the Russian one of course!)
ReplyDeleteI very much enjoyed the conservation. I'm surprised that he didn't have more of a background in philosophy.
Finally got around to listening. Excellent. Maybe I will enter the next BAHFest
ReplyDeleteHi Massimo, sorry a bit off topic, but I was just watching Michio Kaku's interview on the 2/25 episode of the The Daily Show where he discusses his new book The Future of the Mind and speaks about things like uploading our consciousness onto CDs. I'm wondering if you will interview him at some point. :)
ReplyDeleteTim, seems to me that Kaku is a bit of a cuckoo. An RS interview ain't very likely...
DeleteSure, although it seems like exposing cuckoos is not an uncommon theme of your blog. I'm not so sure Tegmark's new book is non-cuckoo either.
DeleteUploading - the immortality myth for atheists
ReplyDeleteI have to agree with that one... Though I'm looking forward to the movie with Johnny Depp!
DeleteUtility machine from the Zach comic would've been working better if happiness was normalized for each person to unity :-)
ReplyDelete