Episode 137: Ray Scott Percival on Incurable Mind Viruses

This week we were honored to interview Ray Scott Percival, a significant but also woefully under-appreciated figure in critical rationalism. Percival has been active in critical rationalist forums, conferences, and academic journals since the 90s and before. He has written for Quillette. He was the editor of a book of critical responses to Steven Pinker. He created an excellent documentary film called Liberty Loves Reason. But most significantly, in 2012 he wrote a book called Myth of the Closed Mind, which is available on Amazon in all the formats, including audio. The basic idea he explores there is that humans care about truth. We are truth seekers that create and pass on both rational and irrational memes. Dawkins calls the worst of these memes “mind viruses,” but what Percival points out is that as flawed as humans are, the good kind of memes have a competitive advantage in the war of ideas. Such a simple idea, but the implications of this are profound, and Percival has spent a lifetime wresting with them.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Support us on Patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Myth of the Closed Mind: https://amzn.to/48xAoDGX: @Ray_S_Percival

This week we had the pleasure of interviewing Michael Golding, M.D, who is a psychiatric physician. He is also heavily influenced by the philosophical ideas of David Deutsch and Karl Popper. At one point he calls himself a proponent of homeschooling and Taking Children Seriously. Together we wrestle with what critical rationalism and the universal explainer hypothesis suggests about mental illness and human creativity.Steven Peck's "My Madness"⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Support us on Patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠X: @mgoldingmd

Bruce examines how effectively critical rationalism can ground the non-aggression principle (NAP)—the libertarian idea that, in some formulation, it is morally wrong to initiate violence.But does it really make sense to interpret all areas of law through this single principle? Might it be better replaced by an alternative, such as a principle of least coercion? And what, from a critical rationalist perspective, does coercion actually mean? Is it a theory with substantial moral content, or an easy-to-vary principle that ultimately collapses into “coercion is whatever I dislike”?And how might we test between these alternating views?Bonus: What did Karl Popper think of Thomas Szasz's theories?⁠⁠⁠⁠Support us on Patreon⁠⁠⁠⁠

In this video podcast, Bruce makes his boldest statement yet about probability. He dives into David Deutsch’s lecture “Physics Without Probability”—as well as our Episode 100 interview with Deutsch—to unpack the core argument.Bruce carefully works through the mathematical details of Deutsch’s claim that probability is merely a “flat-earth approximation.” As best as he can make sense of it, however, the argument just doesn’t add up. In fact, Bruce concludes that Deutsch’s own reasoning seems to imply that probability is not at all comparable to a flat-earth approximation.From there, he methodically explores whether this long-running debate about probability is really a case of word essentialism—an argument over definitions rather than a substantive difference.He closes with an impassioned plea: if someone out there truly understands Deutsch’s argument, please help him pinpoint exactly where he’s going wrong.⁠⁠⁠Support us on Patreon⁠⁠⁠

This week Bruce takes a deep dive into the epistemological ideas in Jonathan Rauch’s book The Constitution of Knowledge. Rauch is a fan of Karl Popper and a former guest on this show. He makes the case that the creation of objective knowledge relies on institutions and norms as much individuals. All claims must be open to criticism and not based on authority. This applies not just to science but to journalism, law, and all areas where humans seek to fallibly move closer to truth. Bruce considers how these claims relate to critical rationalism, specifically Deutsch’s conception of static vs dynamic societies. Does this provide another clue as to why we got stuck in static societies for so many millennia?⁠⁠Support us on Patreon⁠⁠⁠

This week, Bruce looks at how much critical rationalists do—and do not—subject their proposed best theories to critical testing. Bruce wrestles with how we apply the tools of critical rationalism—fallibilism, argument/debate, the demarcation criteria, falsification, and so on—to our real world ideas about economics, politics, and other issues.To do this, Bruce asks these question: Isn't economics famously difficult, or even impossible, to test? Does that mean it is a metaphysical theory? Doesn't Popper's famous demarcation criteria force us to accept that label? And what about Praxeology and Anarcho Capitalism?⁠⁠⁠Support us on Patreon⁠⁠⁠

In our shortest episode ever, Bruce continues his exploration of the concept of concepts by looking at "knowledge" as a concept rather than a theory. And of course along the the way he pushes back again several critical rationalist dogmas.⁠⁠Support us on Patreon⁠⁠

Bruce looks at what makes sense—and doesn’t—about popular theories on knowledge promoted by CritRats (critical rationalists on X). He looks at how much these theories align, and don’t align, with what David Deutsch has actually said about knowledge.⁠Support us on Patreon⁠⁠

A curious Twitter exchange with David Deutsch prompts Bruce to explore what Deutsch and other critical rationalists mean when they assert that randomness doesn’t truly exist.⁠Support us on Patreon⁠⁠

In this episode, Bruce explores his extended conversation with philosopher and inductivist Kieren, focusing on Kieren’s claim that Popper’s Critical Rationalism ultimately depends on induction.Bruce then makes a striking counter-claim: that Kieren’s entire argument amounts to stripping all substantive content from his “theory” of induction and turning it into an unfalsifiable concept—essentially a word game, a kind of argument-by-tautology designed to immunize the theory from criticism. Or put another way, Kieren is turning his theory into a concept because concepts are unfalsifiable.This leads Bruce into a deeper examination of what induction actually is—and what it isn’t. Why is “induction” such a confusing, multidimensional idea? What is the real point of contention between critical rationalists and inductivists? Did Popper truly lack a notion of “support,” as Kieren argues? And what did Popper actually say about justification—did he really reject every form of it?And to make things even more provocative: do CritRats rely on similar linguistic maneuvers to shield their own favored theories from criticism?⁠⁠Support us on Patreon