Ep 252: Response to the Prime Minister of Australia

A reaction "episode" where I make some remarks about a speech by Anthony Albanese, Prime Minister of Australia, in the wake of the Bondi Beach Massacre by Islamists terrorists who attacked Jews at a Hanukkah celebration on 14 December, 2025

This is a reproduction of a talk I gave to some trainee surgeons in Sydney who, among other things, were learning about AI as it was affecting their own field. It is, in a sense, a summary of many of the points I have been making recently on this channel with respect to AI and pessimism around it.

The Farthest Reaches is a book about "Explanatory Universality". Explanatory Universality is a concept introduced by physicist and philosopher David Deutsch in his book "The Beginning of Infinity". Links, as mentioned in the audiobook can be found in the ebook available for free here: https://www.bretthall.org/the-farthest-reaches.html This present work follows the logic of that concept as it applies to education, psychology, morality, immigration, the trans issue, "evolutionary psychology" and the significance of people to physical reality and much more. This version is significantly longer and with superior audio production compared with the original podcast of the same name. These are the chapters and timestamps: 00:00 Preface 21:51 Chapter 1 - Universality and Reach 29:38 Chapter 2 - The Reach of Explanatory Universality 38:53 Chapter 3 - Explaining Explanatory Universality 47:31 Chapter 4 - Explanatory Universality and Education 1:00:27 Chapter 5 - Explanatory Universality, Psychological Science and IQ 1:03:41 Chapter 6 - Explanatory Universality and Adopting Culture 1:10:26 Chapter 7 - Explanatory Universality and IQ Part 2 1:14:58 Chapter 8 - Explanatory Universality and the “Trans Issue” 1:22:57 Chapter 9 - Explanatory Universality and Immigration 1:48:12 Chapter 10 - Explanatory Universality and Ethnicity 2:11:39 Chapter 11 - Explanatory Universality and Multiculturalism 2:23:22 Chapter 12 - Explanatory Universality and Mental Illness 2:32:35 Chapter 13 - Explanatory Universality, Hangups and Sexuality 2:41:26 Chapter 14 - Explanatory Universality and The Woke Left and The Woke Right 2:48:29 Chapter 15 - Explanatory Universality and Optimism 2:58:20 Chapter 16 - Explanatory Universality and Artificial Intelligences 3:09:59 Chapter 17 - Universality, Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Reach 3:17:07 Chapter 18 - Explanatory Universality and Evolutionary Psychology 3:31:20 Chapter 19 - Explanatory Universality and Individuality 3:39:05 Chapter 20 - Summary and Conclusions 4:08:18 Acknowledgements and Afterward   The author thanks David Deutsch ( ⁨@DavidDeutschPhysicist⁩  ) Naval Ravikant ( ⁨@NavalR⁩  ) Reid Nicewonder ( ⁨@CordialCuriosity⁩ ) and Peter Boghossian ( ⁨@drpeterboghossian⁩ ) for their crucial support and engagement. And to all other supporters who have contributed to the ongoing viability of ToKCast and my other content output. Brett Hall is a technical advisor and content creator, Ambassador to Conjecture Institute ( ⁨@ConjectureInstitute⁩ ) and Board Member of the National Progress Alliance (www.nationalprogressalliance.org) and holds undergraduate qualifications from: The University of New South Wales )in Physics and the Philosophy of Science) The University of Western Sydney (in Science and Mathematics Teaching) and Postgraduate Qualifications from Swinburne University, Melbourne (in Astronomy and Astrophysics). Macquarie University (in the Teaching of English Language) The Australian Catholic University (in Mathematics) and a partially completed post graduate certificate in Geology and Geophysics from Macquarie University. He lives in Sydney, Australia.

Chapters and Timestamps 00:06 Chapter 13: Explanatory Universality, Hangups and Sexuality 08:07 Chapter 14: The Woke Left and the Woke Right 15:38 Chapter 15: Universality and Optimism 25:04 Chapter 16: Universality and Artificial Intelligences 35:54 Chapter 17: Universality, Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Reach 42:44: Chapter 18: Summary and Conclusions

This is the extended "director's cut" of a talk delivered for "RatFest 2025" (next year to be "Conjecture Con"). This also serves as a supplement to my "Doom Debates" interview which can be found here: https://youtu.be/koubXR0YL4A?si=483M6SPOKwbQYmzb It is simply assumed some version of "Bayesian reasoning" is how AI will "create" knowledge. This misconception permeates the https://ai-2027.com paper, as well as Bostrom and Yudkowsky's work on this, as well as that of every other AI "Doomer" and even on the other extreme the so-called "AI-Accelerationists". All of that indicates a deep misconception about how new explanations are generated which comes from a deep misconception about how science works because almost no one in the field of AI seems to think the *philosophy of* science is even relevant. I explain what has gone wrong: 00:00 Introduction 09:14 The Big Questions and the new Priesthoods 18:40 Nick Bostrom and Superintelligence 25:10 If anyone builds it, everyone dies and Yudkowsky. 33:32 Prophecy, Inevitability, Induction and Bayesianism. 41:42 Popper, Kuhn, Feyerabend and Lakatos. 49:40 AI researchers ignore The Philosophy of Science. 58:46 A new test for AGI from Sam Altman and David Deutsch? 1:03:35 Accelerationists, Doomers and “Everyone dies”. 1:10:21 Conclusions 1:15:35 Audience Questions

Chapters and Timestamps 00:07 Chapter 10 Explanatory Universality and Ethnicity 24:51 Chapter 11 Explanatory Universality and Multiculturalism 37:47 Chapter 12 Explanatory Universality and Mental Illness.

Chapters and Timestamps:   00:06 Chapter 5 Explanatory Universality, Psychology and IQ 03:30 Chapter 6 Explanatory Universality and Adopting Culture 11:47 Chapter 7: Explanatory Universality and IQ Part 2 17:10 Chapter 8 Explanatory Universality and the “trans” issue. 27:35 Chapter 9: Explanatory Universality and Immigration

Chapters 1 to 4 of a multi-chapter series about the reach of what I argue is one of the most important lessons to learn in order to solve many pressing problems: explanatory universality. This podcast provides an explanation that "explanatory universality" is an idea of such depth it may have among the greatest reach of any idea. Chapters: 00:12 Chapter 1 - Universality and Reach 09:09 Chapter 2 - The Reach of Explanatory Universality 20:01 Chapter 3 - Explaining Explanatory Universality 30:23 Chapter 4 - Explanatory Universality and Education

We are told by people working in the field, researchers and those who publish academic papers on the topic that artificial intelligence or deep learning or LLMs or Machine Learning or Recurrent Neural Networks - call them what you like - employ some form of inductive reasoning. But do they? What is inductive reasoning? What is deductive or adductive for that matter? Is "new physics" or other new science being discovered by the most recent and best chatbots or other "artificially intelligent" computer systems? My response to all that is contained herein.   For images see: https://youtu.be/9Dimv7mOls4 For more information: https://www.bretthall.org/blog/induction

This episode is a reading of and reflection upon more writing by David Deutsch - an article you can find at https://takingchildrenseriously.com/in-praise-of-ignorance/ Joining me is philosopher and language educator Liberty Fitz-Claridge. Liberty holds Master Degrees in both Philosophy and Applied Linguistics and English Language teaching, as well as a Bachelors in The Philosophy of Science. As well as teaching, Liberty runs the Popper-Deutsch Reading Group which can be found at www.meetup.com/popper-deutsch-reading-group/ In this conversation Liberty refers to the following articles: 1. Ioup, Georgette, Elizabeth Boustagui, Manal El Tigi, and Martha Moselle. “Reexamining the Critical Period Hypothesis: A Case Study of Successful Adult SLA in a Naturalistic Environment.” Studies in Second Language Acquisition 16, no. 1 (1994): 73–98. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0272263100012596.   2. Alsulaimani, Adil. (1990). Reading problems in Arab learners of English (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). London University, UK.   3. Randall, Mick and Meara, Paul. (1988). “How Arabs read Roman letters.” Reading in a Foreign Language, 4 (2): 133-145.