The Theory of Anything

How do we square genetically influenced mental disorders with the theory of explanatory universality? In a previous episode, Tracy asked Bruce how to reconcile her experience with mental disorders, like narcissism, with the idea of Universal Explainers. This is part 2 of that discussion. In the last episode, Bruce introduced the idea that emotions and feelings aren't the same as ideas and go back to an earlier point in our evolutionary history. The genes then use our feelings to try to coerce us or encourage us via pleasures and pain.  Bruce completes his list of possible ways genes can affect our personality and ideas without violating universality: The genes can control physiology and this in turn can impact our personality and ideas via interaction with existing (sometimes stable) culture The genes can control how we grow the various parts of the cortex and since those parts affect our ability to think, they affect our personality development as well as interests. The genes can control perceptions and this can in turn impact our ideas. The genes control how we’re wired to pleasure and pain centers of the brain and can coerce or encourage us via these feelings. The genes control how we gain ideas via attention. The genes can affect culture via 1-5 above and then let culture do the heavy lifting Humans may be significantly affected by older animal modules of the brain in some cases. We have no reason to believe all knowledge we learn is via ‘the universal explainer’ module. In addition, we discuss how the existence of insanity, dreams, and people who are extremely mentally challenged prove that there is such a thing as a person that is not a universal explainer but can still reason to a degree. See Steven Peck's "My Madness" for an amazing example. Then we introduce the strongest problem we currently know of: the extreme heritability of psychopathy in some children.

How do we square genetically influenced mental disorders with the theory of explanatory universality? In our last episode, Tracy asked Bruce how to reconcile her experience with mental disorders, like narcissism, with the idea of Universal Explainers. In this episode, Bruce does his best to tease out an answer. (While admitting that we can't answer her entirely--yet.)  In "The Beginning of Infinity", David Deutsch offers some solid criticisms of current experiments to determine how much of a personality trait is 'heritable.' This has led some of his fans to take his ideas to some extreme conclusions not implied by the book. For example, some people now claim that genes play no role at all in influencing Universal Explainers. In fact, Deutsch did not say this.  According to Deutsch (in BoI), genes can influence our ideas and personality traits via something as simple as how physiology (physical traits) interact with culture (standards of beauty) and that can in turn impacts one's personality (perhaps increasing happiness.) So we now have at least one example of how genes can have an impact on our personality and ideas. (Via physiology interacting with culture.)  With this in mind, Bruce asks the obvious question: What are other ways genes can affect personality traits and ideas that do not violate explanatory universality?  Bruce's list (partially revealed in this episode) is a testable set of ways genes may impact our personality and ideas. This suggests how we might go about responding to critics of the theory of Explanatory Universality without violating Popper's epistemology via either ad hoc saves or ignoring basic statements (i.e. repeatable observations) from existing experiments. O Falibilista's review of "The Ape That Understood the Universe – how the mind and culture evolve" is an excellent example of how bad evolutionary psychology can be at times. 

Tracy leads a discussion about Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) and Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). We discuss various other mental disorders as well. We sadly admit that some disorders are currently so serious that there is little hope of helping those that have them. (And they may not even be aware that they have a disorder!) But will this always be true? If all problems are soluble and human beings are universal explainers, then the answer should be a resounding "no!" But Tracy asks 'if we're all universal explainers, then why can't we help people today?' as well as 'does this have any relevance to AGI safety programs?'

What responsibility do the creators of a TV series or movie have to be faithful to the original source material? What risks are involved with either adapting the material too closely or not close enough? The much-anticipated Wheel of Time tv show is finally here and we discuss our feelings about the show compared to the books. Warning: this podcast contains extensive spoilers for both the books and the series.

Bruce had a chance to talk to David Deutsch and ask him questions about his views of knowledge to clarify if he disagreed with Popper and Campbell about what is considered knowledge. Bruce took notes and in this episode reports back on what he learned. 

The podcast discusses deep reinforcement learning, its relationship to regular reinforcement learning, and its potential application to animal intelligence and AGI. They give examples using code, explore Elon Musk's dedication to solving humanity's problems, and discuss OpenAI's approach to AI research and AGI safety. The podcast also covers Markov decision processes and the challenges of using a Q table in stochastic environments.

In this podcast, the hosts discuss the challenges and misunderstandings surrounding Karl Popper's concept of refutation. They explore how Popper sometimes uses terms in idiosyncratic ways, leading to misreadings of his work. They delve into the asymmetry of refutation versus verification and its relationship to empirical and non-empirical theories. They also touch on topics such as the problem of string theory being non-empirical and the interconnectedness of Popper's epistemology. Additionally, they discuss the importance of starting a conversation, discovering different magnitudes of infinity, sharing ideas in philosophy, and the difficulty of understanding a theory.

Over the years Bruce collected a series of 'problems' with the Popperian concept of refutation. Or so he thought. A chance encounter with Popper scholar Danny Frederick led to him re-evaluating Popper's writings and realizing that Popper sometimes uses terms (such as 'refutation', 'falsification', and even 'theory') in idiosyncratic ways that aren't quite how most people would understand those terms. This leads to both Popper's opponent and fans alike sometimes misreading him. It turns out that the 'problems of refutation' that many philosophers cite as disproof of Popper are actually due to misunderstanding Popper due to his specialized vocabulary.  In this episode, we cover Bruce's list of 'problems of refutation' (which he know believes are all pseudo-problems) and explains his encounter with Danny Frederick and how it led to him re-imagining Popper's epistemology in different terms that were easier for laymen (and philosophers) to understand.  Blog Post Series on The Problems of Refutation A Summary of Deutsch’s Epistemology The Problems of Refutation Popper Explains The Asymmetry Between Refutation and Verification Do Deutsch and Popper Disagree Over Refutation? There is Nothing Wrong with the Language of Support Are Refutations and Verification Really Symmetrical Within A Theory Comparison? Demarcation: What Does it Mean to Be Empirical? But What If You Verify a Theory That Can Only Be Verified? The Two (or More) Kinds of Refutation How to Make Popper’s Epistemology More Clear

In this (mostly) standalone episode, we cover how Deutsch and Byrne each interpret Byrne's theory differently. Deutsch emphasizes the micro-level actions and gestures of great apes and the clear lack of understanding of what each gesture does. Byrne emphasizes the macro-level and the flexible intelligence required to come up with a program of action to accomplish a novel goal. Byrne's theory of 'animal insight' makes specific testable claims. To Byrne, great apes (especially Chimps) can 'think.' His theory says that animal insight was a necessary precursor to human insight and that humans utilize both kinds. If he's right, then animal insight has relevance to AGI studies. Deutsch has doubts about all of this and thinks of Bryne's theory more as evidence that animals cannot think. We also discuss how Byrne and Deutsch both understand the mirror test differently. And finally, we dip just a bit into animal sentience and discuss why the theory that animals feel things is the prevailing theory not so much because it's a great theory but more because it has no real current competitors. It's difficult to explain much animal behavior without either tacitly referring to animal feelings or just clearly making up bad ad hoc explanations.  While it's helpful to have listened to the 3 previous episodes, this episode mostly stands alone. Links: Richard Byrne's book Evolving Insight: How it is we can think about why things happen Richard Byrne's book The Thinking Ape: The Evolutionary Origins of Intelligence Video on dolphin intelligence/communication

Researcher Richard Byrne discusses his methodology for determining animal insight, including examples of behavioral patterns that can't be explained by genetics or trial-and-error learning. The podcast explores the comparison between animal intelligence and machine learning, highlighting the current limitations of technology. Topics also include ad hoc explanations, specific modules in the brain, differences between apes and monkeys in terms of insight, examples of deceptive behavior in chimps, and the role of anthropomorphism in understanding animal intelligence.