关于人性的观点饱受争议。一些学者——通常是人文学科的学者——认为根本不存在这样的东西，而另一些学者——通常是社会科学和生物科学的学者——则认为“否认”它是反科学的。那么，这个有争议的观点有什么意义呢?

The Great Chain of Being—the notion that the biosphere is partitioned into ranks, with humans at the top, and every other organism at some inferior position—is a way of thinking that’s incredibly difficult, if not impossible, to dislodge. Most of us have a strong conviction that it’s true, but we don’t have a clue why we think that.

The Rachel Divide, a documentary about Rachel Dolezal and the controversy over her claims to racial identity, came out in April on Netflix. The movie would have benefited, however, from some philosophical consideration of what race is—or is not—and what claims to racial identity assert.

Are we alone in the universe? Or is the cosmos teeming with life? And what difference would it make if we found the answer? Those are just some of the questions we address in this week's show.

Most philosophical work on race concentrates on two questions. The first is the question of whether race is real. Are there really kinds of people corresponding to racial categories like “white” and “black,” or is this merely an illusion? Suppose that races are real.