Science

The Philosophy of the Vienna Circle

Is metaphysics just a bunch of nonsense? Is it okay to believe something you could never prove? Could logic be a solution to the world’s problems? This week on Philosophy Talk, we’re thinking about the Vienna Circle, a group of Austrian philosophers from the 1920s who debated these questions.

Skepticism and Trust in Science

Why do so many people believe in conspiracy theories? Do we need to evaluate the evidence for ourselves, or should we just trust the experts? This week on Philosophy Talk, we’re discussing science and skepticism, and the role that trust plays in deciding what's true.

Letting Go of Human Nature

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?

Getting Clear on the Replication Crisis

Ever since the replication crisis broke in 2011, a number of causes have been identified for why a psychological experiment might not replicate. I want to suggest a possible reason why a study might fail to replicate, one that seems to have been mostly overlooked, namely: lack of conceptual clarity about the phenomenon being measured.

Freud's Philosophical Challenges

Last month, I started a new series of essays on Freud as a philosopher. This month, I want to lay out some of the perplexing philosophical issues that Freud and his intellectual community were confronted with towards the end of the nineteenth century, and how they grappled with them.