Liam Bright Interview *UNEDITED* (Video)
Added 2022-02-17 00:42:12 +0000 UTCIt's been a long time coming but we finally cornered the internet's favourite philosopher Liam Bright. It is not everyday you get to have a wide ranging discussion with Leverhulme Prize recipient so we tried to make the most of it.
We cover a bunch of topics including how to use Twitter well, just what is logical positivism and why Liam thinks DtG is the final embodiment of their virtues, why institutions are always completely right and should never be questioned, and how revolutionary politics are a non-starter.
Audio version to follow. As always video is UNEDITED so watch at your own peril!
Comments
Over the past days I was alone at home suffering constant pain from a medical condition that has now thankfully been relieved surgically. That period happened to coincide with you dropping the Timbah, Bright and Wright episodes. Your velvety, soothing, graceful pronunciations of the English language are what pulled me through! This particular episode contained a lot of delightful banter, joking around and sarcasm; I would keep all of that in the final edit!
Maarten Wesselius
2022-02-22 11:58:59 +0000 UTCThat’s how it’s done. 👏
elcid
2022-02-20 12:46:50 +0000 UTCYep, Elcid it’s 12 yr old Port Charlotte highly peated single malt. Drunk neat with a spoonful of water , as god intended
Guruspod 2
2022-02-20 02:52:27 +0000 UTCAustralia has youse!
Guruspod 2
2022-02-20 02:51:11 +0000 UTCThis was very enjoyable :).
Sharmi
2022-02-19 18:29:46 +0000 UTC"Southern" (*cough* Free State) Irish also has yous and in some places, yees (someone must have done a survey on the regional variations). The "yees" is not to be confused with my native South Yorkshire's archaic use of thee and thou (the original intimate pronouns - "you" is the formal pronoun, equivalent to vous or usted)
Paul Bowman
2022-02-18 21:38:20 +0000 UTCThis is interesting. I agree that the addition of affect to the traits was the thing that most enthused me (now I feel embarrassed bc Liam's avatar is just above this glaring at me accusingly - it was all enthusing Liam! honest). But I read it in a different way. That is the condescending or contemptuous aspect. That the speaker somehow engages or empathises (or gets you to empathise with them?) with your frustrations and resentments, that when they channel that bit of "you must think we're fucking stupid if you think we're falling for that lie, Big Brother!" you automatically respond with "Yeah! Of course!". Or maybe that's the "hot" version. The "cold" version is more you feel that you don't want to be like those stupid people who think that "obviously wrong" thing (despite no real argument being made as to why that thing is actually wrong). There's an element of not just being afraid of getting on the wrong side of the bully, but also identifying with how cool it is to be the bully and be in the bully's gang.
Paul Bowman
2022-02-18 21:31:26 +0000 UTCI think (if we're brainstorming) it would be best if it was a bit like jury service. I.e. that it wouldn't be the same people all the time, but researchers in a particular field would be in a pool that every time they dipped back into the funding lottery, there would be a chance that they'd draw the "replication jury service" short straw and have to serve a term on that duty. It would be important that every researcher had the same chances of being landed with this job
Paul Bowman
2022-02-18 21:19:30 +0000 UTCThere was a hiccup because the software outputted a huge file and Patreon has limits to audio file uploads. Trying to rectify now.
Christopher Kavanagh
2022-02-18 19:56:42 +0000 UTCI'm wondering the same thing
Shane Gronholz
2022-02-18 19:20:45 +0000 UTCAh you are too kind ty
Liam Kofi Bright
2022-02-18 16:04:04 +0000 UTCLmao ty
Liam Kofi Bright
2022-02-18 16:03:45 +0000 UTCAudio only version coming? I have a long drive to make today and I want my wife who doesn’t follow any of this shit to still love me when we get there so I hope not.
Matt Graham
2022-02-18 14:26:32 +0000 UTCWonderful guy, entertaining chat
Nick Wiebe
2022-02-18 12:09:42 +0000 UTCVery gangsta! I’d hazard a guess that the whiskey he’s savouring is not a cheap blended variety.
elcid
2022-02-18 04:05:52 +0000 UTCYay, I love Liam!
sebcatemis
2022-02-18 04:01:43 +0000 UTCI'm so happy to know this. You've made my day
Jennifer Nelson
2022-02-18 01:17:33 +0000 UTCNorthern Irish has yous and yousins.
Christopher Kavanagh
2022-02-17 21:38:03 +0000 UTCLiam's a record-breaking 6/10 argument for the existence of Twitter.
Exai
2022-02-17 18:54:54 +0000 UTCA Liam Bright/DTG crossover is what I've been waiting for! Fantastic.
Sean Doody
2022-02-17 18:27:18 +0000 UTCI greatly enjoyed hearing a British person saying “yinz,” showing the influence of your time in Pittsburgh. As an italophile and student of Latin and other languages with a plural form of “you” I’m obsessed with English vernaculars that have it, like yinz, yous, and y’all. It’s such a downright reasonable linguistic form
Jennifer Nelson
2022-02-17 18:27:01 +0000 UTCThere's something very entertaining about Matt chugging whiskey and pounding the vape in the first minute of the podcast. Gangsta.
Dave Lavelle
2022-02-17 17:46:11 +0000 UTCAh yes ty!
Liam Kofi Bright
2022-02-17 15:54:04 +0000 UTCPart of my job is keeping tabs on trends in scholarly publishing, so I'm watching this (legitimately) on work time - Brilliant! Thank you! (And looking forward to your Robert Wright ep. Still.) :-)
Arabella Holzapfel
2022-02-17 15:33:18 +0000 UTCYup, Aristotle. Rhetoric 1.1. "Rhetoric is a counterpart of Dialectic; for both have to do with matters that are in a manner within the cognizance of all men and not confined to any special science. Hence all men in a manner have a share of both; for all, up to a certain point, endeavor to criticize or uphold an argument, to defend themselves or to accuse" https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Aristot.+Rh.+1.1.1
Jennifer Nelson
2022-02-17 13:59:06 +0000 UTCStop trying to silence free speech!!!!
Tasty3141
2022-02-17 13:23:32 +0000 UTCAnd perhaps a way to almost scientifically define 'affect' might be "The gap between how persuasive a statement sounds when spoken vs when you see the same thing written down." A small gap would mean a low score for the Guru in question. I remember seeing Peterson's recent "The bible was the first book" monologue written down into text on r/history and in that form it looked faintly ridiculous but when he was saying it out loud it sounded quite fun and plausible. Trump is also a classic example of somebody who as stupid as he can sound seems even stupider than that when his ramblings are transcribed.
Tasty3141
2022-02-17 13:15:03 +0000 UTCAdding "Affect" to the Gurometer is an idea with a lot of merit. The moment he mentioned it I thought of Douglas Murray. But Sargon is another great example. It's like the degree to which you can get away with bad arguments because you say them with gravitas or the right British accent. So if we included it we might see something like a 4/5 for Sargon where if it wasn't for his accent he would be much, much less persuasive to anybody because his arguments are so poor. Douglas Murray might get a 5/5 but another Guru like Scott Adams would get a 1/5. Peterson ocasionally stumbles about a bit and has a sort unusual charisma so might give him 4/5 but Eric Weinstein is a definite 5/5 with his brother a bit more boring but carrying the scientific aura in the way he speaks might get a 3/5 or 4/5.
Tasty3141
2022-02-17 13:07:31 +0000 UTCThat is a normal collar. Move on, find a new slant.
Fraser
2022-02-17 11:47:24 +0000 UTCAh you're not missing out on anything, just substanceless insults!
Liam Kofi Bright
2022-02-17 10:38:47 +0000 UTCThe idea of having a team of paid scientists whose full time job it is to root out fraud and bad science seems like a fantastic idea. In the same way that antivirus companies pay white hat hackers to find exploits. It strikes me too that they could easily have an anonymous reporting system where people could give them tips on where they might find fraud. Often there are suspect papers but nobody has the time or inclination to really root into it. Even more fun would be in labs with larger studies the junior members might be well aware of dodgy stuff going on that they don't like but can't say anything about. They could easily anonymously tip off this 'crime division' of academia to say "Look at charts X and Y on page 12 of This paper. You'll see they dont' make sense." and it would be v hard for them to be exposed as the whistleblower. In that climate I could see fraud becoming far less enticing for even a totally immoral actor.
Tasty3141
2022-02-17 09:48:17 +0000 UTCThat point about 'confidence in their ridiculous opinion' .... I think we used to call that arrogance. When I was a youngster it was the main characteristic of the private school educated male and was used to cover up extreme immaturity and an inability to think
Nina Davies
2022-02-17 09:28:40 +0000 UTCKavanagh has the biggest collar in the game!
Tasty3141
2022-02-17 09:14:28 +0000 UTCSuffice to say he’s not a fan.
Christopher Kavanagh
2022-02-17 09:04:20 +0000 UTCWhat's so bad about Conor Friedersdorf? I couldn't hear what Liam was saying about him. A "something-centrist"?
Mikerpiker
2022-02-17 08:58:06 +0000 UTCLooking forward to this. Although I would be horrified if someone described something I did as the embodiment of logical positivism - maybe he's as sarcastic as Chris?
Subodh Kafle
2022-02-17 07:13:07 +0000 UTCYay!
Tom Allison
2022-02-17 06:29:43 +0000 UTC
