Can we trust our minds to know reality?

This clip is taken from Nathan Jacobs' most recent interview with Thomas Thorogood and features a reaction to a discussion between Destiny and T.K. Coleman on The Minimalists podcast. Their exchange raises a profound philosophical question: what makes our reasoning faculties trustworthy in the first place?

Nathan explores properly functioning faculties, Descartes' skepticism, moderate foundationalism, and the crucial distinction between realism and nominalism. Along the way, he argues that every act of perception, reasoning, language, and scientific inquiry already presupposes realism, making it impossible to consistently live or argue as a nominalist.

If you've ever wondered whether we can genuinely know reality—or what our ability to reason tells us about the nature of the world—this discussion offers a compelling introduction to some of philosophy's deepest questions.

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Timestamps

00:00 — A Debate About Objective Morality

06:24 — Why Our Faculties Matter

09:21 — Properly Functioning Faculties

09:48 — Hard vs Moderate Foundationalism

10:19 — Descartes and Radical Doubt

13:09 — Why Skepticism Cannot Be Lived

14:24 — Trusting Our Faculties

16:26 — The Most Important Question in Philosophy

17:26 — Realism vs Nominalism

19:14 — Why Perception Depends on Realism

20:34 — Why Logic Depends on Realism

22:17 — Why Everyone Lives Like a Realist

23:14 — Realism and Providence

24:07 — Morality, the Numinous, and Human Experience

25:52 — Every Argument Presupposes Realism

26:56 — Living Consistently With Your Worldview

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Relevant Links:

Thomas Thorogood Interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNu3mGq6HhU

The Most Important Question: https://youtu.be/nVmPIMg4St4

All links:

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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thenathanjacobspodcast

X: https://x.com/NathanJacobsPod

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nathanandrewjacobs

Academia: https://vanderbilt.academia.edu/NathanAJacobs

Listen and please review the podcast elsewhere:

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0hSskUtCwDT40uFbqTk3QS

Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-nathan-jacobs-podcast