(Audio version here, or search for "Joe Carlsmith Audio" on your podcast app.)

“There comes a moment when the children who have been playing at burglars hush suddenly: was that a real footstep in the hall?”

- C.S. Lewis

1. Introduction

Sometimes, my thinking feels more “real” to me; and sometimes, it feels more “fake.” I want to do the real version, so I want to understand this spectrum better. This essay offers some reflections.

I give a bunch of examples of this “fake vs. real” spectrum below -- in AI, philosophy, competitive debate, everyday life, and religion. My current sense is that it brings together a cluster of related dimensions, namely:

• Map vs. world: Is my mind directed at an abstraction, or it is trying to see past its model to the world beyond?
• Hollow vs. solid: Am I [...]

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Outline:

(00:30) 1. Introduction

(03:21) 2. Caveats

(05:42) 3. Examples

(06:18) 3.1 AI

(11:54) 3.2 Philosophy

(15:41) 3.3 Competitive debate

(18:11) 3.4 Everyday life

(21:51) 3.5 Lewis on the living God

(25:57) 4. Why does this matter?

(26:33) 4.1 Spiritual stuff

(29:51) 4.2 The telos of thinking

(34:24) 5. How do we do real thinking?

(35:17) 5.1 Going slow

(36:36) 5.2 Following curiosity and aliveness

(37:52) 5.3 Staying in tune with your why

(39:21) 5.4 Tethering your concepts

(42:21) 5.5 Arguments are lenses on the world

(48:12) 5.6 Helplessness about the truth

(50:07) 5.7 Just actually imagining different ways the world could be

(52:41) 5.8 Being wrong/right in both directions

(54:07) 5.9 What would the future people think?

(59:08) 5.10 No bullshit

(01:00:01) 5.11 Real scientists, real philosophers

(01:10:49) 6. Staying awake

The original text contained 20 footnotes which were omitted from this narration.

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First published:

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

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