The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast

On Raphaël Millière and Cameron Buckner's "A Philosophical Introduction to Language Models, Part I: Continuity With Classic Debates" (2023).

Is the Large Language Model type of architecture currently in use by AIs a legitimate basis for intelligence? M&B explain the technology and run through arguments for and against, with the conclusion that while current LLMs are not properly intelligent, there's no in principle reason why they could not become so.

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We discuss the new Mike Flanagan series adaptation of Stephen King's 1974 novel in comparison to the 1976 Brian De Palma film and the other adaptations (the 2013 film, the 2002 TV movie, and 1998's The Rage: Carrie 2). Featuring Mark, Lawrence, Al, and spanked-in-school Sarahlyn.

What does the story say about human nature? How much agency does Carrie have? Was the new version just a fundamentally different story grafted onto this basic framework of a psychic girl destroying the prom? Does it totally ruin the premise to try to turn this into a multi-season series? Is it destined to devolve into the X-men if this continues?

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Mark, Mary, and Jenny are joined by improviser Anthony to restore us to a 2 X 2 Team Play balance, again reading part of Martha Nussbaum's The Therapy of Desire as a way of exploring ancient traditions by which one might use philosophy for self-improvement.

We act out and/or discuss vacation portal polyamory, voluntarily living in dangerous places, life return bureaucracy, risk bricks, connecting the classroom to the real world, and the first weekly check-in of the robots' revolution scheduling society.

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Finishing up on Hippias Minor and moving on to the Ion, where Socrates convinces a rhapsode (someone who does public, dramatic readings of Homer and is a Homer scholar) that his talent is a matter of inspiration and not knowledge. So how does this relate to Plato's dismissal of poets in the Republic?

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Bruce has released 34 solo albums between 1970 and the present. He's a very accomplished finger-picker and often plays entirely solo but has also written rock, jazz, Christian, and 80s syntho songs.

We discuss "Louis Collins" from The Blood of Others (2026), "Look How Far" from Breakfast in New Orleans Dinner in Timbuktu (1999), and Let's Go Laughing" from High Winds White Sky (1971). End song: "Café Society" from Bone on Bone (2017). Intro: "If I Had a Rocket Launcher" from Stealing Fire (1984).

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On the 2024 low-budget horror blockbuster film by Curry Barker. Mark, Lawrence, and Sarahlyn are joined by feminist philosopher Jenny Hansen to talk about this peculiar film. Is it a feminist tract exposing "nice guys" for their underlying narcissism, or just a lengthy Twilight Zone episode getting creative about the mechanics of the old magic wish trope?

Like Get Out, this film is a surreal take on exploitation, but it also places itself in the tradition of Fatal Attraction as playing on our fear of and disdain for "clingy women." Did Barker even know what his message is? Is this film actually scary?

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On two short Platonic dialogues, written perhaps around a decade after Socrates' death in 399 BCE.

Hippias Minor, where Hippias is (like many of Socrates' interlocutors) a Sophist. In this case, this means that Hippias presents himself as an expert in all sorts of practices (techne) including not only literary marvels but even making his own clothes. Do these things add up to virtue?

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On The Concept of Mind (1949), Ch. 6, "Self-Knowledge." Ryle is arguing against a Cartesian take on mind that he sees as over-intellectualizing. In this case, it is not the case that every conscious act is itself an object of an act of consciousness: Not all consciousness is self-conscious, and introspection itself must involve a layer of mentality (the act of self-consciousness) that is not itself the object of an act of consciousness.

Read along with us, starting on p. 136 (PDF p. 199).

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The new official crew of Mark Linsenmayer, Mary Hynes, and "Jus' Jenny" Hansen kicks off our new endeavor to explore ancient self-help/psychologically therapeutic philosophical traditions via Martha Nussbaum's book "The Therapy of Desire," which we've read the intro of. We talk and/or act about preconceptions about philosophy, AA, a single-celled support group, a foul-mouthed poetry slam, and more.

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Finishing up U.T. Place's "Is Consciousness a Brain Process?" (1956) and starting on J.J.C. Smart's "Sensations and Brain Processes" (1959).

Place argues against the "phenomenological fallacy," i.e. the reality of the contents of one's inner life. Then Smart considers objects against mind/brain identity: Must qualities of sensations be something over and above qualities of brain processes? Finally, is mind/brain identity a scientific hypothesis at all?

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