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Did anyone see Terrence Howard on Joe Rogan? Would love to see what the motte thinks.
Personally I'm withholding judgment until he goes up against someone credible.
What are you withholding judgment on? He seems like a pretty garden variety hotep logician, the kind of guy that believes a lot of incredibly dumb shit and says it smugly because it makes him feel like he's actually very smart.
I believe that your confidence in believing something should be proportional to how close you are to that something.
For example I (I believe) I should not be more confident about string theory than an actual physicists that deals with the frontier of string theory on a day to day basis. Which means if the most knowledgeable string theorist is 95% sure that string theory is true/viable/useful, then me who gets all my information second hand (through YouTube videos, podcasts, articles, lectures, papers) should not be more than 95% sure about string theory.
Watching the Terrence Howard podcast I realised that I cannot defend against anything he is saying. I'm not saying he is correct. I'm not saying he is incorrect. I've simply deemed myself too far away from where the actual science happens to say anything intelligent on the matter at all.
Everything I know about physics comes from people who (supposedly) know more than most people on physics. I just took their word for it. I've never seen a proton, neutron or electron. I've never looked through a telescope and observed different galaxies. I've never sat down and really tried to understand the math that supports quantum physics. Yet I believe all these things. I just understand that I am trusting these high status people (Physicists) and their findings. But these people that I trust can be wrong. They could have missed something.
In my experience the best way to learn as a layperson is to watch experts (or people who have spent a longer than average time on a subject) debate each other and google/chatgpt/research all the points of disagreement that come up.
Other than entertainment, what value does one's confidence in something like the laws of physics or string theory have to the average layperson?
It honestly doesn't matter if it's correct or not unless you're working on something where that knowledge has a direct impact on something you're engaged with. For most people, your ability to function in the world is no better or worse whether you choose to believe in or not believe in string theory.
Usually, the "value" in this kind of sophistry in trying to recontextualize the lens to view the world is to open up people's mind to the possibility that maybe our fundamental assumptions about the world are incorrect and in doing so you might be able to unlock a new way of viewing the world or thinking that can yield positive results.
Okay, I can agree with this that, so why not use an actual useful example that can show that instead of arguing that if you change the axioms of mathematics 1x1=2. This feels just like that 2+2=5 controversy that just happened a few years ago. All the conversation gets lost in the absurdity of the example because frankly speaking, nobody goes around changing the axioms of mathematics in their day-to-day lives. It's only useful to mathematicians and philosophers.
Since you're deferring to the experts for subjects you don't understand, why are you listening to Terrence Howard, who is an actor and not a mathematician or logician or philosopher or scientist?
If you want to listen to a counterpoint of Howard's ideas, here's a video by YouTuber Professor Dave Explains: https://youtube.com/watch?v=lWAyfr3gxMA
This is a guy who typically makes videos debunking pseudoscience ideas like flat earth theory. He's probably just as qualified as Terrence Howard to talk about the subject.
I'm trying to have an accurate view of the world so I'm (somewhat) constantly checking my confidence levels in certain beliefs. But yes you are correct the latest findings in string theory does not affect my ability to function in the world day to day.
You could say "why are you trying to have an accurate view of the world ?" and to that I don't have a real answer other than truth is a terminal value to me.
Okay forget the word "expert" and replace it with the phrase "people with above average interest and time spent on a subject". Terrence Howard and Professor Dave have both spent more time on this subject than me so I'll listen to them both. I mean you also listened to Terrence Howard no ? Listening is not necessarily an endorsement and he popped on the biggest podcast in the world.
We live in an era of information bombardment so it's crucial to be able to figure out what deserves your attention and what doesn't. By the way, I defer to the experts for a lot of my knowledge too, it's unavoidable. I couldn't get anything useful outside of Terrence Howard's ideas except amusement so I didn't listen to the whole thing. Maybe you see something of value in there I don't.
I think I would enjoy his ideas if it was presented as a system in a science fiction novel but it's being presented as reality and I can't decouple that to take his ideas seriously.
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