314. Martin Rees — Can Science Save Us?
The Michael Shermer Show
Michael Shermer
4.3 • 1K Ratings
🗓️ 3 January 2023
⏱️ 100 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Shermer and Rees discuss: existential threats • overpopulation • biodiversity loss • climate change • AI and self-driving cars, robots, and unemployment • his bet with Steven Pinker • his disagreement with Richard Dawkins • how science works as a communal activity • scientific creativity • science communication • science education • why there aren't more women and people of color in STEM fields • verification vs. falsification • Bayesian reasoning and scientific progress • Model Dependent Realism and the nature of reality Fermi's Paradox • why he's an atheist but wants to be buried in the Presbyterian church in which he was raised • mysterian mysteries.
Martin Rees is Astronomer Royal, former President of the Royal Society, Fellow (and former Master) of Trinity College, Cambridge, and Emeritus Professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge. He sits as a member of the UK House of Lords. He is the author of many bestselling popular science books, including: On the Future; Just Six Numbers; Before the Beginning; and Our Final Hour. His newest book is If Science is to Save Us.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You're listening to theurmer Show. |
| 0:18.0 | Hello everyone, welcome to the Michael Shurmer Show. It's your host. Michael Shurmer. Today's episode is brought to you by Wundrium. |
| 0:22.0 | Wundrium is the online subscription platform for all matters |
| 0:27.5 | intellectual thoughtful, thought-provoking content that you can consume while you're |
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| 1:10.6 | related to the subject shocking psychological studies and the lessons they teach. |
| 1:15.6 | Some of the obvious ones have got to be Milgram Shock Experiment, when's the title? |
| 1:21.6 | Zimbardo's Foh prison experiment at Stanford and many other things. |
| 1:27.0 | This one is only six lectures, so you can just blast through this. |
| 1:30.0 | I'd probably do this in a day. |
| 1:32.0 | Lessons from Tuskee and Facebook. |
| 1:35.0 | I'm not sure what the Facebook references, |
| 1:37.0 | but of course Tuscagee is the famous and tragic experiment conducted |
| 1:42.0 | by the federal government health agencies to not provide treatment for African Americans with syphilis just to see the course of the disease when they could have. |
| 1:54.8 | Without the consent or knowledge of the subjects, this led to a lot of reform in the 1970s |
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