Episode 48, Rebecca Goldstein: Why Philosophy Won’t Go Away (Part II)

The Panpsycast Philosophy Podcast

Jack Symes | Andrew Horton, Oliver Marley, and Rose de Castellane

Euthanasia, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Existentialism, Marxism, Kant, Ethics, Davidpapineau, Dennett, Marx, Evilgodchallenge, Cosmological, Mind, Consciousness, Courses, Nagasawa, Education, Johnstuartmill, Jeremybentham, Aristotle, Ocr, Camus, Josephfletcher, Conscience, Society & Culture, Kantianethics, Philosophy

4.8 • 604 Ratings

🗓️ 14 October 2018

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Professor Rebecca Newberger Goldstein is one of the most influential thinkers in the world of public philosophy. Amongst many other philosophical texts, Goldstein is the author of The Mind-Body Problem, Betraying Spinoza: The Renegade Jew Who Gave Us Modernity, 36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction and Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won’t Go Away. For many, Goldstein’s talent for bringing philosophy to life through her wit and beautiful storytelling is unapparelled. In the words of A. C. Grayling,

“Like Plato… Goldstein has both literary and philosophical gifts of the highest order: the combination is superb.”

The list of Goldstein’s accomplishments is exhaustingly extensive; let us mention just five of many. Professor Goldstein was named a MacArthur Fellow (popularly known as the “genius award”) in 1996 and elected to The American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2005. In 2011, she was designated Free-thought Heroine by the Freedom from Religion Foundation and Humanist of the Year by The American Humanist Association, and in September of 2015, awarded the National Humanities Medal by President Obama in a ceremony at the White House. The reason cited?

"For bringing philosophy into conversation with culture. In scholarship, Dr Goldstein has elucidated the ideas of Spinoza and Gödel, while in fiction, she deploys wit and drama to help us understand the great human conflict between thought and feeling."

Transcript

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0:00.0	Part 2. Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, The Philosopher.
0:16.3	So, Rebecca, we thought in this section would ask you some more questions rather about, you know, why philosophy won't go away and perhaps getting rid of the naysayers of philosophy.
0:28.0	And kind of the bread that you're baking now, you've moved away from just mathematics and physics, and your philosophical positions.
0:35.8	We mentioned in the introduction of the episode that in 2011, you were named Humanist of the Year by the American Humanist Association.
0:42.8	So no surprise is then that you don't believe in God.
0:45.7	But would you consider yourself an atheist still?
0:48.5	And how would you describe your other philosophical positions?
0:51.1	Would you say you're a naturalist, a secularist, a physicalist?
0:54.1	What labels would you associate with yourself?
0:56.0	Hmm.
0:57.0	A secular humanist, I think.
1:00.0	Okay.
1:01.0	Is what a label I'm comfortable with?
1:04.0	An atheist as well? You say God does not exist?
1:08.0	I'll put it this way. I'd be damn surprised to discover that this is a universe in which anything like the Abrahamic
1:16.6	God is in control.
1:19.6	Yes.
1:20.6	I would say not only don't the arguments work, right, but this empirically just does not seem to be the kind of universe that is consistent with the kind of God described by the Abrahamic religions.
1:43.4	I think there is secular grounding for morality.
1:48.0	I find the attempt to insert God into the discussion of what the difference is between right and wrong, completely
2:03.0	unconvincing.
2:06.2	And I also find the kinds of motivations to be good that it appeals to immoral, right?
	...

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