Thoughts about Thoughts

Media

I try to make sure I give at least a few talks a year, but mostly I end up giving more than a few. I'll list some of the upcoming ones here from time to time. Also you can see some previous interviews I've given. I wouldn't recommend it--I've never been able to bring myself to watch them (actually I've never watched any of the links below for the simple reason that no sane person should want to watch their own talks.) But if you wanted to for some reason, here are some.

I gave the SPP Stanton lecture in June 2023. It was an amazing honor and one of the highlights of my career. Many other people in the crowd were just as deserving and receiving this recognition was really touching. There is so much bullshit in academia (and well everywhere, which was part of the theme of my talk on ‘Epistemic Chaos’) that it’s really rare to find the things that matter. Everyone has to try to shut out the noise and just focus on the few opinions that really matter to them. For me, the people that come to SPP are those people. I’ve been going for years, and to receive the prize and see a crowd full of past winners and presidents, people whose work inspires and propels and intimidates…it was humbling. The antidote for thinking academia is full of shit is the work of people in this conference. I was legitimately touched by the way the talk was received, including the very generous laughter. I don’t have a video of my talk but I do have Chaz Firestone’s ridiculously kind and touching intro. I got choked up after watching it. The whole experience and the way the community embraced me—it was truly meaningful. Anyway here that is. What an unbelievably sweet guy.

Here is a talk I gave at College de France in June 2021 (on belief as the most basic propositional attitude): https://www.college-de-france.fr/site/en-francois-recanati/symposium-2021-06-17-11h00.htm

Here is a talk at the Royal Swedish Academy of the Sciences, which was broadcast on Swedish public television (KVATV):  https://kva.screen9.tv/media/AUf0KIdd1iZ74Iov3rn7HA/troubles-with-bayesianism-an-introduction-to-the-psychological-immune-system

Here's an interview I did on Bayesianism for the Royal Statistical Society's magazine Significance:  http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1740-9713.2016.00935.x/full

Here is a Bloggingheads video of (the really clever and fun) Jonathan Phillips and me talking about beliefs: http://bloggingheads.tv/videos/20056

And here's the Science Network's interview with the Cognitive Science Societies Dissertation Prize winners. The other guys interviewed here (Ed Vul and Michael Frank) have done some truly groundbreaking work, so it might be worth watching it to hear what they say. http://thesciencenetwork.org/programs/cogsci-2011/panel-1-3

Here's a Psychology Today blog post (by the wonderful Josh Knobe) on some experimental work of mine on mental illness and responsibility: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/experiments-in-philosophy/200805/can-the-mentally-ill-be-blame 

Here's the Youtube link to my 2015 Stockholm talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MawVpJE3zDA

Lastly, here's a link to a podcast of the NPR gameshow 'Ask Me Another.' I haven't listened to it myself, but I was a contestant and guest along with Tiny Desk Contest winner Gaelynn Lea and the incomparable Bob Boilen. Gaelynn's music is really moving, and Bob Boilen is a freaking national treasurer. Getting to spend a long evening talking music with Bob is up there with the best random nights I can remember (and I once brought Yo La Tengo to high table at Oxford [Catz]). Anyway, the cast of AMA is excellent too--Ofira, Art, and Jonathan are all excellent and hilarious so it's worth listening to their podcast regardless of whether I'm there. But here's the link to my episode: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/bob-boilen-gaelynn-lea-whats/id524978407?i=1000369969597&mt=2

Social Media FAQ

Q: Are you friends with me on Facebook?

A: No, you are definitely not as I have never had a Facebook account. If you are like many of my graduate students you probably friended someone with my name from New York. That isn’t me. A quick Q&A about this:

Q: Who is that Eric Mandelbaum?

A: I have no idea. I don’t really care either. Fwiw though the few other NY Mandelbaums I’ve met all seem pretty cool. Also they all enjoy Seinfeld references way more than I do so maybe keep it for them.

Q: This other EM has been accepting my invitations to stuff. Are you sure it’s not you?

A: Yup, very sure. I have no idea why that’s happening, but it’s pretty weird. In fact, the only way I found out about this person is because people keep asking why I said I was coming to some party and then didn’t show. This is pretty weird. Be comforted in the fact I’d never to come a party invite sent through Facebook, as I don’t have Facebook.

Q: Is that you on Twitter?

A: Yes, the one that has a picture of me is me. In December 2017 I won an NEH grant. This was great! Sadly, it had its downsides, which included a lot of extremists sending me, um, colorful mail. So I got my name as a handle then (I had been on there anonymously for a while. Twitter is an excellent source of bird and basketball info).

Upcoming Talks

It’s impossible to keep these up to date so I’m not listing them anymore. Sorry stalkers!