The Limits of Knowing with Elise Crull
Neil deGrasse Tyson and co-host Chuck Nice talk with philosopher of physics Elise Crull about the historical and contemporary relationship between physics and philosophy. They trace how natural philosophy split into specialized disciplines, how foundational concepts like space, time, and objectivity shaped classical and modern physics, and why questions raised by quantum mechanics-such as entanglement and non-locality-force a reevaluation of those concepts. The conversation also explores academic specialization, the role of philosophy in guiding cutting-edge physics, and Neil's nuanced critique of modern academic philosophy.
Selects: How ESP Works (?)
Hosts Josh Clark and Charles W. "Chuck" Bryant explore extrasensory perception (ESP), outlining different proposed phenomena such as telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, retrocognition, mediumship, psychometry, and telekinesis. They trace the history of parapsychology from early work by William James and the Society for Psychical Research through J.B. Rhine's laboratory studies with Zenner cards and later experiments like Ganzfeld setups, Princeton's PEAR random number generator research, and Daryl Bem's controversial precognition studies. Throughout, they contrast believers' interpretations with skeptical explanations involving coincidence, attentional bias, subliminal cues, and issues of scientific rigor and reproducibility.