We discuss the biggest questions: "what's real?", "who matters?" and "how to make a better world?" with scientists, celebrities, activists, writers and philosophers. The Sentientism worldview is "evidence, reason and compassion for all sentient beings." It's a simple, yet radical, philosophy that's grounded in reality (naturalistic epistemology) and has compassion for all sentient beings (mostly human and non-human animals). Naturalism & sentiocentrism combined.
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Constantine is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Hertfordshire, Director of Lex Academic & a Fellow of the RSA. He describes his philosophical interests as “unfashionably broad, but I work primarily in the philosophy of action, moral psychology & interpersonal understanding. I also have an interest in the psychology of philosophy, as advanced by Hume, Nietzsche, & Wittgenstein.” He spent most of his twenties as a theatre director & playwright.
In Sentientist Conversations we talk about the two most important questions: “what’s real?” & “what matters?”
Sentientism is “evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings.” The video of our conversation is here on YouTube.
We discuss:
00:00 Welcome
01:15 Constantine’s Intro
– “I’m looking forward to finding out if I’m a Sentientist or not”
– Teaching & researching philosophy
– Phil of action, Wittgenstein & Hume, virtue ethics, anti-vegan rhetoric
– Rejecting the separation betweeen human & non-human animals “Who are ‘we’ anyway?”
– The value of improving human worldviews (epistemology & ethics)
– Beliefs & values & reasons driving action
08:07 What’s Real?
– Greek Orthodox Christian upbringing but “science was taken very seriously”
– Born in India, living in Zimbabwe
– Being placed in “Protestant” vs. “Catholic” or “Ethics” class
– Agnostic as a teenager
– Degree at Oxford in phil & theology “By the end of that degree I was atheist”
– “The more you read about it [the bible] as a human text…”
– Studying Christian moral reasoning & Nietzsche
– Wittgenstein & Kierkegaard
– “I’m not one of those Dawkins style atheists”
– “I just don’t have this faith”
– “Everyday life was very naturalistic”
– Culturally Christian
– Those who stay religious but update the ethics
– “I think there are things we can’t explain”
– Doubt as central to science & naturalism
– “I know the precise second I switched from agnostic to atheist” in a phil of religion lecture: “Just because it’s possible something exists & you can’t disprove it’s existence doesn’t mean you’re agnostic about it… a 3 headed dragon in some other galaxy.” Atheism & Adragonism 🙂
– Norms re: religious rituals/marriage
– Why do religious organisations get a pass re: basic ethics? (sexism, homophobia, abuse)?
– Atheist societies often suffer from similar problems
– The good that can come from religion
– Allen Ginsberg re: homophobia in Cuba
– Post-truth, QAnon, homeopathy, Flat Earth… epistemology fails
– Refusing medical treatment on religious grounds
– Vountary euthanasia
– Wearing the hijab
– Personal autonomy, but don’t harm others
35:18 What (and who) matters?
…and much more. Full show notes at Sentientism.info and on YouTube.
Sentientism is “Evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings.” More at Sentientism.info. Join our “I’m a Sentientist” wall via this simple form.
Everyone, Sentientist or not, is welcome in our groups. The biggest so far is here on FaceBook. Come join us there!
Thanks Graham.
I had the pleasure of talking about Sentientism on the Clearer Thinking podcast hosted by Spencer Greenberg. This is a cross-post of our episode so make sure you go subscribe to Clearer Thinking too. Clearer Thinking is a podcast about …continue
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