Episodes
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What is the function of emotional displays?
We sit down with Thomas Ganzetti and discuss the role emotions serve in social contexts and how we use the displays of others to gather information about our realities. We chat about the evolutionary trajectory of emotional displays, how they help us navigate our environments, and what we learn about ourselves and those around us as we observe each other (whether we intend to or not).
Guest: Thomas Ganzetti
Co-Host: Xueyi Yao (to hear more from Xueyi, check out Episode 18!)
Show notes on the monkey dance website!
Also, we've now been going for a full year! Thank you to everyone who has been listening and reaching out.
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How does the brain process music and how has the perception of music changed over time? We sit down with cognitive neuroscientist Anja-Xiaoxing Cui to chat about how we relate to music, music's role in social interactions, and how music might be used as a tool for regulating emotions. We cover theories of the emergence of music in human history, the relationship between music and other art forms, and whether reading sheet music is at all similar to hearing it.
My co-host this episode is Arianna Curioni (who was also our guest on Episode 13).
Show notes on the monkey dance website!
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Missing episodes?
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What makes systemic inequality such a hard problem to tackle?
We sit down with cognitive anthropologist Angarika Deb and cognitive psychologist Ákos Szegőfi and chat about their research on different aspects of the problem. We chat about the cognitive mechanisms involved in perpetuating systemic inequality both on the part of those benefiting from such systems and those who are marginalized by them. We also discuss the importance of narratives and access to information when it comes to both upholding and justifying inequality as well as challenging and dismantling it.
Show notes on the Monkey Dance website
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What are emotions and how do they impact cognition? We sit down with philosopher Juliette Vazard to talk about what we can learn from our emotions, the relationship between emotions and beliefs, and how emotions can shape our behavior. We cover everything from learning and curiosity, to the epistemic value of emotional states, to their impact on how we relate to the world.
Joining me as a co-host is philosopher Maria Fedorova, our guest on Episode 17.
As always, you can check out the show notes on the website
You an also watch the episode on youtube
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Does everybody experience memory in the same way? We sit down with Andreas Arslan to chat about what we spontaneously imagine when we read or actively remember, and how everything from inferring causal relationships to the salience of symbols can impact recall. We also talk about how the structure of experience impacts and possibly even determines what and how we remember.
Show notes on the website
Or watch on youtube
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How do we use symbols to construct and reconstruct our internal realities? We sit down with two new cohosts of The Monkey Dance, Mariem Diané and Xueyi Yao, to talk about the relationship between language and memory and the importance of symbols in abstract thought. We cover a lot of ground, going from temporal perception and learning to social dynamics and the mitigation of uncertainty from early childhood to adulthood.
Full show notes here:
https://www.monkeydancepod.com/episodes/episode-18
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Why do we have imagination? We sit down with philosopher Maria Fedorova to chat about what imagination is, ways to describe imagination as a process and a capacity, and whether it differs from perception and hallucination (if at all). We also discuss how imagination helps us navigate our realities, its relationship to our beliefs, and its role in empathy and understanding the perspectives of others.
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How can we balance knowledge transfer and democratic empowerment? We sit down with Kristina Vasić and Ákos Szegőfi in a wide ranging discussion about the importance of access to information in a democracy, the need for institutions for knowledge transfer, and how decentralization can help deconstruct entrenched power structures. The conversation spans types of dialogue, the usefulness of rhetoric, whether any argument can be free of bias, and a bunch of other related topics on power, information, and governance.
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What is the function of nostalgia? We sit down with Manu Sharma and talk about what makes a memory, what functions thinking about the past serves, and the impact of broader societal narratives on our senses of self. We discuss the construction of personal histories, their relationships to cultural histories, and also how historical narratives can be constructed by political movements to embolden and dehumanize groups of people.
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How does the engineering of concepts impact how we think about them? We sit down with Bojin Zhu to discuss what makes a concept, how concepts change over time, and what it means to build a methodology for understanding conceptual change. We chat about the intersection of the value and meaning of concepts with their pragmatic and societal implications. Our conversations spans concepts like liberty (whether it's a useful term), free will (what to make of it), truth (whether it exists), and pain (and how to understand our experience of it).
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How is it that human beings achieve collaboration? We sit down with Arianna Curioni and chat about the cognitive science of joint action in its many forms. We talk about human robot interactions, how moving a couch is not the same as boxing, and the difference between a hammer, a neural implant, and a teammate. We also chat a bit about collaboration in society at large and the implications for work on policy.
Show notes on the website
Or you can also watch on youtube
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What differentiates lying from other examples of communicative intent? We sit down with Akos Szegofi and talk about misinformation, institutional trust, and the cognitive mechanisms underlying information processing. We chat about skepticism, how the media has changed over time, and why the intent to deceive is as old as communication itself.
Show notes on the Monkey Dance website
You can also watch the podcast on Youtube
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Does Democracy have intrinsic value or is it only as good as what it helps us achieve? We sit down with Kristina Vasic and chat about what Democracy is, whether it is for individual autonomy or collective autonomy, and the individual's place in systems of power. We chat about disenfranchisement, inequality, and what kinds of political structures are best suited to challenge the status quo.
Show notes on the Monkey Dance website!
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How can we build better tools to identify and predict large scale corruption? We sit with Irene Tello Arista and chat about everything from what corruption is to the systemic pressures that bring it about, and discuss how grand corruption and petty corruption are different not only in scale but in methods. We cover a bit of Irene's background in Mexico starting an NGO to uncover corruption networks, human behavior more generally, and how corruption looks different in different places.
Full show notes on the website
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Should we consider art beyond its utility? We sit down with Emily Kay Williamson to chat about what aesthetics can tell us about art's role in society and its impact on cognition. We talk about whether there is a difference between art and everyday objects, whether art has any boundaries, what there is to learn from art, and where things like journalism fall in discussions about art.
Full show notes here
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How we as a species define ourselves and what we do? We sit down with Aleksandra Knežević and chat about the work to integrate different fields in science and whether anybody is making a genuine attempt to do so. This takes us to questions of what science is and what it does, and how feminist thinkers have helped to improve science as an institution. We also talk about definitions of human nature, what evolutionary psychology can and can't give us, and whether essentialism has anything to offer.
Full show notes
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How do cultures change over time? We look at the framework of cultural evolution, picking apart some of its aspects and trying to build a framework we can both agree on. We look at how you can take a systems level approach of looking at culture, which is looking at the mechanisms of culture itself, or a component level approach, which looks at individual belief dynamics.
Full show notes here
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Who is responsible for the actions of machines? Questions around who is responsible for the behavior of generative statistical algorithms, like large language models, have direct implications for our daily lives. Particularly as they become increasingly "intelligent". We chat with Pelin Kasar about the current state of philosophical debates around how to approach the ethical considerations of machines that seem to think.
Check out the show notes
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What can evolutionary anthropology teach us about ourselves? We sit down with Nikhil Chaudhary and chat about everything from the formation of the self to societal pressures. We cover cooperation and collaboration, hunter-gatherer societies, how to think about thinking, managing uncertainty, cultural narratives, and everything in between.
Show notes on the website!
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What does it mean for a situation to be fair and how does this relate to notions of equality, equity, and justice? We sit down with Angarika Deb, a cognitive anthropologist, to chat about what fairness means and how to think about it. This takes us to conversations about political movements, the communication of information, social justice, and the fundamentally relative nature of fairness.
Show notes on TMD site!
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