Second Reflective Essay – Dennett at Google Talks

For the second reflective essay, you will view this video

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Q_mY54hjM0&ab_channel=TalksatGoogleby Daniel Dennett at Google Talks. 

His talk is based upon one of his books.  It’s about 38 minutes long (the additional 22 minutes is interesting audience questions and his responses).

As before, the length of your essay will be about 1,000 to 1,300 words, or about 3-4 pages if double-spaced.  Try to get this essay done soon.  At the end of the semester you will post all three of your reflective essays on canvas (see due date on syllabus).  Again, these will be credited rather than graded.  A satisfactory essay will receive the maximum points, fewer points for incomplete, late, or unsatisfactory work.  Essays will be processed by “turn-it-in.com” to check for plagiarism. 

You can decide for yourself what aspects of the video to focus on and respond to.  It is recommended that you try to relate the content to what we are reading in this unit.  Here are just some suggestions (in the form of questions) for what to consider responding to this video:

What does Dennett mean by “intuition pumps” (or “mind tools” or “thinking tools”)? How do we ACQUIRE such mind tools? 

How have “mind tools” transformed humans and the planet (what is the relevance here of what he calls the Flynn effect and the MacCready explosion)? How do “mind tools” make us smarter?

What is Dennett’s point in comparing a termite mound to the church by Antonio Gaudi? Teleology:  How is Intelligent Design an effect of evolution rather than its cause?  What problem does evolution and cultural evolution have to explain?

How, according to Dennett, do “mind tools” enable humans to have free will as well as to think?

Of course, you can consider additional or alternative questions as they occur to you.

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