Experimental Philosophy

Science and philosophy are traditionally considered very distinct disciplines. Certainly many scientists are philosophical, and there are many philosophers of science. But we think of the two domains as following very different methodologies. Scientists perform experiments: they manipulate variables and observe the outcome. Philosophers think: they perform thought experiments, manipulating concepts by pumping intuitions in one direction or another using words. Which is far from putting on a lab coat and collecting data, right?

Well, recently a subdomain of philosophy has appeared on the scene, called experimental philosophy. Philosophers have long pontificated about how people think, and base their thought experiments on the assumptions of “folk psychology” — naive, common-sense assumptions about our everyday behaviors and why we think and act the way we do. Until recently, philosophers have pulled from the work of scientists (at best) or just ignored the science (at worst). But now, experimental philosophers are performing actual experiments, controlling variables and collecting data. Take, for example, the entertaining video below of comedian Eugene Mirman explaining a recent experiment:

Feeling Out of Control

When your life feels out of control, are you more likely to believe in a deity and its grand plan than when you feel in control of your life? A study by Aaron Kay and colleagues (2008) showed just that effect. In fact, if you prime someone to feel out of control — say, by merely asking them to recall a personal experience where they felt out of control — they tend to report a stronger belief in a controlling higher power. Also, when people feel that they lack personal control, they’re more likely to deny randomness and chance in the universe, perceiving their external reality as orderly.

Furthermore, the study showed that priming someone to feel out of control increases their support for and defense of government (especially if they perceive the government as generally benevolent). It’s as if people change their beliefs about the orderliness of the external world based on how they feel inside about their personal level of control. Kay and colleagues label this a “compensatory control mechanism” — when your perception of personal control goes down, perceptions of external control go up to compensate.

To test this general explanation, the researchers asked whether the effect would work in reverse. If you prime people to see an external source of control as chaotic or unjust, will they perceive a higher level of personal control as a result? The researchers had subjects watch a video story about an HIV patient who sought government medical assistance. Participants saw one of two versions of the video: in one version, the government was depicted as effectively helpful; in the other, it was not.

Mind-Controlling a Computer, on 60-Minutes

Brain Power

The link above takes you to a great 12-minute segment (after a brief commercial) from the TV show “60 Minutes” about brain-computer interfaces. It’s amazing to see how neuroscience can directly change the lives of people who otherwise might not be able to interact with the world at all.

By recording the electrical activity of the brain (typically the premotor or primary motor cortex, where movements are planned and executed), scientists can translate thought into simple computer commands, out of which more complicated interfaces can be built. For someone with advanced ALS or related conditions, this technology can free their brain to communicate with the outside world despite being locked in an unmoving body.

It’s exciting to see how quickly this technology is moving forward.

Do Primates Have Self-Control?

Despite our many lapses, humans still manage to show remarkable self-control. We pass up a tempting slice of cake in order to eat a healthier alternative. We avoid buying a shiny new car today so that in a year we can put a down payment on a house. We save for retirement. Sure, we may not be perfect at avoiding temptation in the present, but when you think about it, the amount of self-control we do show is rather impressive.

Some people are better than others, of course. In the 1960s, Walter Mischel tested young children by giving them a marshmellow. They could eat it immediately if they wanted, but if they waited 15 minutes, they got a second marshmellow. Some kids succeeded in waiting, some didn’t; and it turns out the ability to wait was linked to success later in life.

Self-control is a valuable skill, but is it unique to humans? We can look at our close evolutionary ancestors, the non-human primates, for a hint.

The Dangers of Benevolent Sexism

Hostile and Benevolent Sexism
Everyone is familiar with hostile sexism: the rude jokes, discrimination, harassment, and explicit opinions of gender inferiority. In general, this attitude is condemned in our society, and laws are in place to at least try to minimize employment discrimination and outright harassment.

However, sexism may come in more subtle forms, sometimes labeled benevolent sexism. Paternalist traditions such as opening doors, paying for meals and carrying things may be seen as sexist if they imply a lack of competence on the part of the woman to do these things herself. Patronizing comments may involve ambivalent content, such as praise combined with an implied devalued position (“It’s okay, honey, don’t worry your pretty head about it”). Women may be seen as warm but incompetent, or as needing men’s help. Examples of benevolent sexism are often less clear-cut than hostile sexism.

A 2007 study at the University of Liege looked at the effects of these two types of sexism on women performing job-related tasks. Specifically, women in a trade school or college doing job interview training were told about a potential job opening up at a place that had previously employed only men. The training consisted of (1) a description of the job, and then (2) taking what was described as a standard job interview test involving a simple task.

Social Chameleons

Some people are great at self-monitoring in social situations. They attenuate their behavior based on the social dynamic they are in, engage in impression management, tend to be concerned with the appropriateness of their actions, and adapt well to different social circumstances.

High self-monitors are often likeable and successful people, and highly desired romantic partners. However, a 2007 study showed that people who score high on measures of self-monitoring may seem desireable partners, but often they are less happy in their relationships and less committed.

Michael Roloff, one author of the study, suggests that a tendency to adapt their personality to fit different situations keeps them from letting their true selves out during intimate interactions with romantic partners.

Low self-monitors, on the other hand, are less likely to hide their feelings, and appear to be happier with their relationships and more committed. However, as Roloff points out, these people might be less diplomatic, they may say hurtful things, and studies show they tend to be worse negotiators and get promoted less at work.

Obviously, most people fall in a middle ground between these extremes, and have some aspects of both traits. It seems valuable, then, for all of us to keep in mind the trade-offs of being diplomatic and fitting in versus wearing all your thoughts on your sleeve all the time. Certainly some combination of diplomacy and bluntness can mitigate the downsides of both. Indeed, Roloff’s study points out that intimate communication and tendencies that enhance communication quality tend to improve the quality of relationships even for high self-monitors.

False Memories

Do you remember where you were when you first saw the closed-circuit TV footage of the 7/7 London bombings in 2005?

Hopefully not, else you may be imagining things — no such footage exists. But if you claimed to remember it, you would be in good company. Around 40% of British college students said they remembered such a video, when filling out questionnaires a mere three months after the bombings. It seems as if people had invented a memory to fill in or coalesce the details of an event they had seen or heard described later.

Beneath Normal People Lurk Monsters

Back in 1961, Yale researcher Stanley Milgram performed a now-controversial experiment. He recruited people to volunteer in a psychology study supposedly about learning and memory. When they arrived, they were told the setup: a pair of participants were to play two roles, teacher and learner, while the experimenter (a stern man in a lab coat) observed. However, the trick of the experiment was that each participant was always “randomly” assigned to be the teacher, while the second alleged participant, assigned as learner, was in fact always an accomplice to the experiment.

For the experiment, the participant (as teacher) was moved to a separate room from the learner. Through an intercom, the participant was to read a list of word pairs to the learner, who then had to choose matching pairs when quizzed. After incorrect answers, the participant was to flip a switch to shock the learner — a panel at their desk had switches labeled 45 volts increasing up to 450 volts. The participant had watched the learner get strapped in to the shock equipment. The learner mentioned in passing that he had a heart condition, after which the experimenter authoritatively assured him that there was no danger (again, this was all acted out with the participant thinking the learner was just another volunteer). Back in the test room, the participant received a not-insignificant 45 volt shock to see what it felt like, and then the word-pair testing began.

The teacher read the words, and the learner appeared to be responding, and getting shocked at successively higher levels after each mistake. In fact, there were no real shocks, but a pre-recorded tape played reactions to each shock. As the shock levels went up, the learner feigned increased pain and eventually banged on the wall, complained about his heart condition, and asked to be released. If the participant continued, the learner stopped responding at all.

In- and Out-of-Body Experience

Normally our bodies receive sensory input through eyes, ears, skin and other systems, and those inputs synch up in consistent ways, such that our brain can put it together into a coherent picture of the 3D world around and including us. My visual input is basically just a sterooscopic movie, but because it matches so well with tactile and other input (you feel the toe-pain of a rock right when you see that familiar foot object hit it), we interpret those images as us being inside a 3D world. Really we construct the world around us — and we presume our construction is veridical because it consistently predicts the matching up of sensory events (occasional illusions notwithstanding).

This makes perfect sense if, as we assume, we are bodies inhabiting a 3D world — bodies including brain systems that integrate sensory input from different feedback devices (including inner feedback from proprioception and the like). But if this is the case, then we should theoretically be able to disrupt or alter the brain processes that synch up our various sensory experiences, such that our consistent, 3D view of the world from our own body’s perspective is thrown out of whack. But what would happen, in that case?

Monkey-Controlled Robot

Researchers in the U.S. and Japan successfully synched up a monkey’s brain with a robot across the world, and after about an hour of practice the monkey could control the robot’s legs while it walked on a treadmill.

First the scientists trained the monkey to walk on a treadmill, and electrodes monitored her brain signals during the activity. The brain signals predicted her leg movement in such a way that they could translate the signals into instructions for a bipedal robot in Japan on a similar treadmill.

The monkey was shown a live video of the robot’s legs while both walked on their own treadmill, and the monkey’s brain soon ‘tuned in’ to the robot’s leg movements. In fact, when they turned off her treadmill and she stopped walking, she continued to concentrate on the video screen, and sure enough, her neurons kept firing, controlling the robot’s movement. The robot kept walking, controlled from across the seas by a stationary monkey’s brain.