Shadowing Practice: AI Will End Philosophy, Physicist Claims - Learn English Speaking with Video
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A physicist has written a book explaining how artificial intelligence will make much of philosophy obsolete soon.
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A philosopher thinks otherwise, and I think, well, they're both wrong.
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Let me explain.
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The new book comes from Louis Fervort, who started out with a PhD in physics, but then did a second PhD in philosophy.
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So this isn't your stereotypical ignorant physicists with a YouTube channel.
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You have me for that.
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The book is titled Problem Solving in Philosophy, How to Do Philosophy in the Age of Ultra Intelligent AI.
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To make a long story short, the author argues that philosophy should be done like in natural science in general, and like theoretical physics in particular.
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As he writes in the book, quote, philosophy is now mature enough to come to reasonably solid answers to key problems,
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And there's one overarching method to do so, in essence, the same method as the natural science is used to obtain answers,
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in particular theoretical physics.
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He argues that philosophers should quantify how good an explanation is by using
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that explanation which gives the largest number of coherent answers to the well -posed problems.
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He calls this the maximally coherent theory.
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The best theory is the one that explains the most cases, makes sense of the most counterexamples and contradicts the least other accepted knowledge.
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And AI can do it, so his argument, because all it really comes down to is counting the questions answered and contradictions.
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He's even done an experiment in which he used AI to allegedly solve a thorny problem of philosophy.
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That's how to define causality.
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The experiment works like this.
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Ask Chad GPT, at the time this was GPT -4, which notion of causality is the best.
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Chad GPT said, counterfactual causality, which Fairbord thinks is correct because it's the one he also likes best.
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Maybe doing philosophy like theoretical physics is not the flex he thinks it is.
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Other philosophy topics that Fairbord thinks AI or cetera is free will, which clearly doesn't exist, and induction,
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which he thinks is a pseudo -problem.
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Though I have to add that he also says that he doesn't think AI will solve all philosophy problems.
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In particular, he says big questions like the meaning of life or the existence of God are still up for grabs,
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presumably until chat GPT 7 .8 Max Pro Ultra agrees with him.
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The author published a paper with his main argument before the book, so we already have a comment from a philosopher titled,
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can we automate philosophy through AI?
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And we want to.
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The philosopher basically says that if you think philosophy is about generating theories and arguing for and against them,
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then yes, an AI can in principle do it.
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If you, on the other hand, think philosophy is about thinking through these problems yourself, then an AI can't do it for you.
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The remarkable thing about this argument is that he managed to blow it up to 15 pages, which is basically my problem with all philosophy literature.
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Loads of words to say the pathetically obvious.
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That said, I don't have much sympathy for the physicist's argument in this case either,
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because the question of how to quantify the best explanation for a philosophical theory is itself a philosophical problem.
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And the entire idea that you can science -ify philosophy is nonsense,
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because philosophy is exactly what we use to discuss the questions that science cannot answer, or not yet.
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There are, of course, questions that eventually move from philosophy to science.
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Consciousness is just doing this, and free will is likely going to come next.
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The problem with the author's argument is nicely illustrated in his take on the problem of induction.
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That's the question of why induction works.
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Why do the laws of nature continue to work?
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Why does the sun rise every morning?
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Why do atoms remain stable?
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Why does Sabina keep making stupid jokes?
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You might say, well, it's because we have seen in the past that that's the case.
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Yes, but that'd be proving induction by induction, which is a circular argument.
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Verwort basically says it's a meaningless question
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because induction should be treated as an axiom and as such it doesn't require a justification.
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But induction is an axiom in science.
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We need it for science to work.
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The question is why does it work?
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That's a question science can't answer which is exactly why it's a question for philosophers.
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If you say a non -scientific question isn't a question then yeah I guess you can close the philosophy departments
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but even Claude could tell you that this is a pseudo -argument.
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That said, I think both of these gentlemen missed the obvious point, which is that humans are by.. default lazy.
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Most philosophy papers are already collections of useless words
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that no one reads and of course increasingly more philosophers will let AI do this job.
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Indeed, I'm sure this is already happening and I hope
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that this will ultimately encourage philosophers to improve the quality of their discourse.
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I give the book a 6 out of 10 on the bullshit meter.
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Why is it so low after all I've said?
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It's because I think that the method that the author suggests to quantify how good different explanations are is worthwhile.
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I just don't think it's going to make philosophy redundant.
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And if AI really does make philosophy obsolete, philosophers will spend the next 50 years debating whether that actually happened.
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You
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This video has 85 sentences and 1087 words to shadow. The speech runs for 6:58. The speaker talks at a natural 156 words per minute, close to everyday conversation. Only 80% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| philosopher noun | /fəˈlɑsəfɚ/ | A lover of wisdom. |
| induction noun | /ɪnˈdʌkʃən/ | An act of inducting. |
| explanation noun | /ˌɛkspləˈneɪʃən/ | The act or process of explaining. |
| physics noun | /ˈfɪz.ɪks/ | The branch of science concerned with the study of the properties and interactions of space, time, matter and energy. |
| argue verb | /ˈɑɹ.ɡju/ | To show grounds for concluding (that); to indicate, imply. |
| theoretical adjective | /ˌθi.əˈɹɛt.ɪ.kəl/ | Of or relating to theory; abstract; not empirical. |
| solve verb | /sɒlv/ | To find an answer or solution to a problem or question; to work out. |
| experiment noun | /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/ | A test under controlled conditions made to either demonstrate a known truth, examine the validity of a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of… |
| philosophical adjective | /ˌfɪl.əˈsɑ.fɪ.kl̩/ | Of, or pertaining to, philosophy. |
| obsolete adjective | /ˈɑbsəlit/ | No longer in use or no longer useful; now disused or neglected (often in favour of something newer, better, or more fashionable); outmoded. |
| coherent adjective | /koʊˈhɛɹ.ənt/ | Unified; sticking together; making up a whole. |
| topic noun | /ˈtɑpɪk/ | A subject; a theme; a category or general area of interest. |
| stable noun | /ˈsteɪ.bəl/ | A building, wing or dependency set apart and adapted for lodging and feeding (and training) ungulates, especially horses. |
| encourage verb | /ɪnˈkʌɹ.ɪd͡ʒ/ | To mentally support; to motivate, give courage, hope or spirit. |
| select verb | /sɪˈlɛkt/ | To choose one or more elements of a set, especially a set of options. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Meaning |
|---|---|
| come down to verb | To reach by moving down or reducing. |
| come up verb | To emerge or become known, especially unexpectedly. |
| think through verb | To fully consider, so as to understand all the consequences of. |
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | pages, which is · induction, which is · answer which is |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | has written · have seen · I've said |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | is titled · should be done · should be treated |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 17 contractions and reduced forms, such as doesn't, don't, can't. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: theoretical /ˌθi.əˈɹɛt.ɪ.kəl/, sympathy /ˈsɪm.pəθ.i/, worthwhile /ˌwɜː(ɹ)θˈwaɪl/, pathetically /pəˈθɛtɪkli/, thorny /ˈθɔɹni/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: induction /ɪnˈdʌkʃən/, explanation /ˌɛkspləˈneɪʃən/, artificial /ˌɑː.tɪˈfɪʃ.əl/, collections /kəˈlɛkʃənz/, notion /ˈnoʊʃən/
- Long words — get the stress right: philosopher /fəˈlɑsəfɚ/, explanation /ˌɛkspləˈneɪʃən/, theoretical /ˌθi.əˈɹɛt.ɪ.kəl/, experiment /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/, philosophical /ˌfɪl.əˈsɑ.fɪ.kl̩/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like philosopher, induction, explanation.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.