This Not School discussion by PEL Citizens Mike Murray, Justin Modra, and Ray Black was recorded 10/25/17. Join the Philosophy in Film group and propose a film to discuss! Continue Reading …
Not School: James B. Miles’s “The Free Will Delusion”
Free will is the ability to choose between different possible courses of action. It is closely linked to the concepts of responsibility, praise, guilt, sin, and other judgments that apply only to actions that are freely chosen. Traditionally, only actions that are freely willed are seen as deserving credit or blame. PEL Citizens Justin Modra, Alexander Roth, and Brian Wise Continue Reading …
Not School: Neil Postman’s “Amusing Ourselves to Death”
Featuring Mike Murray, Jennifer Tejada, Ray Black and Phi Fic podcasters Mary Claire, Daniel St. Pierre, and Cezary Baraniecki. Recorded March 11, 2017. This Not School discussion covered ideas from Neil Postman’s 1985 book Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business. The group was asked to read chapters Introduction, 1, 2, and 9. The group put Continue Reading …
Great Discourses: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
A class session from a Great Discourses seminar on Robert Pirsig's novel/memoir/philosophical treatise taught by Adam Rose, featuring Dave Buchanan (reprising his role as Prisig enthusiast from PEL episode 50, plus participants from Berkeley, Seattle, Chicago, Brazil, and Mexico! This is the kind of thing you can take part in if you sign up for a Great Discourses course at Continue Reading …
Not School Intro Group: Camus’s “Myth of Sisyphus”
Brian Wilson leads a seminar on Albert Camus's essay "The Myth of Sissyphus," deepening our look into Camus following PEL ep. 4. With Jim Rice and Preston Price. Recorded 8/8/16. Continue Reading …
Great Discourses: The Trial and Death of Socrates Excerpts
PEL is partnering with Great Discourses to offer souped-up Not School content: i.e. actual educational professionals leading multi-session courses. Professionals need to get paid (a bit!), so unlike other Not School offerings, your tuition is not covered entirely with your PEL Citizenship fee, but being a Citizen does get you 20% off any and all courses (at least for the July Continue Reading …
Not School Intro Group: Plato’s “Crito”
The first session of the newly revived group, led 3/20/16 by Brian Wilson of Combat & Classics fame (a St. John's thing). Featuring Steve Kurtz, Stacey Morris, Roger Crandy, Nick Eddy, Justin Modra, James Lee, and Cathy Reisenwitz. It was a sold-out show that even attracted a decent amount of viewers so we'll be moving over to a different platform to allow for Continue Reading …
Not School Fiction Group: Albert Camus’ “The Fall” (Phi-Fi #16)
The Philosophical Fiction group, featuring Nathan Hanks, Daniel, Cezary, Laura, and Mary, in conversation on the novel by Albert Camus, The Fall. Recorded 8/30/15. We discuss the "portrait as a mirror," "party guilt," Jesus, traffic, and the human condition. Also, by way of clarifying, I was thinking of this false story surrounding "In the Air Tonight" by Phil Continue Reading …
Not School Fiction Group: Isaac Asimov’s “The Last Question” (Phi-Fi #15)
Featuring Nathan Hanks, Daniel, Cezary, Laura, and Mary, in conversation on the short story by Isaac Asimov, "The Last Question." Entropy, artificial selves, comfort in circularity, and banning dragons as guests, all in this conversation. You can also hear Asimov read the story himself. Recorded on 8/16/2015. Continue Reading …
Not School Fiction Group: Walker Percy’s “The Moviegoer” (Phi-Fi #14)
Featuring Nathan Hanks, Daniel, Cezary, Laura, and Mary, on Walter Percy's novel The Moviegoer about "existential crisis in beautiful language... with Southern charm." Mentionables: "I wish I could marry Walker Percy," The Windup Bird Chronicles, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, and "How the movies mess it up." Join the group to participate in future discussions! Continue Reading …
Not School Fiction Group: Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” (Phi-Fi #13)
Featuring Nathan Hanks, Daniel, Laura, and Mary. The story is about one special day in an American "village" that turns horrific and ends with, as was said, "the most perfect last line." We partially spoil the story, use adult language, and wander into politics and religion. Recorded July 19, 2015. "Bill," Mr. Summers said, and Bill Hutchinson reached into the box and felt Continue Reading …
Not School: C. S. Peirce’s “The Fixation of Belief”
Featuring David Prentiss, Tim Clarke, Peter Oppenheim. Recorded July 19, 2015. "The Fixation of Belief" was the first of four essays he wrote for Popular Science Monthly in 1877-8. In the essay, Peirce introduces his concepts of belief, doubt, and inquiry. He also proposes four types of intellectual activity that result in fixed beliefs. His purpose in this is to show that Continue Reading …
Not School Fiction Group: Franz Kafka’s “In the Penal Colony” (Phi-Fi #12)
Featuring Nathan Hanks, Daniel, Cezary, Laura, and Mary. Recorded May 31, 2015. The story is about a traveler visiting a penal colony who meets the officer in charge of a justice system. It's tense, violent, surprising, and "kind of like a Tarantino movie." Read more about it. Join the Philosophical Fiction group! Continue Reading …
Not School Theater Group: Philip Auslander on Post-Modern Theater
Discussing the first three essays in From Acting to Performance: Essays in Modernism and Postmodernism. The conversation touches on the therapeutic value of catharsis, deconstruction in theater, and Willem Dafoe's acting methods. Featuring Daniel Cole, Philip Cherny, Carlos Franke. Recorded April 19, 2015. As the back of the book says, these essays map a "transition from the Continue Reading …
Not School Fiction Group: Virginia Woolf’s “To The Lighthouse” (Phi-Fi #11)
Featuring Nathan Hanks, Daniel, Cezary, Laura, and Dan J. Recorded April 5, 2015. Talking about time, beauty, and life in Woolf's 1927 novel. Read more about it. Join the Philosophical Fiction group! 'And that's the end,' she said, and she saw in his eyes, as the interest in the story died away in them, something else take its place; something wondering, pale, like the Continue Reading …
Not School: Karl Jaspers’s “Truth and Symbol”
Featuring Mark Linsenmayer, Michael Burgess, Tara Leigh Bell, John Ludders, Chris Eyre, Benjamin Feddersen. Recorded April 26, 2015, 1 hr., 50 min. Jaspers thinks that we should neither live as if the objective world the sole object of real knowledge (per natural science) or to act like all we can know is ourselves (per Cartesian doubt) but to acknowledge that both are part Continue Reading …
Not School Theater Group: Jerzy Grotowski’s Sourcebook
The first of two discussions on Jerzy Grotowski, the famous Polish director whose productions first stunned audiences in the 1960s with their distinctive physicality. Featuring Daniel Cole, Philip Cherny, Carlos Franke. Recorded January 4, 2015. Studying philosophy in theater primarily through texts is obviously somewhat indelicate. Plays are meant to be experienced Continue Reading …
Not School Theater Group: Jerzy Grotowski’s “Akropolis”
Concluding the Philosophy and Theater Group's two-month foray into the Polish director's work; listen to part one first. Covering the play Akropolis, which was based on Stanisław Wyspiański’s dramatic epic poem, as well as more of the Grotowski Sourcebook. Featuring Daniel Cole, Philip Cherny, and Carlos Franke. Recorded January 4, 2015. Read more about the play. You can Continue Reading …
Not School Fiction Group: Michel Houellebecq’s “The Map and the Territory” (Phi-Fi #10)
Featuring Nathan Hanks, Daniel, and Kimberly. Recorded December 12, 2014. We discuss the story of Jed Martin, a man at the “at the beginning of the third millenium” whose successful life as an artist pales against his lonely life as a human. "You can work alone for years, it's actually the only way to work, truth be told; but there always comes a moment when you feel the Continue Reading …
Not School Fiction Group: James Joyce’s “Ulysses” (Phi-Fi #4)
Featuring Nathan Hanks, Daniel, Philip and Laura. Recorded Mar. 9, 2014. Not everyone had finished the book, but we all got a sense of the richness and depth of Joyce's expanding story of the phenomena of a single day. There are Irish folk songs, stunning prose, a style weaving between the inner-thoughts of characters, and content considered blasphemous and obscene in its Continue Reading …