Mark, Wes, and Dylan conclude our discussion of Shakespeare's play. We talk about the exchanges about art in the play: How does art relate to life and to commerce? This leads us to consider more generally Shakespeare's language and how we moderns can be good spectators of these plays. Are we meant to just get the gist, or is study and preparation necessary before Continue Reading …
Citizen Feed Episodes: Paywalled and Ad-Free
Available only to PEL Citizens: All of our paywalled and ad-free regular episodes in a single feed. That includes paywalled full episodes from the back catalogue, Nightcap and (Starting in September 2020) Part 2 of all episodes. You can add this feed to the podcast app of your choice by following the instructions here. You can download them, listen to them here, or get them on the podcast app of your choice by following the instructions here. Not a Citizen? Join here.
Episode 1: “The Unexamined Life Is Not Worth Living” (2022 Re-Edit)
Hey, folks. We're looking for audio clips of no more than 2 minutes reacting to this episode and/or telling about how PEL has affected your life. We'll patch some of these together to make some kind of ep. 300-accompanying release and/or maybe hold a recorded Zoom call with up to 10 of you to follow the public version of this episode. Send your submissions as mp3s to Continue Reading …
Ep. 299: Philosophy in Shakespeare’s “Timon of Athens” (Part Two for Supporters)
Continuing from part one, instead of Jonathan, now actor Sarah Manton (from our performance) joins us, plus Seth is back. We start out by re-litigating what Timon's problem is at the beginning of the play, which sets up his fall. Then we move to explicitly considering the Cynic school the historical figure of Diogenes. Is Timon really a Cynic? For a nice, concise Continue Reading …
Ep. 299: Philosophy in Shakespeare’s “Timon of Athens” (Part One for Supporters)
What role does money have in human psychology? This is one of several philosophical questions that William Shakespeare's least popular play explores, and Mark, Wes, and Dylan start off our rumination on these with special guest Sir Jonathan Bate, editor of this new complete edition of Shakespeare's plays for the Royal Shakespeare Company, who played Flavius in our Continue Reading …
PEL Nightcap Episode 300 Retrospection
Recorded 8/5/22 in anticipation of having reached this milestone. After sharing our current spiritual state and activities, we share some recommendations for diving back into our catalog: Dylan: Ep. 154 Sellars on the myth of the givenMark: Ep. 59 Macintyre's After VirtueSeth: Ep. 249 Dewey on educationWes: Ep. 183 Mill on liberty Mark talks about the podcasts he's been a Continue Reading …
Shakespeare’s “Timon of Athens” Audioplay (Part Two for Supporters)
Continuing our performance from part one of William Shakespeare's play, finishing things up with acts 4 and 5 plus some post-performance discussion with the cast. This is the part of the play where Timon either has gone crazy or become enlightened, such that he's trying to out-cynic the cynic philosopher Apemantus. Meanwhile, Socrates' former admirer Alcibiades has been Continue Reading …
Shakespeare’s “Timon of Athens” Audioplay Feat. Jay O. Sanders, Michael Ian Black, and Michael Tow (Part One for Supporters)
The PEL Players are back, with more players than ever, doing an unrehearsed reading of William Shakespeare's least popular play, co-written with Thomas Middleton in Shakespeare's later years, probably around 1605. The play is about money and cynicism, where a man gets to see where his friends go when his money runs out and let's say doesn't react well. This is our largest Continue Reading …
PEL Ficino-Flavored Nightcap Early August 2022
On 7/11/22, Mark and Wes first discuss a few more passages from Ficino's Commentary on Plato's Symposium on Love, including one on five types of desire: How the two most extreme ones are "daemons," i.e. primal urges (one towards procreation, one towards God), and in the incarnation of these in human psychology, we have to have a desire that's a compromise between the two: Continue Reading …
Ep. 298: Marsilio Ficino on Love (Part Two for Supporters)
Continuing from part one on Commentary on Plato's Symposium on Love (1475), with guest Peter Adamson. Peter gives us some context in terms of other Renaissance theories of love, and then we're back to the text, considering the role of beauty in the theory and how this connects to our recent coverage of various thinkers on aesthetics. We also fill out Ficino's neo-Platonic Continue Reading …
Ep. 298: Marsilio Ficino on Love (Part One for Supporters)
On Commentary on Plato's Symposium on Love (1475), with guest Peter Adamson from the History of Philosophy podcast joining Mark, Wes, and Seth. Attention: We'll be live-streaming video for our big ep. 300 on Friday, Aug. 19 at 8pm ET. More info at partiallyexaminedlife.com/pel-live. Leading up to that episode, we're continuing to revisit some classic themes, and this Continue Reading …
Ep. 297: Heidegger on the Human Condition (Part Three for Supporters)
Concluding our close reading for the moment of Heidegger's Being and Time, now up to chapter 3, sections 15 and 16. These sections are entirely focused on H's primordial ontological category of Being: "ready to hand," or equipment. Since we are primarily action-oriented beings, then (as discussed in part two), the world is not a set of present-at-hand objects all laid out Continue Reading …
Ep. 297: Heidegger on the Human Condition (Part Two for Supporters)
Continuing from part one on Being and Time, now up to Ch. 2, sec. 12 on what our "being-in-the-world" amounts to. According to H, we are not in the world like a shoe is in a shoebox. Rather, the world is part of our existential structure, providing a background for our actions. Our primary relation to it is not knowing, as if we were a subject beholding a painting, but more Continue Reading …
Ep. 297: Heidegger on the Human Condition (Part One for Supporters)
We continue from ep. 296 with our close reading on Martin Heidegger's Being and Time (1927), covering in this part of the discussion chapter 1. Featuring Mark, Wes, Dylan, and Seth. This selection (aka section 9) covers existence (in German, Existenz) vs. existentia. The former is Dasein's (humanity's) specific way of being, which involves possibility and thus choice. H was Continue Reading …
PEL Nightcap July 2022
Recorded 6/20/22. Mark and Seth consider the close reading format as evinced in our new Heidegger episodes and get side-tracked into talking about Dr. Drew and vaccine hesitancy. Here he is answering questions about it, and I see he just had an AMA that includes talk about the infant version. I guess the main hubbub surrounded a tweet from April 21, 2021 about vaccine Continue Reading …
Ep. 296: Heidegger Questions Being (Part Two for Supporters)
Continuing our close reading of selections of Being and Time from part one, we come back on a different day without Wes and focus on two parts from the Introduction 2, sec. 7: Sec. 5, where Heidegger says why time has to be the focus of the ontological analysis of Dasein (i.e. his description of the essential human condition).Part A, on what are phenomena, according to Continue Reading …
Ep. 296: Heidegger Questions Being (Part One for Supporters)
This close reading of sections near the beginning of Martin Heidegger's Being and Time (1926) is a direct sequel to ep. 32, which provides an overview of his project. We re-introduced that episode in our most recent PEL Nightcap. In this episode and 297, we read and discuss particular textual passages, so you can experience along with us what it's like to read this text with Continue Reading …
PEL Nightcap June 2022
Recorded 6/3/22. First we re-introduce episode 32 on Heidegger's Being and Time in preparation for a two episode run doing a close reading of sections of that. Next, we brainstorm about what to discuss on our tentatively planned ep. 300 live-stream. What's the most famous, self-contained and entertaining work that we haven't yet covered? Reach out to us and weigh in! Continue Reading …
Ep. 295: Kant on Preventing War (Part Three for Supporters)
Concluding on Kant's "Perpetual Peace," plus Jurgen Habermas' "Kant's Idea of Perpetual Peace, with the Benefit of Two Hundred Years' Hindsight." Start with part one. We talk about the two appendices to Kant's essay: first about "realpolitik," the idea that because other states will act immorally, then the wise politician must also act immorally. As you might predict, Kant Continue Reading …
Ep. 295: Kant on Preventing War (Part Two for Supporters)
Continuing from part one on Immanuel Kant's essay "Perpetual Peace," we go further into how Kant's politics relate to his ethics and consider his actual policy proposals: each state must be a republic, i.e. somehow representative with separation of powers, and countries should join in a confederation. Kant also spells out the new idea of "cosmopolitan right," which only entails Continue Reading …
Ep. 295: Kant on Preventing War (Part One for Supporters)
On Immanuel Kant's essay "Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Sketch" (1795). Do nations have the "right" to go to war? What principles ground just international relations, and are there structures and agreements that we can embrace to prevent prevent future wars? Naturally, we consider the current conflict in Ukraine as well as other recent wars. Kant's essay reads like a Continue Reading …