More on the novel with guest Corey Mohler, considering Dostoyevsky explicitly as an existentialist in terms of his analysis of the crisis of meaning and his consequent views on religion. Listen to part 1 first, or get the unbroken, ad-free Citizen Edition. End song: "Don Quixote" (acoustic, 2010) by Nik Kershaw, as interviewed on the Nakedly Examined Music podcast #37. Continue Reading …
Episode 164: Dostoyevsky’s “The Idiot” on Perfection (Part One)
On Fyodor Dostoyevsky's philosophical novel from 1869. Could a morally perfect person survive in the modern world? Is all this "modernity," which so efficiently computes our desires and provides mechanisms to fulfill them, actually suited to achieve human flourishing? Dostoyevsky (whose name, incidentally, can correctly be spelled with either one "y" or two... the Continue Reading …