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Ep. 272: Fichte’s Idealist Theology (Part Two for Supporters)

June 20, 2021 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

Concluding our coverage of The Vocation of Man (1799), Books II and III. This discussion continues part one. We start out with a bit more wondering about how we build objects with our mind, in particular about whether this entirely uniform because we all have the same psychology as humans, or whether it might seriously vary according to your cultural group or individual  Continue Reading …

Sneak Preview: Philosophy vs. Improv #1

May 19, 2021 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

A new limited (?) series is afoot in PEL-land: I'm indulging my interest in improv comedy as discussed in our most recent Nightcap to pilot a new show featuring Bill Arnett, who wrote the book on long-form improv, runs the Chicago Improv Studio, and served as the game master Metamore on the Hello from the Magic Tavern spin-off series Offices and Bosses, wherein fantastical  Continue Reading …

Ep. 262: Nietzsche on Self-Denial (Part One)

February 1, 2021 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

Subscribe to get Part 2 of this episode, or listen to a preview. Citizens can get the entire second part here. On Friedrich Nietzsche's The Genealogy of Morals (1887), "Third essay: what do ascetic ideals mean?" featuring Mark, Wes, Dylan, and Seth. When people really get serious, and try to put away frivolous things, is that good or bad? A serious athlete will subordinate  Continue Reading …

Ep. 262: Nietzsche on Self-Denial (Part Two for Supporters)

January 31, 2021 by Mark Linsenmayer 3 Comments

Continuing on Friedrich Nietzsche's The Genealogy of Morals (1887), "Third essay: what do ascetic ideals mean?" Listen to part one first. We start out with a little summarizing, trying to fit asceticism into Nietzsche's overall morality as it moves forward from the slave revolt over master/animal morality, turning to how Nietzsche uses asceticism to critique how scientists  Continue Reading …

Ep. 262: Nietzsche on Self-Denial (Part One for Supporters)

January 31, 2021 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

On Friedrich Nietzsche's The Genealogy of Morals (1887), "Third essay: what do ascetic ideals mean?" featuring Mark, Wes, Dylan, and Seth. When people really get serious, and try to put away frivolous things, is that good or bad? A serious athlete will subordinate everything to their training, an artist may even forget to eat or sleep while crafting a work, and of course at  Continue Reading …

Ep. 214: More Nietzsche’s Zarathustra (Part Two)

May 6, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 2 Comments

Concluding Friedrich Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1885). What's the wise way to live? We start in earnest into part three, treating the "spirit of gravity," where socially imposed values cover over your uniqueness; omni-satisfaction vs. being choosy; "Old and New Tablets," where Nietzsche explores various ethical and meta-ethical issues (e.g., is self-overcoming a  Continue Reading …

Ep. 214: More Nietzsche’s Zarathustra (Part One)

April 29, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 4 Comments

On the remainder of Friedrich Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1885). How can we keep our spirits up and avoid nihilism? After all (says Nietzsche), there's no God or other transcendent purpose-giving entity to guarantee that life is worth living. There's just our complex animality, with its cycles of desire, satiation, and more desire, with our in-built character and  Continue Reading …

Ep. 214: More Nietzsche’s Zarathustra (Citizen Edition)

April 29, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 3 Comments

On the remainder of Friedrich Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1885). How can we keep our spirits up and avoid nihilism? After all (says Nietzsche), there's no God or other transcendent purpose-giving entity to guarantee that life is worth living. There's just our complex animality, with its cycles of desire, satiation, and more desire, with our in-built character and  Continue Reading …

Ep. 213: Nietzsche’s Zarathustra (Part Two)

April 22, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 2 Comments

Continuing on Friedrich Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra, books 1 and 2 (1883). We talk through Nietzsche's symbolism (e.g., a tightrope walker as someone trying to be a bridge between man and overman), the path toward the overman (develop a pure will to create like a child, risk your life for your creation), his various critiques including his screed against the state  Continue Reading …

Episode 213: Nietzsche’s Zarathustra (Part One)

April 15, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 8 Comments

On Friedrich Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra, books 1 and 2 (1883). What is wisdom? In Nietzsche's most famous book, he gives us his own Socrates, his own avatar to engage the foolish populace, though instead of asking them questions, Zarathustra tends to preach, and the whole book has a very Biblical tone, except more cagey. You see, this is a book "for all and none,"  Continue Reading …

Ep. 213: Nietzsche’s Zarathustra (Citizen Edition)

April 15, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

On Friedrich Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra, books 1 and 2 (1883). What is wisdom? In Nietzsche's most famous book, he gives us his own Socrates, his own avatar to engage the foolish populace, though instead of asking them questions, Zarathustra tends to preach, and the whole book has a very Biblical tone, except more cagey. You see, this is a book "for all and none,"  Continue Reading …

Ep. 208: Epicurus on Seeking Pleasure (Part Two)

February 4, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 3 Comments

More on the ethics-related fragments of Epicurus and accounts by Martha Nussbaum and Tim O'Keefe. What would a purely therapeutic philosophy consist of? Does spreading a philosophy to the masses necessarily water it down to the point where it's not really philosophical any more? Does philosophy as pursuit of pleasure mean that you eschew political action? Can the pleasures  Continue Reading …

Ep. 208: Epicurus on Seeking Pleasure (Part One)

January 28, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 9 Comments

On the extant fragments of Epicurus (341–270 BCE) dealing with ethics, including his "Letter to Menoceus" and collections known as “The Principal Doctrines” and “The Vatican Collection of Epicurean Sayings.” How are we supposed to act once we understand nature as we outlined in episode 206, i.e., atoms bouncing and swerving around in the void temporarily producing order  Continue Reading …

Ep. 208: Epicurus on Seeking Pleasure (Citizen Edition)

January 28, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 5 Comments

On the extant fragments of Epicurus (341–270 BCE) dealing with ethics, including his "Letter to Menoceus" and collections known as “The Principal Doctrines” and “The Vatican Collection of Epicurean Sayings.” How are we supposed to act once we understand nature as we outlined in episode 206, i.e., atoms bouncing and swerving around in the void temporarily producing order  Continue Reading …

PREVIEW-Ep 201 Marcus Aurelius’s “Meditations” (Part Three)

November 5, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 2 Comments

Mark and Seth build on parts 1 and 2 of our discussion of Marcus to get further into the specifics of his metaphysics and how this is supposed to relate to behavior. Can Stoic directives really come solely "from reason," as he claims? How does this interact with the behaviors that we pursue (appropriately, according to Marcus) "by nature," i.e., without conscious deliberation  Continue Reading …

Ep. 201 Follow-Up: More on Marcus Aurelius’s “Meditations” (Citizens Only)

October 29, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 5 Comments

Mark and Seth get further into the specifics of Marcus's metaphysics and how this is supposed to relate to behavior. Can his directives really come solely "from reason," as he claims? How does this interact with the behaviors that we pursue (appropriately, according to Marcus) "by nature," i.e., without conscious deliberation required? Seth is concerned with how individualistic  Continue Reading …

The Limits of Philosophical Ethics

September 27, 2018 by Stephen Scher and Kasia Kozlowska Leave a Comment

From Stephen Scher and Kasia Kozlowska, Rethinking Health Care Ethics (Singapore: Springer Nature/Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), published open access/free download, which you can find here. Conflicts with other persons typically demand that we make explicit our reasons or feelings in an effort to work through any differences. Possible outcomes range from the non-negotiable  Continue Reading …

The Power of Empathy for Good in the World

September 14, 2018 by Christian B. Miller 2 Comments

(Excerpted from the recently released, The Character Gap: How Good Are We?) Sometimes it is easy to get discouraged if, like me, you read a lot of psychological studies about how people behave when faced with moral choices. In some studies we find the majority of participants not helping even with simple tasks. Examples include carrying some papers down a hall, or letting  Continue Reading …

Science, Secularism, and Religion, Part XXX: William Kingdon Clifford—The Ethics of Belief

July 5, 2018 by Daniel Halverson 1 Comment

Imagine a ship owner who sells tickets for transatlantic voyages. He is at the dock one day, bidding his ship farewell, when he remembers a warning he had received from his mechanics the week before, that the integrity of the ship’s hull was questionable and that it might not be seaworthy. But on some plausible grounds or other he forms the sincere, honest conviction that his  Continue Reading …

Ep. 187 Follow-Up: The Limits of Free Speech (Citizens Only)

April 5, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 20 Comments

Mark and Wes continue the discussion from ep. 187. We watched some Jordan Peterson, so we talk about his position a bit, and about the appropriateness of organizations encouraging certain kinds of speech, the offense principle, the difference (and overlap!) between good-faith arguments and insults, conspiracy theories, "incoherence arguments" like Fish's (also used by Kant,  Continue Reading …

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