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Ep. 284: Mark Twain’s Philosophy of Human Nature (Part One)

December 20, 2021 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

Subscribe to get Part 2 of this episode. Listen to a preview. On "What Is Man" (1905) by Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain, featuring Mark, Wes, Dylan and Seth. This rare bit of philosophy wasn't published until after Twain's death (maybe because it was too bleak?), but apparently reflects the mechanistic, cynical take on humanity that informed his literary works. Twain was  Continue Reading …

Ep. 284: Mark Twain’s Philosophy of Human Nature (Part Two for Supporters)

December 17, 2021 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

Continuing from part one on "What Is Man" (1905). We work through Twain's metaphors for human nature: We're like engines made out of various materials, and these materials can be refined (through education, which acts to root out prejudice), though the type of material will limit its maximum capabilities even with refinement. We also get Twain's concept of instinct:  Continue Reading …

Ep. 284: Mark Twain’s Philosophy of Human Nature (Part One for Supporters)

December 17, 2021 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

On "What Is Man" (1905) by Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain, featuring Mark, Wes, Dylan and Seth. This rare bit of philosophy wasn't published until after Twain's death (maybe because it was too bleak?), but apparently reflects the mechanistic, cynical take on humanity that informed his literary works. Twain was a tech guy; he was interested in the machines of his age, and he  Continue Reading …

Episode 180: More James’s Psychology: Self and Will (Part Two)

January 8, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 4 Comments

Concluding on William James's Psychology, the Briefer Course (1892). We briefly cover emotions and spend the bulk of our time on will. Talking about emotions allows us to refresh on James's overall theory of mind: An organism's activity basically involves various signals coming in through the senses and going out to produce reaction. This chain can reach to a greater or  Continue Reading …

Ep. 180: More James’s Psychology: Self and Will (Citizen Edition)

January 1, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

On Psychology, the Briefer Course (1892), chapters on "The Self," "Will," and "Emotions." Continuing from ep. 179, we talk about the various aspects of self: The "Me" (the part of me that I know) that's divided into physical, social, and spiritual aspects, and the "I" (the part of me that has experiences), which is pretty problematic, but which we need not posit as a "soul,"  Continue Reading …

Not School: James B. Miles’s “The Free Will Delusion”

October 6, 2017 by Justin Modra Leave a Comment

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 …

REISSUE-Ep. 24: Spinoza on God and Metaphysics

May 29, 2017 by Mark Linsenmayer 9 Comments

On Baruch Spinoza's Ethics (1677), books 1 and 2. Time warp to 2010 when Mark, Seth, and Wes recorded this lo-fi burst of energy, made available to you now to kick of our June Spinoza-fest, with two full discussions coming out over the next four weeks on Spinoza's Tractatus Theologico-Politicus. Dylan and Mark have recorded a new introduction connecting the two works. Our  Continue Reading …

Episode 120: A History of “Will” with Guest Eva Brann

July 27, 2015 by Mark Linsenmayer 13 Comments

We discuss Un-Willing: An Inquiry into the Rise of Will'’s Power and an Attempt to Undo It (2014) with the author, covering Socrates, Augustine, Aquinas, Heidegger, Nietzsche, Sartre, compatibilism, the neurologists' critque of free will, and more. What is the will? Is it an obvious thing that we all can see in ourselves when introspecting? If so, then why is there so much  Continue Reading …

Episode 120: A History of “Will” with Guest Eva Brann (Citizen Edition)

July 25, 2015 by Mark Linsenmayer 4 Comments

We discuss Un-Willing: An Inquiry into the Rise of Will'’s Power and an Attempt to Undo It (2014) with the author, covering Socrates, Augustine, Aquinas, Heidegger, Nietzsche, Sartre, compatibilism, the neurologists' critque of free will, and more. What is the will? Is it an obvious thing that we all can see in ourselves when introspecting? If so, then why is there so much  Continue Reading …

Topic for #120: Guest Eva Brann on Will (and Aquinas, Augustine, Heidegger, etc.)

July 24, 2015 by Mark Linsenmayer 10 Comments

On 6/26/15 Dylan Casey visited Annapolis, Maryland to talk with Eva Brann, bringing the rest of us in via Skype to talk with her about her 2014 book, Un-Willing: An Inquiry into the Rise of Will'’s Power and an Attempt to Undo It. We all read chapters I "Before Will" (about the ancient Greeks), II.C. on Augustine, III.A. on Aquinas, VI. "A Linguistic Interlude" about the word  Continue Reading …

Free Will Worth Having

July 14, 2014 by Billie Pritchett 12 Comments

What are your thoughts on machines that can predict what you're going to do in the next five minutes? Do you think that everything that happens now in the universe was causally determined by some event(s) that happened before it? When professional philosophers check people's intuitions it looks as though sometimes people generally agree that we have free will even if the  Continue Reading …

Wittgenstein on the ‘Illusion’ of Free Will

May 15, 2014 by Randall Miron 16 Comments

In Philosophical Investigations, section 174, Wittgenstein is discussing the temptation to describe the experience of acting with deliberation (in drawing a line parallel to another, say) as a “quite particular inner” experience. At this point in the text, he has been discussing reading in order to shed light on the concept of understanding, which he had been discussing in  Continue Reading …

Discuss Free Will (John Searle, Sam Harris) with Not School

May 13, 2014 by Billie Pritchett Leave a Comment

In light of the most recent PEL episode, we folks in PEL's Not School will be holding a discussion on free will this month through next month. Some of the conversation will be continuous with and complementary to the PEL guys' discussion as well as perhaps raise other issues. For the remainder of this month, we'll be reading John Searle's essay "Freedom as a Problem in  Continue Reading …

Episode 93: Freedom and Responsibility (Strawson vs. Strawson)

May 2, 2014 by Mark Linsenmayer 38 Comments

On P.F. Strawson's "Freedom and Resentment" (1960), Galen Strawson's "The Impossibility of Moral Responsibility" (1994), and Gary Watson's "Responsibility and the Limits of Evil: Variations on a Strawsonian Theme" (1987). Do we ordinarily act with the right kind of freedom so that blame is justified? Galen Strawson says no: our choices stem from our character, which is not  Continue Reading …

Episode 93: Freedom and Responsibility (Strawson vs. Strawson)

May 2, 2014 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

On P.F. Strawson's "Freedom and Resentment" (1960), Galen Strawson's "The Impossibility of Moral Responsibility" (1994), and Gary Watson's "Responsibility and the Limits of Evil: Variations on a Strawsonian Theme" (1987). Do we ordinarily act with the right kind of freedom so that blame is justified? Galen Strawson says no: our choices stem from our character, which is not  Continue Reading …

Precognition of Ep. 93: Free Will (via Strawsons)

May 1, 2014 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

Guest Tamler Sommers (from the Very Bad Wizards podcast) summarizes Galen Strawson's "The Impossibility of Moral Responsibility" (1994) and his father P.F. Strawson's "Freedom and Resentment" (1960). Read more about the topic and get the articles. Listen to the episode.  Continue Reading …

Precognition of Ep. 93: Free Will (via Strawsons)

April 29, 2014 by Mark Linsenmayer 7 Comments

Guest Tamler Sommers (from the Very Bad Wizards podcast) summarizes Galen Strawson's "The Impossibility of Moral Responsibility" (1994) and his father P.F. Strawson's "Freedom and Resentment" (1960). Read more about the topic and get the articles. Listen to the episode.  Continue Reading …

Topic for #93: Free Will and Moral Responsibility (Strawson Father vs. Son)

April 12, 2014 by Mark Linsenmayer 5 Comments

Listen now to Tamler Sommers's summary of the two Strawson articles. On 4/6, Mark, Wes, and Seth were joined by Tamler Sommers of the Very Bad Wizards podcast to discuss the following articles: 1. P.F. Strawson's "Freedom and Resentment" (1960) 2. Galen Strawson's "The Impossibility of Moral Responsibility" (1994) 3. Gary Watson's "Responsibility and the Limits of Evil:  Continue Reading …

The Architecture of Compatibilism (Are We REALLY free?)

August 19, 2013 by Mark Linsenmayer 28 Comments

In our discussion on Jung, I brought up the issue of free will with respect to the existence of the unconscious, and I wanted to explore this a bit further: Compatibilism is the doctrine that free will and determinism are in some way compatible, but since these terms were designed to contradict each other, any claim to be a compatibilist requires an account of how this is  Continue Reading …

“Very Bad Wizards” Podcast on Free Will

July 3, 2013 by Mark Linsenmayer 5 Comments

A point neglected in the moral discussion in our recent episode is free will. She-who-will-not-be-named (read her view here) on the one hand insists on the supremacy of empirical science but on the other hand insists that our freedom and hence moral responsibility is obvious and inescapable. So that should make her a compatibilist, but as usual, she doesn't really know what  Continue Reading …

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