Continuing from part one on Beauty (2009), ch. 1-4. We critically examine Scruton's claim that apprehending beauty is cognitive and never merely sensory, which would rule out, e.g. there being beautiful smells or tastes. We also go into points from Scruton's chapters on natural beauty, human beauty, and everyday beauty. Appreciation of natural beauty seems to be something Continue Reading …
Ep. 277: Hegel on Our Understanding of Physics (Part Two for Supporters)
Continuing from part one our close reading of The Phenomenology of Spirit (1807), ch. 3, "Force and the Understanding." We start off with the dynamic between the expressed and merely stored up aspects of force and how this relates to the forcing and the forced entities in the interaction. Which of these is the "solicitor" and which is being solicited? Either one can be seen Continue Reading …
Ep. 271: Johan Gottlieb Fichte’s Transcendental Idealism (Part One)
Subscribe to get Part 2 of this episode. Listen to a preview. Hear this part ad-free. On The Vocation of Man (1799), Books I and II, featuring Mark, Wes, Dylan and Seth. What is reality? Fichte is known as a key interpreter of Immanuel Kant who removed the idea of the "thing-in-itself," i.e. reality apart from how we interpret it, from Kant's system. Kant had described how Continue Reading …
Ep. 271: Johan Gottlieb Fichte’s Transcendental Idealism (Part One for Supporters)
On The Vocation of Man (1799), Books I and II, featuring Mark, Wes, Dylan and Seth. What is reality? Fichte is known as a key interpreter of Immanuel Kant who removed the idea of the "thing-in-itself," i.e. reality apart from how we interpret it, from Kant's system. Kant had described how human faculties impose structural features like space, time, number, and causality on Continue Reading …
Ep. 200: Kant/Mendelssohn/Foucault on Enlightenment (Part Two)
Continuing on "What Is Enlightenment" by Immanuel Kant (1784), "On Enlightening the Mind" by Moses Mendelssohn (1784), and "What Is Enlightenment" by Michael Foucault (1984). We finish up Kant (the courage to know!) and lay out the Mendelssohn (cultivation vs. enlightenment) and Foucault (ironically heroize the present!). Will this conversation enlighten you? Who Continue Reading …
Ep. 200: Kant/Mendelssohn/Foucault on Enlightenment (Part One)
On "What Is Enlightenment" by Immanuel Kant (1784), "On Enlightening the Mind" by Moses Mendelssohn (1784), and "What Is Enlightenment" by Michael Foucault (1984). At the end of the historical period known as the Enlightenment, a Berlin newspaper asked what exactly that is, and Kant and Mendelssohn both responded (neither having read the other's answer). According to Kant, Continue Reading …
Ep. 200: Kant/Mendelssohn/Foucault on Enlightenment (Citizen Edition)
On "What Is Enlightenment" by Immanuel Kant (1784), "On Enlightening the Mind" by Moses Mendelssohn (1784), and "What Is Enlightenment" by Michael Foucault (1984). Participate in the survey to help us plan our 10 year anniversary PEL Live event! At the end of the historical period known as the Enlightenment, a Berlin newspaper asked what exactly that is, and Kant and Continue Reading …
Books of Wisdom
What good are philosophy books? Can they make us any the wiser? There’s a funny story about reading philosophy books by the Irish writer Robert Wilson Lynd, an essay titled “On Not Being a Philosopher: Epictetus and the Average Man” (1930). Lynd wonders whether you can get wisdom from kicking back with a philosophy book. He gives it a try. He recounts his efforts in a Continue Reading …
Episode 137: Bourdieu on the Tastes of Social Classes
On Pierre Bourdieu's Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste (1979), introduction, chapter 1 through p. 63, conclusion, and postscript. How do our tastes in music, art, and everything else reflect our social position? This philosophically trained sociologist administered a few detailed questionnaires in 1960s France and used the resulting differences in what Continue Reading …
Ep. 137: Bourdieu on the Tastes of Social Classes (Citizen Edition)
On Pierre Bourdieu's Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste (1979), introduction, chapter 1 through p. 63, conclusion, and postscript. How do our tastes in music, art, and everything else reflect our social position? This philosophically trained sociologist administered a few detailed questionnaires in 1960s France and used the resulting differences in what Continue Reading …
New in Not School: Niebuhr, Kant, Zizek, Lovecraft
Hey everyone, Nathan Hanks here with an update from the Partially Examined Life's Not School. Just sign up for PEL Citizenship and you'll be able to access all the group pages and weigh in on new proposals. You'll find other members in the Citizen's Forum with these new group proposals to join in October: The Irony of American History by Reinhold Niebuhr Critique of Pure Continue Reading …
Same-Sex Marriage: A Kantian Take on Religious-Exemption Rhetoric
“Argue as much as you like and about whatever you like, but obey!” –Kant (Read: Do your job, and complain about it later!) Religious freedom is often appealed to by opponents of legislative efforts to increase equality for members of the LGBT community, and it’s being invoked once again, not surprisingly, in response to the Supreme Court’s decision to protect same-sex Continue Reading …
Close Reading (Preview) of Kant on the Sublime
Mark Linsenmayer and Wes Alwan read and interpret Kant's Critique of Judgment, sections 23-25. This is a 13-minute preview of a 72-minute bonus recording, which you can purchase at partiallyexaminedlife.com/store or get for free here with PEL Citizenship (see partiallyexaminedlife.com/membership). You can also purchase it at iTunes Store: Search for "Partially Examined Kant Continue Reading …
Close Reading: Kant’s “Critique of Judgment” on the Sublime
A sentence-by-sentence interpretation of Kant's Critique of Judgment, sections 23-25 by Mark and Wes, recorded 1/8/15. In episode 105, we explained Kant's account of how we recognize beauty and and in episode 107, we presented the view of one of Kant's influences, Edmund Burke, on the difference between recognizing beauty and experiencing something as sublime. With this Continue Reading …
Some Questions on Aesthetics and Art
I recently finished reading Noel Carroll's remarkable book Philosophy of Art: A Contemporary Introduction, and the result was a newfound appreciation for aesthetics and art, and it even caused me to change my mind regarding some of the untested assumptions I had regarding art. For example, I regularly meet with a writing group and we workshop short stories. The other guys in Continue Reading …
Episode 105: Kant: What Is Beauty? (Citizen Edition)
On Immanuel Kant's Critique of Judgment (1790), Pt. 1, Book 1. Kant thinks that finding something beautiful is different than merely liking it. It's a certain kind of liking, not dependent on your idiosyncratic tastes (like your preference for one color or flavor or tone over another) or on your moral opinions. He wants these judgments to be subjective in the sense that Continue Reading …
Episode 105: Kant: What Is Beauty?
On Immanuel Kant's Critique of Judgment (1790), Pt. 1, Book 1. Kant thinks that finding something beautiful is different than merely liking it. It's a certain kind of liking, not dependent on your idiosyncratic tastes (like your preference for one color or flavor or tone over another) or on your moral opinions. He wants these judgments to be subjective in the sense that Continue Reading …
Topic for #105: Kant on the Beautiful
It's been a long time since we read Kant (see here and here), and folks always like our aesthetics episodes (see here, here, and here), so now you get the best of both worlds: Kant's Critique of Judgment, aka the third critique, which aims to somehow bridge the gap between his epistemology (first critique) and ethics (second critique). If it seems funny to try to do this by Continue Reading …
Convenience, Thought and Technology
No-one could argue that technology does not make our lives easier, or that technology has not been one of the great liberators in the history of humankind; it certainly has been. Our lives would be more solitary, poorer, nastier, more brutish and shorter without technology, to steal a line from Hobbes. We should hope for continued advances in this liberating sort of technology, Continue Reading …
A Wealth of Not School Offerings in June
Summer has arrived, and in case you can't decide whether to take Kant's Critique of Pure Reason or Franz Kafka's The Trial to the beach with you, let me help: take them both and be prepared for Not School in June. Thinking of taking summer classes? Think better of it. That's expensive, and for a measly $5 a month you can gorge yourself on philosophy right here at The Continue Reading …