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Ep. 291: Cassirer and Langer on Myth and Ritual (Part One)

April 11, 2022 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

Subscribe to get Part 2 of this episode. Listen to a preview. Hear this part ad-free. On Ernst Cassirer's his An Essay on Man (1944), ch. 6-7, and Susanne Langer's Philosophy in a New Key (1942), ch. 6-7. This discussion featuring Mark, Wes, and Seth follows the introduction of these books and the argument that we are primarily symbolic creatures in ep. 290. Why do  Continue Reading …

Ep. 291: Cassirer and Langer on Myth and Ritual (Part One for Supporters)

April 8, 2022 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

On Ernst Cassirer's his An Essay on Man (1944), ch. 6-7, and Susanne Langer's Philosophy in a New Key (1942), ch. 6-7. This discussion featuring Mark, Wes, and Seth follows the introduction of these books and the argument that we are primarily symbolic creatures in ep. 290. Why do people produce ritual, mythology, and religion? According to Cassirer and his follower Langer,  Continue Reading …

Episode 185: Ethics in Homer’s “Odyssey” Feat. Translator Emily Wilson (Part Two)

March 12, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

Continuing with Emily Wilson on her translation of the Greek epic poem. We discuss the value of the oikos, or estate, built on violence, with slaves rewarded for loyalty and killed for preferring a different master. These estates were brought into military alliances through xenia, or hospitality, which you should definitely extend to any gods-disguised-as-beggars that come  Continue Reading …

Episode 185: Ethics in Homer’s “Odyssey” Feat. Translator Emily Wilson (Part One)

March 5, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 2 Comments

On the classic Greek epic poem, written ca. 750 BCE and translated by our guest Emily Wilson (of the University of Pennsylvania) in 2018. Does this story of "heroes" have anything to teach us about ethics? Emily wrote an 80-page introduction to her new translation laying out the issues, including "hospitality" as a political tool, the value for status and identity of one's  Continue Reading …

Ep. 185: Ethics in Homer’s “Odyssey” Feat. Translator Emily Wilson (Citizen Edition)

March 4, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 2 Comments

On the classic Greek epic poem, written ca. 750 BCE and translated by our guest Emily Wilson (of the University of Pennsylvania) in 2018. Does this story of "heroes" have anything to teach us about ethics? Emily wrote an 80-page introduction to her new translation laying out the issues, including "hospitality" as a political tool, the value for status and identity of one's  Continue Reading …

Topic for #81: Carl Jung on the Psyche and Dreams

July 29, 2013 by Mark Linsenmayer 11 Comments

Listen now to Wes's introductory precognition of this Jung discussion. On 8/7/13, we recorded a discussion of Carl Jung's Man and His Symbols, specifically essay he wrote that kicks off the book (which includes several authors), "Approaching the Unconscious." This reading (written shortly before Jung's death in 1961 and published afterwards) was recommended to us by some  Continue Reading …

Alan Watts on Buddhist and Christian Mythographies

April 27, 2012 by Daniel Horne 12 Comments

http://youtu.be/w0FQoypdDTk Watch on YouTube. I liked the meta-discussion that kicked off the second PEL naturalized Buddhism episode, specifically on what knowledge we gain by assessing the supernatural "rules" contained within "religious" Buddhism. Even after rejecting a supernaturalist stance, there's value in reviewing the form of life revealed within Buddhism's  Continue Reading …

Karen Amstrong, Ross Douthat, and the Functions of Religion

September 24, 2010 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

My post on fake myths has generated some good discussion, and our future podcast guest Daniel Horne pointed me to a nice concise New York Times review by Ross Douthat of Karen Armstrong's The Case for God, which prompted my line of thought about myth. Douthat's review presents a much better summary to the book than my preliminary attempt, and makes the overall point, which I  Continue Reading …

Manufacturing Myths: J.R.R. Tolkien’s Silmarillion

September 9, 2010 by Mark Linsenmayer 19 Comments

Much has been remarked about Tolkien's Catholicism and how this plays out in Lord of the Rings. Much less known, or more precisely much less tolerated are his earlier efforts to create the myths of Middle Earth, later packed by his son into The Silmarillion. These stories are for the most part told at a high level of summary, which sucks a lot of the potential drama out of  Continue Reading …

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The Partially Examined Life is a philosophy podcast by some guys who were at one point set on doing philosophy for a living but then thought better of it. Each episode, we pick a text and chat about it with some balance between insight and flippancy. You don’t have to know any philosophy, or even to have read the text we’re talking about to (mostly) follow and (hopefully) enjoy the discussion

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