Subscribe to get Parts 1 and 2 ad-free, plus a supporter exclusive Part 3, which you can preview. Continuing from part one on Being and Time, now up to Ch. 2, sec. 12 on what our "being-in-the-world" amounts to. Sponsors: Download the Zocdoc app free to find a top rated doctor at Zocdoc.com/PEL. Learn about St. John's College at sjc.edu/pel. According to H, we are Continue Reading …
Ep. 297: Heidegger on the Human Condition (Part Three for Supporters)
Concluding our close reading for the moment of Heidegger's Being and Time, now up to chapter 3, sections 15 and 16. These sections are entirely focused on H's primordial ontological category of Being: "ready to hand," or equipment. Since we are primarily action-oriented beings, then (as discussed in part two), the world is not a set of present-at-hand objects all laid out Continue Reading …
Ep. 297: Heidegger on the Human Condition (Part Two for Supporters)
Continuing from part one on Being and Time, now up to Ch. 2, sec. 12 on what our "being-in-the-world" amounts to. According to H, we are not in the world like a shoe is in a shoebox. Rather, the world is part of our existential structure, providing a background for our actions. Our primary relation to it is not knowing, as if we were a subject beholding a painting, but more Continue Reading …
Ep. 296: Heidegger Questions Being (Part Two)
Subscribe to get Parts 1 and 2 ad-free plus tons of bonus content. Continuing our close reading of selections of Being and Time from part one, we come back on a different day without Wes and focus on two parts from the Introduction 2, sec. 7: Sec. 5, where Heidegger says why time has to be the focus of the ontological analysis of Dasein (i.e. his description of the Continue Reading …
Ep. 296: Heidegger Questions Being (Part One)
Subscribe to get parts 1 and 2 of this now, ad-free. This close reading of sections near the beginning of Martin Heidegger's Being and Time (1926) is a direct sequel to ep. 32, which provides an overview of his project. In this episode and 297, we read and discuss particular textual passages, so you can experience along with us what it's like to read this text with its Continue Reading …
Ep. 296: Heidegger Questions Being (Part Two for Supporters)
Continuing our close reading of selections of Being and Time from part one, we come back on a different day without Wes and focus on two parts from the Introduction 2, sec. 7: Sec. 5, where Heidegger says why time has to be the focus of the ontological analysis of Dasein (i.e. his description of the essential human condition).Part A, on what are phenomena, according to Continue Reading …
Ep. 296: Heidegger Questions Being (Part One for Supporters)
This close reading of sections near the beginning of Martin Heidegger's Being and Time (1926) is a direct sequel to ep. 32, which provides an overview of his project. We re-introduced that episode in our most recent PEL Nightcap. In this episode and 297, we read and discuss particular textual passages, so you can experience along with us what it's like to read this text with Continue Reading …
REISSUE-Ep 36: Hegel on the Social Dimension of Self-Consciousness
For our final 2021 installment on G.W.F. Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit, we give you a second episode originally posted in 2011, where Mark and Seth continue from ep. 35 with guest Tom McDonald to cover the rest of chapter 4, focusing on sections 178-230. First, Hegel's famous "master and slave" parable, whereby we only become fully self-conscious by meeting up with another Continue Reading …
REISSUE-Ep 35: Hegel on Self-Consciousness (w/ New Intro)
Seth, Wes and Dylan newly introduce an episode from ten years ago on G.F.W. Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit, Ch. 4A "Self-Consciousness," which features Mark, Seth, Wes, and guest Tom McDonald. Sponsors: Get a free month of Great Courses lectures and lots of other great content at Wondrium.com/PEL. Get a free month's access to a vast library of guided meditations at Continue Reading …
REISSUE-Ep 35: Hegel on Self-Consciousness (Ad Free w/ New Intro)
Seth, Wes and Dylan re-introduce this episode from ten years ago on G.F.W. Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit, Ch. 4A "Self-Consciousness," which features guest Tom McDonald. We've removed the "review" section of the old episode (the first half), because it's duplicative of our recent three-episode run on this book. The old discussion thus picks up in the book right where ep. Continue Reading …
Ep. 274: Schelling on Self-Consciousness (Part Two for Supporters)
Concluding our treatment of Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling’s System of Transcendental Idealism (1800), Parts 1 and 2. Start with part one. What sort of self is created in the singular act of self-consciousness that according to Schelling grounds all knowledge? It can't be your personality, or the thing that makes all of your various experiences uniquely yours, because Continue Reading …
Ep. 274: Schelling on Self-Consciousness (Part One for Supporters)
On Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling’s System of Transcendental Idealism (1800), Parts 1 and 2. This continues from Ep. 273 and features Mark, Wes, and Seth. If you're an idealist, and so think that all existence is somehow in our minds, then the key to any knowledge whatsoever would have to be an understanding of the mind. Schelling thought in particular that in the act of Continue Reading …
Ep. 258: Locke on Acquiring Simple Ideas (Citizen Edition)
On Book II (through ch. 20) of John Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689), discussed by Mark, Wes, Dylan, and Seth. In ep. 257, we established that Locke didn't think we are born with any actual knowledge; we only have as the raw materials of knowledge what our five senses feed us. But there do seem to be some beliefs about, for instance, the existence of our Continue Reading …
Ep. 248: Racism and Policing (Al-Saji, Merleau-Ponty, et al) (Part Two)
Continuing on Alia Al-Saji’s “A Phenomenology of Hesitation: Interrupting Racializing Habits of Seeing” (2014), Maurice Merleau-Ponty's “The Spatiality of One’s Own Body and Motility" from Phenomenology of Perception (1945), Linda Martín Alcoff’s “Identity as Visible and Embodied” and “Perception" sections from Visible Identities: Race, Gender, and the Self (2006), and ch. 1 of Continue Reading …
Ep. 248: Racism and Policing (Al-Saji, Merleau-Ponty, et al) (Part One)
On Alia Al-Saji’s “A Phenomenology of Hesitation: Interrupting Racializing Habits of Seeing” (2014), Maurice Merleau-Ponty's “The Spatiality of One’s Own Body and Motility" from Phenomenology of Perception (1945), Linda Martín Alcoff’s “Identity as Visible and Embodied” and “Perception" sections from Visible Identities: Race, Gender, and the Self (2006), and ch. 1 of Alex Continue Reading …
Ep. 248: Racism and Policing (Al-Saji, Merleau-Ponty, et al) (Citizen Edition)
On Alia Al-Saji’s “A Phenomenology of Hesitation: Interrupting Racializing Habits of Seeing” (2014), Maurice Merleau-Ponty's “The Spatiality of One’s Own Body and Motility" from Phenomenology of Perception (1945), Linda Martín Alcoff’s “Identity as Visible and Embodied” and “Perception" sections from Visible Identities: Race, Gender, and the Self (2006), and ch. 1 of Alex Continue Reading …
Ep. 245: Fashion (Derrida, Foucault, Sontag) w/ Shahidha Bari (Part Two)
We continue with Michel Foucault's "The Ethics of the Concern of the Self as a Practice of Freedom" (1984) and add Susan Sontag's "On Style" (1965). After the departure of our guest about halfway through this part, we wrap up with thoughts on all the readings, including Jacques Derrida's "The Animal That Therefore I Am" (1999) p. 1–16, and our guest Shahidha's book Dressed: A Continue Reading …
Ep. 245: Fashion (Derrida, Foucault) w/ Shahidha Bari (Part One)
On Jacques Derrida's "The Animal That Therefore I Am" (1999) p. 1–16, Michel Foucault's "The Ethics of the Concern of the Self As A Practice of Freedom" (1984), and our guest Shahidha's book Dressed: A Philosophy of Clothes (2020) p. 1–22, 205–217. Much historical philosophy takes appearance to be the mere covering to be ignored in favor of the soul, essence or content Continue Reading …
Ep. 245: Fashion (Derrida, Foucault, Sontag) w/ Shahidha Bari (Citizen Edition)
On Jacques Derrida's "The Animal That Therefore I Am" (1999) p. 1–16, Michel Foucault's "The Ethics of the Concern of the Self As A Practice of Freedom" (1984), Susan Sontag's "On Style" (1965), and our guest Shahidha's book Dressed: A Philosophy of Clothes (2020) p. 1–22, 205–217. Much historical philosophy takes appearance to be the mere covering to be ignored in favor of Continue Reading …
Episode 146: Emmanuel Levinas on Overcoming Solitude
More Levinas, working this time through Time and the Other (1948). What is it for a person to exist? What individuates one person from another, making us into selves instead of just part of the causal net of events? Why would someone possibly think that these are real, non-obvious questions that need to be addressed? Levinas gives us a phenomenological progression from the Continue Reading …