Philosophy vs. Improv

There’s trouble at the work site! There are secret shifts of emotion going on. Do they make sense? Later, a guy’s car is blocking a driveway. Does he deserve the electric chair, or a beer? It depends on your theory of punishment. Ep. art cribbed from a Psychology Today article . Audio editing by Tyler Hislop at Pixelbox Media . Hear more PvI . Support the podcast to get bonus stuff and...

The scene is its own entity. What else might be its own entity? Can a machine that passes the Turing test know what it’s like to be a bat? We bring in emotions from irrelevant contexts, and we keep hearing them long after they’re gone. Episode art by Alvin Alvaro . Audio editing by Tyler Hislop at Pixelbox Media . Hear more PvI . Support the podcast to get bonus stuff and good karma! S...

What is “othering”? Why did Bill get such a bad grade? Is it because of his feather quill pen? Don’t miss our anti-vaxxer drama! This is our first episode with a real philosophy professor on it, and we get to talk about her experience as an academic as it relates to this most socially relevant philosophical topic. Listen to Jenny talk in more depth with Mark and co. on The Partia...

Let’s all lose our jobs and talk instead about fundamental ontology and social dynamics.  Image by I don’t remember. Audio editing by Tyler Hislop . Hear more PvI . Support the podcast to get bonus stuff and good karma! Sponsors : Visit betterhelp.com/improv to be matched with a licensed, professional therapist. Learn about St. John’s College at sjc.edu/improv .

Hell is NOT other people, and the more the merrier, with our second episode with guests being with TWO guest improvisers, Jill, co-founder of HUGE Theater and her friend Michelle, owner of Improv MKE . Bill and our guests each start a scene to explore something of what utopia might amount to, and of course how it will inevitably go bad. Then we discuss whether there is some single type of utopia,...

Riffing on resemblance. Eventually invoking the spirit of a toaster. Mark is wrong: the God Emperor of Dune can’t drink water at all, just dried food. Learn about Del Close . Philosophy barely makes it in, but if you want to chase down this nonsense about whether a robot cat is still a cat or not, check out the Twin Earth stuff in PEL’s Putnam episode . Image by Maia . Audio editing by...

Do you believe in miracles? If doctors believed in miracles, would they just let surgeries finish themselves? Do assumptions of a logical universe make it not just unjustified by psychologically impossible for us to really believe in miracles? Read about our VERY FIRST guest, Tim Sniffen at timsniffen.com . Follow him @MisterSniffen and hear him talking more with Mark about improv on Pretty Much P...

Who stole Carmine’s lunch? I think you know. Are there only a certain number of “logical” directions from one idea to another? Are there no mistakes, or are there mistakes that know? This week’s image (which definitely has an eye in it) cribbed from Child’s Own . Audio editing by Tyler Hislop . Hear more PvI . Support the podcast to get bonus stuff (like the post-game...

Are so-called “material objects” really just a scam? These two cut-ups (Bill and Mark) cut up the world in various ways, showing you how to teach, how to act, and how to haggle.  Learn more about Berkeley’s idealism with PEL #89 . Image by Sam (called “Sharp Dressed Man”). Audio editing by Tyler Hislop . Hear more PvI . Support the podcast to get bonus stuff and good...

Beauty is cool, but is art always aiming at beauty? Generations disagree about their music. Snakes disagree about how much they should worry. Image by 3rd grader Ariana; google says the image is somewhere on this page . Audio editing by Tyler Hislop . Hear more PvI . Support the podcast to get bonus stuff and good karma!

Bill gets really real, with his unlogical emotions. When we feel things, do we know why? Is there a why? Image found in a serious academic paper to reflect the seriousness (the snapped bra strap is merely implied). Audio editing by Tyler Hislop . Hear more PvI . Support the podcast to get bonus stuff and good karma!

Bill gets to have the power of live and death, with a bit of moral luck. Is he enthused? Image found on twitter by a kid told to draw a fruit salad . Audio editing by Tyler Hislop . Hear more PvI . Support the podcast to get bonus stuff and good karma! Sponsor: Learn about St. John’s college at sjc.edu/improv .

Turkeys speculate in a game scene. Are they reasonable and/or jive turkeys? Then, geometry is subject to ad hominem attack in an instructive relationship scene. Image by Ava from this site . Audio editing by Tyler Hislop . Hear more PvI . Support the podcast to get bonus stuff and good karma!

Why is lying wrong? Scene conceptions clash. It is hard to lie in a pretend scene, because the pretending is already a lie. You can lie inside-out or outside-in. The relevant PEL episode to find out about Kant on lying is #10 . Image cribbed from this article . Just look at that goddamned liar in the middle of the picture His deceit is captured perfectly! Audio editing by Tyler Hislop . Hear more...

Mark and Bill do impressions of people you don’t know. The is-ought distinction is bravely explored. Does pretending to be cavemen help? Magic business is afoot. Childhood speaks. We’ve now passed the point where the post-game discussion is just included with the episode here. If you want to hear our reflections on the episodes going forward and our recommendations for other things you...

Does it make sense to try to have everyone get what they “deserve”? We act out the desert machine but yet get no predictable cake. Judgebot 5000 enters our lives. Is this our first really good episode? Maybe. To hear more about meritocracy, try the Partially Examined Life’s recent interview with the great Michael Sandel . Audio editing by Tyler Hislop . Image by Alice Fothergill,...

We try to be boring. Bill tries to make a discovery amidst the canards. Mark tries to be a good meta-dupe. But is our success in these attempts guaranteed by the deal you have already made with us by listening to this? It is not. With our first celebrity guest, the final judge is unveiled! In the post-game, we talk Conan O’Brien (sound effects) and talk shows in general, plus Joe Pera Talks...

Two micro scenes and a mystery number of interruptions reveal our underlying definitions. How will we overcome the lag between our words and become like-minded? How many beats in an heirloom beet if an heirloom hair-looms beets? Many lessons are learned that are not THE lesson, necessitating some difficult multi-tasking. In the post-game, Bill starts something we can’t finish about libertari...

Is death something to be feared? What’s next? What are the DETAILS? Do not adjust your listening device or call an ambulance. That sound you hear is not ground hum nor tinnitus but is the sound of improvisation. Warning: We talk about suicide a bit. If you’re feeling depressed, don’t call the lava demon hotline, as it is a scam. We make a few references in this one that might be...

Bill starts us with a scene: Behold the Doctor’s Office, where anything can happen, and often DOES. Is this whole thing a bad idea? Do you think you’re BETTER than this idea? Do you? If you need to tell yourself that, that’s OK. In the post-game, we talk a little about Stoicism ( listen to PEL about it , ego issues, and ephemeral art. Our recommendations include: Bobby Huff time-...

Mark starts us off this time: What is reality? Bill pushes back, which is rather his point this round. Hilarity ensues, given that the world is just a construct of our minds and we want it to do so. Hilarity doesn’t really do much else besides ensuing, does it? Lazy bastard. Learn more about Kant’s phenomena vs. noumena in this very old episode Partially Examined Life episode . We retu...

The gauntlet has been thrown. In this first episode, Mark Linsenmayer and Bill Arnett channel their respective muses to try to enlighten each other about something having to do with ethics on the one hand and the continuity of improvisation with regular life on the other. Which lesson shall produce the most profound effect? Does this format make any sense at all? As a special treat, this episode i...

What is Philosophy vs. Improv? Hear about the new podcast by Mark Linsenmayer ( The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast ) and Bill Arnett ( Chicago Improv Studio , The Complete Improviser author). Thanks to our announcer, Erica Spyres. PvI logo by Solomon Grundy . Reach out to us with your children’s art, episode ideas, guest suggestions, and other comments. Get more episodes than are...