The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast

A whole second discussion on G.F.W. Hegel's Encyclopedia Logic , hitting sections 78–99 on the dialectic and Understanding vs. Reason. Hegel thinks we can use Reason to objectively come up with basic metaphysical categories, but can we really? With guest Amogh Sahu. This continues ep. 134 . PEL Citizens can listen to the Aftershow . End song: "Flow" by Gary Lucas and Mark Lint. Listen to Gary inte...

On G.F.W. Hegel's The Science of Logic (1812–1816), §1–§129 and The Encyclopaedia Logic (1817) §1–§25. "Logic" for Hegel isn't about symbolic logic; it's about how thought interacts with the world. Our thoughts about fundamental metaphysical categories bear the same relations to each other as the the categories themselves do. Just take Hegel's many, many words for it! With guest Amogh Sahu. End so...

Welcome to Nakedly Examined Music, our first spin-off of PEL. Hear more at nakedlyexaminedmusic.com or find it via iTunes . Mark interviews songwriters about why and how they do what they do. Think of it as applied philosophy. Four episodes are now posted; this cross-post of our pilot features David Lowery of Camper van Beethoven and Cracker talking through three of his songs. He's as well-spoken...

On Fromm's The Art of Loving (1956). What is love, really? This psychoanalyst of the Frankfurt school thinks that real love is not something one "falls" into, but is an art, an activity, and doing it well requires a disciplined openness and psychological health. End songs: "Kimmy" (1995) and "Kimmy 2002" by Mark Lint . The post Episode 133: Erich Fromm on Love as an Art first appeared on The Parti...

On selected "moral epistles" (from around 65 CE) by Lucius Annaeus Seneca: 4. On the Terrors of Death, 12. On Old Age, 49. On the Shortness of Life, 59. On Pleasure and Joy, 62. On Good Company, 92. On the Happy Life, 96. On Facing Hardship, and 116. On Self Control. We're joined by Massimo Pigliucci of the How to Be a Stoic blog . How can one most profitably interpret weird-sounding Stoic recomme...

Our second discussion of De Anima or On the Soul (350 BCE), this time on book 3. What is the intellect? We talk about its highest part/function: nous, which is a "form of forms," literally nothing until it thinks, survives death and is not actually yours or mine, but just the universal mind! This continues the discussion from ep. 130 and includes a preview of the Aftershow featuring Rebecca Goldne...

On De Anima or On the Soul (350 BCE), books 1 and 2, after some listener mail. What can this ancient text tell us about biological life? What counts as a scientific explanation? A. describes life as "the first actuality of a natural body which has organs," so bodies express their nature only when they're growing and reproducing and all that stuff that bodies do. The body is potential, and life is...

Mark is joined by numerous previous guests to catch up and engage the musical part of PEL's past episodes by introducing and playing the entirety of Mark Lint's "Songs from the Partially Examined Life," which you can own , along with the 2016 PEL wall calendar . The post Holiday Special 2015: Mark Lint’s “Songs from the Partially Examined Life” with Many Guest Greetings first appeared on The Parti...

Nathan Gilmour ( Christian Humanist podcast) and Pastor Rob Dyer join Mark and Wes for to discuss the reasonableness of religious belief reading Antony Flew's "The Presumption of Atheism," Norwood Russell Hanson's “The Agnostic’s Dilemma," Steven Cahn's "The Irrelevance of Proof to Religion," Alvin Plantinga's “Is Belief in God Properly Basic?" Merold Westphal's "Sin and Reason," Basil Mitchell's...

On "The Meaning of Meaning" (1975). If meaning is not a matter of having a description in your head, then what is it? Hilary Putnam reformulates Kripke's insight (from #126) in terms of Twin Earths: Earthers with H20 and Twin Earthers with a substance that seems like water but is different have the same mental contents but are referring to different stuff with "water," so that word is speaker-rela...

On Experience and Nature (1925), through ch. 4. What's the relationship between our experience and the world that science investigates? Dewey thinks that these are one and the same, and philosophies that call some part of it (like atoms or Platonic forms) the real part while the experienced world is a distortion are unjustified. End song: "Uncontrollable Fear" by The MayTricks So Chewy! (1993). Th...

On Naming and Necessity (1980). What's the relationship between language and the world? Specifically, what makes a name or a class term pick out the person or things that it does? Saul Kripke wanted to correct the dominant view of his time (which involved a description in the speaker's mind), and used talk of "possible worlds" to do it! With guest Matt Teichman. End song: "Reason Enough" by Mark L...

On Isaac Asimov's "The Last Question," Albert Camus's "The Fall," Karl Jaspers's "Truth and Symbol," C.S. Peirce's "The Fixation of Belief," Bertold Brecht's "Theatre for Pleasure or Theatre for Instruction," and Thomas Sheehan's Stanford lectures on the Historical Jesus. These are snippets covering topics we haven't had time to cover on the podcast proper. Brief yourself via these 10–15 minute bu...

On The Human Condition (1958), Prologue and Sections 1 and 2. How has our distinction between the private and public evolved over time? Arendt uses this history, and chiefly the differences between our time and ancient Athens, to launch a critique of modern society. The fab four conducted this podcast live at the Pittsburgh Continental Philosophy Conference . End song: "Space" by Mark Lint. Read a...

What is it like to do philosophy in public? As prelude to our ep. 125 appearance at the Pittsburgh Continental Philosophy Network Conference on theory and public space, Mark, Seth, Wes, and Dylan sat down for questions by moderator Erica Freeman, conference host Justin Pearl, and numerous attendees. The post Q&A with the Partially Examined Life, Pittsburgh 9-25-15 first appeared on The Partially E...

On the Manual of Epictetus, aka The Enchiridion (135 CE). What's a wise strategy for life? Stoicism says that the secret is mastering yourself. Nothing external can break your spirit unless you let it. So, how weird and misguided is that advice? With guest Alex Fossella. End song: "But I Won't" by Mark Lint from Spanish Armada: Songs of Love and Related Neuroses (1993). The post Episode 124: The S...

On F.A. Hayek's "The Use of Knowledge in Society" (1945) and Amartya Sen's On Ethics and Economics (1987). Is economics a pseudoscience? Are its assumptions by necessity too over-simplifying? Hayek objects to the idea of planning an economy, because the planners aren't in a position to know enough. With guest Seth Benzell , who starts us off with a "precognition" of the material. End song: "People...

Haven't had enough Augustine? Danny Lobell and Wes Alwan welcome Augustine scholar James Wetzel and PEL Citizens Terra Leigh Bell, Amogh Sahu, and Scott Anderson to discuss our Augustine episodes, covering humility, love, desire, grief, sex, misogyny, degrees of reality, and how love of God fits with relating to other people. Minimally edited, recorded the same day it's being posted, we present a...

Yet more on The Confessions , now on books 10–13. What is memory and how does it relate to time and being? Augustine thinks that memory is a storehouse, but it contains not just the sensations we put in it, but also (à la Plato's theory of recollection ) all legitimate knowledge. It's our route to God, to real Being. Mark, Wes, and Dylan also discuss time, language, knowledge, the existence of evi...

On The Confessions (400 CE), books 1–9. The question is not "What is virtue?" because knowing what virtue is isn't enough. The problem, for Aurelius Augustinus, aka St. Augustine of Hippo, is doing what you know to be right. End song: "I Still Want" by New People , from Impossible Things (2011). The post Episode 121: Augustine on Being Good first appeared on The Partially Examined Life Philosophy...

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. End song: "I Insist" by Mark Lint . Read about it . The post Episode 120: A History of “Will” with Guest Eva Brann first appeared on The Partially Exami...

On Friedrich Nietzsche's The Birth of Tragedy (1872). Nietzsche thought that you could tell how vital or decadent a civilization was by its art, and said that ancient Greek tragedy was so great because it was a perfect synthesis of something highly formal/orderly/beautiful with the intuitive/unconscious/chaotic. But then Socrates ruined everything! With guest John Castro. Includes a preview of the...

Victor Krummenacher and Jonathan Segel join Mark and Wes to discuss songwriting and authenticity in the age of Internet consumerism. This episode prefigured Mark's Nakedly Examined Music podcast . Includes a preview of the Aftershow featuring more musicians including ex-Camper Chris Molla. End songs: "The Bastards Never Show Themselves" by the Monks of Doom and Mike Wilson's "RG." The post Episode...

Philosophically considering the ancient Greek tragedy, which we also performed with Lucy Lawless and Paul Provenza . End song: "Woe Is Me" (live, 2002) by Madison Lint . Features a preview of the Aftershow , feat. Wes and host Danny Lobell. The post Episode 117: Discussing Sophocles’s “Antigone” first appeared on The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast .

An unrehearsed, fun read-through of the Greek Tragedy from 441 BCE, plus some discussion with the cast of Greek drama, our selected translation, and other stuff. Enjoy! PEL Citizens can get an ad-free, extended version . End song: "Antigone (Choragos Speaks)" by Mark Lint. Read about it . The post “Antigone” Read by PEL with Lucy Lawless and Paul Provenza first appeared on The Partially Examined L...