The Wisdom Of

Gabriel Marcel was a French existentialist Christian philosopher.  What he had to say is very relevant today, more so than in his own time!  

Both Jean-Paul Sartre and Friedrich Nietzsche privilege the present over the past. Let's find out why! 

Alain Badiou is a French philosopher. In this episode, we discuss his In Praise of Love . The work is a passionate defence of love in a time when romance is being threatened from all directions! 

In this episode, I talk a bit about the notions of revenge and retribution and punishment. The Book of Revelation , Nietzsche, Martha Nussbaum and Hannah Arendt all make appearances! 

Don't all living things die? Well, not according to Rousseau and Heidegger! 

ChatGPT spit out some prose on our command. Is it art? What might Heidegger say? What should our relationship be to objects and artifacts? What does Martin Buber think?  Are our relationships with our bots a good idea? Let's explore! 

Is it actually good to be nice? Is niceness a virtue? That’s to say, is it a character trait that’s admirable? At the end of the day, should we value niceness as much as we do? Let's explore! 

There's a social aspect to our death that philosophers often tend to overlook when discussing the issue of death, or so it might be argued. In this episode, we hear from Epicurus, Heidegger and Levinas!  

In this episode I try to say a little something about the writer Aldous Huxley and his view on psychedelics!

In this episode on indigenous thought, we try to discuss the importance of storytelling and the cyclical nature of time! 

What is solitude? How is it different from loneliness and alienation? What does Thoreau think about solitude? Let's explore!  

In this episode I try to say something about Marcus Aurelius and what's going on in his book the Meditations .

William Barrett was a professor of philosophy. He wrote a book called Irrational Man , published in 1958, that’s considered to be one of the finest introductions to the philosophy of existentialism ever written! 

In this episode I try to briefly say a few words about the role and nature of ideology and ideological thinking!  

In this episode, I try to talk a little bit about the nature and importance of sex and love according to the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer and the writer D.H. Lawrence! 

Ayn Rand is a Russian born writer. She’s best known for her two novels, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged . In this episode, we discuss Nietzsche's and Aristotle's influence on her! 

Boethius was a Roman philosopher and political statesman. In this episode, I discuss his great work On the Consolation of Philosophy ! 

The Fall was Camus’ last complete work and it was published in 1956. In this episode, we discuss the themes of insincerity and virtue-signalling. 

Some thoughts about what happened to the actor William Shatner when he went to space aboard a capsule operated by Jeff Bezos’s company Blue Origin.

Peter Abelard and Heloise are one of the most celebrated couples of all time, known for their love affair and for the tragedy that separated them. In this episode, we discuss their love letters! 

What's courage? Are there different kinds of courage? Why is courage important? Let's see what Plato and Paul Tillich think! 

Is happiness just about feeling good? Is that the way we should view it? Or is there more to it than that? Let's find out! 

In this episode I try to talk a bit about the nature of evil. I use Susan Neiman's book Evil in Modern Thought as the context.  

Byung-Chul Han is a south Korean born philosopher and he’s currently professor at the  Berlin University of Arts in Germany. In this episode, we talk a bit about his views on phones, social media and the nature of thinking in our contemporary world! 

For all its focus on the struggles of the human condition and on our spiritual ailments, ultimately existentialism is a deeply affirmative and constructive philosophy!