The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast

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Episode 210: Frantz Fanon's Black Existentialism (Part Two) Mar 04, 2019

Show notes

Continuing on Black Skin White Masks (1952), starting with the influential ch. 4 "The Fact of Blackness." Are the successive coping strategies to racism (including "anti-racist racism" and embrace of negritude) that Fanon describes necessary steps in a dialectic which should be encouraged, or would it be best to learn from his "mistakes" and jump right to the humanistic end-point? With guest Lawrence Ware.

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End song: "Malaika" by John Etheridge and Vimala Rowe; hear John interviewed on Nakedly Examined Music #85.

Episode 210: Frantz Fanon's Black Existentialism (Part One) Feb 25, 2019

Show notes

On Black Skin White Masks (1952).

How does growing up in a racist society mess people up? Fanon's "clinical study" includes phenomenology, poetry, and a lot of existentialism, which means that the "let's embrace negritude in the face of bigotry" solution isn't ultimately available to him: We're all radically free, with no race-specific essence, whether positive or negative. With guest Lawrence Ware.

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Podchaser Interview of Mark Linsenmayer: Partially Examined Life and Nakedly Examined Music Feb 23, 2019

Show notes

Morgan DeLisle, writer for the PodChaser "Behind the Streams Blog," interviewed Mark for a feature of our podcasts. Learn about the origins of PEL and NEM, how we make the shows, and what's coming up.

Listen to all of the PEL network podcasts at partiallyexaminedlife.com, or subscribe to them individually on Apple Podcasts or via your preferred player.

Episode 209: Francis Fukuyama on Identity Politics (Part Two: Discussion) Feb 18, 2019

Show notes

Continuing on Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment (2018).

Fukuyama recommends a "creedal national identity" as a solution for tribalism; does this work? Is this "demand for recognition" that he describes foundational for the act of making an ethical claim? For self-consciousness itself? How does ideology prejudice the sort of theorizing that Fukuyama engages in?

Listen to part one first, or get the unbroken, ad-free Citizen Edition. Please support PEL!

End song: "Cornerstone" by Richard X. Heyman, as discussed on Nakedly Examined Music #61.

Episode 209: Guest Francis Fukuyama on Identity Politics (Part One) Feb 11, 2019

Show notes

Talking to the author about Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment (2018).

What motivates people? Frank points to thymos, the demand for recognition, as at the root of both the "end of history" (i.e., democracy as demand for equal recognition) and our current tribalist stalemates, involving desires to be seen—in virtue of group membership—as superior. Thymos may in fact be central to self-consciousness, ethics, and the origins of political association.

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Episode 208: Epicurus on Seeking Pleasure (Part Two) Feb 04, 2019

Show notes

More on the ethics-related fragments of Epicurus and accounts by Martha Nussbaum and Tim O'Keefe.

What would a purely therapeutic philosophy consist of? Does philosophy as pursuit of pleasure mean that you eschew political action or other substantial goals? Mark, Wes, and Dylan try to figure out which of our desires are vain and whether society is compatible with human happiness.

Listen to part one first or get the unbroken, ad-free Citizen Edition. Please support PEL!

End song: "The Language of the Body" by Ant-Bee as discussed on Nakedly Examined Music #68.

Episode 208: Epicurus on Seeking Pleasure (Part One) Jan 28, 2019

Show notes

On the extant fragments of Epicurus (341–270 BCE) dealing with ethics, including his "Letter to Menoceus," "The Principal Doctrines," and "The Vatican Collection of Epicurean Sayings." Plus Tim O'Keefe's Epicureanism (2010) and Martha Nussabum's The Therapy of Desire (1994).

How are we supposed to act once we understand nature as atoms bouncing and swerving around in the void, temporarily producing order through fortuitous collisions? Ruling out demanding gods means ethics is dictated by human nature: we avoid pain and pursue pleasure. However, we're very bad at this, and Epicurus wants to fix all of us!

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Episode 207: Herder on Art Appreciation (Part Two) Jan 21, 2019

Show notes

Continuing on Johann Gottfried von Herder's "The Causes of Sunken Taste among the Different Peoples in Whom It Once Blossomed" (1775), then moving to "On the Influence of the Belles Lettres on the Higher Sciences" (1781), "Does Painting or Music Have a Greater Effect? A Divine Colloquy" (1785), and and some of Critical Forests: Fourth Grove (written 1769). With guest rock god John "Jughead" Pierson.

What grounds good taste in a society? Can an aesthetic education ground abstract thought? What would such an education consist in? Which is more affecting, music or painting?

Start with part 1, or get the full, ad-free Citizen Edition. Please support PEL!

Episode 207: Herder on Art Appreciation (Part One) Jan 14, 2019

Show notes

On Johann Gottfried von Herder's "The Causes of Sunken Taste among the Different Peoples in Whom It Once Blossomed" (1775), "On the Influence of the Belles Lettres on the Higher Sciences" (1781), "Does Painting or Music Have a Greater Effect? A Divine Colloquy" (1785), and some of Critical Forests: Fourth Grove (written 1769). With guest rock god John "Jughead" Pierson.

What is aesthetic taste, and why do some societies (e.g. ancient Greece) seem particularly rife with genius? Herder has some definite ideas about aesthetic, sensual education as grounding for abstract thinking, rages against attempts to copy another culture's art-forms, and likes melody over harmony. Plus he coined the term "zeitgeist!"

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PREMIUM-Ep 206 Lucretius's Epicurean Physics (Part Three) Jan 13, 2019

Show notes

Mark and Wes go into more textual detail re. Lucretius's take on atomism and the metaphysical and epistemological problems it entails. Start with Part one.

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