William Johnsen is  former graduate chair and coordinator of undergraduate programs in the Department of English at Michigan State University, editor of “Contagion: The Journal of the Colloquium on Violence and Religion”, and general editor of "Studies in Violence, Mimesis, and Culture” a book series through Michigan State University Press.

We talk about his work spreading the ideas of René Girard, imitation, mimesis & the internet, the role of the scapegoat, Girard’s radical interpretation of the crucifixion, his criticism of Nietzsche’s Slave Morality, his prescience in calling political correctness a new totalitarianism, the limits of imitative desire, & the paradox of differentiation.

39: René Girard - Imitation & Desire with William Johnsen

Samo Burja is founder of Bismarck Analysis, a consulting firm that investigates the political and institutional landscape of society. He is also a research fellow at the LongNow Foundation, where he studies how institutions can endure for centuries and millennia, and a Senior Research Fellow in political science at the Foresight Institute where he advises on how institutions can shape the future of technology. Writer, speaker, and strategist.

We discuss his Great Founder Theory, his hypothesis that “a small number of institutions founded by exceptional individuals for the core of society”; as well as the requisite infrastructure for complex thought that Samo says has almost entirely disappeared, and the causes of Western nations' decline in state capacity.

41: Great Founders, Complex Thought, and State Capacity with Samo Burja

In the launch episode of the brand new ii Hostcast, Evaric Weicksel goes meta: he interviews fellow Interintellect and Host Visakan Veerasamy and Interintellect founder Anna Gát about conversations and talent, world peace and nerds, friends and the internet, philosophy and freedom, and how to find your intellectual tribe with the Interintellect.

Check out all Interintellect events:  https://interintellect.com

Find us on Twitter:
Visa: https://twitter.com/visakanv
Anna: https://twitter.com/TheAnnaGat
Evaric: https://twitter.com/evaricweicksel
The ii: https://twitter.com/interintellect_

Read about how an Interintellect Salon feels:
https://interintellect.medium.com/my-first-interintellect-salon-1fa52c386f27

Come to Visa’s next Salon:
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/it-takes-a-village-building-communities-of-kinship-and-meaning-ii-salon-tickets-127550245217 

Come to Anna's next Salon:
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/on-jealousy-why-should-you-have-what-i-have-not-interintellect-salon-tickets-128322677583

Read 'Complicating the Narratives' by Amanda Ripley which is mentioned in the episode:
https://thewholestory.solutionsjournalism.org/complicating-the-narratives-b91ea06ddf63

Interintellect Hostcast - Ep1 - With Anna Gát and Visakan Veerasamy

Agora Politics is dedicated to making sense out of our outdated theories of politics. 

The show features long-form interviews with academics, entrepreneurs, intellectuals, and luminaries of all types, who are tuning in to the zeitgeist and attempting to synthesize stories of the past, with knowledge of the present, and visions of the future.

39: René Girard - Imitation & Desire with William Johnsen

Agora Politics

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