Billboards

Scrieri si literatura

talk

philosophy talk

pendientes

O incursiune sonoră care mixează realul cu fantasticul din nuvelele lui Mircea Eliade , un traseu cultural parcurs împreună cu Andreea Răsuceanu şi Anita Stere.

Pe urmele semnelor Mântulesei

Roving Philosophical Reporter Caitlin Esch talks to Patrick Sammon, Creator and Executive Producer of "Codebreaker", a 2011 documentary film with dramatic recreations of Alan Turing's life.

Roving Philosophical Report: Alan Turing

More at http://philosophytalk.org/shows/reincarnation-past-lives-future-selves.

According to Buddhist tradition, all people must suffer illness, aging, and death. Yet the universe is seen as a vast living entity, in which cycles of individual life and death are repeated without cease. Therefore death is a necessary part of the process of life, making renewal and new growth possible. So what does this view mean about the eternality of the self? Is there a single subject or consciousness that persists through all the cycles of death and rebirth? What are the karmic consequences of one’s moral acts for future lives? And how can the view of endless death and rebirth lead to greater compassion for all life? John and Ken revisit their past with Robert Thurman from Columbia University, author of "Infinite Life: Awakening to Bliss Within."

Reincarnation: Past Lives, Future Selves

More at https://www.philosophytalk.org/shows/schopenhauer-living-your-worst-life.

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) is considered one of the great European philosophers of the nineteenth century. His most famous work, The World as Will and Representation, presents a pessimistic view of a world filled with endless strife and suffering, where happiness can only be but fleeting. So, how did Schopenhauer think we ought to live with one another in such a world? Did he believe there was ultimately a way to overcome the pain of the human condition? Or are we all doomed to live frustration-filled lives? Josh and Ray keep a sunny disposition with David Bather Woods from the University of Warwick, author of "Arthur Schopenhauer: The Life and Thought of Philosophy’s Greatest Pessimist" (forthcoming).

Schopenhauer: Living Your Worst Life

More at https://philosophytalk.org/shows/what-is-music.

From classical concerts to commercial jingles, music fills our lives every day. But philosophers disagree about what exactly music is and why it’s valuable. Among the world’s diverse musical cultures and styles, are there any universals? If you play Bach’s cello suites on a synthesizer, is it still the same piece of music? And why do people deliberately listen to sad songs? John and Ray sing it with Andrew Kania from Trinity University, author of "Philosophy of Western Music: A Contemporary Introduction."

The Value of Music

More at http://philosophytalk.org/shows/neuroscience-and-free-will.

We like to think of ourselves as rational agents who exercise conscious control over most of our actions and decisions. Yet in recent years, neuroscientists have claimed to prove that free will is simply an illusion, that our brains decide for us before our conscious minds even become aware. But what kind of evidence do these scientists rely on to support their sweeping conclusions? Is the "free will" they talk about the same kind of free will that philosophers have puzzled about for millennia? And could science ever prove that we lack the kind of freedom needed for moral responsibility? John and Ken free their minds with Daniel Dennett from Tufts University, author of "Freedom Evolves" and "Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking."

Neuroscience and Free Will

More at https://philosophytalk.org/shows/henri-bergson-and-the-flow-of-time.

Many people think of time as a series of events, like successive frames in a movie. But French philosopher Henri Bergson (1859-1941) argued that this widespread picture was wrong: everything is in constant motion, and can’t be captured by a series of static descriptions. So why does Bergson think our intuition guides us and reason leads us astray? If your self is constantly in flux, is there any such thing as the real you? And how would we have to change our language to reflect the truth? Josh and Ray go with the flow of Barry Allen from McMaster University, author of "Living in Time: The Philosophy of Henri Bergson."

Henri Bergson and the Flow of Time

More at https://philosophytalk.org/shows/robert-musil.

Robert Musil (1880-1942) was an Austrian novelist, famous for "The Man Without Qualities." Set in Austria just before the start of World War I, it features a character who tries to live without fixed principles. But is it a good idea to conduct your life in this way? Is it even possible? Could having a rigid system of beliefs make you insensitive to changes in society? Is there a happy medium between dogmatism and spinelessness? Josh and Ray remain flexible with Bence Nanay from the University of Antwerp, author of "Philosophy Without Qualities: Robert Musil, the Thinker" (forthcoming).

Robert Musil and Life as Experiment

Making and Breaking Habits

More at http://philosophytalk.org/shows/living-through-others

Imagine that the world will end in thirty days. Would your life have meaning anymore? Would anyone’s? It seems that there would no longer be any point to making technological or medical advances, developing new forms of art, or even taking good care of ourselves. Imagining the doomsday scenario shows that there is something particularly disturbing about the prospect that not only we, but also everyone else, will die. Why is this? Would our lives be nearly as meaningful if others did not live on after our death? Could our “collective afterlife” through the lives of others actually be more important than the “personal afterlife” with which we are so often preoccupied? John and Ken live on through Samuel Scheffler from NYU, author of "Death & the Afterlife."

Living On Through Others

More at http://philosophytalk.org/shows/ancient-cosmos.

Even in ancient Greek society, philosopher-scientists engaged in heated debate about the origin, composition, and structure of our universe. Tracking our understanding of cosmology from then until now shows monumental shifts in thinking. So what did the Ancients think was the fundamental nature of the cosmos, and what kind of evidence did they use to support their theories? How did Copernicus provoke such a radical shift in cosmology? And what should we think about the status of scientific theories if they can be subject to such massive conceptual shifts? John and Ken ponder the cosmos with Carlo Rovelli from Aix-Marseille University, author of "Seven Brief Lessons on Physics."

The Ancient Cosmos: When the Earth Stood Still

Feel No Ways - Drake

On Simone De Beauvoir's The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947), parts I and II.

We return to existentialism! Instead of describing our predicament as "absurd," de Beauvoir prefers "ambiguous": We are a biological organism in the world, yet we're also free consciousness transcending the given situation. Truly coming to terms with this freedom means not only understanding that you transcend any label of character ("villain") or role ("doctor") that you or anyone else has put on you, but also recognizing that your freedom requires the freedom of others.

And this is the challenge of her book: In an existentialist world view that denies pre-existing moral laws, whether given by God or Reason or anything else, how can ethics be possible? Wouldn't it just be all subjective, or relative, if, as Nietzsche says, we are the ones who create values? What prevents an existentialist from being a self-consistent monster à la the antagonist of Cormac McCarthy's No Country for Old Men?

The key is recognizing and preserving this human ambiguity. We are things in the world, yet qua consciousness, we're really a hole in the world, a little pit of desire, an unpredictable action behind a pair of eyes, and to embrace our negativity means recognizing not only that no external, alien moral law causes or commands our behavior, but also willing that being exist, i.e., the being of the things we desire, the projects we want to enact in the world, and the happiness of other people and improvement of the world. Self-consistently embracing our free nature therefore means willing the good, and this willing is an act of creation much like creation of an artwork.

Mark, Wes, Seth, and Dylan are all on board this time to fill out this picture and try to figure out whether de Beauvoir is right that not only does this existentialist picture support ethics, but in fact it's the only way to support ethics: a pre-existent, objective standard would not allow us the freedom to actually choose the good. Think about how, for Plato, we never knowingly choose evil; we always want what we think is good but sometimes are just mistaken. De Beauvoir, like Augustine, thinks that we really can perversely choose to deny our nature, deny our freedom (though that denial remains a free choice), where pretending like Aristotle and (in a different way) most theologians that we have a built-in teleological "good" that by our nature we were meant to pursue is just another way of actually denying our total freedom.

Recommended prerequisites: De Beauvoir's book is a great introduction to existentialism, if you haven't read any, and our discussion should be mostly clear, but it may help you especially to listen to our ep. 10 on Kant's ethics, which also argues for the "self-legislation" of ethics. Other touchstones are Nietzsche (most centrally ep. 84), Camus (ep. 4), and especially Sartre (ep. 87). We also bring up Augustine (eps. 121 and 122), Eva Brann's take on Nietzsche (ep. 120), and stoicism (ep. 124).

Go to blog

De Beauvoir on the Ambiguous Human Condition (Part One)

Continuing on Simone de Beauvoir's The Ethics of Ambiguity(1947), parts I and II.

We discuss all the various ways to fail to wholly will your own freedom, i.e., will it all the way to where you will the freedom of others. The first step is admitting that human consciousness is an ontological negative, i.e., it doesn't have static being in the way a rock or tree or even an instinct-driven squirrel is, and some people just stop there, really willing nothing at all. These are the "sub-men."

Or maybe you sign on to some cause, some goal with all your being: you fill your negativity up with something external (like God, or wanting with all your heart to become an Olympic gymnast, or devotion to doing your job well) and thereby pretend to be determined just like a squirrel is. This is the "serious man," and it's a serious abrogation of your freedom!

Or maybe you react against this seriousness and just deny that any such external thing has a hold on you, and actively will to have no values at all. This is nihilism, and it fails the existential test too.

…And there are several more iterations before you're really a fully freedom-embracing, authentic human being; in the process she ends up distinguishing herself from other existentialist atheists like Nietzsche (whom she thinks to be too solipsistic) and Camus (p. 129: "To declare that existence is absurd is to deny that it can ever be given a meaning; to say that it is ambiguous is to assert that its meaning is never fixed, that it must be constantly won.").

Listen to part 1 before this, or get the unbroken, ad-free Citizen edition with your PEL Citizenship. Please support PEL!

End song: "Reasonably Lonely," by Mark Lint & the Simulacra from The Sinking and the Aftermath, recorded in 2000 and 2003, newly mixed.

De Beauvoir on the Ambiguous Human Condition (Part Two)

More on Simone de Beauvoir's The Ethics of Ambiguity (1947), this time on part III.

In ep. 140, we described de B's picture of our "ambiguous" existential situation and how proper recognition of our freedom means willing the freedom of others, but what does that actually mean for how we're supposed to act? De Beauvoir is well known as a feminist and political leftist, and is concerned here with oppression. To fight an oppressor is necessarily to not will the oppressor's freedom, and de B. doesn't rule out violence, though she at the same time points out how inexcusable it is. That is, literally inexcusable, because there is no external moral standard ("I killed one to save many, which utilitarianism says is OK!") one can turn to for exculpation. And if you're part of a corrupt system, you share in its responsibility, even if you are not personally guilty of exploiting someone.

So, what do you do? There's no rulebook to tell you, but in general terms, you need to respect the individual, whose value can never be simply written off as insignificant next to the group. And of course, people are exploited who claim to be satisfied with their lot, so paying attention to the individual is not simply getting their consent or doing what they say. You have to (when practically feasible) raise their consciousness and put them within grasp of their freedom, which only they can grasp. Mark, Wes, Dylan, and a Seth who was sick enough to drop off before the end of the discussion try to sort through De B's practical paradoxes.

Don't wait for part 2; get the Citizen Edition, ad-free and unbroken, now by becoming a PEL Citizen! This will also get you in the company of Mark, Danny Lobell, and a de Beauvoir scholar discussing this and the previous episode on the the 6/26 Aftershow at 5pm ET, covering both eps. 140 and 141. Watch the event live or after the fact. Please support PEL!

Simone De Beauvoir picture by Solomon Grundy.

De Beauvoir’s Existentialism: Moral and Political Dilemmas (Part One)

More at http://philosophytalk.org/shows/john-dewey.

John Dewey is regarded by some as THE American philosopher. In the first half of the 20th century, he stood as the most prominent public intellectual whose influence reached into intellectual movements in China, Japan, and India. Although we hear less of Dewey nowadays, his pragmatic political philosophy has influenced the likes of Richard Rorty and other political thinkers. What were the basic ideas in his philosophy of democracy? Does America have a public sphere? If not, how might we recreate a public necessary for democracy? And does the rise of the internet and social media fit into Dewey’s ideal democracy? John and Ken welcome Melvin Rogers from UCLA, author of "The Undiscovered Dewey: Religion, Morality, and the Ethos of Democracy."

John Dewey and the Ideal of Democracy

More at http://philosophytalk.org/shows/mystery-multiverse.

At the foundation of modern theoretical physics lie the equations that define our universe, telling us of its beginnings, evolution, and future. Make even minor adjustments to the fundamental laws of the universe, and life as we know it would not exist. How do we explain this extraordinary fact that our universe is so uniquely fine-tuned for life? Could our universe may be just one of infinitely many in a vast multiverse? Does it make sense to talk about other universes if they can never be detected from this one? Can science ever prove or disprove the multiverse theory? Or does the theory make some testable predictions about our finely-tuned universe? John and Ken multiply their thoughts with George Ellis from the University of Cape Town, author of "How Can Physics Underlie the Mind?"

The Mystery of the Multiverse

As a mother who lost her son over "loud music" and a young man who survived being shot in the head, Lucy McBath and DeJuan Patterson discuss the pain of coping with the violence they've endured. This episode contains explicit language.

The everyday trauma of being a black man in America

More at https://philosophytalk.org/shows/space-time-continuum.

Strange things are said about time: that it's illusory, that it has no direction. But what about space, or the space-time continuum? What exactly is space-time? Are space and time fundamental features of the world? How do Einstein’s special and general theories of relativity change our understanding of space-time? Is there a distinction to be made between space and time, or must the two concepts be united into a single interwoven continuum? John and Ken fill time and space with Tim Maudlin from NYU, author of "Philosophy of Physics: Space and Time."

The Space-Time Continuum

More at https://philosophytalk.org/shows/knowing-what-we-know.

It seems like we know many facts about ourselves and the world around us, even if there vastly many others we know that we don’t know. But how do we know if what we believe to be true is really knowledge? Can our beliefs be both justified and true, yet still not count as genuine knowledge? If so, then how much confidence should we really have in our beliefs? Is there a way to strike a balance between paralyzing skepticism, on the one hand, and dogmatic conviction, on the other? John and Ken know that their guest is Baron Reed from Northwestern University, author of "The Long Road to Skepticism."

Knowing What We Know (And What We Don't)

More at https://www.philosophytalk.org/shows/machiavelli.

Niccolò Machiavelli is best known for arguing that people in power should use deception, force, and manipulation if those tactics are necessary to achieve their ends. In an age of unscrupulous politics and ruthless business practice, shouldn't we be encouraging a move away from Machiavellian thinking? Then again, are we even sure that those "Machiavellian" views were really Machiavelli's? If not, what did he really think, and what might we learn from him? John and Ken plot and scheme with Maurizio Viroli from Princeton University, author of "Redeeming the Prince: The Meaning of Machiavelli's Masterpiece."

Machiavelli

More at https://www.philosophytalk.org/shows/summer-reading-list-2017.

Summer is the perfect time to dig in to deep reading. Hannah Arendt’s "The Origins of Totalitarianism" may be a bit much for the beach, but there are lots of readable classics and new titles that could make your summer reading a transformative experience.

• Stanford literature professor Josh Landy on Toni Morrison's "Song of Solomon"
• Philosophy Talk's film blogger, #FrancisOnFilm (aka Leslie Francis from the University of Utah) on Margaret Atwood's "The Handmaid's Tale" and the new TV series based on it
• Roving Philosophical Reporter Holly J. McDede investigates the graphic novel behind this summer's blockbuster Wonder Woman movie
• Other recommendations from the Community of Thinkers

Summer Reading List 2017

Available at Timmion Records Bandcamp: http://bit.ly/2uQEnXY
and Daptone Shop: http://bit.ly/2feZrnj

Bad Education

Bad Education - Bardo Martinez & The Soul Investigators

More at https://www.philosophytalk.org/shows/could-laws-physics-change.

From airplanes flying overhead to the cellular activity inside us, all events that take place in the world obey the laws of physics. Physicists seem to be getting closer and closer to understanding the physical laws that govern our universe. But what if our physical laws changed? Could that even be possible? How might changing of physical laws affect us? Or is just that what we take to be laws changes over time? Should we still call the laws of physics “laws”? The philosophers conserve mass with Massimo Pigliucci from the City University of New York, author of "Nonsense on Stilts: How to Tell Science from Bunk."

Could the Laws of Physics Ever Change?

"My older sister tells them me that when I was about five I punched her and broke her nose. I have no doubt she is telling the truth, but I don't remember the incident. At all. She does, and when she lightheartedly reminds me of my punch, I apologize, but frankly I don't feel all that guilty, presumably because I have utterly no recollection of it. Is lack of memory some sort of strange moral defense? Or is there just a defect in my conscience?"

Should I regret my forgotten misdeeds?

"There’s a panhandler where I have coffee and hang out most days some old men to chew the fat. The whole neighborhood knows him. He’s clean not aggressive likes Jazz & sports but there’s something off there.  A woman that works at a grocery store ran into his name and picture on one of those lists of sexual offenders.  She was sure it was him but not clear on any details and I assume it wasn’t a violent act or she would have said. My wife and  I give this guy a buck to two whenever we see him and he mumbles a thanks. My conundrums are these why do I give him spare change at all ( I know you did a program about this but I haven’t looked it up)? But also should I keep giving him the small amount I do. ?  I do! If not why?  I haven’t told the old men about this guy’s history."

Should I continue giving money to a homeless sex offender?

Josh and Ken debate which of the Academy's Best Picture nominees deserves the Dionysus Award for Most Searing Depiction of Humankind's Propensity to Dehumanize the Other.

Get Out vs. The Shape of Water

Care erau opţiunile ierarhiei Bisericii Ortodoxe Române în gestionarea relaţiei cu statul după 1945?
Cum a colaborat şi cum a rezistat Biserica sub regimul comunist ateu?

La aceste întrebări vor căută să răspundă invitaţii celei de-a doua întâlniri din seria Dezbaterilor CSIC: Adrian Nicolae Petcu (cercetător CNSAS), prof. univ. dr. Radu Carp (Facultatea de Ştiinţe Politice) şi pr. prof. univ. dr. Adrian Gabor (Facultatea de Teologie). Cu participarea extraordinară a pr. prof. Nicolae Bordaşiu, fost deţinut politic. Moderatorul dezbaterii va fi, şi de această dată, filosoful Sorin Lavric.

Scopul principal al Dezbaterilor CSIC îl reprezintă readucerea în discuţia publică a unor subiecte controversate, care modelează societatea contemporană, precum şi prezentarea unor puncte de vedere diferite asupra lor, într-o atmosferă echilibrată, argumentată şi de bun simţ. Întâlnirea va porni de la o prezentare generală a temei supuse dezbaterii, urmând a continua pe câteva direcţii sugerate de către organizatori şi moderator.

Evenimentul va avea loc marţi, 11 iunie, începând cu ora 18.00, la Biblioteca Naţională a României (Bd Unirii nr. 22), sala Mircea Eliade.

Proiectul se desfăşoară cu sprijinul Fundaţiei Konrad Adenauer România şi al Grupului Filos. Recomandat de Radio Guerrilla.

Intrarea publicului este liberă.

Dezbaterile CSIC - Biserica Ortodoxă Română sub comunism

"The program that questions everything -- except your intelligence."

Philosophy on the radio? You've got to be kidding? Well, sometimes we do (kid, that is). Mostly we look at today's important ideas with an eye to thinking them through.

Philosophy Talk is a weekly, one-hour radio series. The hosts' down-to-earth and no-nonsense approach brings the richness of philosophic thought to everyday subjects. Topics are lofty (Truth, Beauty, Justice), arresting (Terrorism, Intelligent Design, Suicide), and engaging (Baseball, Love, Happiness).

This is not a lecture or a college course; it's philosophy in action!

Philosophy Talk is a fun opportunity to explore issues of importance to your audience in a thoughtful, friendly fashion, where thinking is encouraged.