NEM#85: John Etheridge (Soft Machine) is For Everything!
John is an amazing guitarist who started in the late-'60s British blues boom, had his first compositions set to tape with Darryl Way's Wolf in the early '70s, then joined the latter line-ups of jazz-prog legends Soft Machine (replacing Alan Holdsworth) in the late '70s. He's collaborated with luminaries like violinist Stéphane Grappelli, guitar great John Williams, and Andy Summers from The Pol...
1hr 12m Oct 29, 2018
1hr 12m
Episode 201: Marcus Aurelius's Stoicism with Ryan Holiday (Part One)
On The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius (ca. 180 C.E.) plus Ryan's The Daily Stoic (2016). What does Stoicism look like in practice, in both ancient and modern contexts? You might think that eschewing the shallow, out-of-our-control trappings of fame and wealth in favor of personal cultivation would make one unambitious, but Ryan uses Marcus as a prime example of how to be a Stoic while trying to...
1hr Oct 22, 2018
1hr
Episode 200: Kant/Mendelssohn/Foucault on Enlightenment (Part Two)
Continuing on "What Is Enlightenment" by Immanuel Kant (1784), "On Enlightening the Mind" by Moses Mendelssohn (1784), and "What Is Enlightenment" by Michael Foucault (1984). We finish up Kant (the courage to know!) and lay out the Mendelssohn (cultivation vs. enlightenment) and Foucault (ironically heroize the present!). Will this conversation enlighten you? Who knows? Listen to part one first...
1hr 8m Oct 15, 2018
1hr 8m
Episode 200: Kant/Mendelssohn/Foucault on Enlightenment (Part One)
On "What Is Enlightenment" by Immanuel Kant (1784), "On Enlightening the Mind" by Moses Mendelssohn (1784), and "What Is Enlightenment" by Michael Foucault (1984). At the end of the historical period known as The Enlightenment, a Berlin newspaper asked what exactly that is, and Kant and Mendelssohn responded. Both were concerned with whether too much enlightenment among the public can cause soc...
47m Oct 08, 2018
47m
Bonus: (sub)Text#4: Freud's "Mourning and Melancholia" (Part One)
Wes Alwan is joined by Tracy Morgan and Louis Scuderi to discuss Freud's classic 1917 essay. Note: Part two will NOT be appearing on this feed. Become a PEL Citizen to get the full discussion. Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to learn how. Listen to more (sub)Text.
36m Oct 08, 2018
36m
Episode 199: Elizabeth Anderson on Equality (Part Three: Discussion)
Mark, Wes, Seth, and Dylan continue to discuss “What Is the Point of Equality?” (1999) and how it lays foundations for Private Government (2017). What is democratic equality, and can a Rawlsian/liberal/neutral-with-regard-to-defining-the-good state consistently advocate for this ideal? Our interview starts in Part One. You can get all three parts together, and more with a PEL Citizenship or $5 ...
1hr 6m Oct 01, 2018
1hr 6m
NEM#83: Rat Scabies's Damned Drumming
Christopher Millar played for about two decades with first-generation British punk band The Damned starting in 1976, and has now released his debut solo album, P.H.D. (Prison, Hospital, Debt). We discuss "Dazy Bones" and "Rat's Opus" from that 2018 album, then look back to The Damned's "History of the World (Part One)" from The Black Album (1980), then end by listening to Rat's cover of the Kra...
55m Oct 01, 2018
55m
Guest Elizabeth Anderson on Private Government (Part Two)
Continuing on Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives (2017) and “What Is the Point of Equality?” (1999). Should the amount of respect that a worker gets be proportional to his or her market value? Our guest tells us more about how all citizens have the right to have their interests considered and what this means for how the relationship between employers and employees might change. W...
1hr 3m Sep 24, 2018
1hr 3m
Guest Elizabeth Anderson on Private Government (Part One)
The U. of Michigan prof joins us to discuss Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives (and Why We Don't Talk about It) (2017) and “What Is the Point of Equality?” (1999). What is government? Liz points to the historical use of the term to refer to not just the state, but any organized power relations, including the relation between a firm and its employees. What is it for something to b...
55m Sep 17, 2018
55m
NEM#82: Byron Isaacs Emerges From Bassland
Byron is an in-demand session/touring bassist whose main band since 2004 has been NYC's Ollabelle. We talk about "Losing You" and "Gypsy Wind" from his debut solo album, Disappearing Man (2018), plus "Gone Today” by Ollabelle from Riverside Battle Songs (2007), and finish with"Horizontal Man" by Lost Leaders from their 2014 eponymous album. Intro: “Heaven’s Pearls” by Levon Helm from Electric D...
1hr 9m Sep 14, 2018
1hr 9m
PREVIEW-Ep 198 Plato's "Parmenides" (Part Three)
http://partiallyexaminedlife.com
12m Sep 13, 2018
12m
Plato's Forms in the "Parmenides" (Part Two)
We get down to the specific questions considered in this perplexing Platonic dialogue: Are there Forms for all adjectives? Does the Form of a property itself have that property? (Is the Form Large itself large?) How do Forms connect with particulars? How can we mortals have any connection to heavenly Forms anyway? Why even think there are Forms outside of particulars? Listen to part one first ...
1hr 15m Sep 10, 2018
1hr 15m
Plato's Forms in the "Parmenides" (Part One)
On the most peculiar Platonic dialogue, from ca. 350 BCE. Are properties real things in the world, or just in the mind? Plato famously thought that for a property like "large," there's a Form that causes all the large things to be large, and which enables us to recognize those things as large. These Forms are not material things, and hence aren't the objects of ordinary sensation. In other dia...
47m Sep 03, 2018
47m
Bonus: (sub)Text #3: Spielberg's "AI: Artificial Intelligence": What Is It to Be Human? (Part One)
Wes discusses the film with philosophy professor David Kyle Johnson. What is there to fear in artificial intelligence? How does this shed light on what it means to be fully human? Note: Part two will NOT be appearing on this feed. Become a PEL Citizen to get the full discussion. Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to learn how.
34m Sep 02, 2018
34m
NEM#81: Lindsay Murray Is Gretchen's Wheel
Lindsay has released four albums and an EP of depressed alternative rock under the band name Gretchen's Wheel since 2015, providing a modern model of accessible yet professional DIY recording. We focus on Black Box Theory, covering "Untethered," "Tatyana," and "Plans," plus "Save the Day" from Sad Scientist (2017). Intro: “Total Loss” from Fragile State (2015). For more, visit gretchenswheel.co...
1hr 9m Aug 31, 2018
1hr 9m
Parmenides on What There Is (Part Two)
Continuing with guest Peter Adamson with ""On Nature"" (475 BCE). We finally get to the great ""fragment 8,"" which describes why Being must be singular and eternal, given that the notion of Non-Being is nonsense. So does it make any sense to talk of this eternal, uniform Being as a finite sphere? Would this absolute unity of Being make it impossible for us to even be individuals engaging in t...
53m Aug 27, 2018
53m
Parmenides on What There Is (Part One)
On the fragments referred to as ""On Nature"" from ca. 475 BCE, featuring guest Peter Adamson from the History of Philosophy without Any Gaps podcast. One of the most influential Presocratic philosophers, Parmenides gives ""the Way of Truth,"" which is that there is only Being, and talking of Non-Being is nonsense. And guess what? Any talk of difference implies non-being, so that's right out t...
1hr 1m Aug 20, 2018
1hr 1m
Bonus: (sub)Text #2: Is There Such a Thing as a War Story? Time and Trauma in Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse Five" (Part One)
Episode 2 of Wes's new podcasting endeavor, featuring Mary from the Phi Fic podcast, who's also the managing editor of the PEL blog. Note: Part two will NOT be appearing on this feed. Become a PEL Citizen to get the full discussion. Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to learn how.
41m Aug 20, 2018
41m
NEM#80: Rod Picott: Literary Workin' Man
Nashville singer/songwriter/fiction-writer Rod laid sheet rock for years before releasing his first album in 2001; he has now released ten albums of vivid Americana. We focus on his new double album Out Past the Wires, discussing "Take Home Pay" and "Date of Grace" (with intro/outro from "Be My Bonnie"), then look back to "Rust Belt Fields" from Welding Burns (2011) and finally listen to “You'r...
1hr 5m Aug 19, 2018
1hr 5m
Guest Simon Blackburn on Truth (Part Two)
Continuing with Simon on his book On Truth (2018). We move to part two of the book, where we get down to the procedures used to obtain truth in art, ethics, and science. Simon is well known for his meta-ethics, which is descended from C.L. Stevenson's emotivism. Just as he said in part one that he agreed largely with Strawson's view that to say a sentence is true is to advocate for it, the sam...
1hr 8m Aug 13, 2018
1hr 8m
Guest Simon Blackburn on Truth (Part One)
The Cambridge/etc. prof best known for his neo-Humean meta-ethics joins Mark, Wes, and Dylan to discuss his book On Truth (2018). What is truth? A pragmatist like William James wants to define truth in terms of the procedures we actually undergo to confirm a claim. Simon instead buys into a performative/deflationist view of truth. The notion can't be defined in general, but we can describe how...
53m Aug 06, 2018
53m
NEM#79: Prateek Kuhad's Bi-Lingual Love Songs
Prateek was named artist of the year for 2016 by MTV India and has been releasing tasteful, lyrics-focused songs about relationships in English and Hindi since 2011. We focus on his 2015 album Tokens and Charms: "Go," "Oh Love," and "Flames," plus the 2017 single "Tum Jab Pas," and the title track from his brand new EP cold/mess. Intro/Outro: "Raat Raazi" (2013). For more, visit prateekkuhad.co...
1hr 16m Aug 05, 2018
1hr 16m
Truth-The Austin/Strawson Debate (Part Two)
Continuing on "Truth" by J.L. Austin and "Truth" by P.F. Strawson, both from 1950. We proceed to the Strawson article, which critiques the notion of a "fact" as explaining why a sentence might be true. A "fact" is not a thing in the world! So what do we add when we change "The cat is on the mat" to "'The cat is on the mat' is true"? Addendum: We discovered after posting this episode that Aust...
1hr 2m Jul 30, 2018
1hr 2m
Truth-The Austin/Strawson Debate (Part One)
On two articles in the "ordinary language" tradition of philosophy called "Truth" from 1950 by J.L. Austin and P.F. Strawson. You may remember John Langshaw Austin as the performatives guy, but it's actually Peter Frederick Strawson (whom we covered in the context of free will) who (shortly before either of these papers) came up with what has become known as the performative theory of truth. ...
1hr 1m Jul 23, 2018
1hr 1m
Bonus Discussion: Wes Interprets Shakespeare's "Tempest" (Part One)
Wes Alwan and Bill Youmans discuss the 1611 play about revenge, forgiveness, and authorship. Or maybe it's about exploitation, or how we react to changes in status, or perhaps how a liberal education can give you magical powers! Note: Part two will NOT be appearing on this feed. Become a PEL Citizen to get the full discussion. Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to learn how.
34m Jul 21, 2018
34m
NEM#78: Tara Lynch's Unflinchingly Honest Metal Debut
Tara has long been building her heavy metal guitar skills, but has only recently gone public, building a huge social media following and now releasing Evil Enough, an album featuring musicians who've played with Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne, Yngwie Malmsteen, etc. We discuss "Antidote" and "Banished from My Kingdom," and close with "Unbreakable." Opening music: "Gui-Tara Rises." Hear more at ta...
1hr 1m Jul 21, 2018
1hr 1m
Alfred Tarski on Truth (Part Two)
Continuing on Tarski's “The Semantic Conception of Truth and the Foundations of Semantics,” (1944), Hartry Field's “Tarski's Theory of Truth” (1972), and Donald Davidson's “The Folly of Trying to Define Truth” (1977). What was Tarski really doing? What are the implications of his project? Does it even make sense to define "truth," and what should a definition look like? Listen to part one fir...
1hr 12m Jul 16, 2018
1hr 12m
Alfred Tarski on Truth (Part One)
On Tarski's “The Semantic Conception of Truth and the Foundations of Semantics,” (1944), Hartry Field's “Tarski's Theory of Truth” (1972), and Donald Davidson's“The Folly of Trying to Define Truth” (1977). What is truth? Tarski gives a technical, metaphysically neutral definition for truth within a particular, well-defined language. In short, a sentence is true if it is "satisfied" by all term...
55m Jul 09, 2018
55m
NEM#77: Shawn Phillips: Uncategorizable from Texas
Shawn started as a '60s folk singer, went to England to cavort with the greats of classic rock, and emerged in the '70s with ten albums of eclectic, progressive music with shamanic lyrics delivered with a twang. We discuss "Woman" from Second Contribution (1971), "A Christmas Song" from Faces (1972) and "Mr. President" from Furthermore (1974), then play two songs from his new album, Continuance...
1hr 7m Jul 08, 2018
1hr 7m
PREVIEWS-Eps 192-193 Allan Bloom & Liberal Education Follow-Ups
Hear highlights from two supporter-only discussions: Allan Bloom on Nietzsche/Freud/etc. and Leo Strauss vs. Richard Rorty on liberal education and democracy.
17m Jul 07, 2018
17m
The Theory and Practice of Liberal Education (Part Two)
Continuing with the current St. John's College president on articles on liberal education by Jacob Klein (former Dean of SJC), Sidney Hook (critiquing the SJC program), and Martha Nussbaum (critiquing Allan Bloom). What's the practical application of a liberal education? Is it really liberating or indoctrinating? How can we justify learning for learning's sake in a world with so many problems ...
52m Jul 02, 2018
52m
The Theory and Practice of Liberal Education (Part One)
Dylan returns to St. John's College, Annapolis to bring its president into dialogue with the PEL clan about Jacob Klein's “The Idea of a Liberal Education” (1960) and “On Liberal Education” (1965), plus Sidney Hook’s “A Critical Appraisal of the St. John’s College Curriculum” (1946) and Martha Nussbaum’s “Undemocratic Vistas” (1987). Ep. 192 got us talking about a great-books-oriented educatio...
51m Jun 25, 2018
51m
NEM#76: Phil Manzanera's Impossible Guitar
Phil was a core member of Roxy Music through the '70s and early '80s, has released 10+ solo albums since 1975 and many collaborations—appearing on around 80 albums in total—with an experimental yet tasteful guitar that's sometimes mistaken for a keyboard or something else. We discuss "No Church in the Wild" from The Sound of Blue (2015), which is a cover of the song by Jay Z and Kanye West base...
1hr 12m Jun 24, 2018
1hr 12m
"The Closing of the American Mind": Allan Bloom on Great Books (Part Two)
Continuing on Allan Bloom's 1987 book critiquing the current fragmented structure of the university that promotes technical and professional education over the ability to think philosophically. Does Bloom's vision require aristocracy, or can a Great Books education be available for all? Bloom thinks we lack a shared culture and consequently a sense of the common good. He gives us a history of ...
1hr 11m Jun 18, 2018
1hr 11m
"The Closing of the American Mind": Allan Bloom on Education (Part One)
On Allan Bloom's 1987 best-seller about why students' disconnection from Great Books has led to relativism and ultimately nihilism. What is the role of the university in our democracy? Bloom relates from his many years' teaching the problem with kids today: They're subject to the evils that Tocqueville warned us go with American-style democracy: They're conformist, superficial, focused on the ...
53m Jun 11, 2018
53m
NEM#75: Nick Saloman (The Bevis Frond): Indie Every Day!
Nick has released 22 albums as The Bevis Frond since 1986, alternating jangle-pop with psychedelia and power-guitar rock… pretty much anything '60s-flavored. We discuss "Longships" from Example 22 (2015), "Opthalmic Microdots" from White Numbers (2013), and "Coming Round" from London Stone (1992). We conclude by listening to "Portobello Man" from Valedictory Songs (2000). Intro: “He’d Be a Diam...
1hr 5m Jun 08, 2018
1hr 5m
Conceptual Schemes: Donald Davidson & Rudolf Carnap (Part Two)
Finishing Davidson's "On the Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme" (1974) and moving on to Carnap's "Empiricism, Semantics, and Ontology" (1950). Carnap's paper comes 22 years after his Aufbau project that we covered in ep. 67, and is really a response to Quine's 1948 paper "On What There Is," which we covered in ep. 66. His point is that when we use a certain vocabulary, whether talking about phy...
1hr 10m Jun 04, 2018
1hr 10m
NEM#74: Colin Moulding (XTC) Kills and Scatters the Editor
As bassist/co-frontman for XTC, he released around 14 albums between 1978-2000, and for the first time since, he has a new release, the Great Aspirations EP now under the name TC&I. We discuss "Scatter Me" and "Kenny" from this 2017 release, plus "Say It" an 2002 XTC song, and conclude by listening to "Where Did the Ordinary People Go?" the final 2005 XTC single. Intro music: "Making Plans for ...
1hr 12m May 29, 2018
1hr 12m
Conceptual Schemes: Donald Davidson & Rudolf Carnap (Part One)
On Davidson's "On the Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme" (1974) and Carnap's "Empiricism, Semantics, and Ontology" (1950). What does it mean to say that we grasp the world through a conceptual scheme? Are schemes different between cultures or even individuals, such that we can't really understand each other? Davidson thinks that this doesn't make sense: For schemes to be really different and no...
56m May 28, 2018
56m
PREVIEWS-Ep 189: Authorial Intent (Part Three) Plus Identity Politics
Listen here to a few highlights from two recent discussions between Mark and Wes: We chase down some issues from ep. 189, relating authorial intent to philosophy of language more generally, then we have some preliminary discussion about the possibility of a future identity politics episode. Get the full discussions by becoming a PEL Citizen or $5/month Patreon supporter.
17m May 26, 2018
17m
NEM#73: David J Colors His Poetry
David J. Haskins gained fame with Bauhaus in the late 70s/early 80s, gained more fame with Love and Rockets, and has since 1983 released around ten albums plus several EPs and other collaborations. We discuss "The Auteur (Redux / Reprise)" a 2018 single (featuring Rose McGowan and Emily Jane White), "Vaudeville Ghost Light" from Carpe Noctem (2016), credited to M.C. Nightshade and the Theatre B...
1hr 7m May 21, 2018
1hr 7m
Film Analysis: "mother!"
On Darren Aronofsky's philosophical 2017 film about humanity's relationship to nature. We discuss the philosophical content of the film (Gnosticism, anyone?) and explore the relation between meaning and the sensuous aspects of an artwork. Can a work be both allegorical and yet have fully fleshed out characters and the other elements that make a film feel real? This was a very polarizing film; h...
1hr 28m May 21, 2018
1hr 28m
Authorial Intent (Barthes, Foucault, Beardsley, et al) (Part Two)
Continuing on "The Death of the Author" by Roland Barthes (1967) and "What Is an Author?" by Michel Foucault (1969), and finally getting to “Against Theory” by Steven Knapp and Walter Benn Michaels (1982). What could it mean to say that a text, once written, speaks itself, that it no longer really has an author? We get into the specific critiques Foucault has of the cult of the author and what...
1hr 19m May 14, 2018
1hr 19m
Authorial Intent (Barthes, Foucault, Beardsley, et al) (Part One)
On four essays about how to interpret artworks: “The Intentional Fallacy” by W. K. Wimsatt and Monroe Beardsley (1946), "The Death of the Author" by Roland Barthes (1967), "What Is an Author?" by Michel Foucault (1969), and “Against Theory” by Steven Knapp and Walter Benn Michaels (1982). When you're trying to figure out what, say, a poem means, isn't the best way to do that to just ask the au...
57m May 07, 2018
57m
NEM#72: Sarah McQuaid Kills Her Darlings
Sarah has recorded five solo albums since 1997, starting with traditional folk songs, sometimes guitar instrumentals, and now focusing on originals that mix British and American folk in a style influenced by Joni Mitchell among others. She has lately pared back her songwriting to ensure that every note counts. We discuss the title track and "The Silence Above Us" from If We Dig Any Deeper It Co...
54m Apr 30, 2018
54m
Discussing "Lysistrata" and Politics with Lucy and Emily (Part Two)
Concluding our discussion of Aristophanes's play with Lucy Lawless and Emily Perkins. We focus on trying to connect its lessons to the here and now: Is Lysistrata's victory properly described as the ascension of some kind of "feminine spirit" over warlike values, and how does that actually relate to women's struggles now to attain positions of power? Is sex helpful to the state or a threat? Do...
1hr Apr 30, 2018
1hr
Discussing "Lysistrata" and Politics with Lucy and Emily (Part One)
We are rejoined by actresses Lucy Lawless and Emily Perkins to discuss Aristophanes's bawdy play. Listen to us perform it first. Supplementary readings included Jeffery Henderson's introduction to his 1988 translation of the play; "Sexual Humor and Harmony in Lysistrata" by Jay M. Semel (1981); and "The 'Female Intruder' Reconsidered: Women in Aristophanes' Lysistrata and Ecclesiazusae" by Hele...
53m Apr 23, 2018
53m
NEM#71: Aaron David Gleason Is a Wry Observer
Aaron was born into show business, staring young in L.A. in the early 00's with All Hours, then went solo, moved to New York, became an actor, and has now released his first album in seven years, Wry Observer. We discuss the title track from that album plus "Brooklyn at Dawn" (the intro music is from that too: "The Last to Die in Battle"). Then we look back to "Box Office Stud" by All Hours (20...
51m Apr 16, 2018
51m
"Lysistrata" w/ Lucy Lawless, Emily Perkins, Erica Spyres, Bill Youmans & Aaron Gleason
The PEL Players return to perform Aristophanes's comedy (first performed in 411 BCE) about using a sex strike to stop war, using Jeffrey Henderson's 1988 translation. Mark (old men's chorus leader), Wes (old men's chorus and Athenian), Dylan (old men's chorus), and Seth (Spartan sentry) are joined once again by TV's Lucy Lawless (Xena Warrior Princess, Ash vs. Evil Dead, Spartacus, Battlestar ...
1hr 23m Apr 16, 2018
1hr 23m
PREVIEW-Episode 187: The Limits of Free Speech (Part Three)
Three substantial chunks of a follow-up conversation to our free speech episode. Mark and Wes discuss Jordan Peterson on speech, organizations' promoting certain speech (as opposed to restricting), insults vs. arguments, offense vs. harm, "incoherence" arguments like Fish's, fundamental principles in ethics, and more. Get the full discussion by becoming a PEL Citizen or Patreon supporter.
14m Apr 14, 2018
14m