We finish our treatment of Capital , Ch. 1, covering the little bit that Marx says about actual communism (he was wary of utopianism, contra his reputation), and think through a number of related practical problems. We introduce "Fragment on Machines" (1858). Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsor: Get a $1/month e-commerce trial at shopify.com/pel....
Feb 17, 2025•48 min
Continuing on Capital , Ch. 1 on commodities. We go into detail on his account of how money gets derived from the continued comparison of various commodities, how use value comes back into play when we compare the economic value of one commodity as compared to another, and finally, the details of commodity fetishism. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsors: Get a $1/month e-commerce trial at sh...
Feb 10, 2025•51 min
On Capital (1867), Ch. 1, "The Commodity." What makes something we buy or sell valuable? Marx says it's ultimately the labor that goes into it, though there are some wrinkles in formulating this accurately, and the commodities and surrounding marketplace activity blind us to labor's role and its ethical import. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsor: You may also the Fallacious Trump podcast at...
Feb 03, 2025•48 min
Mark and Wes read through and discuss Karl Marx's The German Ideology (1846), delving deep into the middle of his critique of Max Stirner's The Ego and Its Own . Marx articulates and criticizes Stirner's attempt to distinguish the mere common egoism of an unthinking person from the enlightened egoism that Stirner is recommending. Read along with us , starting on p. 259 (PDF p. 255). Sign up to support Closereads at patreon.com/closereadsphilosophy to get future parts of this discussion plus lots...
Feb 01, 2025•1 hr
We continue on the introduction to Marx's Grundrisse , going through his criticisms of prior economists who were too ahistorical and didn't understand how production, consumption, distribution and exchange hang together as a single system. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsor: Learn about St. John's College at sjc.edu/pel ....
Jan 27, 2025•52 min
On the intro to Marx's Grundrisse (1857) and "Theses on Feuerbach" (1845). Why economics, and why do it the way Marx does? We see Marx argues that Feuerbach's materialism was not materialistic enough, start looking at production, consumption, distribution, and exchange as moments within a single process, and talk about why anyone would want to read a historical economic text. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus...
Jan 20, 2025•49 min
Continuing on The Ego and Its Own , focusing now on the sections "The Owner" and "My Power." Stirner lets us know that his egoism ("ownness") is not compatible with liberal egalitarianism, which he sees as just a continuation of the Christian project of perfecting humanity. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsor: Learn about St. John's College at sjc.edu/pel ....
Jan 13, 2025•42 min
On The Ego and its Own (1844), another big influence on Karl Marx and a precursor of Nietzsche, or perhaps an early Ayn Rand. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsor : Have up to a $100 donation to effective charities matched at GiveWell.org ....
Jan 06, 2025•49 min
Mark, Wes, Seth, and Dylan reflect on our past year of PEL recording, catch you up on our habits and interests, and talk about what might come next. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to this and every recording ad-free, plus numerous Nightcaps and many hours of other bonus content. Learn about Mark's spring Core Texts in philosophy class at partiallyexaminedlife.com/class....
Dec 30, 2024•1 hr 8 min
We finally discuss Feuerbach's proposed post-Hegelian, materialist approach to philosophy in his "Principles of the Philosophy of the Future" (1843). How can a materialist framework support phenomena central to F's account like our immediate, indubitable recognition of our selves, each other, and love itself? Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion, including a supporter-exclusive part three to this disc...
Dec 23, 2024•53 min
Mark, Wes, and Dylan continue to look at Ludwig Feuerbach's "Principles of the Philosophy of the Future" (1843), recounting his story about how increasingly mature notions of God should lead philosophy eventually to a materialism where the sensual is the real. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsors: Have up to a $100 donation to effective charities matched at GiveWell.org . Check out the Const...
Dec 16, 2024•49 min
We dig in and start our detailed treatment of Ludwig Feuerbach's essay "Principles of the Philosophy of the Future" (1843). Feuerbach claims that people don't realize that the entity they worship is really just whatever it is about humanity and the world that we value, wrongly posited as an independent entity. So God is a mirror for any given society. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsors: Ha...
Dec 09, 2024•52 min
On Ludwig Feuerbach's "Principles of the Philosophy of the Future" (1843) and the introduction to The Essence of Christianity (1841). What was the original point of religion? Can we retain what was emotionally good about it yet direct our efforts to purely practical matters? Feuerbach says yes, and this was a key influence on Marx. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsors: Have up to a $100 dona...
Dec 02, 2024•51 min
Continuing on "Estranged Labor," "Private Property and Communism," and "The Power of Money on Bourgeois Society" with guest Lawrence Dallman. Does capitalism give rise to alienation, or is it alienation that is responsible for capitalism? Does a person (capitalist) have to be responsible for someone's alienation? What would we be like unalienated? Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion, including a supp...
Nov 25, 2024•50 min
On three of Karl Marx's Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, "Estranged Labor," "Private Property and Communism," and "The Power of Money on Bourgeois Society." Featuring guest Lawrence Dallman. What is the plight of the working poor? It's that they are in an unnatural situation with regard to their work, which is supposed to gain them a sense of self but doesn't do so when it's a result of selling one's time. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/suppo...
Nov 18, 2024•39 min
Mark, Wes, and Seth talk about horror media and what scares us in light of Halloween. We then give some follow-up discussion re. our Williamson and Chappell interviews. Do we actually want to participate in Williamson's science-minded analytic philosophy of the future? Were we too one-sided in our trans coverage? We respond to an email about our trans episode. If you're not hearing the full version of this discussion , sign up via one of the options described at partiallyexaminedlife.com/support...
Nov 17, 2024•10 min
We continue talking with Tim about Overfitting and Heuristics in Philosophy (2024), considering Tim's overall project and view of what philosophy should be doing and with what tools. We get into modeling, ethics, public philosophy, and more. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion, including a supporter-exclusive PEL Nightcap further reflecting on this episode. Sponsor: Apply for convenient term life ins...
Nov 11, 2024•41 min
Oxford philosophy professor Timothy Williamson talks to us about his new book, Overfitting and Heuristics in Philosophy . How can we best apply the insights of philosophy of science to philosophy itself? Maybe some alleged philosophical counter-examples are just the result of psychological heuristics gone wrong. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsor: Get a $1/month e-commerce trial at shopify....
Nov 04, 2024•43 min
Concluding our treatment of "Of Seeing" in Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense . We continue to hammer at this idea of "resemblance" between mental contents and physical objects, consider more carefully Reid's level of support for the primary/secondary quality distinction, how he treats non-signifying feelings like pain and warmth, and his comparison of sense experience to testimony. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ...
Oct 28, 2024•48 min
We're continuing our treatment of Thomas Reid's Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense (1764), now discussing ch. 6: "Of Seeing." Does vision provide the exception to Reid's point that our sensations do not resemble objects in the world? Images surely seem to do so! What does this mean for Reid's epistemology? Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and tons of bonus discussion. Sponsor: Apply for convenient t...
Oct 21, 2024•49 min
Continuing on Inquiry into the Human Mind , getting further into the chapter on smelling as well as the conclusion and Reid's exchange with Hume. What exactly is our relation with objects in the world according to Reid? Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and bonus content....
Oct 14, 2024•49 min
On Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense (1764): the introduction, conclusion, ch. 2 "Of Smelling" ch. 4 "Of Hearing," and some correspondence between Reid and Hume. According to Reid, the big mistake of "modern" philosophy is thinking that objects in the world need to resemble the sensations we have of them. Smelling is supposed to give us an obvious counter-example: the scent of a rose in no way resembles a physical rose. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit pa...
Oct 07, 2024•55 min
Mark, Seth and Dylan continue talking about philosophy surrounding trans phenomena in light of our interview with Sophie Grace about Trans Figured . In this supporter-exclusive discussion, we get into sex and gender as cluster concepts, ethical theory in equity discussions, and the practical matters you'd expect: sports participation, pronouns, bathrooms and dress codes. If you're not hearing the full version of this part of the discussion , sign up via one of the options described at partiallye...
Oct 05, 2024•14 min
Mark, Seth, and Dylan interview this British philosophy prof about her new book, Trans Figured, and philosophy's role in discussing the phenomena of transgender (which, yes, can be used as a noun, according to Sophie). Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Part two of this episode (with just the PEL guys) will only be available to PEL supporters. Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get this along with our massive package of ad-free episodes and bonus content. Sponsors: Apply for conveni...
Sep 30, 2024•53 min
Concluding on "Universality and Truth" from Richard Rorty's Pragmatism As Anti-Authoritarianism . It it coherent to simply not have a theory of truth? Rorty claims that he's not a relativist; he's just avoiding some useless parts of philosophy that just cause problems, including inculcating the respect for a non-human absolute, and this attitude undermines democracy. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and bonus content. Sponsor...
Sep 23, 2024•52 min
On "Universality and Truth" and "Pan-Relationalism," which are lectures 3-5 in Richard Rorty's Pragmatism As Anti-Authoritarianism . How do we justify democracy? Rorty says we don't have to refer to transcendent Truth or Good to do this. He also denies the disinction between essential and accidental properties, and in fact between substance and property: Everything is just described in terms of its relations to other things, and which relations are important are not intrinsic to the thing, but a...
Sep 16, 2024•51 min
Continuing on Richard Rorty's Pragmatism As Anti-Authoritarianism , ch. 1, "Pragmatism and Religion" and 2, "Pragmatism as Romantic Polytheism." Rorty evaluates past pragmatists' approaches to religion, arguing contra James that it can't be "privatized," that democratic social goals involve shared rationality, which means that all of our beliefs are open to the judgment of our peers. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and bonus...
Sep 09, 2024•51 min
We begin a long series on Maurice Merleau-Ponty's "Phenomenology of Perception" (1945), focusing on Part I, "The Body": "Experience and Objective Thought." To get the whole recording , you can become a PEL Citizen , or simply go subscribe to the Closereads: Philosophy with Mark and Wes podcast at closereadsphilosophy.com . You can also watch the proceedings on YouTube . To get future parts of our treatment of this text, you'll need to support Closereads, either at patreon.com/closereadsphilosoph...
Sep 06, 2024•15 min
On Richard Rorty's Pragmatism As Anti-Authoritarianism (1997), ch. 1-2 about religion. Should democracy be defended on absolutist grounds, e.g. by reference to God-given or natural rights, the nature of Man, or the dictates of Reason? Rorty says no! Democracy, ethics, and even truth itself are a matter for societies to decide for themselves. Monotheistic religion provides a negative model for ceding authority on these matters no something non-human. Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit ...
Sep 02, 2024•47 min
Continuing on "Knowledge First Epistemology" (2011), "Justifications, Excuses, and Sceptical Scenarios" (2015), and "Morally Loaded Cases in Philosophy" (2019). How does knowledge-first epistemology relate to reliabilism? What are its moral implications? Does W. have a good argument against relativism and skepticism? Get more at partiallyexaminedlife.com . Visit partiallyexaminedlife.com/support to get ad-free episodes and bonus content....
Aug 26, 2024•51 min
