We've met the ladies at the end of Odysseus' journey--though not, of course, the most important one. But now it's time for the main man to get re-acquainted with the fellas: his faithful wingman, his furry friend, and most of all, his long-lost son. In a moving series of reunion scenes, Odysseus learns that though he brought much of himself to war and back again, he also left much of himself at home--and the worst of his failures are not the last word. Plus: an update about the revival of higher...
Nov 06, 2024•1 hr•Ep. 213
If tomatoes are a fruit, why can't you put them in a fruit salad? Somewhat more importantly, did you know cashews aren't nuts? And most importantly of all, what does any of this have to do with the theory of translation? Today I'm responding to a question about the difference between technical, scientific terminology, and the words we use in everyday speech. Are these really the same language, even if they use the same vocabulary? The answer may surprise you, and affect the kinds of mixed nuts y...
Nov 01, 2024•31 min
We are truly on the home stretch now--folding up the frame story around Odysseus' adventures, we can see there are three women that walk beside him on his way back to Ithaca. Each of them, in her own way, must love him without holding on to him, as he goes through the painful process of recovering who he is after all the accretions of war and wandering have been stripped away. It's an epic drama but also, in some deeply essential way, the story of all of us. Register for Spring courses at The An...
Oct 30, 2024•1 hr 2 min
We're so back, folks--it's Words, Words, Words, our series on translation! Election or no, we stay translating Homer. This time I've taken one of the passages from our Odyssey walkthrough--the summoning of the dead in Book 11--and compared versions from the 1700s to today. What sorts of compromises do translators have to make, and how well have different translators (including me) made them? We'll answer those questions while reading Homer a bunch, which honestly is just always good for the soul...
Oct 25, 2024•40 min
We're nearing the last leg of Odysseus' journey, and he's really caught between a rock and a hard place. Between the devil and the deep blue sea. Between...well, between Scylla and Charybdis. After a dramatic turning point among the dead, Odysseus is now faced with what he says is the saddest and most pitiable horror he has ever seen on all his suffering journeys across the sea. What is it--and would you have chosen differently? Register for Spring courses at The Ancient Language Institute https...
Oct 22, 2024•1 hr 1 min
It's been just under a week since my new book, Light of the Mind, Light of the World was released. In that time, I've been privileged to have a whole array of wonderful conversations about the book and its themes. One of the most stimulating, wide-ranging, and enjoyable of those was with the UCSD physicist Brian Keating, who asked well-framed and fascinating questions about the reconciliation of science and faith. If you haven't already, you really should subscribe to Dr. Keating's own podcast, ...
Oct 21, 2024•1 hr 34 min
I was startled when I walked into my living room today to find Andrew Klavan (no relation) sitting in my chair! But while he's in town I thought we might as well talk about his new book, A Woman Underground , the latest in the Cameron Winter series. It's a detective story that's at once gripping and intellectually fascinating, so we explored some of the influences and themes that make this book an essential read for our times. As it turns out, we've taken two very different approaches to one ide...
Oct 18, 2024•35 min
It's about time for our Halowe'en special--and as luck would have it, I can think of no more chilling or eerie storie than the one we have to tell today. It's Odysseus' meeting with the shadows of the dead in the Odyssey Book 11. In it, both Odysseus and Homer must confront the ultimate existential crisis and grapple with the possibility that life itself ends in nothing but worm food. So why go on living? It's a painful question, but one a hero must face to make his way out the other side of dea...
Oct 15, 2024•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 210
Who doesn't love a free sample? This week, to change it up, I'm offering a sneek peak behind the paywall at rejoiceevermore.substack.com, where I've been creating an audiobook of John Milton's epic Paradise Lost . Hard to believe it's almost done! But to entice you to join, and to solicit suggestions for what to record next, here's the latest installment, in which Adam--newly expelled from Paradise--gets a glimpse of what will come in the wake of sin. SIGNUPS OPEN: Register for Spring courses at...
Oct 12, 2024•35 min
Life is very hard for Odysseus. He's lost comrades to war and to people-eaters of both the one- and two-eyed varieties. He's far from home, wandering at sea, and now, after all that...he has to go to bed with a beautiful goddess. Please bow your heads in a moment of silence. Truly, though, the island of Aeaea, where Circe the witch lives, does represent a major trial that Odysseus must go through to make his way back into civilization. But it's not he kind of trial we'd imagine today, when Chris...
Oct 08, 2024•58 min•Ep. 209
Translation should be impossible--but it works. Does that prove there's such a thing as universal, objective reality? For that matter, what would "objective" reality even mean? This week, thanks to a listener question, I'm lead to the heart of these ancient mysteries via Aristotle, Kant and...Kanye West? Plus: the Light of the Mind book tour begins! Guess where I am this week... SIGNUPS OPEN: Register for Spring courses at The Ancient Language Institute https://ancientlanguage.com/youngheretics/...
Oct 04, 2024•34 min
Ah, the state of nature: a peaceful utopia where each man is free to live off his own vineyards, sit under his own fig tree, and eat people alive. Wait--what?? In Book 9 of the Odyssey, Homer gives us a diabolical bait-and-switch, from the pure serenity of primitive life to the gruesome horrors of a world without law. It's the perfect antidote to the wishful thinking that might set in around election time, when all we want is to get away from politics: if you can believe it, the alternatives mig...
Oct 01, 2024•1 hr 1 min
Let's pick up where we left off last week: words are symbols of symbols, representing inward states of the soul. But those inward states are also symbols, because the world is symbolic--that is, it naturally produces symbols as a real feature of its construction. So...what do we do about it? To answer that question we turn to Thomas Aquinas, whose little book De Natura Verbi Intellectus tells you everything you need to know about Adam naming the animals, and probably also about quantum superposi...
Sep 27, 2024•33 min
The Odyssey begins with a big empty space where Odysseus should be. His home, his familiy, his household are all suffering for want of him. But where is he--and more importantly, who is he? That's the poem again and again and today, we begin trying to answer it. If there's one thing everyone remembers from this poem it's the adventure stories in the middle: the Cyclops, Circe, the Lotus Eaters. We embark on those stories now, beginning with the moment when Odysseus finally chooses to reveal his ...
Sep 24, 2024•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 207
If a tree falls in the forest...does it make a sound? There's actually a great answer to that question, and Aristotle just tweeted it out way back when. Today, in response to a listener question, I finally lay it all on the line and tell you my nuts-and-bolts theory of translation, which is also a theory of the world. It's basically Aristotle, with some Thomas Aquinas mixed in: the mysteries of the soul are inscribed all over with the hieroglyphs of the body, and symbols are the rosetta stone th...
Sep 20, 2024•32 min
Let's check in on how Odysseus' other buddies from Troy are doing. *Briefly scans news report from Proteus* Yeah so uh it's a dumpster fire. Today Telemachus arrives at Troy, where he hears from Menelaus about his own fraught journey home, including his encounter with an immortal seal dad (real) which led to the first news of Odysseus in years. It won't bring him home but it will bring his son hope, which might be just what he needs to fill the void that has opened up since Odysseus left. SIGNUP...
Sep 17, 2024•1 hr 3 min•Ep. 206
The name "Rosetta Stone" has great brand recognition, but how much do you really know about Ptolemy V's royal decree? When you get right down to it, it's one of the wildest little corners of world history, stretching from the conquests of Alexander the Great to the defeat of Napoleon, with lots of bonkers facts in between. Plus it'll help us uncover more about the nature of language, logic, and humanity itself. Not bad for a hunk of rock! Check out our sponsor, the Ancient Language Institute (no...
Sep 13, 2024•32 min
The Odyssey is a very different poem from the Iliad in many ways, but in one way it picks up right where the Iliad leaves off: with the fallout of war and the journey to re-integrate soldiers back into the civil society they came from. Today we begin Odysseus' long journey home, which actually begins at the end and works backward, starting with his son Telemachus' journey to grow to manhod without his dad around. Pre-order my new book, Light of the Mind, Light of the World: https://a.co/d/2QccOf...
Sep 10, 2024•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 205
Is prophecy a species of translation, or encryption, or both? This fascinating question, prompted by last week's episode on quantum cryptography, breaks down into two different sub-questions: how do prophets receive and communicate their messages, and how should we understand them? There are lots of ways to go wrong here--think doomsday cults--but also some fascinating ways to go right that help reveal the nature of language, scripture, and history. Plus: an illustration of the four traditional ...
Sep 06, 2024•34 min
Fall is in the air, which means the time has come for us to close out our study of the Iliad . From book 16 to the end in book 24, the poem engages in what remains one of the most enduring subtle studies of rage, war, grief, and even PTSD that the human mind has ever produced. It shows us the roots of all tragedy in our own lives and throughout history, leaving the stage set for a new adventure in the Odyssey . Which we'll pick up next week! Pre-order my new book, Light of the Mind, Light of the...
Sep 03, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 204
Ifmmp! After months spent explaining how communicating works in different languages, I've gotten a question about now not communicating works, in any language. Turns out the answer will take us through ancient mysticism, the invention of computers, and the technology behind Bitcoin...all in 30 minutes! At the end of it all, a tl;dr on what we should think about the race to build bigger faster quantum systems to make and break codes in our age of AI and machine-generated poetry. Check out our spo...
Aug 30, 2024•37 min
If I were making a movie of the Iliad (a good one, not the Brad Pitt version of Troy ), there's no question the trailer would have to include today's central scene: Hector and Andromache on the wall. This is the money shot that reveals the poem in its full greatness, honest and sober about the realities of war but capable of mourning with those who suffer defeat. The Trojans might be the most interesting part of the poem, especially for what they reveal about the problems of polytheism and the c...
Aug 27, 2024•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 203
"A word is a kind of painting of which the subject is a thought," wrote Nicolas Beauzée. Even an Enlightenement Frenchman is right twice a day. But where does that leave the written word--as a picture of a picture of a thought? Yes, I argue in this episode, and there's profundity in that which goes far beyond the history of alphabets--though that is, in its own right, exceptionally cool too. It's all here in the latest words, words, words. Dear English Language: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z...
Aug 24, 2024•32 min
The cotton gin, the railroad, the printing press, the internet...there are plenty of candidates for the world's biggest tech revolution, but the biggest one might be one we've never even thought about before. And it has to do with how we process language, so naturally...I'm obsessed. PLUS: in a very special announcement, all my listeners are invited to join me at New College Florida this fall semester for an online course on Greek literature! Link below. Class is in session: https://www.ncf.edu/...
Aug 22, 2024•32 min
And we're off to the races! The Iliad begins in earnest this week with the outbreak of the feud between Achilles and Agammemnon (#TeamAchilles). The drama that unfolds contains almost the entirety of all that was to come in Greek culture, from the terror of hubris to the magnificent achievement of city-states in coalition. Plus: stick around to the end for a bunch of very cool announcements. Trump the Sandworm: https://x.com/Babygravy9/status/1823830496872136776 Sign up to Audit my Class: ncf.ed...
Aug 20, 2024•58 min•Ep. 202
Is the Iliad just a cautionary tale about toxic masculinity? Or is there something deeper at work in Achilles' murderous rage? To really understand the poem, you have to understand--and internalize--what it means to live in an honor culture, and to seek justice in a universe that makes no guarantees. After listening to this episode you can understand the story of the poem as it was meant to be understood, rather than letting petty modern ideologues set the terms of interpretation. Check out our ...
Aug 13, 2024•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 201
What a time to be alive. New Euripides just dropped! Results are pouring in not only from the AI project that's unearthing new passages from the charred scrolls of Herculaneum, but also from the good old-fashioned method of leafing through mounds of old scrolls. Some of it is directly related to everything we've been talking about in Homer and the mythic cycle. It's the only Young Heretics news that's fit to break. Check out our sponsor, the Ancient Language Institute (now offering Old English i...
Aug 09, 2024•27 min
The game is on, Helen is abducted, and now it's time to gather the Greeks for war. There are lots of stories about how the Achaean forces made their way to Troy, and some of them--like the story of the Achilles heel--are permanently associated in the popular imagination with Homer's stories. But how many of them are actually in the Iliad ? And what's Homer doing by making this version of Achilles the central focus of his story? This week we sift through the myths to get to know the man, and what...
Aug 06, 2024•1 hr•Ep. 200
Time's up! I gave you a weekend extension on the first-ever Young Heretics homework assignment, but now it's time to review some of the responses that came in. From a purely grammatical perspective, it turns out to be one of the most fascinating sentences in the English language, and the grammar actually has a little bit to say about the theology of the thing, too. As if you guys needed another reason to nerd out with me about words. Check out our sponsor, the Ancient Language Institute (now off...
Aug 05, 2024•29 min
Stop me if you've heard this one: guy walks into a bar...and his head is an orange. If you know, you know. If you don't know, let me tell you how my favorite joke is also a perfect foil for the story that started it all in the Homeric universe, the Judgment of Paris. In hindsight it's pretty clear that Paris could have navigated the situation a little better, but...if you'da been there...if you'da seen it...how sure are you that you wouldn't have done the same? Check out our sponsor, the Ancient...
Jul 30, 2024•57 min•Ep. 199
