Episode 21 - Addiction, Death, and Meditation

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We are all addicted to pop culture, and maybe pop culture gives us a series of little deaths that temporarily occupy consciousness so that we have less attention available for the things that we claim to believe would make our lives more meaningful. Hear Jamie Cullum’s, “All At Sea,” written by, yes, Jamie Cullum. Hear power pop music by Larry May, or listen to him on YouTube. To be alive is to be dying; to be dying is to be alive; and to recognize this is to be human. By all means, enjoy your ingestments.

Episode 20 - Nationalism: A Fallacy?

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What is a fallacy, and is nationalism one of them? With a lot of help from Yuval Noah Harari, MoFo addresses this issue. MoFo’s uncle Linus R. Fike addressed the topic in a book that was sitting on President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s desk at the time of his passing. Progress, not perfection . . . Kudos to a student who prompted the revisitation!

Episode 14 - Human Flourishing: Plato and Aristotle

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Episode 9 - Taking Notes, Listening to Lectures, and Other Unpopular Habits

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Descartes (1596-1650) is most famous for saying, “I think, therefore I am.” But he also had four “rules” for the right conduct of human understanding and progress, and these rules constituted his method. Guess what his fourth rule was? Take notes! Find out why. And then recommend this podcast to one friend who suffers from insomnia, or who lays claim to boredom.

Episode 8 - The Misery of Tyrants: Plato's Republic, Book IX

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“Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.” -Eleanor Roosevelt. MoFo allows Plato to fill his mental content and speak to us today about the psychological origins of tyranny. Written in 380 BCE, you the listener can judge the relevance of its psychological pronouncements for the twenty-first century.

Episode 7 - Bibliomania: For the Love of Books

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Middlemarch author George Eliot’s actual name was Mary Anne Evans (22 November 1819 - 22 December 1880). Here is MoFo’s Booklist.

Episode 6 - Human Beings as Value-Laden Spirits

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We are spiritual beings, but what is a spirit? Nothing ethereal, but rather, embodied - at least for now, and in the form of a human being. Beliefs, opinions, perceptions: these are all modes of conscious experience, but what about moods? They are, too. Allen Ginsberg recommends that you, “notice what you’re thinking.” MoFo did this while looking at a drainage spout at age 10, and again while out for a run back in 1998. What’s it like to regard yourself as “a spiritual being having a human experience”? For a dose of existential angst, check out Shirley Jackson’s, “The Lottery.”

Episode 3 - What the Fact, MoFo?!

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Facts, facts, facts . . . Is there any end to them? What is a fact? Are there alternative facts? What does that even mean? Why do people like facts, and what role do they play in civil society? Does it matter? Is all this as complicated as we make it sound sometimes, or is there a shortcut that can enable us to see facts as wonderful, and representative of a concept that is easily understood?

Hear “Seeing Double” sung and produced by Larry May, as sampled in this episode. See Justin McBrayer’s article, as alluded to in this episode. Read MoFo’s article, “Seattle is North of Portland” in Fike’s blog! Finally, check out the current world population (human-wise).

Sorry for the popping noises, Boo - I’m still learning.

Episode 2 - Human Flourishing, Aristotelian-Style

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“How are you? I’m good.” Why do we begin conversations this way? Are we all, as a species, striving to be good? Are we cooperative well-wishers, and is this a part of our biology? Aristotle thought he knew, and therapists seem to think that they do, too. Maybe it “takes an internet” to maximize human flourishing. So join the conversation!

[‘Casuistry’ was misspelled during the broadcast, and it means: the resolving of moral problems by application of theoretical rules to particular instances.]