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Coming Up on Philosophy Talk

The Allure of Authoritarianism

In George Orwell’s 1984, the party’s “final, most essential command” was “to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears.” Authoritarian regimes call on us to accept as fact whatever they tell us; or worse, as Hannah Arendt says, they get u

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15 May 2022

J.S. Mill and the Good Life

John Stuart Mill was one of the most important British philosophers of the 19th century. As a liberal, he thought that individuals are generally the...
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This Month’s Playlist

Great Jewish Thinkers

May is Jewish American Heritage Month, so in acknowledgement our first live taping in over two years will be on the topic of Antisemitism. For this month's playlist, we've also put together a number of episodes from the archive featuring prominent Jewish thinkers like Hannah Arendt, Walter Benjamin, Baruch Spinoza, and Sigmund Freud, in addition to a vintage episode on Jewish Philosophy.

The Blog @ Philosophers' Corner

22 April 2022

Kant's Guide to Morality

Can you reason your way into being a good person? Or are your feelings a better guide for doing the right thing? This week we’re thinking about German enlightenment philosopher Immanuel Kant and his view of a universal morality based on reason.
08 April 2022

The Staying Power of Poetry

I was delighted when Louise Glück, one of the great poets of our age, won the Nobel Prize in Literature. I wrote about one of my all-time favorite poems, "Ithaca," for this week's episode, "Why Poetry Matters," with Louise as guest!
18 March 2022

Mourning a Lost Culture

When we are grieving, is it a good idea or a bad idea to engage with art that takes grief to be its subject? Does this help us to cope, or does it rip out whatever stitches we have managed to sew in while we try to bear an unbearable loss?

Upcoming Shows

29 May 2022

The Scandalous Truth about Memoir

A memoir is a personal narrative written about a pivotal time in the author’s life. While the story is told from a particular perspective, the events...

05 June 2022

Conscious Machines

Computers have already surpassed us in their ability to perform certain cognitive tasks. Perhaps it won’t be long till every household has a super...

12 June 2022

The Changing Face of Antisemitism

Antisemitism is an old problem with roots that reach back to medieval Europe. While earlier forms focused more on religious bigotry, antisemitism in...

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Recent Shows

08 May 2022

What Is Ideology?

Political polarization seems to be deepening, both in the U.S. and around the globe. Some believe that the rise of ideology is to blame for growing...

01 May 2022

Sanctuary Cities

In the U.S. there are over 500 sanctuary cities—municipalities that limit their cooperation with the federal government’s immigration law enforcement...

24 April 2022

Explanation At Its Best

In science as well as everyday life, we often feel the pull of simpler, more elegant, or more beautiful explanations. For example, you notice the...

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Featured Shows

Identity Politics

09 March 2015
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Edward Snowden and the Ethics of Whistleblowing

12 October 2016
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Democracy in Crisis

12 October 2016
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Separation of Powers

12 October 2016
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About Us

Philosophy Talk celebrates the value of the examined life. Each week, our philosophers invite you to join them in conversation on a wide variety of issues ranging from popular culture to our most deeply-held beliefs about science, morality, and the human condition. Philosophy Talk challenges listeners to identify and question their assumptions and to think about things in new ways. We are dedicated to reasoned conversation driven by human curiosity. Philosophy Talk is accessible, intellectually stimulating, and most of all, fun!

Philosophy Talk is produced by KALW on behalf of Stanford University, as part of its Public Humanities Initiative.

 

 

The Team

Philosophy Talk celebrates the value of the examined life.

John Perry

Co-founder and Co-host

John Perry is the Henry Waldgrave Stuart Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Stanford University, and a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at University of California Riverside. He is author of over 100 articles and books on the philosophy of language and the philosophy of mind. He received a Jean Nicod Prize (France), a Humboldt Prize (Germany), and a Guggenheim Fellowship. In 1983, he co-founded Stanford's Center for the Study of Language and Information (CSLI) and served as its director. He also wrote the internet’s most popular essay on procrastination.

Ken Taylor

Co-founder and Co-host

Ken Taylor (1954-2019) was the co-founder of Philosophy Talk and its co-host for almost fifteen years. He was the Henry Waldgrave Stuart Professor of Philosophy at Stanford University and director of Stanford's interdisciplinary program in Symbolic Systems. His work lies at the intersection of the philosophy of language and the philosophy of mind, with an occasional foray into the history of philosophy. He is the author of many books and articles, including Truth and Meaning, Reference and the Rational Mind, and Referring to the World. 

Josh Landy

Co-host

Josh Landy is the Andrew B. Hammond Professor of French, Professor of Comparative Literature, and co-director of the Literature and Philosophy Initiative at Stanford University. He joined the Philosophy Talk team as co-host in 2017 when John Perry retired from the show. Among many other publications, he is the author of Philosophy as Fiction: Self, Deception, and Knowledge in Proust and How to Do Things with Fictions. He is currently writing a second book on Proust for Oxford’s Very Short Introductions series.

Ray Briggs

Co-host

Ray Briggs is a Professor of Philosophy at Stanford University. Their research explores how formal models can help us reason better about practical and theoretical matters; they are particularly interested in decision theory, measurement theory, and the philosophy of probability. In addition to over 20 philosophy articles, Ray has published two poetry collections and been nominated for a Pushcart.

Debra Satz

Co-host

Debra Satz is the Marta Sutton Weeks Professor of Ethics in Society at Stanford University and dean of the School of Humanities and Sciences. She is a political philosopher whose work addresses contemporary public policy debates. In addition to authoring many articles and co-editing books, she is the author of Why Some Things Should Not be for Sale: The Moral Limits of Markets and co-author of Economic Analysis, Moral Philosophy and Public Policy.

Laura Maguire

Director of Research

Laura Maguire is Philosophy Talk's Director of Research, editor-in-chief of Philosophers' Corner, and an occassional co-host. She hails from Dublin, Ireland, but has called the Bay Area home for decades. After graduating with distinction at Trinity College Dublin, she earned her PhD in Philosophy at Stanford University. She has taught in Stanford's Philosophy Department, Introduction to the Humanities program, and Structured Liberal Education program.

Devon Strolovitch

Senior Producer

Born and raised in Montreal, Devon studied medieval Judeo-Portuguese manuscripts and earned a PhD in Linguistics from Cornell University before pursuing radio professionally. Since then he has been the primary studio producer for Philosophy Talk, while also contributing as a writer, editor, occasional Roving Philosophical Reporter, and manager of the program's day-to-day operations.

Merle Kessler

Sixty-Second Philosopher

Merle Kessler is a writer, humorist, and performer, best known perhaps by his pen name, Ian Shoales. As Ian Shoales he has been churning out cranky yet strangely humorous commentaries since 1979. First heard on NPR's All Things Considered, he has been featured on Morning Edition, ABC's Nightline, and the online magazine, Salon. In addition, his pieces have been published in the New York Times, LA Times, the San Francisco Examiner, USA Today, the Washington Post, and the Minneapolis Tribune, among other publications.

Holly McDede

Roving Philosophical Reporter

Holly J. McDede is the criminal justice reporter for KALW public radio in San Francisco. She studied Creative Writing and Literature at the University of East Anglia in Norfolk, England, where she wrote her dissertation on Don Quixote and a radio drama about public radio. She also works as an editor and producer at KCBS radio, sometimes very late at night when it’s difficult not to ponder life’s existential questions.

David Livingstone Smith

Featured Contributor

David Livingstone Smith is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of New England in Biddeford, Maine. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of London, Kings College, where he worked on Freud’s philosophy of mind and psychology. His current research is focused on dehumanization, race, propaganda, and related topics.

Neil Van Leeuwen

Featured Contributor

Neil Van Leeuwen is an empirically-oriented philosopher of mind at Georgia State University. He did his graduate work at Oxford University, where he studied classics, and at Stanford University, where he studied philosophy. Prior to his appointment at Georgia State, he held postdoctoral fellowships at Rutgers University and Tufts University. He has also taught at University of Johannesburg, where he has an ongoing appointment as Senior Fellow.

Antonia Peacocke

Featured Contributor

Antonia Peacocke is currently a Bersoff Faculty Fellow in the Philosophy Department at New York University and is looking forward to joining the Philosophy Department at Stanford in 2019 as an Assistant Professor. She writes about philosophy of mind, epistemology, metaphysics, and aesthetics—especially as they relate to literature and poetry. Recently she has written about special first-personal knowledge, the nature of aesthetic value, and how mental actions can have several contents at once. She writes short stories as well as philosophy.

“We are what we repeatedly do. Greatness then, is not an act, but a habit” ― Aristotle

“Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisioned by the enemy, don't we consider it his duty to escape?. . .If we value the freedom of mind and soul, if we're partisans of liberty, then it's our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can!” ― J.R.R. Tolkien

“Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the thinks you can think up if only you try!” ― Dr. Seuss

“Wise men speak because they have something to say; fools because they have to say something.” ― Plato

“Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right.” ― Isaac Asimov, Foundation

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