Announcement: special podcast
Punk, Philosophy,
and My LIfe:
An Interview with
Jack Russell Weinstein
Listen on Jughaed’s Basement
WELCOME JUGHEAD’S LISTENERS
We’re glad to have you.
Please explore our two archives.
Why? Radio has eighteen years of Jack interviewing other people
Philosophical Currents has five years of people interviewing Jack
Here are four episodes we think you’ll enjoy:
The latest episode of WHY? Radio
“What are the ethical costs of upward mobility?” with guest Jennifer M. Morton
Most of us strive for a better life. We want to have more money, more opportunities, and more recognition. We want to find new and exciting places to live. But what and who do we leave behind when we pursue better lives? On this episode, we ask these questions. We explore how our identity changes as our communities do and the responsibilities we have to help others after we succeed. The discussion also examines ways to tell our own stories more authentically, in line with our own values.
Jennifer M. Morton is the Presidential Penn Compact Professor of Philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania and a member of the Graduate School of Education. She is also senior fellow at the Center for Ethics and Education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is the author of Moving Up Without Losing Your Way: The Ethical Costs of Upward Mobility published by Princeton University Press.
This month’s discussion of current events:
What Makes A Nation a Nation?
Craig and Jack explore the ideas behind national identity and the difference between patriotism and nationalism. They also discuss generational conflict and the duty to help others around the world.
Read the Latest Article on our Blog,
PQED: Philosophical Questions Every Day
“what is empathy for?”
The battle over empathy is more than just politics. It’s actually about nihilism, masculinity, and the stability of the American republic.
Empathy makes you weak. This is a message that Charlie Kirk is supposed to have communicated to his millions of followers. Interestingly, he never actually said this; Elon Musk is the one who did. In an interview on the Joe Rogan Experience, Musk remarked that “The fundamental weakness of Western civilization is empathy. The empathy exploit. They’re exploiting a bug in Western civilization, which is the empathy response.” You should care about other people, he reluctantly concedes, but then he doubles down: “there’s so much empathy that you actually suicide yourself.”
Kirk’s comments about empathy are different but more extreme. Criticizing Bill Clinton, he opines: “I can’t stand the word empathy, actually. I think empathy is a made-up, new age term that—it does a lot of damage.” Kirk also looks like he will concede his point by admitting that some people should, at times, feel sympathy for others, but he waves that conversation away. He is assuming that the distinction between empathy and sympathy is both clear and significant. It is not.
Read the new (fREE) Book from Why? Radio Host
Jack Russell Weinstein
israel, Palestine, and the trolley problem
On the futility of the search for the moral high ground
Arguments about Israel and Palestine are almost always accusatory and polemical. Rather than learning from one another, opponents jockey for the moral high ground trying to find that one attack they believe proves their side to be completely on the right, without compromise. This means Israel’s advocates dismiss Palestinian land claims without due consideration and Pro-Palestinian voices falsely accuse Israel of the most heinous modern crimes: colonialism, genocide, and apartheid. None of this is productive or healthy.
In Israel, Palestine, and the Trolley Problem: On the Futility of the Search for the Moral High Ground, philosopher Jack Russell Weinstein interweaves philosophy, history, politics, and personal experience to expose the argumentative mistakes we all make too often. Mapping out moral psychology—how we actually make moral decisions—and using the famous Trolley Problem as a metaphor, Weinstein paves the way for a new, more empathetic exchange of ideas about today’s most puzzling moral dilemma: how to find peace in the Middle East.
Jack Russell Weinstein is Chester Fritz Distinguished Professor and Director of the Institute for Philosophy in Public Life at the University of North Dakota. He is also the host of the public radio show/podcast Why? Philosophical Discussions About Everyday Life.
Available for free to download as a PDF.
Click here.
Available as a paperback at Amazon.com:
click here
Join us monthly:
WHY? Radio Senior Citizens’ PHILOSOPHY discussion group
CHECK OUT OUR VIDEOS:
We have switched our video hosting to Vimeo.
Please update your links.
YouTube has deleted our account. We don’t know why. We’ve received no notice or justification, and no one in customer service will engage with us (there’s no phone number to call). We have copies of most of our videos, but thirteen years of followers, likes, and data are now gone, not to mention the thousands of links from websites around the world that are now dead. There’s nothing we can do about it. There’s no way to recover what we lost. It’s both devastating and frustrating. We are helpless in the face of the uncaring juggernaut that is Google. Kafka would be proud.
It will take a while to populate it, but if a particular video you want is missing, email us and we’ll get it up as soon as we can. We apologize for any inconvenience and dead links on your sites.
You are invited to participate in a wide range of philosophical activities, from asking questions of some of the world’s most thoughtful people on our radio show and podcast, to sitting in a coffee shop with a dozen intellectually curious octogenarians. Read our blog and our magazine, or learn why philosophy is a great major with employable graduates.
Please explore our site and enjoy. We welcome all of your feedback. Send us your thoughts via our comment form.