Episode 51: Strength Is Never a Weakness ft. Bill Coyne

August 10th, 2021  |  1 hr 11 mins

dave tate, jim wendler, mark rippetoe, powerlifting, starting strength, strength, weightlifting, westside barbell

Strength coach and powerlifter Bill Coyne joins Emmet to talk about his pilgrimage to Westside Barbell, the strongest gym in the world, the history of weight lifting, getting strong as an antidote to despair, and more!

Episode 50: Real Eyes Realize Real Pfize Ft. Canada Mike

August 3rd, 2021  |  1 hr 2 mins

agamben, cold war, covid, darpa, fauci, foucault, logistics, pfizer, plato, vaccine

Emmet and Canada Mike return to their bread and butter: vaccine supply chains.

[teaser] Two Piece: Ranciere's Emancipated Spectator and Plato's Meno

August 1st, 2021  |  1 min 16 secs

In this one, talk through a Ranciere essay and a Platonic dialog, both deal with epistemology and politics. We had a lot of fun considering and juxtaposing these.

Episode 49: The DENNIS System for Death Cults: Degrowth, Consumerism, and the Environmental Movement ft. Space Commune

July 27th, 2021  |  1 hr 8 mins

capitalism, consumerism, degrowth, environmentalism, neofeudalism, peter buffet

Alex and Fox (a return guest) from Space Commune join Emmet to talk about their new documentary--Consumerism: Can We Buy a Better World?

Episode 48: What We Talk About When We Talk About Conservatism ft. Micah Meadowcroft

July 20th, 2021  |  56 mins 36 secs

america, american history, aquinas, aristotle, christianity, conservatism, cs lewis, empire, plutarch, politics

Emmet sits down with Micah Meadowcroft, an editor at The American Conservative, to talk about some of his recent writing, a view of the right from the right, what conservatism should mean, and much more!

[teaser] American Canon: Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find"

July 18th, 2021  |  4 mins 27 secs

John and I are back with another canon ep by request. This one's about one of our favorite short stories. We talk through the story, then ruminate on the connections between O'Connor and McCarthy, and then close with a meditation on life in flyover country.

Episode 47: How Did We Get Here? Ft. Sterling Bartlett

July 13th, 2021  |  57 mins 19 secs

art, flat design, history, image comics, matisse, recycling, spawn, theory, william burroughs

Emmet sits down with comic book artist Sterling Bartlett to talk about his comics "How Did We Get Here?" and "Kali, Yuga, Eschaton."

Episode 46: Map v Territory, or, Statistical Modeling for Poets ft. Canada Mike

July 6th, 2021  |  1 hr 24 mins

ecology, malthus, population, science, statistical modeling, taleb

Canada Mike returns to talk about the theoretical basics of statistical modeling, which turns into a discussion of discourse, democracy, expertise, sophistry, and history.

[teaser] After Virtue IV: The Tradition of Virtue

July 4th, 2021  |  4 mins 22 secs

In our second to last installment on After Virtue we look at Aristotle's impact and the origins and extension of virtue ethics from Homer to the Middle Ages. This one was a fun deep dive and very in our wheelhouses in different ways.

Episode 45: I Make An Honest Living!: Pain & Gain, Wolf of Wall Street, and the Financial Crash

June 29th, 2021  |  1 hr 17 mins

2008, american history, culture, film, financial crash, martin scorsese, michael bay, movies, politics

Josh Bregman comes back on the pod to talk with Emmet about two movies that came out in the same summer that sought to capture post-crash America: Pain & Gain and Wolf of Wall Street.

Episode 44: Astroturfing the Thunderdome ft. Fox Green

June 22nd, 2021  |  1 hr 16 mins

fandom, george soros, marvel, mcu, new york, ngo, non-profits, peter buffer, politics, warren buffet

Emmet sits down with Fox Green of Space Commune to talk about how his town is being astroturfed by billionaire-funded NGOs, political fandom, the revolt against adulthood, and much, much more.

[teaser] Visions of Heaven and Hell - 1994

June 20th, 2021  |  3 mins 17 secs

John and I watched a forgotten Channel 4 documentary on the early internet from 1994. It's a very weird message in a bottle. This is a wide-ranging discussion. We hope you like it.

Episode 43: American Hardball: Scorsese's GoodFellas and McKay's Vice

June 15th, 2021  |  1 hr 2 mins

american politics, culture, dick cheney, film, goodfellas, history, iraq war, martin scorsese, politics, the big short, wall street

Emmet and John talk about America's delight in self-serving, cruel narcissists via the movies Vice and GoodFellas in addition to an essay by Jim Shepard.

Episode 42: "It All Ends in Pizza": Brazilianization and Life in the Undeveloping World ft. Alex Hochuli

June 8th, 2021  |  1 hr 4 mins

bolsonaro, brazil, development, history, lula, modernism, neoliberalism, socialism, zizek

Writer and co-host of the Aufhebungabunga podcast Alex Hochuli joins Emmet and John to talk about his latest article in American Affairs: "The Brazilianization of the World."

[teaser] After Virtue III: WTF Is a Fact?

June 6th, 2021  |  3 mins 30 secs

John and Emmet talk about facts, bureaucracy, science as a social process, the social telos of internet moderation as a culture, and more.

Episode 41: A Brief History of the American Electricity Grid From the 1920s to Closure of Indian Point ft. Edgardo Sepulveda

June 1st, 2021  |  1 hr 7 mins

american history, electricity grid, electricity markets, indian point, infrastructure, monetarism, neoliberalism, new deal, nuclear energy

Emmet sits down with Edgardo Sepulveda to talk about the history of the electrical grid in America and why certain infrastructure projects no longer feel possible anymore.