Episode 61: Two Piece: Resigning from Being Superfluous

October 19th, 2021  |  1 hr 5 mins

incels, obama, peak oil, strike wave, the great resignation

Emmet, John, and Canada Mike talk through two pieces: one on superfluous men by Alex Gendler and another about bullshit jobs and people quitting the workforce by John Michael Greer. They talk about the Great Resignation, the strivewave, why many men have been historically superfluous, incels, and ponder if we need new ways to think of being modern.

[teaser] The True and Only Heaven 4: The Sociological Tradition and the Idea of Community

October 17th, 2021  |  6 mins 43 secs

Emmet and John forge ahead in the Lasch reading. This time they watch Lasch take on Burke, Marx, Weber, Tonnies, and more. They discuss development theory, the systematic view of history's progress, what they think Lasch is up to, what Schopenhauer did for them, and more.

Episode 58: American Canon: John Milius

September 28th, 2021  |  1 hr 26 mins

america, american culture, cold war, film, john milius, milius, movies

Emmet and John discuss the life and times of writer and director John Milius, looking specifically at his movies The Wind and the Lion and Conan the Barbarian.

[teaser] The True and Only Heaven 2: The Idea of Progress Reconsidered

September 19th, 2021  |  2 mins 46 secs

In this one, we embark on the second chapter of Lasch's The True and Only Heaven to talk about his historical understanding of progress and his underlying critique. We talk about millenarianism, what progressivism isn't, the family as a buttress against the market, Adam Smith's fatalism, the challenge of republican ideals, and more.

Episode 55: Ex.haust Birthday Q & A

September 7th, 2021  |  1 hr 22 mins

To celebrate ex.haust's one year anniversary, Emmet and John respond to listener questions.

Episode 53: The Lasch Files: The True and Only Heaven pt. I

August 24th, 2021  |  1 hr 19 mins

chesa boudin, christopher lasch, cold war, gop, history, leftism, progress, progressivism, republican

Emmet and John begin their series on Lasch's book The True and Only Heaven: Progress and Its Critics."

Episode 52: American Canon: HP Lovecraft and Harlan Ellison ft. Canada Mike

August 17th, 2021  |  1 hr 12 mins

america, american history, apocalypse, dystopian, ellison, fiction, horror, lovecraft, weird, weird fiction

Canada Mike, Emmet, and John discuss HP Lovecraft's "Call of Cthulu" and Harlan Ellison's "I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream."

[teaser] After Virtue: The Final Episode

August 15th, 2021  |  3 mins 32 secs

In our final installment of the After Virtue series, we provide an overview of MacIntyre's closing arguments, pose complicating rebuttals, and consider the power of viewing life as a narrative among other things.

[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.

[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.

[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.

[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 40: "We all saw that idea come home": The Imperial Vampire Castle and Its Fixed Ideas

May 25th, 2021  |  1 hr 6 mins

911, afghanistan, cancel culture, cia, cold war, empire, iraq war, joan didion, liberalism, mark fisher, mujahideen, neoconservatism, woke

Emmet and John use three articles to talk about our woke empire and how much it feels like the neocon heyday of the early 2000s.