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The Obscure: On the Philosophy of Heraclitus
Episode 13
Heraclitus of Ephesus was one of the great pre-Socratic thinkers. Called the Obscure and the Weeping Philosopher, he left behind a collectio…
7 years, 8 months ago
The Dark Eye: On the Films of Rodney Ascher
Episode 12
American filmmaker Rodney Ascher is a master of the weird documentary. Whether he be exploring wild interpretations of a classic horror film…
7 years, 8 months ago
Art is a Haunting Spirit
Episode 11
M. R. James' "The Mezzotint" is one of the most fascinating, and most chilling, examples of the classic ghost story. In this episode, Phil a…
7 years, 8 months ago
Weird Stories: M. R. James' "The Mezzotint"
M. R. James has been hailed as the unrivalled maser of the classic ghost tale, and his powers are at their zenith in "The Mezzotint," a stor…
7 years, 8 months ago
Philip K. Dick: Adrift in the Multiverse
Episode 10
In 1977, Philip K. Dick read an essay in France entitled, "If You Find this World Bad, You Should See Some of the Others." In it, he laid ou…
7 years, 8 months ago
On Aleister Crowley and the Idea of Magick
Episode 9
The plan was to discuss the introduction to Aleister Crowley's classic work, Magick in Theory and Practice (1924), a powerful text on the na…
7 years, 9 months ago
On Graham Harman's "The Third Table"
Episode 8
JF and Phil discuss Graham Harman's "The Third Table," a short and accessible introduction to "object-oriented ontology." Phil takes us on a…
7 years, 9 months ago
The Unspeakable Mystery at the Heart of Boxing
Episode 7
For as long as they've been pounding the crap out of each other for good reasons, humans have also been pounding the crap out of each other …
7 years, 9 months ago
Dungeons & Dragons, or the Reality of Illusions
Episode 6
The Dutch historian Johan Huizinga was one of the first thinkers to define games as exercises in world-making. Every game, he wrote, occurs…
7 years, 9 months ago
Reading Lisa Ruddick's "When Nothing is Cool"
Episode 5
Phil and JF discuss Lisa Ruddick's "When Nothing is Cool," an essay on the postmodern humanities and its allergy to essences -- especially t…
7 years, 10 months ago