The Living Philosophy

In this episode we are going to explore Nietzschean spirituality in contrast to Buddhist spirituality (and other Ascetic Ideal spiritualities and religions). This topic was prompted by a question from Kevin Sherman on Patreon so thanks to Kevin for the interesting spark. This script kind of poured out of me and it was only afterwards that as I was listening to it again and again in editing that I found myself inhaling through my teeth a bit with the critique of Buddhism. I feel like I was a bit heavy-handed in places and I'm sure many of you will agree. My qualification for this is that I wanted to be a little bit provocative around the spiritual element to cut past a lot of the inflation you find in New Age circles but in hindsight I feel I didn't give enough space for the value of Buddhism. Maybe I need to make an episode explaining why Buddhism is amazing to counterbalance and in what ways it is preferable to Nietzschean spirituality. In the meantime I thought I'd include this qualification here in the description where I'm not quite sure anyone will see it. For those of you who do read the description, hello. ____________________Further Reading:- Basic Writings of Nietzsche edited by Walter Kaufmann (contains full texts of The Birth of Tragedy, Beyond Good and Evil, On the Genealogy of Morals and Ecce Homo) - The Portable Nietzsche edited by Walter Kaufmann (contains Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist)________________⭐ Support the channel (thank you!)▶ Patreon: https://patreon.com/thelivingphilosophy▶ Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/thelivingphilosophy_________________ 💬 Discord ▶ https://discord.gg/XNd4gTpfu9________________⌛ Timestamps:0:00 Introduction6:01 The Binary of Ascetic Ideal and Worldliness8:33 A Counter-Ideal12:48 Against Enlightenment

Why it matters is back! And this time we're talking about why Nietzsche matters. We're going to look at why I find Nietzsche so important and why you should too. ___________________⭐ Support the channel (thank you!)▶ Patreon: https://patreon.com/thelivingphilosophy▶ Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/thelivingphilosophy_________________ 💬 Discord ▶ https://discord.gg/XNd4gTpfu9_________________ #thelivingphilosophy #philosophy #nietzsche #existentialism #psychoanalysis

In this deeper dive into philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche we are going to look at his big ideas and his overall philosophy through the orienting generalisation of his thought as being health vs. decadence. Through this lens we can fruitfully place Nietzsche's "no-saying" work where he critiques Christianity, science and philosophy as well as his "yes-saying" work in Thus Spoke Zarathustra (with Zarathustra's three great ideas of the Ubermensch, the Eternal Recurrence and the Will to Power) and his fascination with the Greek god Dionysus. Nietzsche is commonly known as the Father of Existentialism but he could just as well be called the Father of Psychoanalysis or the Father of Postmodernism. Along with Marx and Freud, Nietzsche is one of the most influential thinkers in the past 200 years. ____________________📖 Further Learning:Videos: If you're interested in learning more about Nietzsche's biography and philosophy, there's a whole playlist of episodes on him here:Books:- Basic Writings of Nietzsche edited by Walter Kaufmann (contains full texts of The Birth of Tragedy, Beyond Good and Evil, On the Genealogy of Morals and Ecce Homo) - The Portable Nietzsche edited by Walter Kaufmann (contains Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist)________________⭐ Support the channel (thank you!)▶ Patreon: https://patreon.com/thelivingphilosophy▶ Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/thelivingphilosophy_________________ 💬 Discord ▶ https://discord.gg/XNd4gTpfu9________________Media Used:1. Despair and Triumph - Kevin MacLeod2. End of the Era - Kevin MacLeod3. Anguish - Kevin MacLeod4.  Long Note Three - Kevin MacLeod5. Lightless Dawn - Kevin MacLeod6. Lost Frontier - Kevin MacLeod7. There's Probably No Time - Chris Zabriskie8. Mesmerize - Kevin MacLeodSubscribe to Kevin MacLeod [https://www.youtube.com/user/kmmusic](https://www.youtube.com/user/kmmusic)Subscribe to Chris Zabriskie [https://www.youtube.com/c/chriszabriskie](https://www.youtube.com/c/chriszabriskie)_________________⌛ Timestamps:0:00 Introduction1:52 The Crisis of Nihilism10:02 Decadence I: Rationality10:58 Decadence II: Morality12:14 The Ascetic Ideal and Slave Morality15:15 False Counter-Ideals: Science and Democracy16:32 Health: Nietzsche's Counter Ideal17:00 Health I: Dionysus and Greek Tragedy18:57 Health II: Zarathustra19:41 Zarathustra I: the Eternal Recurrence20:37 Zarathustra II: the Übermensch 21:36 Zarathustra III: the Will to Power22:09 Nietzsche New Metaphysics25:23 Signoff 

Friedrich Nietzsche is commonly known as the Father of Existentialism but he could just as well be called the Father of Psychoanalysis or the Father of Postmodernism. Along with Marx and Freud, Nietzsche is one of the most influential thinkers in the past 200 years. Nietzsche's ideas are famous (and due to much manipulation of his work, infamous) — the Will to Power, the Ubermensch/Overman and the Eternal Recurrence are the three great doctrines of Nietzsche's Zarathustra. They form his positive philosophy. This is the Health side of the equation. But these positive doctrines are only way half of Nietzsche's philosophy. The other side is his critique of Christianity and of Ascetic Ideals in general, his enquiries into the origin of morality and his explorations of the crisis of NihilismIn this brief episode we look at Friedrich Nietzsche's philosophy through his distinction between Decadence and Health. This video is a taster of Nietzsche and will be followed up in a future episode by a much deeper dive. ____________________📚 Further Reading:- Basic Writings of Nietzsche edited by Walter Kaufmann (contains full texts of The Birth of Tragedy, Beyond Good and Evil, On the Genealogy of Morals and Ecce Homo) - The Portable Nietzsche edited by Walter Kaufmann (contains )

The Living Philosophy is two years old! Two years ago the 100 videos in 100 days began. But before there was the Living Philosophy, there was The Living Myth — an Irish mythology podcast with my friend Barry that gave me my first taste of YouTube and podcasting. I thought it'd be nice to mark this second anniversary by looking back at the origins of this channel. It's also an auspicious time because I've been having some cogitations about how it's been going and how I want to take things further and I've decided to spend the month of November making an episode on Nietzsche. Beyond that I've also been thinking about this canonical video approach in general and the Obsidian work so yeah there's a lot moving and right on the point of the third year. So exciting times.Thanks to Matt for the suggestion about making a masterpiece. Check out Ideas Sleep Furiously's revamped Substack publication that's got a lot of exciting things happening at the moment: https://ideassleepfuriously.substack.com/And for those of you interested in the psychology of Irish mythology check out the Living Myth:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCG1V9H3FdD9mEk-75C6VjyA

This is a deeper dive into the Father of Existentialism Soren Kierkegaard. Following on the 5-minute introduction to Kierkegaard, this episode looks in more depth at the philosophy and life of Soren Kierkegaard and why he is one of the greatest philosophers ever.In this episode we look at the three phases of Kierkegaard's work: the First Authorship (and its masterpieces Either/Or and Fear and Trembling), the Second Authorship (including Kierkegaard's third masterpiece Sickness Unto Death) and the final year of his life where he took the gloves off and directly attacked the church. We also look at the "long foreground" to Kierkegaard's work — the curse on his family and his broken engagement to Regine Olsen. Kierkegaard was one of the most prodigious philosophers. In 1843 he published three books in a single day (one of which Fear and Trembling is commonly placed in the canon of great philosophy). In the space of three years he published sixteen books. These books were written using various pseudonyms with many different stylistic devices. This was all part of Kierkegaard's style of "Indirect Communication". Like Socrates he didn't want to give answers he wanted to awaken the quest for individuality in his readers. Kierkegaard was part of the select group of Christian Existentialism (his most famous peer being Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky). Like Nietzsche he hated the Church. His form of Christianity was about the self-making quest of Faith. This self is forged out of the dizzying Anxiety of choosing. This choice of faith can only be made by the individual and this is why Soren Kierkegaard spent his career trying to call people away from the "levelling" of Modernity which was turning everyone into "The Crowd" and away from the Church which kept its congregation like children. He was calling them to the "highest passion" of faith. He was calling them to forge their own selves and not give into the inauthenticity of Despair. In this introduction to Kierkegaard we take a brief look at the most compelling reasons why Kierkegaard is relevant today.____________________📚 Further Reading:- McDonald, William, "Søren Kierkegaard", _The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy_ (Winter 2017 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), Available at: https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2017/entries/kierkegaard/- McDonald, William, _Søren Kierkegaard (1813—1855)_, _Internet encyclopedia of philosophy_. Available at: https://iep.utm.edu/kierkega (more in-depth than the Stanford one. Highly recommend) - Søren Kierkegaard: A Biography by Joakim Graff (https://amzn.to/3Sx1Tm5)- Either/Or by Søren Kierkegaard (https://amzn.to/3DrOVBC)- Fear and Trembling by Søren Kierkegaard (https://amzn.to/3TxiNCv)- Sickness Unto Death by Søren Kierkegaard (https://amzn.to/3TxiY0D)The above are Amazon affiliate links that let you get an awesome book AND support the channel (with no additional cost to you)________________⭐ Support the channel (thank you!)▶ Patreon: https://patreon.com/thelivingphilosophy▶ Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/thelivingphilosophy________________🎵 Media Used:1.  Long Note Three  — Kevin MacLeod2.  There’s Probably No Time — Chris Zabriskie3.  Dark Times  — Kevin MacLeod4.  Mesmerize  — Kevin MacLeod5.  Lost Frontier  — Kevin MacLeod6.  Shores of Avalon — Kevin MacLeodSubscribe to Kevin MacLeod [https://www.youtube.com/user/kmmusic](https://www.youtube.com/user/kmmusic)Subscribe to Chris Zabriskie [https://www.youtube.com/c/chriszabriskie](https://www.youtube.com/c/chriszabriskie)

Soren Kierkegaard is commonly known as the "Father of Existentialism". This brief introduction to Kierkegaard looks at why you should care about the Danish philosopher and why his work is still relevant today. Kierkegaard was one of the most prodigious philosophers. In 1843 he published three books in a single day (one of which Fear and Trembling is commonly placed in the canon of great philosophy). In the space of three years he published sixteen books. These books were written using various pseudonyms with many different stylistic devices. This was all part of Kierkegaard's style of "Indirect Communication". Like Socrates he didn't want to give answers he wanted to awaken the quest for individuality in his readers. Kierkegaard was part of the select group of Christian Existentialism (his most famous peer being Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky). Like Nietzsche he hated the Church. His form of Christianity was about the self-making quest of Faith. This self is forged out of the dizzying Anxiety of choosing. This choice of faith can only be made by the individual and this is why Soren Kierkegaard spent his career trying to call people away from the "levelling" of Modernity which was turning everyone into "The Crowd" and away from the Church which kept its congregation like children. He was calling them to the "highest passion" of faith. He was calling them to forge their own selves and not give into the inauthenticity of Despair. In this introduction to Kierkegaard we take a brief look at the most compelling reasons why Kierkegaard is relevant today. ____________________📚 Further Reading:- McDonald, William, "Søren Kierkegaard", _The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy_ (Winter 2017 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), Available at: https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2017/entries/kierkegaard/- McDonald, William, _Søren Kierkegaard (1813—1855)_, _Internet encyclopedia of philosophy_. Available at: https://iep.utm.edu/kierkega (more in-depth than the Stanford one. Highly recommend) - Søren Kierkegaard: A Biography by Joakim Graff (https://amzn.to/3Sx1Tm5)- Either/Or by Søren Kierkegaard (https://amzn.to/3DrOVBC)- Fear and Trembling by Søren Kierkegaard (https://amzn.to/3TxiNCv)- Sickness Unto Death by Søren Kierkegaard (https://amzn.to/3TxiY0D)________________⭐ Support the channel (thank you!)▶ Patreon: https://patreon.com/thelivingphilosophy▶ Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/thelivingphilosophy_________________ 💬 Discord ▶ https://discord.gg/XNd4gTpfu9________________🎵 Media Used:1.  Shores of Avalon — Kevin MacLeod2.  Despair and Triumph  — Kevin MacLeod3.  Long Note Three  — Kevin MacLeodSubscribe to Kevin MacLeod [https://www.youtube.com/user/kmmusic](https://www.youtube.com/user/kmmusic)_________________⌛ Timestamps:0:00 Introduction2:42 The Life of Kierkegaard5:38 The First Authorship6:08 First Authorship - Aesthetical Stage7:36 First Authorship - Ethical Stage9:55 First Authorship - Religious Stage13:50 Second Authorship18:21 Kierkegaard's Final Stage_______________By using the Amazon links you can support the channel with no additional cost to youAs ever thanks for tuning in!_______________#kierkegaard #thelivingphilosophy #philosophy #existentialism #existential #sorenkierkegaard #sørenkierkegaard

Immature heroic complexes and us and them dynamics — after reading The Cut's article "Did Olivia Wilde Just Make Jordan Peterson Cry?" something stirred in me that seems quite obvious in hindsight: the two sides of the culture wars are psychological mirrors of each other. Both sides partake of the same ingroup and outgroup signalling. They show a lot of compassion for a certain group and a lot of hatred for the outgroup. There is also the same vein of a hero complex running through both. Each side thinks they are saving the cultures from the demonic Other. In this episode we talk about the immature hero complex operating on both sides and how each is a mirror of the other and a co-dependant mirror insofar as they fulfil each other's needs to continue the drama. _____________Sources:The Cut article: https://www.thecut.com/2022/09/jordan-peterson-cries-responding-to-olivia-wildes-critique.htmlThe Piers Morgan Jordan Peterson video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M1612L2FMHo

Martin Heidegger is the greatest philosopher of the 20th century for many — from Giles Deleuze to the alt-right and undoubtedly one of the most controversial characters in the history of philosophy. In this episode we are going to look at the life and philosophy of Martin Heidegger and his masterpiece Being and Time. We also explore his lesser-known later philosophy after going through what scholars call 'Die Kehre' or 'The Turn". At this point, we see Heidegger on technology and the dangers the technological worldview presents to us today. We also talk about his association with the National Socialist party in Germany and Heidegger's controversial embrace of them as rector at the University of Freiburg before turning his back on them as being part of the technological problem.Further Reading:Collins, J., 2015. Introducing Heidegger: A graphic guide. Icon Books Ltd.Wheeler, Michael, "Martin Heidegger", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2020 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.)Frede, D., 1993. The question of being: Heidegger’s project. The Cambridge Companion to Heidegger, 2.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin's theory of evolution posits that with the emergence of the Noosphere (the thinking or mind sphere which transcended the Biosphere and in turn the Physiosphere) the Omega Point was now being converged upon. With the Noosphere Life has penetrated a new ceiling unlike any since the birth of life itself. Now evolution wasn't limited to chromosomes but we saw the emergence of a whole new form of evolution: acquired traits. In other words, culture is a new form of evolution but at the Noospheric level rather than the chromosomal level of the Biosphere. Both the Noosphere and the Biosphere of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin have for their substrate what Ken Wilber later called the Physiosphere. With the secret ingredient of complexity, the inert matter of the Physiosphere became vitalised as the living Biosphere. In turn as the complexity of the Biosphere reached a new level, we see the emergence of the Noosphere and with this new emergence, a convergence has begun upon what de Chardin called the Omega Point but which could be called in today's language the Singularity (or as some have called it - the Rapture of the Nerds). ____________________Further Reading:- de Chardin, T. 1956. *Man's Place in Nature*, Fontana Press: London ________________⭐ Support the channel (thank you!)▶ Patreon: https://patreon.com/thelivingphilosophy▶ Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/thelivingphilosophy_________________ 💬 Discord ▶ https://discord.gg/XNd4gTpfu9________________Media Used:1.  Despair & Triumph  — Kevin MacLeod2.  Promising Relationship — Kevin MacLeod3.  Drums of the Deep — Kevin MacLeod4. Long Note Three  — Kevin MacLeod5. Anguish  — Kevin MacLeodSubscribe to Kevin MacLeod [https://www.youtube.com/user/kmmusic](https://www.youtube.com/user/kmmusic)_________________⌛ Timestamps:00:00 Introduction01:28 A Tale of Two Spheres: the Physiosphere and the Biosphere04:04 The Third Sphere: the Emergence of the Noosphere05:12 The Threshold of Reflection07:40 Knitting Together