Today we’re doing one of our occasional episodes where host Mack Hagood talks about a new essay he’s written for our newsletter “Feed Logic and the Failure to Thrive” Mack writes that students and professors are struggling, both academically and spiritually. He tries to diagnose the issue he felt in his classrooms this year and the role technology may play in it.

For new listeners, Mack is a writer and researcher who studies sound, technology, and culture. He is the author of Hush: Media and Sonic Self-Control, a book on noise-canceling headphones, white noise, tinnitus, and the ways people use sound to manage modern life. He is currently writing a new book for Penguin Press, and he also hosts this podcast Phantom Power, where he interviews artists, scholars, musicians, and sound designers about the invisible power of sound in everyday life. Besides all that, Mack is a university professor and that’s what his most recent essay is about.

Click here to read the newsletter for free.

Cited Media:

Film:
Mary Bronstein - If I Had Legs I'd Kick You (2025)

Books:
Ben Lerner - Transcription (2026)
Mack Hagood - Hush: Media and Sonic Self-Control (2019)
Hartmut Rosa - Resonance: A Sociology of Our Relationship to the World (2019)

Newsletter/Essay:
Mack Hagood - Feed Logic and the Failure to Thrive (2025)

Lecture:
Amar Bose - MIT Lecture on Engineering

Chapters:

0:00 Intro
1:58 The Essay & Its Response
3:13 ARFID as Metaphor
8:38 University Pressures & AI
9:50 Student Disengagement
14:05 Feed Logic & Screen Time
16:30 Ultra-Processed Communication
29:50 Student Doubleness & Motivation
36:05 Resonance vs. Control

To read the full transcript click here

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