I Learned Nothing

Pat was feeling saucy so Ben tantalizes him with philosopher Gregory Kavka's Toxin Puzzle. In this mind-bending thought experiment that sounds like a very special episode of The Price Is Right, an eccentric billionaire (eg. Jeff Bezos' divorced ass) approaches you with a proposition: He will pay you one million dollars tomorrow morning if at midnight tonight you intend to drink a diarrhea-inducing elixir tomorrow afternoon. You'll feel like shit for 24 hours but there are no lasting side effects. The kicker is, you don't even actually have to drink the elixir. You get paid no matter what, whether you drink it or not, as long as you INTEND to drink it. Can you win the $1,000,000? Listen to find out, bitches!

Pat hates women so Ben tries to remedy this by teaching him the existentialist feminism of  French philosopher/sex addict Simone de Beauvoir. Born Simone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir, she quickly became known for her  intellectual precociousness, going tête à tête with existentialist  poster boy (and future fuck buddy) Jean Paul Sartre, writing award  winning novels, and outlining a stunning theory on why women have been relegated to a derivative version of human consciousness through the abuses of the patriarchy in her seminal work "The Second Sex". One reason: Women be shopping (says Simone) and they need to fucking stop. Also, Pat thought she was black LOL.

Pat was feeling dialectical so Ben bulldozes him with the humongous theories of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, the Leslie Knope of 19th Century German philosophy. This guy literally thought of everything, which is both impressive and exhausting. After wandering off on their requisite tangents (such as names in other languages and Jimmy The Greek's unfortunate on air racial anecdotes), Ben & Pat explore Hegel's zany ideas set down in his mammoth book "The Phenomenology of Spirit." Through this work, Hegel dominated the Post-Kantian philosophical landscape, claiming that all of history is the progression of a World Spirit that overcomes dichotomies like subject vs. object or nature vs. freedom through a dialectical process. Another successful episode!

Pat was feeling critical so Ben teaches him the critical philosophy of The Frankfurt School. Founded in 1923 in Weimar Germany, The Frankfurt School was instrumental in revitalizing Marxist theory in the West, exposing the phantasmagoria of late stage capitalism. They identified a new, sinister dimension of capitalism called the Culture Industry, which lulls the working class into compliance, dashing any hopes of the proletariat achieving class consciousness. Ben & Pat explore these ideas through the lives of The Frankfurt School's members: a bunch of bookish Jews chased out of Nazi Germany and ended up settling in the US. We're talking titans such as Walter Benjamin, Max Horkheimer, Theodore Adorno, and friend of the show Herbert Marcuse. It's not delivery, it's Adorno.

Pat was feeling desperate, so Ben makes things worse by introducing him to the despondent writings of proto-Existentialist Søren Kierkegaard. Born in Denmark in 1813 and dying of a shattered heart in 1855, Kierkegaard spent his brief 42 years on this cold, forgotten rock wringing his hands and writing about the overwhelming agony of freedom & the chronic despair that comes with it. Pat & Ben discuss the glum Dane's defining influence on the Existentialist movement of the 20th Century in between shouting matches about where to get decent Italian food in Austin, Texas and whether or not Pat can hit a bird with a ketchup packet. Big Topics, Big Men, Big Podcast.

Pat was feeling authoritative, so Ben has no choice but get help from our heroic armed forces to reassert his sovereignty over the podcast. In other words, Ben and special guest, Harrison Hammonds teach Pat about the political philosophy of Thomas Hobbes. Thomas Hobbes was a 17th Century English philosopher/narc who argued that political power needs to be vested in and embodied by an all-powerful State, what he called the Leviathan in his eponymous masterpiece, in order for society to function smoothly and peacefully. Without this, humans exist in a Mad Max-esque State of Nature where everyone is literally murdering each other, living lives that are "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short." AKA The Five Spice Girls of the Apocalypse.

Pat was feeling theological, so Ben and his eternal pupil spend their 69th episode (lol) tackling the Biggest Topic Ever: God. Who is God? What are his superpowers? Can we ever know the mind of God? Does He really give a shit about anything we do or even us at all? What is the one true religion? (That one's easy, it's Catholicism.) In a tour de force for the ages, the WisdomBois take on the Almighty and live to tell the tale. Listen and subscribe to hear the full story! Amen.

Pat was feeling Darwinian, so Ben treats him to a crash course on the philosophy of evolution. While Pat diverts Ben's train of thought like branches on the Tree of Life, Ben attempts to explain how Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection upended our view of our role in the universe, showing that the tremendous complexity of all life on this planet is the result of blind luck amid generations of mindless death. Darwin ruined everything and Pat is pissed. More like Evil-ution, amiright guys?

Pat was feeling liberal so Ben trots out that golden idol of modern democracy, John Locke, and his sacred teachings on individual rights and the consent of the governed. This fool started his career as a doctor but his inability to resist blowing up the idiocy of divine rule cemented his legacy as perhaps the most important political philosopher in the Western tradition. Just like the American patriots he influenced a generation later, he had a complicated relationship with the radical ideas he espoused in the face of the very real dilemma of slavery. His involvement, direct or not, in establishing slavery in the Colony of Carolina makes it hard to square with his argument for individual liberty as the ultimate source of power.

Yikes!

Pat was feeling irresponsible so Ben clues him in on the fundamental philosophical concept of agency. As the defining characteristic of what we call 'persons', agency is that quality we believe we must possess in order to be considered conscious, autonomous actors in the world. Without it, we'd be nothing but mindless robots. But what is agency? What does it consist in and what about it makes what we do "actions" rather than just "events"? Needless to say, this is a baffling line of questioning for Pat, who looks to his banjo for answers only to find the hollow indifference and deafening silence one would expect from an inanimate object. Are we any different? Tune in to find out!