This is from a live zoom meeting from one of my Pints and Parables lockdown events. Here I talk about the difference between Desire and Demand.

This is a small excerpt from one of the reading groups I run on Patreon. In this group we tackled Gabriel Marcel's essay 'On the Ontological Mystery' over 2 ninety minute sessions. In this excerpt I did a summery of the first half of the article before we dived into the second half.

To find out about future reading groups, visit https://peterrollins.com/calendar

Watching a movie is anything but a passive experience. What happens on the screen is not something we merely observe, but rather offers a mise-en-scène that hooks our desire. Movies show us something about the desire of the society from which they emerge, and something of the desire of the individual that enjoys them. Yet great movies can do more than simply express, incite and manipulate our desire. Some of the most critically acclaimed movies - such as Citizen Kane - confront us with the frailty, contingency and impotence of the objects that often fascinate us the most. This unnerving experience is something that Lacan referred to as an experience of the Gaze.

In this seminar, I be look at what this means via reference to some concrete cinematic examples and then connecting it to the work of pyrotheology.

It’s common for evolutionary psychologists to make comparisons between the animal kingdom and human society. One such area of comparison is in relation to the development of hierarchies. We witness hierarchies in the animal kingdom that rest upon some animals natural dominance over others. It’s said that we witness the same thing in human societies. Left to our own devices, we form hierarchies that reflect our respective strengths and weaknesses.

But is this really the way hierarchies operate in society? In this proseminar I’ll be looking at how we are never at one with the positions of authority that we inhabit. That they predate us and are never properly tailored to us. Facts that we often attempt to disavow.

I draw out how a proper understanding of how we inhabit our various social roles can not only give us insight into the nature of human subjectivity, but also help us understand childhood development, the nature of freedom and the subversive meaning of the Crucifixion.

In recent years Progressivism has developed into one of the most powerful political and religious forces in the contemporary world. Even within more traditionally conservative communities, Progressivism has made significant inroads.

One of the common phrases heard within Progressivism is that there is a ‘right side of history’. This idea captures the belief that there is a correct position to take on many contentious issues within contemporary society. Depending on where you locate yourself in relation to that position, defines whether you are a relic of the past or a citizen of the future. In this way, the Progressive appears to posses a type of clairvoyant ability to know the future, or at least, how the future should turn out if we heed their sagely advice.

But what if the future is radically undecided and all our visions of how things should be are in actual fact adaptations of our present worldview… much like animated sitcom The Jetsons offered a fantastical future that really just represented the ideals of the age in which it was made.

In contrast to Progressivism, I’ll be making a case for Apocalypticism. In Apocalypticism we do not pretend to know what the future will be like - or should be like - and instead concentrate on exposing the cracks within the present system. An approach that can open up the possibility of novelty in the world, and lead to the formation of previously unimagined solutions to the problems we face today.

In this seminar, I use the example of Northern Ireland to offer a critique of the Progressivism that dominates the contemporary religious and political landscape, exposing its implicit dangers and offering an alternative approach that can provide real solutions.

Get full seminars, book studies and courses by joining up at https://pyrotheology.com

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In this final seminar exploring Nietzsche's parable of the Madman, I look at what it might mean to be part of a community that helps people move through the experience of the 'Death of God'. As part of this, I look at the way an oppressive superstition remains effective today at an unconscious level and what a 'Cruciform' collective can do to overcome it. Get full seminars, book studies and courses by joining up at https://pyrotheology.com

This continues developing the themes from part 1. In this seminar I look at how we might understand what Nietzsche is referring to by entering into a higher stage of history. Along the way, we touch on Hegel's notion of contradiction, the meaning of Absolute Knowledge and Feuerbach's relationship to Humanism.

Here I explore Nietzsche's parable of the madman. I look primiarily at how the proclamation of the death of God is from the mouth of a religious figure, directed at a secular audience. For over 100 hours of lectures and courses, visit https://pyrotheology.com

Here I look at the critique of religion expressed in Feuerbach and Marx, before looking at a possible critique from Hegel.

Get full seminars, book studies and courses by joining up at https://pyrotheology.com

In this talk I outline Anselm's Ontological argument, and connect it with the tradition of theological atheism.

For over 100 hours of lectures and seminars, check out pyrotheology.com