In this episode of Philosophizing with a Hammer, we confront one of the deepest questions of modern life: what comes after the death of God? Drawing on Nietzsche’s philosophy, we explore how to navigate the collapse of religious meaning without falling into despair or clinging to hollow substitutes. From the challenge of nihilism to the call for self-created values, we discuss art, love, responsibility, and the courage to affirm life without divine guarantees. This is a journey from inherited faith to existential freedom, where meaning isn’t found, but forged.

In this episode we confront a haunting question: Are we truly ourselves online, or just performing versions of who we think we should be? Drawing on Sartre’s concept of “bad faith” and Foucault’s digital-age Panopticon, we explore how social media transforms identity into performance, authenticity into aesthetics, and freedom into algorithmic suggestion. From Instagram’s curated self to LinkedIn’s highlight reels, and the creeping influence of AI on our choices, this episode challenges you to ask: Am I choosing who I am? Or am I being chosen?

Let’s reimagine Sisyphus, not as a symbol of resignation, but as an existential artist.

What does that look like in a world of AI, algorithms, and endless repetition?

In this episode we explore Martin Heidegger’s Being and Time, uncovering how his groundbreaking ideas such as Being, Care, and Being-toward-death radically reframe what it means to exist. We trace Heidegger’s divergence from Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, and ask how his thought challenges us to live more consciously in today’s hyperconnected world.

In this episode, we dive deep into Jean-Paul Sartre’s monumental work Being and Nothingness, exploring its core ideas such as consciousness, bad faith, freedom, and the weight of existence.

Is his philosophy still relevant in the 21st century?

In this episode of Philosophizing with a Hammer, we delve into Kafka’s The Metamorphosis through the lens of existentialist thought. What does Gregor Samsa’s transformation reveal about alienation, absurdity, and the struggle for meaning? How does Kafka’s world parallel Sartre’s notion of bad faith or Camus’ absurd hero? Join me as we dissect this haunting tale and its lasting philosophical significance.

In this episode of Philosophizing with a Hammer, we explore Michel Foucault’s concept of the Panopticon and its striking parallels with Franz Kafka’s The Trial. How does an unseen authority shape human behavior? How do surveillance and bureaucracy create systems of internalized control? Through existentialist insights from Camus, Sartre, and Nietzsche, we uncover the psychological and philosophical implications of living under omnipresent but faceless power structures. Is resistance possible, or is Josef K.’s fate an inevitable consequence of modern life? Tune in as we break down these questions and more.

In this episode we dive into Franz Kafka’s The Trial through an existentialist lens, exploring its themes of absurdity, guilt and alienation. Drawing from existentialist philosophy, we examine how Joseph K.’s struggle against an opaque and indifferent legal system mirrors the existential crisis of modern man caught between the illusion of meaning and the terrifying weight of freedom.

In this episode, we dive into The Brothers Karamazov through the lens of Nietzsche’s philosophy, exploring the novel’s intense moral struggles, existential dilemmas, and its haunting resonance today. Dostoevsky’s Russia was a society on the edge—torn between faith and reason, tradition and modernity, order and chaos. Through the Karamazov brothers, he stages a battle of ideas that anticipates many of Nietzsche’s core concerns: the death of God, the crisis of values, and the terrifying freedom that comes with rejecting moral absolutes.

In this episode of our existentialism series, we turn to Dostoevsky’s Notes from Underground through the lens of Nietzsche’s philosophy. The Underground Man, with his sharp intellect and corrosive self-awareness, embodies the tensions of modernity that Nietzsche critiqued: the struggle between reason and will, the paralysis of excessive self-consciousness, and the despair that arises from living without a guiding purpose or authentic values.