The Pugcast

In today's show Tom raises the specter of propaganda--the form of communication seen in books like 1984 and totalitarian states, and increasingly the contemporary western world.

It was inevitable considering the fact that our elites no longer believe in metaphysics. Something must be said, but what if truth isn't an option? Propaganda is what you get in the name of truth. One of the thinkers that Tom refers to in the Jacques Ellul, the famous French thinker and aurhor of the book, Propaganda.

Glenn Sunshine is away on business, but Dr. Joseph Leake, Beowulf scholar and authority on Old English and Old Norse sits in for Glenn.

Chris is in Dallas, and Glenn is on the road, and Tom feels too lonely to record a show. So, we dig into Chris's personal vault of recorded stuff this week for a conversation with Aaron Renn, publisher of the Masculinist.

Chris and Aaron are joined by David Talcott, professor of philosophy at King's College in New York City, Sam Perez, a pastor in Jersey City, and Nate Towers of Fellowship Deaconry.

This is a free-range conversation about men, masculinity, the church, women, Jason Peterson, and a host of other things. Enjoy!

The Pugcast guys will be back next week.

In today's show Tom returns to the theme on technology but this time with an eye toward responding to Glenn's thoughts on Enchantment. Is it possible to have the best of both--or must we choose between a world of creature comforts made possible by technology, or an uncomfortable but meaningful one? Fittingly, the guys had to choose between air-conditioning and optimal conditions for recording the show. (Sounds like the wrong choice was made--when you listen to the show you'll know what that means. Sorry.)

But there is some good news to share: this is our last episode with our old recording equipment. When the show was recorded the new equipment had been ordered. By the time the show was uploaded on the internet--the equipment had arrived! So, if all goes well, you'll never have to endure another poorly recored episode of The Pug!)

Content correction: Chris calls "the Death Star" from Star Wars "the Battle Star" (Heresy! He mixed up his franchises)--but at least he got the Marshwiggle's name from The Silver Chair right. It's "Puddleglum".

Today the Pug is joined by Dr. Matthew T. Dickerson, professor at Middlebury College, in Vermont, and author of many books, among them: Ents, Elves, and Eriador: The Environmental Vision of J. R. R. Tolkien. The conversation did get around to Ents (a fascinating part of the discussion), and it even included the environment, but it also wandered into many other matters--some far afield. (Surprise, surprise.) If you like the Inklings, you'll enjoy this episode.

In today's show, Glenn raises the subject of neopagan and heathen movements in the western world. Just what is going on with these movements, are they genuine revivals, or are they merely role-playing diversions? And what does any of this have to do with the alt-right, and Norse-myths in particular? Tune in for a lively discussion as usual!

In today's show, Tom introduces listeners to the Barmen Declaration of 1934. He then helps listeners understand what genuine resistance to the Nazis looked like at the time, and how many German churches had been coopted by cultural trends.

In our ideological age, cut off from both nature and nature's God, totalitarianisms emerge to fill in the empty spaces in our heads and hearts. Classical Christian theism is what we need today, but most evangelicals don't know what that is.

Here's the wiki page for the Barmen Declaration--https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barmen_Declaration

Once again, the show is recorded on our new sound equipment! We're getting the hang of it.

 

In today's episode Glenn discusses an important distinction that is lost on most people today--the difference between liberty and license. The Founding Fathers of the United States understood the difference, and they did their best to structure American government in order to preserve liberty and inhibit license. We've come a long way, baby.

Is there any hope for responsible freedom, or are we doomed to live in the Servile State, as the Distributists put it?

Glenn is back! And today he brings us the topic of the day--Tolkien and literary realism.

Literary realism is one of those question begging movements which advance an argument by assuming the correctness of a particular answer to an unspoken question. Literary realism assumes that the level of the mundane, the prosaic, is what is truly Real, and everything else is just fancy which exists solely in our heads.

If that's your understanding of Reality then you are a modern person--and you're also a rather flat and wooden person too. You probably don't get Tolkien, or you think he's just a teller of adventure stories.

But is that what's truly Real? If Reality is something more--what is it, and how can Tolkien help us see it? Those are the questions addressed in today's show.

In today's episode Chris begins with a simple truth: since modern welfare states are not the Kingdom of God they will end someday. This leads to a discussion of disincentives for having children in welfare states and why that spells their demise in the long run. Naturally debt is used to keep the state going in the near term, but this only make the eventual collapse that much more devastating.

Since we can see evidence of the final failure of the welfare state all around it is a good idea to "short" the welfare state.

Whenever you short an asset you're betting that its value will go down. The bet allocates resources into assets that will go up in value in the event of the loss of value in the shorted asset. So, what should we invest ourselves in instead of the welfare state? Chris turns to the book of Ruth in the Old Testament for clues.Sound quality continues to improve--the Pug has discovered the source of the mysterious background noise that plagued earlier podcasts and it has been addressed. We hope you can enjoy the show better now!

In today's episode Glenn introduces listeners to "transhumanism"--a philosophy and engineering project concerned with transcending the given limits of human nature. Transhumanists view the body solely as a machine, and the mind is somehow both dependent upon it, yet utterly distinct. (This should remind listeners a little of Descartes.) But what transhumanism actually is--for all its mechanistic notions--is just one more manifestation of the ancient hydra that has plagued western culture from the start: Gnosticism.

The Pugcast audience continues to grow--Glenn, Tom, and Chris are both pleased and a little surprised. They're grateful. Also, the show has a growing number of financial supporters on the FLF Network. Thanks are in order for those folks, too. If you would like to join this merry band and financially support The Theology Pugcast you can do so through the Fight, Laugh, Feast Network.