You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Jacqui Frost is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Purdue University.
Website: https://www.jacquifrost.com/
Summary:In this interview, we discuss the nature of atheist churches and how they serve many of the same purposes as religious churches. Their growth is evidence that religious decline does not necessarily mean a decline in community.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Ben Bradley is Allan and Anita Sutton Professor of Philosophy at Syracuse University.
Website: https://benbradleyweb.com/
Summary:In this interview, we discuss the arguments in favor and against anti-natalism, which is the view that it's wrong to have kids. We also discuss how anti-natalism compares to deprivationism, which is a theory of the prudential value or disvalue of death.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Tomas Bogardus is a Professor of Philosophy at Pepperdine University.
Website: https://sites.google.com/site/tbogardus/
Book: https://www.routledge.com/The-Nature-of-the-Sexes-Why-Biology-Matters/Bogardus/p/book/9781041029533
Summary:In this interview, we discuss Bogardus' new book on the nature of the sexes. He argues that the sexes are particular kinds of functions—activated higher-order functions—of entire organisms, coded in master programs specifying the development, organization, and maintenance of components themselves programmed to produce (and transport, etc.) some type of anisogamous gamete, e.g. sperm or ova. Other topics discussed include biological functions and whether humans can change their sex.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Dr. Heidi Klessig is a retired anesthesiologist.
Website: https://www.respectforhumanlife.com/
Book: https://www.amazon.com/Brain-Death-Fallacy-Heidi-Klessig/dp/B0CL5VKJGY
Summary:In this interview, Dr. Klessig describes a number of issues regarding the concept of brain death that ultimately suggest that brain-dead patients are not actually dead.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Tom Cochrane is a British-Australian philosopher working at Flinders University in Adelaide.
Website: https://sites.google.com/view/tomcochranephilosophy/
Summary:In this interview, we discuss how we can address the fear of death. Cochrane argues that our fear of death comes from our will to live; hence, one way to address the fear is to change this underlying motivation. He argues that we can encourage a natural tendency for the will to live to decline as we approach death. We also talk a bit about religion and its role in addressing this fear.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Tony spent 15 years in the white supremacist and neo-Nazi movements, starting as a skinhead and evolving to leadership positions.
Website: https://sci.usc.edu/personnel/tony-mcaleer/
Book: https://www.amazon.com/Cure-Hate-Supremacists-Extremism-Compassion/dp/1551527693
Summary:In this interview, we discuss McAleer's journey into the white supremacist movement. He states that he experienced toxic shame and that this shame led him to search for acceptance from others. We also discuss some pivotal moments in his life that led him to leave the movement.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Thaddeus Metz is a professor of philosophy at the University of Pretoria.
Website: https://www.up.ac.za/philosophy/article/2923571/prof-thaddeus-metz
Book: https://www.amazon.com/Meaning-Life-Thaddeus-Metz/dp/0198748019
Summary: In this interview, we discuss the distinction between meaning in life and the meaning of life, what contributes to a meaningful life, and how it relates to well-being and morality. We also discuss the role of spirituality in meaning. Ultimately, Metz believes that meaningfulness in life comes from actively orienting one’s rational nature toward the good, the true, and the beautiful.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Eric Heinze is Professor of Law and Humanities at Queen Mary University of London.
Website: https://ericheinze.com/
Book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262049580/coming-clean/
Summary:Leftists have long taught that people in the West must take responsibility for centuries of classism, racism, colonialism, patriarchy, and other gross injustices. Of course, right-wingers constantly ridicule this claim for its “wokeness.”
In Coming Clean, Eric Heinze rejects the idea that we should be less woke. In fact, we need more wokeness, but of a new kind. Yes, we must teach about these bleak pasts, but we must also educate the public about the left's own support for regimes that damaged and destroyed millions of lives for over a century—Stalin in the Soviet Union, Mao Zedong in China, Pol Pot in Cambodia, or the Kim dynasty in North Korea.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Richard Yetter Chappell is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Miami.
Website: http://yetterchappell.net/Richard/
Summary:In this interview, we discuss the ethics of effective altruism (EA)—its central tenets and criticisms. Everyone wants to do good, but many ways of doing good are ineffective. The EA community is focused on finding ways of doing good that actually work.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Joseph Tsang is an immigration attorney.
Website: https://tsangslaw.com/
Summary:In this interview, we discuss ICE, immigration, and deportations. I ask him about how ICE targets people, whether Trump is introducing new immigration laws or just enforcing them more strictly, and whether those detained by ICE get due process.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Rivka Weinberg is a professor of philosophy at Scripps College.
Website: https://www.rivkaweinberg.com/
Summary:In this interview, we discuss the distinction between the different types of meaning, the different aspects of meaning, and how death affects meaning. Among other interesting claims, Weinberg does not believe our lives have an ultimate meaning. She believes this is metaphysically impossible. We also discuss the relationship between meaning and well-being and how much they overlap.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Mollie Gerver is an assistant professor in the Department of Political Economy at King's College London, focusing on consent and immigration ethics.
Website: https://molliegerver.weebly.com/
Paper: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4679723
Summary:In this interview, we discuss Gerver's experiment in which she and her team tested the effect of nudging people to donate money even after they declined to be nudged. We also discuss the general nature of nudges and when it would be appropriate to ask for consent to be nudged.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Reiff is a political, legal, and moral philosopher. His main areas of interest include economic justice, liberalism and its critics, the law and ethics of war and warfare, the nature of causal and moral reasoning, and theories of punishment, compensation, and responsibility.
Website: https://www.markreiff.org/
Summary:In this interview, Reiff proposes a libertarian argument for reparations. In contrast to other theories, his argument focuses on the fact that some property and wealth have been acquired unjustly. Reiff argues that since libertarians believe in rectifying unjustly acquired assets, there is a libertarian argument to be made for redistribution. Reiff argues that this rectification should take the form of a sovereign wealth fund where every adult receives money.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Jennifer Kling, PhD is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Center for Legal Studies at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs.
Website: https://philosophy.uccs.edu/directory/faculty/kling
Book: https://www.amazon.com/Philosophy-Protest-Fighting-Justice-without/dp/1786613204
Summary:In this interview, we discuss Kling's argument for when nonlethal violent protest can be justified. We address specific questions regarding what violence means and what criteria a nonlethal violent protest must meet in order for it to be justified. We also discuss how her framework applies to specific examples, including climate activists blocking traffic and white nationalists protesting in Charlottesville.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Samuel Director is a tenure-track assistant professor at the University of Richmond's Jepson School of Leadership Studies.
Website: https://sites.google.com/colorado.edu/samueldirector/home
Summary:In this interview, we discuss how informed consent in the medical context requires knowledge of how much the medical intervention will cost. According to Director, both plausible standards for informed consent would say that knowledge of price is required for consent to be informed.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Alfie Kohn writes and speaks widely on human behavior, education, and parenting. The author of fourteen books and hundreds of articles, he lectures at education conferences and universities as well as to parent groups and corporations.
Website: https://www.alfiekohn.org/
Summary:According to Kohn, standardized tests assess less meaningful outcomes of an education. He is anti-test but not anti-assessment, assuming the assessments truly measure how much students have learned meaningful lessons and skills. We also discuss why standardized testing is so common and what the alternatives are.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Aaron Benanav is an assistant professor at Syracuse University.
Website: https://www.maxwell.syr.edu/directory/aaron-benanav
Book: https://www.amazon.com/Automation-Future-Work-Aaron-Benanav/dp/1839761296
Summary:Silicon Valley titans, politicians, techno-futurists, and social critics have united in arguing that we are on the cusp of an era of rapid technological automation, heralding the end of work as we know it. Benanav argues that these promises have not been fulfilled. Other topics we discuss include the purpose of these advanced technologies and a universal basic income.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Jessica Flanigan is the Richard L. Morrill Chair in Ethics and Democratic Values at the University of Richmond.
Website: https://jepson.richmond.edu/faculty/bios/jflaniga/
Book: https://www.amazon.com/Debating-Sex-Work-Ethics/dp/0190659890
Summary:In this interview, we discuss Flanigan's libertarian defense of the decriminalization of sex work. One core argument is that restrictions on the sale and purchase of sex violate the rights of sex workers. The reasoning is this. Since people have the right to choose whatever job they want, and since people have the right to decide whom to have sex with, it follows that people have the right to sell sex.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Elizabeth Finneron-Burns is Assistant Professor of Political Theory at the University of Western Ontario and an affiliated researcher at the Institute for Futures Studies in Stockholm.
Website: http://politicalscience.uwo.ca/people/faculty/full-time_faculty/elizabeth_finneron-burns.html
Book: https://www.amazon.com/What-Future-People-Contractualist-Intergenerational/dp/0197653251
Summary:In this interview, we discuss Finneron-Burns' book in which she develops principles of intergenerational ethics. Among other things, we discuss how good of a life we are required to leave future people and when it is permissible for an individual to procreate. The book answers these questions by using the contractualist method to develop general moral principles.
You can support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/chenphilosophy
Eric Heinze is Professor of Law and Humanities at Queen Mary University of London.
Website: https://ericheinze.com/
Book: https://www.amazon.com/Most-Human-Right-Speech-Everything/dp/0262547244/
Summary:In this interview, Heinze explains why free speech is a necessary right to have any other right. We also discuss the distinction between content and viewpoint restrictions, the power and danger of the internet to amplify speech, and whether anti-patriotic speech should be banned during wartime.
