Site • RSS • Apple PodcastsDescription (podcaster-provided):
A podcast by Toby Tremlett featuring long-form interviews with philosophers.Themes and summary (AI-generated based on podcaster-provided show and episode descriptions):
➤ Long-form philosopher interviews • Ethics: evil, moral responsibility, deference • Political philosophy: democracy, voting, protest, epistocracy • Art, fiction, poetry and moral vision • Epistemology: knowledge, testimony, self-knowledge • Philosophy of mind • History, diversity, comparative/Chinese Daoism • Empathy and long-term responsibility to future generationsThis podcast features long-form, accessible interviews with philosophers that combine intellectual exploration with personal reflection on how guests came to philosophy and what sustains their work. Across conversations, the host draws out both the human motivations behind philosophical inquiry and the structure of the arguments philosophers use, aiming to make specialized topics approachable without flattening their complexity.
A recurring focus is ethics in both its theoretical and practical dimensions. Discussions probe what it means to call an action “evil” rather than merely harmful, whether freedom is required for moral blame, and how attempts to understand wrongdoing interact with questions about forgiveness and responsibility. Other ethical themes include the risks of repeatedly deferring to others in forming moral views, how practical deliberation shapes everyday life, and why expertise in ethics does not automatically translate into ethical behavior. The show also extends moral concern beyond the present, examining long-term responsibility to future generations and the role of empathy and imagination in motivating that concern.
Political philosophy appears through sustained attention to democracy: what makes a society genuinely democratic, whether existing democracies meet their own standards, and what citizens owe to one another. Related questions include why voting matters when individual impact seems small, what forms of protest are justified, and whether alternative political arrangements—such as rule by the knowledgeable or selection by lottery—could rival electoral systems.
The podcast also ranges into epistemology and philosophy of mind, with conversations about knowledge versus true belief, the nature of inquiry, testimony, and self-knowledge, alongside introductions to what philosophy of mind studies and why it generates counterintuitive views. Another strand connects philosophy with literature and art, especially through Iris Murdoch and the idea that fiction and “vision” can disclose moral reality, as well as reflections on listening: how attention to voice in poetry can illuminate ethical relations between speaker and audience and improve philosophical conversation.
Historical and cross-cultural perspectives are present too, including the value and limits of studying the history of philosophy, issues of diversity in the canon, Schopenhauer on solitude and compassion, and comparative approaches to Chinese philosophy and Daoism.
