• unSILOed with Greg LaBlanc

  • 著者: Greg La Blanc
  • ポッドキャスト

unSILOed with Greg LaBlanc

著者: Greg La Blanc
  • サマリー

  • unSILOed is a series of interdisciplinary conversations that inspire new ways of thinking about our world. Our goal is to build a community of lifelong learners addicted to curiosity and the pursuit of insight about themselves and the world around them.*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*
    All rights reserved.
    続きを読む 一部表示

あらすじ・解説

unSILOed is a series of interdisciplinary conversations that inspire new ways of thinking about our world. Our goal is to build a community of lifelong learners addicted to curiosity and the pursuit of insight about themselves and the world around them.*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*
All rights reserved.
エピソード
  • 536. The Role of Judgment in Literature and Aesthetic Education feat. Michael W. Clune
    2025/05/05
    What have we lost when the expert aesthetic judgement of professors and literary critics is replaced by the marketplace and bestseller lists? How can someone be both a critic and a creator, and do those identities improve or detract from each other?Michael W. Clune is a professor at Case Western Reserve University and the author of several books, including the subject of this discussion, A Defense of Judgment, and the upcoming novel Pan.Greg and Michael discuss Michael's perspective on the necessity of judgment in the study of literature and the arts, contrasting it with the modern academic trend that moves away from making definitive evaluations. Michael draws parallels between literary criticism and economics, highlighting a shift towards egalitarianism and market-driven valuations at the expense of aesthetic judgment. Their conversation delves into the historical evolution of these ideas, the importance of close reading, and the role of literary education in transforming personal taste and understanding. *unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*Episode Quotes:Michael finds it counterintuitive and strange that there is no public standard for distinguishing great art from mediocre art.05:18 To say that there's no public standard for judging some work’s better than the other and to say that everyone should make their own judgements and professors and critics and museum curators shouldn't try to tell people what's good and what's not, that presents as like, oh, everyone gets to choose.There's no public standard. But in fact, what you actually see happening is that it's the replacement of one standard, the judgment of those educated in the arts by another standard, which is the marketplace. And so, bestseller lists basically replace the canon that's constantly changing and there's all of complex judgments, but that's basically the displacement. So in fact, it's not really an egalitarian move in the way that many of its proponents take it to be. It's actually a disavowal of the expertise of aesthetic educators and throwing everything to the kinds of orderings produced by the marketplace.Everyone can make artistic judgments.03:01 There's no coherent way to do literary study or to teach art history without making judgments all the time. That's just the nature of it.The practice of teaching literature requires tacit skills. 20:01 When it comes down to the brass tacks of pedagogy of teaching, and this is a famous thing about literary study, let's say Moby Dick, you could imagine a version of the class where I just talk about Moby Dick and no one reads it, and I describe how great it is and how wonderful it is, and how it's surprising and strange and so forth. You could do that in chemistry. You could do something like that in economics or in physics, but in literature, the student has to encounter it for him or herself, right? It's like nothing is happening unless they're encountering for themselves, unless they have the experience in which something magical is disclosed to them. And so, the actual practice of teaching literature involves what the chemist and philosopher of science Michael Polanyi, described as tacit skills, which is really simply a kind of knowing how, without being able to say exactly what you're doing.Aesthetic education is a vital human need and universities are failing to provide it44:01 The desire for aesthetic education, the desire to have one's taste, be guided to know what books one should look at, how one should read those books, how one should spend one's precious time. That desire is totally out there and is very strong and is not being met by literature departments in the way that I think they should. I think it's a tragedy and a big mistake that literature in our departments are no longer fulfilling that vital human need. Show Links:Recommended Resources:Democracy in AmericaLéon WalrasCarl MengerWilliam Stanley JevonsMichael PolanyiIn Praise of Commercial CultureCultural Capital: The Problem of Literary Canon FormationDavid HumeImmanuel KantJohn KeatsGwendolyn BrooksMoby-DickH. G. WellsJane AustenMarcel ProustHelen VendlerGuest Profile:Faculty Profile at Case Western Reserve UniversityProfile on WikipediaMichaelWClune.comHis Work:Amazon Author PagePan: A NovelWhite Out: The Secret Life of HeroinA Defense of JudgmentGamelife: A MemoirAmerican Literature and the Free Market, 1945–2000Writing Against TimeHarpers Magazine Articles
    続きを読む 一部表示
    58 分
  • 535. How Evolutionary Psychology Can Inform Marketing, the Social Sciences, and the Denial of Science with Dr. Gad Saad
    2025/05/02
    According to today’s guest, “ You can't study anything involving any creature, let alone human beings, let alone human beings in a business setting, whilst pretending that the biological forces that shape our behavior are somehow non-existent.” Dr. Gad Saad is a professor of marketing at Concordia University and the author of the books, The Consuming Instinct: What Juicy Burgers, Ferraris, Pornography, and Gift Giving Reveal About Human Nature and Parasitic Mind: How Infectious Ideas Are Killing Common Sense. His work applies evolutionary psychology to the fields of marketing and consumerism. Gad and Greg discuss resistance toward evolutionary psychology in academia, practical applications of the field in marketing and business, and finally, the implications of parasitic ideas on society and the balance between empathy and scientific truth.*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*Episode Quotes:The animus against evolutionary psychology[06:10] Maybe I could mention just a few reasons why people have such animus towards evolutionary psychology. So, number one, there's something called the human reticence effect, which exactly purports that evolutionary psychology and evolutionary biology should be applicable to every species, but human beings transcend those forces, right? Or it might explain why we have opposable thumbs, but surely don't use evolution to explain everything that's above the neck. Okay? In some cases, people could be a bit more flexible in saying, well, it explains very primal urges why I want to eat a juicy burger, but it surely can't explain higher-order reasoning. What do you mean? Where do you think our cognition comes from? And so, even though I'm completely used to, at this point, facing all the animus, it still surprises me because, to me, it should be banal and trivially obvious that, of course, evolutionary psychology explains our human behavior.According to Dr. Saad, a good marketer is wedded to a solid understanding of human nature. [15:16] A marketer who decides based on their understanding of the human mind, they will create product lines. If it’s not weathered to evolutionary psychology, it’ll fail. On why people hate evolutionary theory[20:52] There's a deeper reason why people hate evolutionary theory. I think it's because in many cases it attacks people's most foundational ideological commitment. Parasitic ideas that emanate from academiaI will be focusing on specific set of parasitic ideas that emanate from academia. And as it so happens, since academia is astonishingly leftist, those parasitic ideas happen to be originating, their genesis from the left. That doesn't mean that people on the right can't be parasitized. Show Links:Recommended Resources:Richard LewontinStephen Jay GouldHomicide: Foundations of Human Behavior by Martin Daly and Margo WilsonMultitrait-multimethod matrixThat’s Interesting! by Murray S. DavisRobert TriversPopperian falsificationAsch conformity experimentsThe Enigma of Reason by Hugo Mercier and Dan SperberHugo Mercier on unSILOedGuest Profile:Professional WebsiteProfile on LinkedInProfile on XThe Saad Truth podcastHis Work:The Consuming Instinct: What Juicy Burgers, Ferraris, Pornography, and Gift Giving Reveal About Human Nature Parasitic Mind: How Infectious Ideas Are Killing Common SenseThe Saad Truth about Happiness: 8 Secrets for Leading the Good Life
    続きを読む 一部表示
    52 分
  • 534. The Evolving Role of Christianity in American Democracy feat. Jonathan Rauch
    2025/04/30
    Why would religion be necessary for a liberal democracy to function fully as intended? What benefits does Christianity provide to society in tandem with democracy that would collapse if either of those pillars failed? Jonathan Rauch is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and also the author of several books and articles across various publications. His latest book is titled Cross Purposes: Christianity's Broken Bargain with Democracy.Greg and Jonathan discuss the declining influence of Christianity in America, the historical symbiosis between religion and liberal democracy, and how that relationship has shifted over time. They explore the rise of alternative spiritual movements and the consequences of shifting toward a more secular society. Jonathan explains his concepts of thin Christianity, sharp Christianity, and thick Christianity, and the benefits of thick Christianity as exemplified by the Latter Day Saints. They also examine the political polarization within Christianity and the effects it is having on the makeup of the church.*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*Episode Quotes:The core message of Jonathan’s book[15:10] You've probably seen this in academia. They look at religion as the sum total of sociology plus demography and political leanings. Those things matter, but theology matters more. The Bible matters, and that remains within Christianity, a fundamental groundwork that it's hard to shop your way out of. I mean, you can. Of course, there's some pretty wackadoodle Christianity out there, but most mainstream Christianity is rooted in certain teachings, and those do provide some important ethical principles. The core message of my book is that the three most important central principles to Christianity, according to Christians, are also three core principles of liberal democracy. And you don't have to believe in Jesus to see that they're true and to see that they're important.Is America ungovernable without Christianity?[04:47] Religion is fading as part of American life. And that's great because religion is divisive, and it's dogmatic, and we'll just all get along better without it. I have never been so wrong. It turns out the founders told us this, but I forgot it, that Christianity, religion generally, but in the US that means Christianity- that especially means white Christianity, is a load-bearing wall in our democracy. And America is becoming ungovernable in significant part because Christianity is failing.The crisis of authority[36:22] Barna, which is a Christian research group, did a big survey of pastors a couple years ago. They asked if pastors had seriously considered quitting in the last year. 42% said yes. And the number three reason after, I can't remember number one and two though, were obvious, like low pay and high stress.Number three was politics.Why Christianity and liberalism need to support each other.[39:29] Liberalism needs that sense of rootedness and groundedness, that attention to higher transcendent things and core values and scriptures that are 3000 years old or 2000 years old, depending. It needs those things precisely because it is always changing and always churning.Show Links:Recommended Resources:ChristianityFriedrich NietzscheStrange Rites: New Religions for a Godless WorldJohn Stuart MillAlexandre LefebvreImmanuel KantChristian NationalismAmerican Heretics: Religious Adversaries of Liberal OrderLouis P. SheldonFamily Research CouncilBarna GroupEvangelicalismDavid FrenchEquality UtahRussell D. MooreTim KellerGuest Profile:Faculty Profile at Brookings InstitutionJonathanRauch.comProfile on WikipediaLinkedIn ProfileSocial Profile on XHis Work:Amazon Author PageCross Purposes: Christianity's Broken Bargain with DemocracyThe Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of TruthThe Happiness Curve: Why Life Gets Better After 50Kindly Inquisitors: The New Attacks on Free ThoughtDenial: My 25 Years Without a SoulGay Marriage: Why It Is Good for Gays, Good for Straights, and Good for AmericaThe Outnation: A Search for the Soul of JapanIndex of Articles
    続きを読む 一部表示
    54 分

unSILOed with Greg LaBlancに寄せられたリスナーの声

カスタマーレビュー:以下のタブを選択することで、他のサイトのレビューをご覧になれます。