Intellectual Freedom Podcast

In a world drowning in information but starving for meaning, Dr. David D. Hopkins returns to the mic to ask a haunting question: How did the smartest generation in history become incapable of serious thought?

In this episode of The Intellectual Freedom Podcast, Hopkins breaks down chapters 7 through 9 of Neil Postman’s prophetic masterpiece Amusing Ourselves to Death, exposing how television, and now digital media, reshaped educatio...

🎙 You’re Not Informed or Educated— You’re Stimulated

Series: Amusing Ourselves to Death – Part 2 (Chapters 4–6)

We don’t live in an Information Age.
We live in a Stimulation Age — where attention is currency and distraction is design.

In this episode, Dr. David D. Hopkins unpacks Chapters 4 through 6 of Neil Postman’s prophetic book Amusing Ourselves to Death and reveals how technology, photography, and television resha...

We live in an age where distraction isn’t an accident—it’s the business model.
In this episode, Dr. David D. Hopkins takes you inside Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death and exposes how our attention, curiosity, and even our capacity to think have been quietly hijacked by the entertainment culture we call “media.”

Postman warned us: the danger wasn’t censorship—it was amusement.
And forty years later, the prophecy has ...

We live in the age of short thoughts.
Fast clips. Hot takes. Endless scroll.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth—our minds are paying the price.

In this episode of The Intellectual Freedom Podcast, Dr. David D. Hopkins breaks down how the modern attention economy has quietly rewired your brain—shrinking your focus, flattening your curiosity, and turning deep thought into a lost art.

It’s not your fault. You were trained for this.

In this final episode of our six-part education series, Dr. David Hopkins—Humanities professor and reformed academic insider—dives deep into the gut-punch question haunting Gen Z: Is college still worth it?

With startling new data from a Newsweek/Indeed poll revealing that 51% of Gen Z grads believe their degree was a waste of money, we peel back the layers of rising debt, shrinking ROI, and the relentless march of AI into white-col...

College was sold to us as the golden ticket. A rite of passage. A guaranteed path to success. But for millions of Americans, it’s become a slow-moving financial crisis—one monthly payment at a time.

In this episode of Intellectual Freedom, we peel back the layers of one of the most dangerous and under-examined decisions facing students and families today: signing your future away without doing the math. We’ve normalized debt so deep...

“We’re all going to die, all of us, what a circus! That alone should make us love each other but it doesn’t. We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities. We are eaten up by nothing.” – Charles Bukowski

That line stopped me in my tracks. Bukowski, with his whiskey-soaked honesty, captured the human condition better than most philosophers: we waste our lives on nonsense. Social media arguments. Petty politics. Status games that do...

If AI’s Replacing Jobs, What’s the Point of a Degree?

That’s not clickbait—it’s the question millions of Gen Z students are silently asking. In this episode, Dr. David D. Hopkins takes a wrecking ball to the old college playbook and lays out what actually matters in the age of AI, automation, and algorithmic everything.

If artificial intelligence is already doing entry-level work—from coding to copywriting—where does that leave ...

Stop letting your emotions make six-figure decisions. Choosing a college isn’t like buying a car. But too often, that’s how it’s sold—on vibes, not value. In this episode, Dr. David D. Hopkins unpacks how emotional decision-making can lead to lifelong debt and why parents need to think (and act) strategically before signing off on six-figure loans.

You'll hear a real-world case: a father whose son wants to take out $85K for a c...

College is sold as the golden ticket—but is it? In this episode, David D. Hopkins unpacks the promises and pitfalls of higher education in America. From soaring tuition costs and crushing student debt to the shifting value of degrees in today’s job market, we cut through the hype and ask the hard questions: Is college still worth it? Or has it become one of the biggest scams of our time?

Whether you’re a student, parent, or lifelong...

In this final episode of the Echoes of Tyranny series, we delve deep into the chilling conclusions of George Orwell's '1984' and Aldous Huxley's 'Brave New World', exploring their haunting relevance in today’s world. We break down the different forms of control portrayed in these dystopian classics—Orwell's brutal force through fear and Huxley's seductive oppression through comfort—and how th...

Feeling stuck in a world that seems designed to keep you quiet, comfortable, and controlled? You’re not alone—and neither were the rebels of Orwell’s 1984 and Huxley’s Brave New World. In this episode, we’re diving deep into the heart of these dystopian classics, revealing what their failed rebellions teach us about resistance in our own world today.

We kick things off with some powerful metaphors—think the explosive energy of the f...

Welcome back, friends, to another deep dive into the wild world of dystopia. This is episode five in our seven-part series on Dystopia Literature and theemergence of it in our world today. In this epissode, we’re leaving behind the constant surveillance of Big Brother (sort of) and diving headfirst into something equally messy: love and relationships. But don’t get too comfortable, because in 1984 and Brave New World, love is anyth...

In Part 4 of Echoes of Tyranny, we continue with two of the greatest dystopian novels and ask a pressing question: What happens to us when individuality becomes the enemy? First, we plunge into the world of Orwell's 1984, where Winston Smith's every thought is a potential crime. It's not just what you do—it's what you think that can get you erased from existence. Orwell doesn't shy away from the grim realit...

In this episode, we dive headfirst into the murky waters of truth and reality, exploring how they can be bent, twisted, and outright manipulated. Drawing from two of the most influential dystopian novels—1984 and Brave New World—we'll break down the tactics used by totalitarian regimes to control not only information but the very perception of reality itself.

We start with George Orwell's 1984, where language becomes a wea...

In the second episode of the 'Echoes of Tyranny' series, we delve into the heart of dystopian societies, where the grip of control reaches every corner of life. This isn't just a discussion of 1984's Big Brother or Brave New World's soma-soaked utopia—it's a comparative literary analysis of how these dystopian visions have eerie parallels in today's Western world. 

We'll explore the suffocatin...

The worlds of 1984 and Brave New World are no longer just fiction—they're disturbingly close to our reality. In this first episode of Echoes of Tyranny: How Fiction Became Our Reality, we dive into the unsettling parallels between these dystopian classics and the present day. Get ready to explore the chilling foresight of Orwell and Huxley and how their warnings still resonate in modern society.

Why Listen? You might be wonderi...

Have you ever wondered why a government, a system of institutions specifically designed to solve problems, often preserves and worsens the problems they are supposed to solve?

Buckle up as we dive into a lively discussion unraveling the Shirky Principle, which suggests governments are more prone to protect problems than solve them. We will break down a hilarious example involving the case of an Ontario-based carpooling si...

In this episode, we delve deep into the heart of American democracy and confront a stark reality: Democracy is Dead. Join us as we explore the undeniable influence of economic elites, intellectual elites, and unelected officials in steering the course of our nation through the uniparty of Democrats and Republicans.

We analyze eye-opening statistics and polls revealing how disillusioned Americans are with their elected offi...