The Wes Cecil Podcast

A work that I think embodies, quite consciously on the part of Jung, many of the contradictions, challenges, and paradoxes of the modern mind trying to come to grips with a world that simply does not cohere with our general materialist, rationalist worldview. I hope to use this as both a great text to explore and an example of how one can read in a very different manner. It was working with great teachers who helped me learn t...

MAJOR THINKERS - NIETZSCHE - EP. 1

An intellectual biography of Nietzsche kicks off this series discussing the life and philosophy of a series of major thinkers. I explore some of the key ideas and influences that shaped Nietzsche’s thinking including his loathing of Christianity and the influence of classical literature in shaping his ethical outlook. This is an improved audio version of a lecture I delivered over a decade a...

DIGNITY AND INTEGRITY:

It may seem a bit abstract, which I imagine it is, however I feel the disappearance of the concepts of Dignity and Integrity from the world of education, art, philosophy and culture generally is one of the greatest challenges to a sense of intellectual community today. Recognizing our own dignity allows us to appreciate the value of our contributions to the world of ideas and well as appreciate those of other...

Wow, so I did mention this is a crazy, difficult text didn’t I? So Jung’s conscious attempt to break from the thought processes and values of his society created an intellectual and emotional crisis that shaped the creation of the Red Book. The most significant note for contemporary readers is that he is trying to return in some way to the approaches to knowledge and wisdom that shaped the first 4,000 years of civilizat...

Karl Marx is one of the most influential thinkers in the history of the world. This lecture reviews his background and some of the events that formed his thinking as a means of putting his core ideas into a historical frame. A hopefully much more listenable version of this early recording. 

Karl Marx 1847 A link to the Economic and Philosophical manuscripts of 1847 which is perhaps the best place to get an introductory...

FREE YOUR MIND:

Our culture's bias towards technology, specialization, and bureaucracy all mitigate against having a mind that is free to pursue one’s own ideas and to allow the time and predilection to participate in the House of the Intellect. Here I use the example of medical doctors who, over the course of the last 80 years, have been transformed from key participants in the House of the Intellect to narrow specialists who...

HOW TO KILL THE HERO:

The power of Jung’s approach becomes a little more clear as we move into these later chapters. Jung is quite explicitly at war with his inherited cultural values. While it is one thing to recognize this, it is very much more difficult to try and reimagine one’s values - and hence one’s understanding of the self. Jung tries to murder the image of the hero - casting himself as an honorless assas...

Q & A #1 - HOUSE OF THE INTELLECT

Wes and Jeremy take questions from Patreon Members on Episodes 1 & 2

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Plus, gain access to course materials, reading lists, bonus lectures, and Wes’s weekly diaries from France. Only $2 / month. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more informa...

Q & A #1 - READING JUNG'S THE RED BOOK

Wes and Jeremy take questions from Patreon Members on Episodes 1 & 2

Sign-up for Wes’s PATREON to get your questions answered by Wes!

Plus, gain access to course materials, reading lists, bonus lectures, and Wes’s weekly diaries from France. Only $2 / month. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more inf...

An Improved Audio version of a lecture on Martin Heidegger. Heidegger was one of the most influential and controversial philosophers of the 20th century. This lecture explores his life and work and attempts to frame his philosophical ideas within the context of his many ethical failings. 

A link to the lecture notes

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COMMUNITY MATTERS:

As much as it is important to emphasize personal patterns of thought and behavior, we are hugely influenced by forces that come to us from society. Thinking about the patterns that have shaped culture in the past and our immersion in a new paradigm is necessary, and perhaps helpful, in thinking about why we feel the way we do and how we respond to broader cultural trends.

Think of moments from the past that app...

INTO THE DESERT

The power of Jung’s approach becomes a little more clear as we move into these later chapters. Jung is quite explicitly at war with his inherited cultural values. While it is one thing to recognize this, it is very much more difficult to try and reimagine one’s values - and hence one’s understanding of the self. Jung tries to murder the image of the hero - casting himself as an honorless assassin. H...

Bertrand Russell was a famous and influential thinker. He became a popular philosopher after his groundbreaking attempt to found mathematics on a prefect, logically complete footing failed. This is an improved audio version of my original lecture delivered at Peninsula College.

Here is a link to is very readable and enlightening History of Western Philosophy

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ROB US OF WHAT WE LOVE:

In this episode I discuss the ways in which our culture and mental habits combine to rob us of the experiences we would love to be having by both limiting our capacity to participate and limiting the communities in which we might participate. I use contemporary American film culture as an example of a simultaneously booming art form that nonetheless seems to be culturally barren.

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BEYOND RIGHT AND WRONG

Here Jung moves beyond simply rejecting the Right and Wrong and tries to create an ethos of ambiguity. Focusing on a dream involving Elijah and Salome, he experiences the intertwined relationship of lust and purity, truth and lies, seduction and holiness. 

Here is a great entry in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy on De Beauvoir’s Ethics of Ambiguity Simone de Beauvoir (Stanford Encyclopedi...

One of the most influential and controversial philosophers of the late 20th century, Derrida specialized in trying to unmoor our sense of certainty and truth. Working across 50 books, he was an intellectual gad-fly in the tradition of Socrates who always wanted us to be suspicious of clarity. He almost single-handedly brought continental philosophy back to the English speaking world. 

You can find the original Lecture Notes...

TECHNOLOGY AND DATA:

Neither Barzun nor myself are opposed to technology or data per se - it is the way our culture tries to isolate technology from the cultural environment and, hence, de-value most everything the house of the intellect values. The notion that the quality of the people who control technology and the experiences of people who interact with it simply do not matter is one of the recurrent and obviously deeply flawed c...

CONCLUSION:

I conclude the series with the end of the first book of the Red Book. In the last section we see Jung sliding back and forth between various ideas of the role he is supposed to fulfill - kill god, be god, ignore god - and how we should respond to this. I also reflect on the difference between inspiration and discovery, what Jung is trying to do, and Philosophy, which generally requires a much more rigorous implementation...

Largely forgotten today, she was an influential thinker and, perhaps, mystic who lived a life of ethical commitment in an extraordinarily difficult period in history. She provided an inspirational example to many of her contemporaries and the tone of her works as much as the power of her arguments brought her wide acclaim.

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