PlasticPills - Philosophy & Critical Theory Podcast
The Pill Pod is hosted by a group of PhDs offering their irreverent (and unsolicited) takes on critical theory, philosophy, culture, and politics.
Episodes
August 15, 2025 • 14 mins
We wanted to review some Lacan because everybody's still desiring, and Bruce Fink's Lacanian Subject (1995) is quite often touted as the best unofficial intro, and we can see why.
Get this and all our eps at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
This is the book: https://amzn.to/4oubPxQ
Get this and all our eps at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
This is the book: https://amzn.to/4oubPxQ
Mark as Played
August 11, 2025 • 57 mins
In a recent interview with the New York Times Peter Thiel, one of the world's most powerful men, gave ample evidence that he should be institutionalized before he hurts anyone else.
Link to the full interview https://youtu.be/vV7YgnPUxcU?si=qSLrUmKeEblb4jYS
Find all our episodes ad-free at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Link to the full interview https://youtu.be/vV7YgnPUxcU?si=qSLrUmKeEblb4jYS
Find all our episodes ad-free at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
August 1, 2025 • 82 mins
Pill pod discuss the public media representations of Epstein and Gaza before a seamless transition into a discussion of Giorgio Agamben's concepts of 1) Sovereignty 2) Bare Life and 3) States of Exception.
The FULL OMNIBUS edition of homo sacer is here, but the sections are also available separately.
The FULL OMNIBUS edition of homo sacer is here, but the sections are also available separately.
Mark as Played
July 16, 2025 • 80 mins
Pills is away, so 1Dime Tony came present a thesis he's working at. Tony rejoins the pill pod to excavate the terms "woke right" and the semiotics of "woke" more broadly. We don't always agree, but we attempt to deduce which conservative faction is accusing which other of wokeness, although it is sometimes tough going figuring what they mean by the term. Articles:
Mark as Played
June 25, 2025 • 15 mins
According to Derrida, metaphysicians have spent 2000 years conceptually boxing-in metaphor because they don't want to admit their dependence on figurative language. This has allowed them to trick themselves into believing that fiction and non-fiction are fundamentally different; that one can be true and the other cannot. In White Mythology, Derrida discovers the metaphors buried in philosophy from Plato to Hegel, even as they try t...
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June 18, 2025 • 15 mins
We go deeper into Maurice Merleau-Ponty's insights in The Visible and The Invisible, e.g. The Flesh of the World, the Chiasm, and the Intertwining and what these mean for a meditative experience on the daily.
Get the full episode and tons of others at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Get the full episode and tons of others at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
June 16, 2025 • 79 mins
This week we looked into OG critic of fascism Wilhelm Reich, who wrote The Mass Psychology of Fascism right after the Nazis were elected in 1933. Reich was among the first "neomarxists", and believed that Marxists need to understand psychoanalysis to understand Fascism.
Link to text
Find our full episodes on philosophy and theory at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Link to text
Find our full episodes on philosophy and theory at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
June 12, 2025 • 15 mins
We compare Maurice Merleau-Ponty's insights in an unfinished work he wrote before his death to the meditations of Buddhist philosopher Nagarjuna 18 centuries prior.
This episode and all the rest can be found at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
This episode and all the rest can be found at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
May 31, 2025 • 72 mins
The New York Times has claimed that three "fascism experts" are fleeing Trump and "going abroad". In truth, these are not (all) fascism experts, and they did not flee, in fact they have been in Canada for almost a year because they got jobs at the University of Toronto. We looked into their research, which is the same tired, lib, horseshoe theory bullshit that Nazism and Communism are the same thing.
Find this and our other episod...
Find this and our other episod...
Mark as Played
May 16, 2025 • 69 mins
We catch you up on Canadian politics by introducing you to our new Prime Minister via his book VALUE(S): Building A Better World For All (https://amzn.to/4dj1oYJ).
Bono called it ‘A radical book that speaks out accessibly' (lol)
Bono called it ‘A radical book that speaks out accessibly' (lol)
Mark as Played
May 8, 2025 • 66 mins
Yea we missed a lot of news, but we wanted to cover the Trump regime's war on higher education. As a group with a lot of university affiliations, we hate universities too, but here we try to diagnose the reasons for the recent clashes.
Get all of the content at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Get all of the content at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
April 29, 2025 • 72 mins
After a long hiatus, Pills returns to the main show with some new musings over The Last Samurai, Buddhism and the phenomenology of religion. The Kyoto School and Nagarjuna were mentioned in the episode, but we didn't get into much depth this time round.
Find everything we make at the feed at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Find everything we make at the feed at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
April 22, 2025 • 87 mins
This is Part 3.
What makes a prophet a prophet? As we are on the civilization decline hill, we are going to experience a higher volume of prophets than usual.
Don't miss an episode https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
What makes a prophet a prophet? As we are on the civilization decline hill, we are going to experience a higher volume of prophets than usual.
Don't miss an episode https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
April 15, 2025 • 94 mins
The contemporary political situation has rendered Paradise Lost more relevant now than any time since it was penned by John Milton's daughters. It is an epic, revolutionary in both style and politics, and for this episode we have an expert, Victor Hainagiu, who is writing his dissertation on it.
Check out William Blake's illustrations of the text: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Blake%27s_illustrations_of_Paradise_Lost
Find al...
Check out William Blake's illustrations of the text: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Blake%27s_illustrations_of_Paradise_Lost
Find al...
Mark as Played
April 11, 2025 • 61 mins
The cults of COVID may never go away, but this is why they are to be expected.
This is part II of the plasticpills diatribe on religion focusing on metaphor as the original decision making process in a world and specifically the metaphors of religious laws that begin with keeping your hands clean but end with the mass extermination of people.
Listen ad free at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
This is part II of the plasticpills diatribe on religion focusing on metaphor as the original decision making process in a world and specifically the metaphors of religious laws that begin with keeping your hands clean but end with the mass extermination of people.
Listen ad free at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
April 5, 2025 • 77 mins
So, after decrying philosophy last episode, we are back on it hard again in 201. The Pill Pod interviews Christopher Satoor on Schelling and his conception of freedom from "the freedom essay", also known as THE PHILOSOPHICAL INVESTIGATIONS INTO THE ESSENCE OF HUMAN FREEDOM.
Chris also does a bunch of interview and video content on YouTube, at https://www.youtube.com/@UCjybB5M-knVLAvrohRXtklQ
get all our content at https://www.patreo...
Chris also does a bunch of interview and video content on YouTube, at https://www.youtube.com/@UCjybB5M-knVLAvrohRXtklQ
get all our content at https://www.patreo...
Mark as Played
March 28, 2025 • 60 mins
Christo-techno-fascism? I'm hunting down the impulse producing the end of the world and how religion functions as a social technology. As it turns out, we're all still religious.
All the full episodes are available at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
The videos are available at https://www.youtube.com/plasticpills
All the full episodes are available at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
The videos are available at https://www.youtube.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
February 13, 2025 • 92 mins
A panel discussion on how a once great simulation become, almost overnight, the most schizophrenic spectacle in the history of human society. Is it mere distraction? Is it a war to control our extended nervous system. Should we be worried?
Find our hidden episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Find our hidden episodes at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
February 4, 2025 • 81 mins
The Pill Pod debates the philosophy of freedom from Merleau Ponty, Sartre, Peirce, and Post-structuralism.
Listen ad-free on https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Listen ad-free on https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills
Mark as Played
January 21, 2025 • 8 mins
This is a preview of an episode on Jean-Paul Sartre and existentialism. Find it at https://www.patreon.com/plasticpills. Please join us to support the show and get all our episodes!
Mark as Played
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