Thales’ Well

Apr 18 2025 57 ep. 60 mins 239
Thales’ Well Podcast artwork

A podcast exploring Philosophy, Politics, Current Affairs, Literature and Film.

  Society & Culture  Education
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On Socrates with Agnes Callard

Apr 18 2025 53 mins  
On this episode I talk to the Agnes Callard about the great Ancient Greek philosopher Socrates. We discuss Agnes' new book Open Socrates: The Case for A Philosophical Life [Penguin, 2025]. Agnes and I discuss the themes of Open Socrates, focusing on philosophy as a public, outward-looking practice, Socrates’ call to examine life is framed not just as introspection but as active e

On Remaking Science with Evan Thompson

Dec 09 2024 63 mins  
In this episode, I am joined for a fascinating conversation with philosopher Evan Thompson as we delve into his thought-provoking book The Blind Spot. We discuss this collaboration with scientists Marcelo Gleiser and Adam Frank, his insights on reconciling the “scientific image” and the “manifest image” of the world, and the interplay between subjective experience and objec

On Secular Gurus with Chris Kavanagh

Mar 21 2024 82 mins  
I talk to psychologist Dr Christopher Kavanagh about the phenomenon of secular gurus. We discussed the secularism of latter day gurus, how they differ and compare to traditional cult leaders, what traits it takes to be a secular guru (galaxy brainedness, cultishness, anti-establishmentarianism), psychopathy/sociopathy, narcissism and techniques for avoiding manipulation. Here is a

On Writing with Lars Iyer

Dec 22 2023 62 mins  
Lars Iyer is back! On this episode I talk to novelist Lars Iyer about the fiction, the writing process, the relation between literature and the world, a writers compulsion to write. We speak about a whole range of writers like Plato, Samuel Beckett, Maurice Blanchot, Paul Celan, Margaret Duras, Thomas Bernhard. One of the things Lars suggests is that the value of literature is it u

On Richard Rorty with Chris Voparil

Oct 27 2023 61 mins  
On this episode I talk with Chris Voparil from Union Institute & University about American philosopher Richard Rorty. We discuss Rorty’s biography, his complicated relation with American Pragmatist philosophy and both analytic and continental philosophy, how Rorty dealt with accusations of relativism, his epistemological and moral pluralism, what Rorty has to say about solida

On Spiritual Freedom with Martin Hägglund

Jun 09 2023 71 mins  
On this episode of the podcast, I talk to Swedish philosopher Prof. Martin Hägglund from Yale University about his book This Life: Why Mortality Makes Us Free. The dominant theme of our conversation was the meaning of freedom. Martin has a distinct notion of the demands of being free and we got into a detailed discussion about what freedom really means, how to think about it, how

On Bruno Latour with Joost van Loon

Apr 27 2023 70 mins  
On this episode I talk to Prof. Joost van Loon about French philosopher and sociologist Bruno Latour. We talked about a lot! Joost taught me about Latour’s actor network theory and while we were doing that we ended up chatting about the importance of concrete controversies, how objectivity works, the production of science, conspiracy theories, vaccine science, relativism, new mat

On Alexandre Kojève with Hager Weslati

Apr 02 2023 73 mins  
On this podcast I talk to Dr Hager Weslati about the philosopher Alexandre Kojève. Kojève is a hugely influential but not very well-known philosophers. Here Hager and I talk about his life, his philosophy, and his famous lectures on Hegel. Kojève was a philosopher, entrepreneur, diplomat, architect of the European Union and possible spy! Hager Weslati is a lecturer in media phil

On the Truth of Snuff with Mark McKenna

Apr 02 2023 65 mins  
A podcast with my colleague Dr Mark McKenna who is an Associate Professor at Staffordshire University. We talked about horror films. Specifically, we talked about the the snuff movie as a form of horror. We also talked about the cultural mythologies that have grown up around the concept of snuff, how this mythology transformed in the technological age as well issues pertaining to d

On the Embrace of Capital with Don Milligan

Oct 13 2022 67 mins  
Don Milligan is back to discuss his new book The Embrace of Capital (Zero Books: 2022). In this , Don recounts and analyses his history of social and political activism interrogating the reasons he thinks working people have a love-hate relationship with capitalism but ultimately embrace it. But equally, Don tells us how working people hate insecurity, inequality, greed and love ci