What's Left of Philosophy

In this episode, we discuss the work of historian Hayden White. His provocative claim is that the practice is inescapably the practice of narrative forms to give sense and significance to events of the past. It is this form that often supplements, or even outright makes, historical arguments. Is history a tragedy, a comedy, a satire, or a romance? Why did Marx describe history as tragedy and then farce? What could entitle him to that? The historian always prefigures their history with these choices. We get into whether history has a meaning on its own, what it contributes to politics, and whether there are literary styles more commensurate to Marxist history than others.  
leftofphilosophy.com
References:
Hayden White, Metahistory: The Historical Imagination in Nineteenth-Century Europe (Baltimore:  Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973).
Hayden White, The Content of Form: Narrative Discourse and Historical Representation (London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987).
Music:
“Vintage Memories” by Schematist | schematist.bandcamp.com
“My Space” by Overu | https://get.slip.stream/KqmvAN

In this episode, we talk about Marx’s critique of the Gotha Program, but you knew that from the title. We discuss Marxian critiques of redistributive left politics, why dogmatic Marxists are wrong about this, and much more. We connect it to the present and disagree. It’s very good. Listen.

References:

Karl Marx, “Critique of the Gotha Programme” https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1875/gotha/

Music:

“Vintage Memories” by Schematist | schematist.bandcamp.com
“My Space” by Overu | https://get.slip.stream/KqmvAN

In this episode, we talk about Elias Canetti’s 1960 book Crowds and Power. Equal parts political theory, poetic sociology, and speculative anthropology, this staggering work explores human social life through an increasingly elaborate series of reflections on the nature of crowds. The result is a fascinating typology of different kinds of crowds in which human beings cast off their individuality for the sake of equality and directed collective action: there are baiting crowds, feast crowds, prohibition crowds… Does a lynch mob follow a logic analogous to that of the viewing public in a world of mass media, a gathering of dancers attuned to the rhythms of the others, or those brought before the host of the invisible dead? What does it mean for the general strike that we fear the touch of others, until it’s the thing we desire most? It’s pretty wild stuff, and we find plenty of insights to pull out and play with.
This is just a short teaser of the full episode. To hear the rest, please subscribe to us on Patreon:
patreon.com/leftofphilosophy
References:
Elias Canetti, Crowds and Power, trans. Carol Stewart (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1984).
Music:
“Vintage Memories” by Schematist | schematist.bandcamp.com
“My Space” by Overu | https://get.slip.stream/KqmvAN

In this episode, we talk with James Chamberlain about his new book, Living Through Capitalism, in which he argues that capitalism is hostile to biological life processes and our ability to know them well enough to lead flourishing lives. Capitalism mutilates all life, and not just human life, in its harnessing of life for its own ends. Only in communities that resist this “strange teleology” that capitalism imposes on life can we truly be free. 
leftofphilosophy.com
References:
James Chamberlain, Living Through Capitalism: Resisting Devastation Through Communities of Life (Edinburgh University Press, 2025). 
Music:
“Vintage Memories” by Schematist | schematist.bandcamp.com
“My Space” by Overu | https://get.slip.stream/KqmvAN

In this episode, we take on Adam Smith’s The Theory of Moral Sentiments. Although he is now more well known as an economist because of his later book The Wealth of Nations, Smith shows himself to be a philosopher in his own right in Moral Sentiments. Smith, contrary to popular characterizations, wanted to show that our conduct is not solely motivated by egoism or selfishness, but that we are also motivated by the fortunes of others. For Smith it is only through sympathy that society can achieve stability and harmony. What follows is a comprehensive examination of how we develop virtue, expound rules for justice, and cultivate emotional maturity through our sympathy for others. This episode is all of you who feel society has become more emotionally dysfunctional, lost its sense of shame, and want to understand why it is so frustrating when our so-called ‘friends’ refuse to hate what we hate. Join the pod as we learn about propriety and justice!
leftofphilosophy.com
References:
Adam Smith, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, intro Amartya Sen (New York: Penguin, 2009).
Music:
“Vintage Memories” by Schematist | schematist.bandcamp.com
“My Space” by Overu | https://get.slip.stream/KqmvAN