Laurie focuses on chapter 3 of DC Schindler’s The Politics of the Real. In this chapter, Schindler argues that liberal structures cannot create real community, so even communitarian proposals for doing so fall short. Schindler also begins to hint at what he thinks would do so better. … More How Can Community Be Built? (Politics of the Real 4)
Laurie discusses Chapters 1 and 2 of DC Schindler’s The Politics of the Real: The Church Between Liberalism and Integralism, In this section, she concentrates on what Schindler thinks is the fallout of liberalism, what we’ve gained during the rise of liberalism, why “Nature’s God” is a generic or empty God, and why the American founding was not a Christian event. … More Was the American Founding a Christian Event? (Politics of the Real, 3)
Laurie discusses some of DC Schindler’s main themes in his introduction and first chapter in The Politics of the Real: The Church Between Liberalism and Integralism. Among the arguments Schindler makes that are challenging to contemporary sensibilities: that the combination of Christianity with Roman Institutions was not a mistake but somehow an unfolding of Christianity’s presence in the world, and that Liberalism is a “dis-incarnation” that strikes at the root of Christianity itself and is inherently atheistic. … More Liberalism vs. Christianity (DC Schindler’s The Politics of the Real–2)
Get ready for a series on DC Schindler’s The Politics of the Real: The Church Between Liberalism and Integralism. This video introduces Schindler as a scholar. I discuss why I want to read his book, and something of the larger context of which it is a part. What do we make of a book written primarily for a Catholic audience, and an informed one at that? How do we approach it–and why should we do so? … More The Politics of the Real by DC Schindler: Intro to Series
In this clip from Laurie Johnson’s presentation in the last session of the Maurin Academy’s Agricultural Biotechnology series, the problem of automation for people who need jobs the world over is discussed. The impact on ideological movements, especially right-wing nationalism, is featured in the last half of the clip. … More Retool for What? The Dark Side of Automation (Maurin Academy)
Laurie Johnson discusses McKenzie Wark’s treatment of “envelope” politics and liberal accelerationism, and what politics Wark envisions if the hacker class gains a sense of their own power. Wark reveals the limits of the liberal representative state in an interesting way. … More A Hacker Manifesto: Wark on Envelope and Accelerationist Politics
Discussing how Mackenzie Wark’s Hacker Manifesto applies to big Ag moves Laurie Johnson into some thoughts on information technology has not only not saved our world but made it worse? … More Meta-Morphed: Is There Any Reason for Techno-Utopian Optimism?
This is a segment from Laurie Johnson’s presentation in the first session of The Maurin Academy’s Fall 2022 short series on Agricultural Biotechnology and the Information Economy. She is guided by information from the first part of Jack Kloppenberg’s First the Seed. The short series with Laurie Johnson and Jakob Hanschu brings Kloppenberg’s scholarship to bear on McKenzie Wark’s The Hacker Manifesto, and vice versa. … More Should Seeds Be Mere Commodities?
In this segment from the Maurin Academy’s short series on Agricultural Biotechnology and the Information Economy, Jakob Hanschu introduces some of McKenzie Wark’s ideas from The Hacker Manifesto that apply to the critique of modern corporate agricultural development supplied by Jack Kloppenberg’s First the Seed. … More Hackers v. Vectoralists or Percy v. Goliath (Maurin Academy Short Series Pt 1: Jakob Hanshu)
Launching from a discussion of the Melian Dialogue in Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War, Laurie Johnson discusses how the extravagant figure Alcibiades factored in to Athens eventual demise. The Melians’ warnings were not heard during the dialogue, but they were felt as Athens was lured into disaster by this most fascinating charismatic character. … More Love and Betrayal Brings Down Ancient Athens (Thucydides 7)
Political Philosophy 