Mike and Darren: Unplugged ep. 6 

Every time there is a gap between new videos, I fear for The Professor’s health. Hope everything is ok.

I never cared for literature when I was in school. It wasn't until one day, when i was much older, that i realized somewhere along the way I had lost something. I didn't know what it was or how to recover it but I just suddenly realized that something was different. Literature has served as a roadmap for me to find what I had lost. It's as if it was intentionally left there for those who lost their way.

Please don't stop doing these- they're great.

Just checking in on our good professor. Hope you are well Sir! 🙏

Thank you both for adding immeasurable value to the internet!

Darren and Michael are here to help me make sense of the world (again)! This just made my weekend. Thank you.

Been a decent gap between vids praying for your good health ❤

You two are an absolute powerhouse and balance each other out so well. I’m so grateful for finding this channel.

Dr. Mike Sugrue your lecture on Marcus Aurelius was and is the best ever in history of mankind.

This man is really sitting on a plastic patio chair indoors I love it

It really is an unbelievable blessing that these videos exist.

What a privilege to be able to listen to these conversations.

"It never explains Itself; It just shows up."

Love these talks

Thank you both for everything, Sugrue and Professor Staloff. With the deepest appreciation and respect for your wisdom.

I froze when Dr.Sugrue looked straight in the camera. Greetings from Ireland.

Big love, Michael and Darren. Currently listening my way through everything you have uploaded. Cheers lads, top billing. By far the most valuable content on RU-vid. Wish you both all the very best ❤

You are both teaching treasures. Thankyou for making these available and communicating so many different areas of thought, from your hard earned education you bless us through what you share :)

Thank you once again for sharing your time and intellect, it’s always a great pleasure to hear you speak

Thank you both so much. This is brilliant. I’m watching a lecture a day from Sugrue. I feel so privileged so be able to hear such fantastic lectures !

It's so nice to watch the old videos of you lecturing and now watching you live!! Cheers from Brazil!

People don't listen to the vacuum cleaner by choice because there's no opportunity for pattern recognition, which our brains really enjoy. Anyway - love the videos. Always a pleasure.

I could listen to this for the rest of my life, no ego or showmanship, just pure discussion, I can only imagine this is what went on at places like the stoa back in the day

Mike and Darren Unplugged always stimulating!

Ohhh baby! This is my Friday night PARTY. I. Love. You. BOTH!

This was engrossing ✌😸 - I enjoy these discursive chats in a completely different way to the prepared speech content (which I also love, being that which brings me back here regularly - It's so wonderful to get to share in these openly-available-to-all knowledge sessions)

Love the talk about symmetry and asymmetry. It's something I think about a lot. Symmetry is very beautiful and somehow edifying to us, but there can also be something chilling about it perhaps. Reminds me of the Snow chapter in The Magic Mountain, when Hans Castorp meditates on the eerie symmetrical perfection of snowflakes, and how there's almost something forbiddingly inhuman and sterile about something that's so precise and perfect compared to our warm human messiness. Anyway, I really love these Unplugged talks! I've followed along with every one of them so far, and always look forward to the next installment.

Thanks for this conversation that we were able to listen to. Brilliant!

There's few scenes in my mind more romantic that the vision of a young Sugrue rocking out to the Sex Pistols when it really meant something.

Always a pleasure to watch! I'd like to see Michael choose a topic!

Bravo, look forward to the continuation of this talk guys, thanks

Thank you very much

Should be called mike and darren plugged. Because we plugging in to the channel

best unplugged yet.

On the question of whether beauty has objectivity - it's interesting to observe animals for whom aesthetic creation is important in mate selection, like the white-spotted pufferfish, whose whole mating ritual involves creating an intricate mandala structure, taking over a week to construct, without stopping. The female then selects the best artwork and lays its eggs in the centre of the mandala structure. Compare this to the rose window in the Notre Dame cathedral, with the Christ-child in the centre of the mandala. I don't think that's a coincidence. Beauty, I would argue, exists objectively as an archetype in the mind, experienced with subjective variety. Or in the words of ethologists: a fixed action pattern

Another great episode!

Really enjoyed the brief commentary on modern society last week.

This has become my most anticipated thing ever! Thanks for the enlightening lectures!

Dude they are literally the best.

I came here after watching a video on Thomas Aquinas. I'd be grateful if Michael Sugrue has any recommended books or lectures. Especially in relation to Aristotle + Aquinas.

Thank you!

If Michael isn't drinking good beer, it is strong coffee.

When’s the next one?! I’d watch these guys every week if I could do it.

Thank you 🙏

This one made me smile

Well, my screen just suggested this video again. I saw it however not long ago. But I've just finished listening to Michael's excellent lecture on Locke. Thank you for this magnificent reading of Locke! I've got to read/study that Second Treatise. The way Michael summarizes so insightfully these works, including the essay on religious toleration--it's just an incredible feat of memory and interpretation, understanding and insightful relevance. There are a couple of Straussian experts on Locke--Nathan Tarcov and Michael Zuckert. It's hard for me to imagine either of these two gentlemen just stepping back for a few minutes and explaining for a general audience what Locke is about in his historical context, and for our time. Of course we all have different skills. Dr. Sugrue's ability to teach someone like me is very much appreciated. Not that there isn't a substantial amount to be unpacked in his lectures, quite apart from the surface-level exposition. His words are chosen carefully. And, goodness, the part about Daniel Defoe was absolutely brilliant in fleshing out both Locke and "Robinson Crusoe"!

That bit about Foucault made me laugh last night. Now it is morning and it is still funny. Great video.

Apple's dictum "Think differently" takes on a sinister tone here

So enjoyable!

Thank you

0:20 On The Role of Aesthetics. 🌠 2:25 Family Resemblance. 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 2:45 Hyperactivity, Images, Distractions. 👀 3:30 Great Art outlasts People. 🖼️ 8:36 A Dynamic Brain 🧠 9:38 Feedback Loop 🔂 12:20 _The Alpanist_ 🧗‍♀️ 14:20 The Challenge of Explaining Beauty in words. 15:26 Aesthetics and Ethical, ⚾️ 17:45 DANGER ⚠️ 18:25 Presupposition. 20:30 Asthetics seems (unbox-in-able) change over time. 23:25 Identity Expression, Particularity of the human person. Sense of Self. 25:33 Aesthetics are Not Purely Arbitrary. 26:38 Pallet Cultivation as we age as a person. 27:41 The Grand Canyon in real life. 31:58 Unstructured Art, how does the artist know when to finish? Jackson Pollack. 33:35 Taste Change. Beautiful Sublime - 39:07 16th Century, 18th Century Romanticism, 1905 Einstein 43:48 The Athenian Tradition(s) 49:00 Aesthetics disciplined by Ethics. 52:25 Fallen Man.

This is the best of drinking content, better than music 😀. Cheers big ears.

Darren is so damn good.

Informative discussion 👌

great point about the distinction between the beautiful and the sublime, esp. in the case of turner

The religious may “just show up” without apparent explanation or justification because the religious experience is prior to the possibility of ethics and reason (regarding 19:30). Of course, I study Meister Eckhart, so I’m thinking mysticism here, learned ignorance and the like and not the commonplace sort of claim to have a knowledge producing revelation. Anyway, I love your work and I’ve been watching your videos for a long time - I especially enjoy seeing them right before I go in to teach my own philosophy classes… you’re one of the ones who often helps to get my mind going! 😊

These are amazing. I appreciate so much both of your lack of political agenda and complete impartialness to topics discussed.

I really like more philosophical takes on aesthetics, really broadens my knowledge on the topic 🙏

I could listen to you two talk all day, thanks for doing this dr. It counteracts the stupids i get from being around dullards at my workplace all day. Not that I'm a genius by any means, but talking about nothing but shooting coyotes in the face every day gets real old real quick.

Thanks

​Thank you guys so much for doing this! Would you ever consider maybe giving us a run-down of what happened in your lives the old lecture videos? I would love to hear more about you.

What about this: you can apprehend nature directly through the sublime, but once you say "nature is beautiful" your perception is colored by unconscious artificial categories. The Grand Canyon is sublimely awesome. On the other hand, the intricate beauty of a beehive is like a lacy geometrical pattern, or you're fascinated by how order emerges from the bees' labor, and you wouldn't feel it the same if you didn't know about geometry and communal labor. But you can live in this type of experience on its own, the sublime is also in it

Ok.. here goes.. I remember circa Oct 2022 an article in a local newspaper(Daily Mail : U.K.) about a Piet Mondrian piece(New York City I) This, I believe, was exhibited in MoMA New York in 1945. The reveal was that it had been hanging upside down for 75 years( moved from NY in 1980) Does this make you smile? Do you know/ are you aware of it? Did you see it in the seventies? “Art is higher than reality and has no direct relation to reality. To approach the spiritual in art, one will make as little use as possible of reality, because reality is opposed to the spiritual. We find ourselves in the presence of abstract art. Art should be above reality, otherwise it would have no value for man” PM Was this a deliberate act by PM..ie was it hung in his studio upside down for which the curators followed suit? How was the mistake made? The most incredible thing is that these events happened in the 1940’s!! Also, I believe, Matisse’s Le Bateau suffered the same fate in MoMA although only for 47 days! It has to make you smile… Culture eh..

Awesome discussion! In my experience , the aesthetic always had a " spiritual " quality to it . I was effectively evangelized by beauty . I recall when i was young , I would think to myself that the core claims of religion are not something I believe , but rather, simething I "know" or experience . Ultimately , the aesthetical would lead to the desire for the ethical . After all , isn't virtue basically " inner beauty". This seems to run contrary to the either/ or of Kierkegard , no?

I‘m thirty minutes in, and it‘s a very pleasurable episode, as always! Just one minor thought: isn‘t it almost time for a new playlist on the channel? 😉 We‘re six episodes in, and I think I‘m not the only one who would love to be able to watch them consecutively/chronologically.

Change is the only constant

Feel better Michael, we're looking forward to another video. A topic I would personally find fascinating would be about how your philosophic and religious views have changed since your original series. I realize you've touched on this at various times but it would be nice to get a dedicated episode.

I'm not a connoisseur of art nor am I educated in art history. All I know is I bought a calendar of F. E. Church paintings and was blown away. I would be interested in your take on his place in the esthetic and his apparent anonymity in the present day.

Go off king

Hello professors. Just checking in to see when episode seven might drop and to express our collective hope that all is well with you both, particularly Professor Sugrue. We all hope he is on the mend and that we will see him and his horned beer glass very soon.

I bet music is amazing with all the philosophy you understand.

I would like a discussion on ethics of artificial intelligence. What is consciousness/sentience is. And the consequences of AIs being able to generate creative things such as art, music, engineering etc.

I like the sound of the vacuum cleaner...

HOLY FUCKING SHIT NEW MIKE & DARREN UNPLUGGED JUST DROPPED DROP FUCKING EVERYTHING RIGHT GODDAMNED NOW

I ❤️ philosophy in Art. Music, films... and especially the most modern form of Art, memes. How much are memes programming the organic androids. It's the Muppet show we are experiencing and for some of us enjoying immensely.

We'd have to define our terms, starting with our concept of mind.

I've been listening to Isaiah Berlin's lectures, on Romanticism, on political judgment and on "Against the Enlightenment." His discussions of Hamann and Herder have been of extreme interest to me. He seems to personally relate to the somewhat "unbalanced" Herder, and especially the latter's abhorrence of those (like Caesar) who "trampled on" others. Things should be allowed, if at all possible, to grow naturally and flourish--societies, peoples with their national consciousnesses. He explained the German soul to me and this touches on their sublime music and philosophy (Hamann being a "magus" for Herder). He illumined for me their "inwardness" as a consequence of their geography and geopolitical fates, vis-a-vis the French, with their "symmetry imperialism," their [Hedgehog] Cartesian "rationality."... Joseph Ratzinger mentions Bach and Mozart as his favorites, not Beethoven. That genius is just too much for the conservative sensibility. He is by far my favorite pope and Beethoven my favorite composer (especially the "Pastoral"). But I love the Brandenburgs Concertos. Kenneth Clark said that Handel's "Messiah" never fails to bring tears to his eyes. For me, this happens with Trisha Yearwood's "She's in love with the boy." Berlin puts me in a different place; I literally can't wait for the next lecture. He is challenging all my recent illiberal sensibilities. He implies that he is not fooled by Rousseau's charms; Rousseau is at root not a Romantic, but a rationalist. And the inspiration for those extremists, those gnostics and tyrants who just KNOW, and are willing to purge all those who just don't SEE. (Yet, the "Emile" seems to have greatly inspired Herder's passionate belief in letting things grow naturally.) So there needs ideally to be a "national consciouness" (NOT A NATIONALISM). At the same time, this ROOTEDNESS, this BELONGING, should thrive in a world of DIFFERENCES. As I listened to these fascinating remarks on Herder, I thought of how he must have influenced the great Foucault. Now, I have the impression that poor Foucault did not have a sense of humor. Berlin, for his part, has a SUBLIME sense of humor! By the way, I really enjoyed the concrete examples given tonight and felt so grateful for the art history courses, and the Rome Semester: The Parthenon, "The Bacchae", Plato's "anxiety of influence," Giotto, Chartres, Vermeer, Constable, Turner, Cezanne, Monet, Pollock, Led Zepellin, Lucian Freud and so much more. Berlin's lecture, "Defining Romanticism," is a delight from beginning to end. With its overflow of delightful, beautiful "pluralism," it would have made Herder proud. And probably Hamann too. I've got to sit down and read Vico. This "amor fati" in Nietzsche is very "German," very German "national consciousness." This inward, Zarathustran JOY in private overcoming (which Berlin calls "sour grapes"--we lost, we are mortified and resentful, but we revel in it..... OMG, the Grand Canyon does put EVERYTHING in perspective! At least, we have the Kimbell, in nearby Ft. Worth....

I think it's more about integrating the aesthetic with the ethical. And then integrating the aesthetic and the ethical with the religious. I think that is the ebb and flow of being authentically human.

Darren, dropping the "Sex Pistols" into the conversation! Sid Vicious would have loved it! Dr's. Staloff and Sugrue are two of the very, very few people that make sense to me in this world today.

By the way, those Chinese alphabet symbols or characters, in Darren's house, added to the overarching sense of preciousness and beautiful uniqueness of the many distinct cultures, regions, that give us such aesthetic pleasure and inspiration. (My hobby horse of late has been watching CGTN and loving many things Chinese (but not perhaps their lack of respect, if any, for their fifty-six ethnic minorities).

Huzzah!

Well Art is the highest form of abstraction.

Dang, Dr. Sugrue. Your hair sure grows back fast! Haha. You're looking well! You remain in my prayers. Darren, who is Tatiana? Helping with the video?

Would love to hear your thoughts on Colin Wilson, especially 'The Outsider.'

Jackson Pollock was finished when the CIA stopped funding his art.

I expected Michael to talk about the conclusion that Fredrick Nietzsche came to talking about aesthetics being the alternative to religion or the replacement, Nietzsche being a poet and so forth.

Did the pre-Socratics share the divided line or just the deductive reasoning of geometry?

Dr. Mike explodes the Either/Or within the first 5 minutes

So we are nature personified.

The Fibonacci sequence is important in aesthetics, the golden ratio determines universal beauty.

Get Cornell West on here!

the only thing that is permanent is change.

Well as things in ourselves, we don't create the concepts, do we?

The internet is a strange place. I can go from showing my children the classic video of a monkey sticking its finger up its butt and falling over. After I'm done laughing like a small kid, I can scroll down a little bit and go straight to brain food.

Waiting on my Staloff- Kant episode, in his leather jacket.

Hagia Sophia is a Greek church that was converted to a mosque

Hey Dr. Sugrue and whoever may be reading. I enjoyed Dr. Staloff's treatment of Aristotle, but im surprised by his relative lack of coverage in comparison to Plato on the channel. There are many many writers and philosophers to get to though. Just my thoughts, I'd be interested in hearing more about him.

The Devil was driving the steam roller.

But unless more people break out from the matrix, and start to think for themselves, only the concepts change, the principles remain the same. We have Nietzsche's recurring cycles.

I’m noticing a lot of solipsistic nihilism due to proliferation of screens and ignoring the external world. People don’t share experiences together anymore. MJ hits his big shot and everyone is living in the moment, but LBJ hits the shot and everyone is trying to capture the experience.