Nísia Floresta was a 19th-century writer and translator known as “the Brazilian Mary Wollstonecraft.” She published the first book on women’s rights in South America, when Brazil was gaining independence from Portugal and a new post-colonial nation was being built. She also argued for the rights of the enslaved and indigenous Brazilians, who were marginalized and exploited in this new nation. Josh and Ray explore her life and thought with Nastassja Pugliese from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, author of Nísia Floresta (Elements on Women in the History of Philosophy).

People who are addicted to substances display a puzzling behavior: they keep using even when it causes harm and distress to them and the people in their lives. Why would someone do this? Is it the result of a brain disease? Can we explain it in psychological terms without victim-blaming? What if everyone is irrational, whether or not they’re addicted to substances? Josh and Ray can’t quit talking to Hanna Pickard from Johns Hopkins University, author of What Would You Do Alone in a Cage with Nothing but Cocaine? A Philosophy of Addiction.

More at https://philosophytalk.org/shows/who-speaks-you.

People often speak on behalf of others, like the concerned citizen who stands up for their neighbors at a city council meeting, or the activist who defends the rights of an oppressed group. Some of these spokespeople are elected, and some volunteer, but others simply get drafted into the role. What gives someone the right to speak on behalf of others? What responsibilities do they take on when they do? And how should the rest of us respond to what they say? Josh and Ray speak for themselves with their Stanford colleague Wendy Salkin, author of Speaking for Others: The Ethics of Informal Political Representation.

Mary Wollstonecraft is often labeled as a “liberal feminist” because of her concern for women’s rights and conceptions of freedom. But that label narrows her work, which was broadly critical of all social inequalities that distort human relations. So why did Wollstonecraft think that virtue is not truly possible unless we are all free? What did she think was key to the liberation of women? And what were her criticisms of the powerful institutions of her day, like the monarchy? Josh and Ray explore the life and thought of Mary Wollstonecraft with Sylvana Tomaselli from the University of Cambridge, author of Wollstonecraft: Philosophy, Passion, and Politics.

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) is considered one of the great European philosophers of the nineteenth century. His most famous work, The World as Will and Representation, presents a pessimistic view of a world filled with endless strife and suffering, where happiness can only be but fleeting. So, how did Schopenhauer think we ought to live with one another in such a world? Did he believe there was ultimately a way to overcome the pain of the human condition? Or are we all doomed to live frustration-filled lives? Josh and Ray keep a sunny disposition with David Bather Woods from the University of Warwick, author of Arthur Schopenhauer: The Life and Thought of Philosophy’s Greatest Pessimist.

Governments and central banks set economic policies that affect us all. But how do those policies influence our quality of life? And how can that quality even be measured? Gross Domestic Product (GDP) includes many factors that have little to do with the regular person’s happiness. What do people really need, beyond enough to live on? And how can we make sure they get it? Josh and Ray spend some quality time with Jayati Ghosh from UMass Amherst, co-author of Earth for All: A Survival Guide for Humanity.

Logic may seem like a dry, abstract discipline that only the nerdiest of philosophers study. After all, logic textbooks are full of weird symbols and proofs about abstruse entities, like “the set of all sets.” On the other hand, don’t we all try to think logically, at least in some contexts? Why do we believe, for example, it’s bad to contradict yourself and good to be coherent? And what’s the connection between the abstract rules of logic and the everyday practice of poking holes in each other’s arguments? Josh and Ray entail their guest, Patrick Girard from the University of Auckland, author of Logic in the Wild.

Born into slavery in the nineteenth century, Anna Julia Cooper received a classical education, attended the Sorbonne, and became the fourth African American in history to be awarded a PhD. Her first book, A Voice from the South, offered one of the first articulations of how Black women are impacted by race, gender, and socioeconomic class. She believed that uplifting Black women through higher education would improve life for all Black people. Josh and Ray explore her life and thought with Kathryn Sophia Belle, author of Beauvoir and Belle: A Black Feminist Critique of The Second Sex.

Part of our Wise Women series, generously supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.