What's Left of Philosophy

Just a quick pair of announcements for you!
We'll be doing a live episode recording at the Radical Philosophy Association's conference at Pomona College at 8pm next Thursday, October 15. 
https://www.radicalphilosophyassociation.org/rpa-biennial-conference.html
And Gil will be teaching a class on Hobbes's Leviathan in Chicago next month through the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research.
https://thebrooklyninstitute.com/items/courses/hobbess-leviathan/
We hope that you will be able to join us for one or both! Thanks very much.
Music: "Mothership" by Blue Steel

In this episode we discuss the concept of hyperpolitics, as originally conceptualized by Anton Jäger. We contemplate the acute lack of substantive political transformation that has resulted from recent upheavals and movements, and wonder about what it would take to revive the kind of mass politics of the early to mid-twentieth century. Throughout, we wrestle with the prevailing sense of powerlessness and doom, the practical necessity of hope, and the potential paths toward meaningful social and political transformation.
leftofphilosophy.com | @leftofphil
References: 
Anton Jäger, Hyperpolitics: Extreme Politicization without Political Consequences (New York: Verso, 2026)
Lillian Cicerchia, “The Futility of Hyperpolitics”, https://catalyst-journal.com/2025/04/the-futility-of-hyperpolitics
Virgilio Urbina Lazardi, “Thomas Piketti’s Utopian Socialism”, https://jacobin.com/2026/09/thomas-pikettys-utopian-socialism 
Music:
“Vintage Memories” by Schematist | schematist.bandcamp.com
“My Space” by Overu | https://get.slip.stream/KqmvAN

In this episode we discuss the work of French philosopher Alain Badiou. Ever since the 1970s, Badiou’s philosophy has been characterized by an untimely systematicity and an ambitious effort to bring together politics, art, science, and love in a unique synthesis under the aegis of a novel fundamental ontology. In Metapolitics, Badiou explains what he understands by politics as a historical site where truths can be produced, and what it means for a militant subject to remain faithful to such a truth, affirming a radical egalitarianism over against the exclusions and hierarchies of the state. Along the way he says some very funny things about what he sees as the deficiencies of more traditional ‘political philosophy’. Above all, Badiou reminds us that even when it seems like there is no alternative, no state is capable of truly foreclosing the possibility that a radically restructuring Event might take place – and he’s got the math to prove it. We think he’s neat!
This is just a short teaser of the full episode. To hear the rest, please subscribe to us on Patreon:
patreon.com/leftofphilosophy
References: 
Alain Badiou, Metapolitics, trans. Jason Barker (New York: Verso, 2001).
Music:
“Vintage Memories” by Schematist | schematist.bandcamp.com
“My Space” by Overu | https://get.slip.stream/KqmvAN

In this episode, we continue our series on modernity with a discussion of modernity, colonialism, and the future of both. We take up the claim that modernity is a justifying myth for European colonialism and wonder why we are all so enraptured by it. Are the Europeans as modern as we think they are? We also defend modernity’s promise of emancipation and then wonder what the point of all the modernity talk is anyway. There’s a lot of ambivalence here, but perhaps that’s the point!
leftofphilosophy.com | @leftofphil | @leftofphilosophy.bsky.social
References:
Aníbal Quijano, “Paradoxes of Modernity in Latin America,” in Foundational Essays on the Coloniality of Power (Duke University Press, 2024).
Enrique Dussel, “Europe, Modernity, and Eurocentrism,” Nepantla: Views from South 1.3 (Duke University Press, 2000).
Music:
“Vintage Memories” by Schematist | schematist.bandcamp.com
“My Space” by Overu | https://get.slip.stream/KqmvAN

In this episode, we begin our new series on modernity with a discussion of Marshall Berman’s 1982 book All That Is Solid Melts Into Air: The Experience of Modernity. Some of the questions we will tackle in this series will address the substance of modernity, whether modernity is singular or multiple, the relationship of art to modernization, and whether modernity is better understood as a rupture from the past or a development out of it. Berman, for his part, argues that modernity has always been about development through contradictions. We moderns bear witness to the constant dissolution of the traditions, political forms, and social mores of the past in the name of the production of the new. However, Berman thinks the 20th century has lost touch with the essentially contradictory nature of modernity by becoming either dogmatic enthusiasts of creative destruction or resolute pessimists who see nothing but degradation in modern life. He returns us to the 19th century where artists and thinkers such as Goethe, Marx, and Baudelaire had a more vivid and sensitive appreciation of the contradictory demands of modern development. We discuss Berman’s ultimately hopeful account of modern experience, its relation to urban life, and why any future politics must reckon with people’s desire for stability. Get ready to ride the wave of modernity (it’s not like you have a choice)! 
This is just a short teaser of the full episode. To hear the rest, please subscribe to us on Patreon:
patreon.com/leftofphilosophy
References:
Marshall Berman, All That Is Solid Melts Into Air: The Experience of Modernity (New York: Verso, 2010).
Perry Anderson, “Modernity and Revolution”, New Left Review I/144 (1984): 96-113.
Music:
“Vintage Memories” by Schematist | schematist.bandcamp.com
“My Space” by Overu | https://get.slip.stream/KqmvAN