The HBS hosts talk about optimism and pessimism in its personal, political, and philosophical senses.

We tend to think of optimism and pessimism as personal, psychological characteristics. Betty White said that her secret to living to just so shy of 100 was that she never ate anything green and that she was a “cockeyed optimist.” But it seems as if there are non-personal, non-philosophical senses of optimism/ pessimism. There is clearly a political sense–can we work together to amass power to make the world, society, or a particular country better? Or is it all futile? There might also be a philosophical sense–can philosophy make individual or collective lives better or is it impotent?

In this episode, we discuss the following thinkers, texts, works, and themes:

• W. Caleb McDaniel’s Syllabus Maker
• bell hooks
• Philosophy, Interpretation and Culture, Binghamton University (sadly no longer in existence)
• Frederick Douglass “Agitate, agitate, agitate” advice to a young, black American
• “We won’t be teaching philosophy,” the educational ideals of new Irish Universities
• Theodor Adorno’s pessimism