Ellie and David discuss fun, from its aesthetic opposition to the highbrow realm of beauty, to questions like: what role does fun play in the good life? How does fun relate to art, play, and ritual? Can you really have fun by yourself? And what happens when the lines blur between the fun and the political?

Ellie and David discuss civil disobedience in the present context of university activism for divestment from genocide in Gaza. They chart the concept in political theory, from Thoreau and MLK through to today. Together with guest Noëlle McAfee, Chair of the Philosophy Department at Emory University, they reflect on the relationship between legal protest, civil disobedience, and political dialogue, and think about why activism must be part of any healthy democracy.

This is one for the books. In episode 104 of Overthink, Ellie and David consider what makes reading so rewarding, and, for many people today, so challenging! How did society shift toward inward silent reading and away from reading aloud in the Middle Ages? How have changes in teaching phonics and factors of classism, accessibility, and educational justice made it harder for the young to read? Why is reading philosophy so hard, and how can we increase our reading stamina?

In episode 103 of Overthink, Ellie and David take a leisurely dive into laziness, discussing everything from couchrotting to the biology of energy conservation. They explore Devon Price’s idea of the ‘laziness lie’ in today’s hyperproductive society and look into the racialization of laziness in Ibn Khaldun and Montesquieu’s ideas on the idle tropics, thinking through how the Protestant work ethic punishes laziness, even when technology could take care of the work.

In episode 102 of Overthink, Ellie and David discuss racial mixedness, from family-oriented models of mixed race to José Vasconcelos’ and Gloria Anzaldua’s idea of the ‘mestizo’ heritage of Mexican people. They work through phenomenological accounts of cultural hybridity and selfhood, wondering how being multiracial pushes beyond the traditional Cartesian philosophical subject.

In episode 101 of Overthink, Ellie and David speak with Dr. Shazeda Ahmed, specialist in AI Safety, to dive into the philosophy guiding artificial intelligence. With the rise of LLMs like ChatGPT, the lofty utilitarian principles of Effective Altruism have taken the tech-world spotlight by storm. Who is right about AI: the doomers or the utopians? And whose voices are part of the conversation in the first place?

Overthink goes meta! In the 100th episode Ellie and David reflect on the podcast’s journey and use psychology to understand overthinking as the distracting voice inside your head and a welcome relief from traumatic memories. With John Dewey and the Frankfurt School, they look at different ways to understand the role of overthinking in philosophy and the humanities.

In episode 99, Ellie and David talk all about zombies and their unfortunate legacy in the thought experiments of academic philosophy. Their portrait as brain-eating and consciousness-lacking mobs is a far cry from their origins in the syncretic sorcery at the margins of Haitian Voodoo. Your hosts probe beyond limits of the tradition when they explore zombification in animals, in reading, in Derrida, and beyond.

In Episode 98, Ellie and David untangle the philosophy behind reputations. From Machiavelli’s advice to despots looking to stay popular, to disgruntled students venting on their professors online, they explore concepts like the Matthew effect, the homo comparativus, and informational asymmetry.

From Plato’s spotless Republic to Saudi Arabia’s futuristic The Line, they talk the foul and the vibrant of what it means to live in a city. Why are there so few public plazas in Brasilia? Why did David lose his wallet in Mexico City? How do gridded street layouts reflect colonial fantasies?

“They find our bodies repulsive.” On episode 96 of Overthink, Ellie and David bring on Dr. Kate Manne, philosopher and author of Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia. She explains the moral failures and biomedical perils of our fatphobic culture and diets. They look at the politics of fat, fatness, and fatphobia for questions of accessibility, justice, and intimacy, discussing the BMI, Ozempic, and more.

Night vision. Superhuman strength. And… kale salad? In episode 95 of Overthink, Ellie and David explore the weird world of biohackers, who leverage science and technology to optimize their bodies. The movement moves from the blurry ethics of self-experimentation to Cartesian dualism. The stakes are political, metaphysical, and ethical — and your hosts are here to make philosophical sense of it all.

In episode 94 of Overthink, Ellie and David discuss everything debt, from student loans and bank bailouts to the importance of honoring one’s intellectual forebears. Your hosts explore how debt has structured social, family, and religious bonds across history, from Vedic India, to Plato’s Athens, and how the notion of being “indebted” to one’s cultural past conditions the experience of immigrants in America today.

In episode 93 of Overthink, Ellie and David guide you through the philosophy of this emotion. From Aristotle to British charity telethons, pity lives in our moral and cultural worlds. But who is the object of our pity, and why? Where is the line between pity and compassion? How does pity interact with our social responsibilities and power structures?

In episode 92 of Overthink, Ellie and David discuss love beyond monogamy with philosophy professor, podcaster, and author of Why It's OK To Not be Monogamous, Justin L. Clardy. They discuss love and special attachment beyond sacrifice. With personal stories, they question the role of marriage in consumer capitalism, and reimagine agency, identity, community, and relation in the world.

In episode 91 of Overthink, Ellie and David explore mommy issues, from the OG mother Mary to today’s seducing MILFs. They look into psychonalytic theories and Simone de Beauvoir’s critique of maternal devotion. They explore sexualization, identification, masculinity, and more!

Who’s your daddy? Episode 90 is all about daddy issues. Ellie and David investigate father-child relations and the sexual, emotional, and familial worlds they create. From summer zaddies and sexy dad bods to hero feminist dads, your hosts travel from psychoanalysis all the way to theology and investigate how parenthood, gender, and vulnerability interact.

In episode 89 of Overthink, Ellie and David investigate the loopy world of psychedelics. Mind-opening gateways or tools of therapy and neuroscience? From their implications for phenomenology and the nature of consciousness, to the ethics of their medicinal use, in light of their risks and long-lasting effects: discover all about hallucinogens!

In episode 88, we explore the philosophy of food, discussing everything from Glaucon’s speech in Plato’s Republic, to the link between cultural identity and culinary taste. They welcome food critic and philosophy professor Shanti Chu for conversation on the gendering of meals, the ethics of food systems (lab-grown meat, anyone?), the future of restaurants, and much more. Bon appetit!

Time to be real! From romanticism to reality TV, from social media to existentialism, Ellie and David discuss Heidegger’s writings on Eigentlichkeit (authenticity); they go over sincerity, the self, and discuss drag queens as the peak of postmodern authenticity.