Johanna Oksala holds the position of Arthur J. Schmitt Professor of Philosophy at Loyola University in Chicago (LUC). Before her role at LUC, she was on faculty at Pratt Institute of Art and Design in New York, the New School for Social Research in New York, the University of Helsinki in Finland, and the University…
Nexus: Yuval Noah Harari’s Perspective on Information, Power, and AI
Yuval Noah Harari’s latest book, Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI, is a narrative treatment of history, anthropology, political theory, and artificial intelligence. It’s a continuation of his ambitious style that began with Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. One of the main arguments of Nexus is that…
Understanding Attachment, Love, and Parenting
Any attempt to understand human relationships leads to an exploration of attachment and the importance of parent-child bond. Though my YouTube channel has been indirectly attentive to these themes, there are a few videos where I have approached the subject. In this post, I give an overview of the material from three videos. If you’d…
My “Top 10” Books of 2024
Inspired by a friend’s tweet, I decided to reflect on what I read during 2024 and make my own list of favourite reads of the year. I’m dividing the list into fiction and nonfiction, and because I have a stronger affinity, in general, for literary fiction—in the spirit of delaying whatever offers the most gratification—let…
‘The Thibaults’ by Roger Martin du Gard: Reflections on a Masterpiece
Reading The Thibaults (Les Thibault) was one of my highlights of 2024. Published originally in serial form between 1922 and 1940, the novel tells the story of a family—their historical context, their relationships, and their movements across the private and public spheres. World War I also casts a heavy shadow over the story, but du…