Hello everyone, I'm Stephen West. This is philosophize this.

Thank you to the fine folks that support the show on Patreon.

Thank you to the good people out there that support the show through the contribute what you think the show's worth model on the website.

Today's episode is the first in a series on media and its uncanny ability to shape our beliefs.

I hope you love the show today.

So I want to begin this series on media by taking a look at it from a bit of an alien perspective or at least alien to how we often hear people talk about media and what it does for us.

I want to begin today by talking about the concept of media as a plural form of the word medium.

Because ultimately that's what it is.

You know, we don't often think of media in this way, especially things like the news media.

Like how is the news typically described?

Well, it's often described as the fourth state of government.

The implication being that these people that report the news to us are practically thought of as public servants.

The tip of the spear going out there into the world while we live our daily lives.

They're the people they're going to ask the tough hard-hitting questions that help keep us informed so we can know what's going on in the world and vote accordingly every four years.

They're often framed as though they're performing a service for us.

Many of them passionate about the truth, passionate about getting to the bottom of what's going on.

But what if we were to think of media as a plural form of the word medium?

Dictionary defines medium as the quote, intervening substance through which impressions are conveyed to the senses.

Another way it's defined is as the quote, substance in which an organism lives or is culture.

Now, regardless of any sort of fourth-estate mythology that could be tacked on about news media,

forget about what our culture tells us the media is doing for us.

Want to consider on this episode here today that both of these definitions for the word medium could equally describe the service that the news media provides for us every day.

...