Episode 183: Mill on Liberty (Part One)

The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast

Mark Linsenmayer

Society & Culture, Philosophy

4.6 • 2.3K Ratings

🗓️ 4 February 2018

⏱️ 57 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Discussing John Stewart Mill's On Liberty (1859). For Wes Alwan's summary of this book, go here).

If we disapprove of certain behaviors, when is it okay to prohibit them legally? What about just shaming people? Mill's "harm principle" says that we should permit anything (legally and socially) unless it harms other people. But what constitutes "harm"? And how can we discourage someone from, e.g., just being drunk all the time?

Mark, Wes, and Dylan bring this debate to current issues and explore some of the weirder aspects of Mill's view.

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Transcript

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0:35.6	please visit partiallyexaminedlife.com slash support.
0:46.7	You're listening to Partially Examined Life, a podcast by some guys who at one point
0:50.0	said on doing philosophy for living with them thought better of it.
0:52.5	Our question for episode 183 is something like what is freedom or maybe
0:56.2	if we disapprove of certain behaviors to what extent should that result in legislation or social pressure
1:00.7	centering those behaviors.
1:02.5	And we read John Stuart Mills on Liberty from 1859.
1:05.8	For more information and link to the text, please check out partiallyexaminedlife.com.
1:09.6	This is Mark Linsmire with enough spontaneity to help develop the excellence of the race in Madison, Wisconsin.
1:16.1	Shhh, seized on the knee chair.
1:18.2	This is Wes Aul and in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
1:20.8	This is Dylan Casey in Middleton, Wisconsin.
	...

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