Heart Yoga Radio

STICKING IT TO THE MAN, UBI & DENIAL - INTERESTING TIMES 86

Join me on my constitutional. In this podcast, I examine how wide-spread and justifiable resentment at conditions of life under current power arrangements is channelled by the very agencies causing that resentment into serving their project of concentrating concentrate wealth and power in a very few hands. The result here is that a good many people believe passionately that they are sticking it to the man by cleaving to beliefs, action and politics which that same man devised and paid to propagate. I use the example of some recent debate around the viability of Universal Basic Income (UBI) and the role of the state. [Free. 27 minutes.]

AI, MONEY, TIME

Join me on my constitutional. In a somewhat rambling discourse, I examine an engagement with an AI on the subject of theories of money and, from there, proceed to take issue with 'technological solutionism' which suggests that technological advance of a certain kind is sufficient to solve humanity's pressing problems. Over and against this idea, I claim that technology can be immensely powerful and transformative, but is not sufficient to ensure human flourishing without the appropriate political and structural change to society. I illustrate the case with the empirical case of how massively enhanced technologically-facilitated productivity has not improved the lot of workers but has lead to the concentration of wealth and power in very few hands. I suggest the use of enhanced productivity and the ability to automate drudgery should be used to liberate time for people in general rather than serving the bottom line. [Free. 26 minutes.]

BILLIONAIRES: WHAT ARE THEY GOOD FOR?

Join me on my constitutional. I enquire into the matter of the extreme concentrations of wealth and power in the hands of a small number of billionaires and take issue with a couple of the regular justifications for this status quo. The first of these is the notion that if people can't get hyper-rich without restriction that that would be an affront to liberty. The second is the notion that the ability to accumulate vast amounts of wealth and power by a few somehow makes for dynamism and innovation which benefits everybody via trickle down. Beware! Contains utopian speculation. [Free. 31 minutes.]

"LIFE IS ONLY REDEEMED THROUGH ART" - HOW SO?

In this podcast, I reflect on Nietzsche's apercu that "life is only redeemed through art". I consider social, cultural, political and individual aspects of the question. I ask, what help, if any, such reflections might give us when we are faced with the necessity of changing our brutal reality which is that business as usual is not an option if we are to survive, let alone thrive. [Free. 25 minutes.]

LAO TZU 68

In this podcast, we engage with the final chapter [81] of Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching. In this chapter, Lao Tzu is suspicious of book learning and loquacious oratory, instead intimating that knowledge gained through meditation and clear seeing and plain speech are preferable. He also reminds us that non-doing is the way of both the sage and the Tao itself. [Free. 29 minutes.] For details and to book our forthcoming live event - http://peteyates.uk/live-events/

LAO TZU 64

In this podcast, we reflect on Chapter 77 of Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching. Here, Lao Tzu contrasts the human way with the way of Tao in a way which is highly apposite for our current condition. The human way, according to Lao Tzu is nothing other than our 'trickle up' economic system in which the few get wealthier and more powerful and the many are increasingly immiserated. The contrasting way of Tao is one of spiritual abundance to which giving and helping are intrinsic. We include a trailer for our upcoming series of events, The Apocalypse and You. [For details and to book a place see -  http://peteyates.uk/live-events/] [Free. 28 minutes.]

SOCRATES & THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE

In this podcast, we discuss the resonances between the question asked by Socrates in  Plato's Republic, 'How should life be lived?', and the TV series, The Walking Dead. [Free. 50 minutes.]

CENTRAL BANK DIGITAL CURRENCIES - INTERESTING TIMES 62

In this podcast, I examine the development of Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) by many of the world's central banks, including the Bank of England, and its possible ramifications. I examine both liberal (in the original sense) and right wing anxieties about the dystopian possibilities of this development and conclude, that though the anxieties are well-founded, they are easily misdirected into culture wares and other divide and rule distractions. [Free. 57 minutes.]

THE DAY AFTER

In this podcast we entertain the likelihood of an impending sublime moment in which a variety of people's actions bring about some fundamental  disruption of the status quo. We think that such an event is highly likely but that it will present revolutionary and civil-disobedience movements with the problem of what to do the day after the sublime moment. This is a point often elaborated by Zizek. We offer the Occupy movement and the Arab Spring as examples. We proceed by way of allowing the ideas in two recent books, both offering some utopian speculations informed to some degree by Marx,  to collide in order to produce some analytic tools. Those books are Fully Automated Luxury Communism by Aaron Bastani and Beyond Money by Anitra Nelson. [Free. 44 minutes]

THE DRY TINDER OF RESENTMENT & OPPORTUNITIES FOR EMANCIPATION - INTERESTING TIMES 25

Borrowing a metaphor from Chris Hedges, I consider the UK body politic as rather like a bulk of dry tinder waiting for a random spark to ignite a conflagration of unrest.  I suggest that both Brexit and the COV19 pandemic are intensifiers of this flammability. I treat the matter as having economic and cultural-ideological dimensions, particularly lighting on recent trade union activity in the UK. The recent UK budget receives some attention, particularly the 1% pay rise offer made to health service workers and the angry response that the health professionals made to it. I make suggestions as to how the broad left might not be caught disorientated the day after the inevitable sublime moments that are now waiting in the wings. This involves the judicious use of the utopian imagination to co-ordinate the many strands of progressive activism. [Free. 43 minutes.]