Deep Calls to Deep: Reading Together

Deep Calls to Deep: Reading Together Thu, 28 May 2026 14:35:03 -0400 https://www.buzzsprout.com/2565712 en-us © 2026 Deep Calls to Deep: Reading Together yes 39239c9b-7518-51f1-83c6-012a6d00262a martinessig.com episodic false Going deep together into the "Classics" that have called from "Elsewhere" to the unfathomable depths within. David Tracy thought of a "Classic" as a work that was open to multiple, productive interpretations, which could be anything from a text to a work of art to a religious practice. Jean-Luc Marion thought of "Elsewhere" appearing here as the sort of "Saturated Phenomena" that allowed for radical otherness to speak for itself without exhausting or reducing its meaning to the understandable, which he thought of in terms of Maurice Merleau-Ponty's the invisible appearing without becoming merely visible. Communities of interpretations, called by Hans-Georg Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur "Hermeneutic Circles" after Heidegger's teachings on the matter of the interpretation of being, are religious rituals that form a community of interpreters.

]]> Buzzsprout (https://www.buzzsprout.com) philosophy, religious studies, history of religions, Lacan, Deleuze, Nietzsche, Freud, psychoanalysis, process philosophy martinessig.com https://storage.buzzsprout.com/cdcivk5wkjg4mfr2tdupoupbiu2h?.jpg Deep Calls to Deep: Reading Together Can AI Care about Us? Can AI Care about Us? James and I discuss Under The Eye of the Big Bird by Hiromi Kawakami. We get into whether AI can have an intention other than the ones given to it by our Human intentions. And we wonder whether AI can have the conscious intention to save humanity from itself as a result of the purity of its love for humanity, a purity unlike the yin-yang(y) love-hate of humans that will ultimately be our undoing. Kawakami's AI claims to love human beings in the Positivistic sense of without any negativity; whereas, human love is always tinged with hate. Both James and I agree that love without hate isn't human love, just as human intention is both undermined and generated by the counter-intention of the death drive. But James feels that AI may someday have a different kind of consciousness because it has a different kind of singular intention, singular as in unique as well as in the oneness of a purified positivity, which seems to agree with Kawakami's take on AI. Kawakami's AI fails to keep human beings alive because it fails to cleanse human intention of its negativity. I hold that without this negativity there is no love and no intention of any kind.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> James and I discuss Under The Eye of the Big Bird by Hiromi Kawakami. We get into whether AI can have an intention other than the ones given to it by our Human intentions. And we wonder whether AI can have the conscious intention to save humanity from itself as a result of the purity of its love for humanity, a purity unlike the yin-yang(y) love-hate of humans that will ultimately be our undoing. Kawakami's AI claims to love human beings in the Positivistic sense of without any negativity; whereas, human love is always tinged with hate. Both James and I agree that love without hate isn't human love, just as human intention is both undermined and generated by the counter-intention of the death drive. But James feels that AI may someday have a different kind of consciousness because it has a different kind of singular intention, singular as in unique as well as in the oneness of a purified positivity, which seems to agree with Kawakami's take on AI. Kawakami's AI fails to keep human beings alive because it fails to cleanse human intention of its negativity. I hold that without this negativity there is no love and no intention of any kind.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> martinessig.com Buzzsprout-19255482 Thu, 28 May 2026 14:00:00 -0400 2605 The Eye of the Big Bird, Hiromi Kawakami, AI protectors, AI take over, AI Intention, AI Consciousness 1 21 full false Recovery from Eternal Conscious Torment 2: A Short History of the Afterlife Recovery from Eternal Conscious Torment 2: A Short History of the Afterlife In part two Kevin and I continue to work on Bart D. Ehrman's Book, Heaven and Hell: The History of the Afterlife. We recount some of our life experiences with various doctrines of Hell and the immense suffering that the idea of eternal separation and punishment has wrought in our lives and the lives of others. And then we get into Chapter One: Guided Tours of Heaven and Hell, Chapter Two: The Fear of Death, and Chapter Three: Life After Death Before There Was Life After Death.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> In part two Kevin and I continue to work on Bart D. Ehrman's Book, Heaven and Hell: The History of the Afterlife. We recount some of our life experiences with various doctrines of Hell and the immense suffering that the idea of eternal separation and punishment has wrought in our lives and the lives of others. And then we get into Chapter One: Guided Tours of Heaven and Hell, Chapter Two: The Fear of Death, and Chapter Three: Life After Death Before There Was Life After Death.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> martinessig.com Buzzsprout-19255462 Thu, 28 May 2026 14:00:00 -0400 3772 Bart D. Ehrman, Heaven and Hell, Biblical interpretation, faith journey, recovery, Law of Love, true Christianity, deconstruction, already but not yet, 1 20 full false Robert Anton Wilson's "Mind F---!": High Weirdness Part 3 Robert Anton Wilson's "Mind F---!": High Weirdness Part 3 https://youtu.be/JIMQBSi50Yw

Dom and I are reading High Weirdness by Eric Davis together as a part of this reading in recovery project. "Recovery" can mean all sorts of things, but in this episode, it means recovery from the paranoid conspiracy theories that so many of us in the US are so deeply into. We discuss the "Mind F---ery" of Robert Anton Wilson and our own struggles to stay somewhere between naive belief and total skepticism, and the times when we went too far in one direction or the other. We discover, yet again, that in the most general sense, "recovery" is from absolutized or totalizing ways of being in the world that make each day a repetition of the same. We get sober to become more playful and creative, rather than more ridged, self-serious and certain. Therefore, Robert Anton Wilson offers both a cautionary tale about getting caught up in too much pattern recognition and the creative solution to this sort of psychosis, which is the play of humor that lovingly undermining one's tightly held concepts about reality.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> https://youtu.be/JIMQBSi50Yw

Dom and I are reading High Weirdness by Eric Davis together as a part of this reading in recovery project. "Recovery" can mean all sorts of things, but in this episode, it means recovery from the paranoid conspiracy theories that so many of us in the US are so deeply into. We discuss the "Mind F---ery" of Robert Anton Wilson and our own struggles to stay somewhere between naive belief and total skepticism, and the times when we went too far in one direction or the other. We discover, yet again, that in the most general sense, "recovery" is from absolutized or totalizing ways of being in the world that make each day a repetition of the same. We get sober to become more playful and creative, rather than more ridged, self-serious and certain. Therefore, Robert Anton Wilson offers both a cautionary tale about getting caught up in too much pattern recognition and the creative solution to this sort of psychosis, which is the play of humor that lovingly undermining one's tightly held concepts about reality.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> martinessig.com Buzzsprout-19197146 Mon, 18 May 2026 14:00:00 -0400 3853 High Weirdness, Eric Davis, Robert Anton Wilson, Illuminati, psychedelics, religious studies, HP Lovecraft, Alister Crowley, hyperstition, Carl Jung, conspiracy theories,, mysticism, 1 19 full false The Heaven and Hell of Now The Heaven and Hell of Now Kevin and I have been having conversations about our faith for almost two decades now. While we are both actively recovering from such harmful doctrines as "eternal conscious torment," neither of us reject entirely the Christianity that we were brought up in. We have continued to develop what it means for us to be followers of Christ, so that we thought that the model of "recovery" was a better way of thinking about our faith journey than the currently popular model of "deconstruction." Recovery has both the sense of uncovering or clearing away debris to return to some essential kernel of the faith, but also the sense of getting over a sickness, or getting better from something harmful endemic to the faith tradition that was given to us as children. We are both agreed that the essential kernel worth saving is the Law, specifically the "Law of Love." In this first of our recorded conversations about our faith journey, we discuss recovering our faith by going more deeply into the teachings of love at the center of "The Way" that Jesus seemed to be teaching. We use Bart D. Ehrman's book "Heaven and Hell" as a helpful guide for freeing ourselves from some the misconceptions that we were taught as absolute truths in our religious education.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Kevin and I have been having conversations about our faith for almost two decades now. While we are both actively recovering from such harmful doctrines as "eternal conscious torment," neither of us reject entirely the Christianity that we were brought up in. We have continued to develop what it means for us to be followers of Christ, so that we thought that the model of "recovery" was a better way of thinking about our faith journey than the currently popular model of "deconstruction." Recovery has both the sense of uncovering or clearing away debris to return to some essential kernel of the faith, but also the sense of getting over a sickness, or getting better from something harmful endemic to the faith tradition that was given to us as children. We are both agreed that the essential kernel worth saving is the Law, specifically the "Law of Love." In this first of our recorded conversations about our faith journey, we discuss recovering our faith by going more deeply into the teachings of love at the center of "The Way" that Jesus seemed to be teaching. We use Bart D. Ehrman's book "Heaven and Hell" as a helpful guide for freeing ourselves from some the misconceptions that we were taught as absolute truths in our religious education.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> martinessig.com Buzzsprout-19196499 Mon, 18 May 2026 12:00:00 -0400 3795 Bart D. Ehrman, Heaven and Hell, Biblical interpretation, faith journey, recovery, Law of Love, true Christianity, deconstruction, alreadybutnotyet, 1 19 full false Jesus Is Tested Jesus Is Tested I post this crossover episode as an example of the possibilities for hermeneutic circles as a religious practice. And as a reminder that our only freedom is the open and even playful interpretation of being. And I always love pointing out to people that if they want to follow Jesus, they would do well to adopt the curiosity about the meaning of being that led him out into the wilderness to have a conversation with Satan, and which led him to reinterpret scriptures according to his hermeneutic of love. It is often pointed out that Jesus would have be considered a poor interpreter of the bible in the light of modern Biblical scholarship, and that much to the chagrin of modern "Biblical Literalists," neither he nor any of his interlocutors held to such a limiting and deluded principle, except for maybe Satan, but that his open relation to his tradition allowed for him to understand himself and religious community in a new way. True followers of Christ seek to "make all things new."

https://youtu.be/Fgjqb6bKJ_s

My Uncle Father Herb, my Dad Bob, and I discuss Jesus's testing in the desert. I chose the passage this time. It has always spoken to me about how we are left to interpret the Word of God for ourselves but as a community of interpreters. There will be no one "absolute" interpretation that excludes all the others. However, there will be interpretations that cannot withstand the practices of a hermeneutic circle of responsible interpreters. A hermeneutic circle tests possible interpretations against a set of criteria, which for our circle of Biblical interpreters includes: historical-critical techniques and scholarly information, the history of the theological interpretations of the Church, and our own experiences of trying to apply Biblical teachings and narratives to our lives. But the most important principle for the interpretive practices of those who seek the God of love is love, which is sometimes called the interpretive practice of "Christ the Key" in the Church's tradition of Biblical interpretation. Our faith is that the histories, mythologies and even the laws of the Bible must be interpreted, which means they are open, except for those interpretations that would close one off to hope or love. Unloving Biblical interpretation is without the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and is what proliferates most rampantly today. This is the consequence of both our fallenness and our freedom to interpret without love's lure.

Love is revealed anew throughout ours lives as it has historically been reveled through out the lives of those who have sought it, but it is always a lure to love and never compulsory because love according to its nature must be freely chosen. Even when things seem dark or evil, it is our faith that God is still speaking as the lure to love. Jesus's test in the desert reveals His ministry and is character to Himself and to those that would follow Him. Satan's job as God's "prosecuting attorney," is to test and reveal. In the desert Jesus reinterprets the figure of the "Messiah" from his Jewish tradition and scripture according to the law of love, so that it becomes a figure not of power but of weakness as love does not overpower or control. Jesus passes His test by refusing to test, which is to choose the revelation of love over whatever revelation is given by tests of strength.

If you want to check this episode out on YouTube: https://youtu.be/Fgjqb6bKJ_s

My podcast in which I develop the theory of interpretation, or hermeneutics: https://failureisfreedom.buzzsprout.com

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> I post this crossover episode as an example of the possibilities for hermeneutic circles as a religious practice. And as a reminder that our only freedom is the open and even playful interpretation of being. And I always love pointing out to people that if they want to follow Jesus, they would do well to adopt the curiosity about the meaning of being that led him out into the wilderness to have a conversation with Satan, and which led him to reinterpret scriptures according to his hermeneutic of love. It is often pointed out that Jesus would have be considered a poor interpreter of the bible in the light of modern Biblical scholarship, and that much to the chagrin of modern "Biblical Literalists," neither he nor any of his interlocutors held to such a limiting and deluded principle, except for maybe Satan, but that his open relation to his tradition allowed for him to understand himself and religious community in a new way. True followers of Christ seek to "make all things new."

https://youtu.be/Fgjqb6bKJ_s

My Uncle Father Herb, my Dad Bob, and I discuss Jesus's testing in the desert. I chose the passage this time. It has always spoken to me about how we are left to interpret the Word of God for ourselves but as a community of interpreters. There will be no one "absolute" interpretation that excludes all the others. However, there will be interpretations that cannot withstand the practices of a hermeneutic circle of responsible interpreters. A hermeneutic circle tests possible interpretations against a set of criteria, which for our circle of Biblical interpreters includes: historical-critical techniques and scholarly information, the history of the theological interpretations of the Church, and our own experiences of trying to apply Biblical teachings and narratives to our lives. But the most important principle for the interpretive practices of those who seek the God of love is love, which is sometimes called the interpretive practice of "Christ the Key" in the Church's tradition of Biblical interpretation. Our faith is that the histories, mythologies and even the laws of the Bible must be interpreted, which means they are open, except for those interpretations that would close one off to hope or love. Unloving Biblical interpretation is without the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and is what proliferates most rampantly today. This is the consequence of both our fallenness and our freedom to interpret without love's lure.

Love is revealed anew throughout ours lives as it has historically been reveled through out the lives of those who have sought it, but it is always a lure to love and never compulsory because love according to its nature must be freely chosen. Even when things seem dark or evil, it is our faith that God is still speaking as the lure to love. Jesus's test in the desert reveals His ministry and is character to Himself and to those that would follow Him. Satan's job as God's "prosecuting attorney," is to test and reveal. In the desert Jesus reinterprets the figure of the "Messiah" from his Jewish tradition and scripture according to the law of love, so that it becomes a figure not of power but of weakness as love does not overpower or control. Jesus passes His test by refusing to test, which is to choose the revelation of love over whatever revelation is given by tests of strength.

If you want to check this episode out on YouTube: https://youtu.be/Fgjqb6bKJ_s

My podcast in which I develop the theory of interpretation, or hermeneutics: https://failureisfreedom.buzzsprout.com

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-19176692 Thu, 14 May 2026 11:00:00 -0400 3761 hermeneutic circles, biblical scholarship, religious practices, religious communities, Paul Ricoeur, David Tracy, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Jean-Luc Marion, Heidegger, Lacan, Deleuze, Hegel, Freud 1 18 full false Annihilation: Book and Movie Comparison Annihilation: Book and Movie Comparison We get deep into the weird genetic refractions of Alex Garland's very loose take on Jeff Vandermeer's Annihilation. Area X seems to be a place of infinite possibilities, except for the possibility of remaining untouched by the mysterious, churning flows of organic codes that produce mixed bodies of unknowable intention. What is the intention of this alien presence in what seems to be a swamp somewhere on the Florida coast of the Gulf of Mexico? Maybe, it doesn't have one. Join us as we think about the human proclivity for self-destruction, the ambiguity of identity, and how the intentions of organic bodies arise from the non-intention of inorganic processes.

This is a crossover episode with the Desire of Horror podcast available on all the major pod-catchers, including apple and Spotify. Come check us out there. https://www.buzzsprout.com/2509184

Also available on YouTube: https://youtu.be/nqaZp3-AK4Q or you can search "Kitchen Table Conversations: Annihilation"

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> We get deep into the weird genetic refractions of Alex Garland's very loose take on Jeff Vandermeer's Annihilation. Area X seems to be a place of infinite possibilities, except for the possibility of remaining untouched by the mysterious, churning flows of organic codes that produce mixed bodies of unknowable intention. What is the intention of this alien presence in what seems to be a swamp somewhere on the Florida coast of the Gulf of Mexico? Maybe, it doesn't have one. Join us as we think about the human proclivity for self-destruction, the ambiguity of identity, and how the intentions of organic bodies arise from the non-intention of inorganic processes.

This is a crossover episode with the Desire of Horror podcast available on all the major pod-catchers, including apple and Spotify. Come check us out there. https://www.buzzsprout.com/2509184

Also available on YouTube: https://youtu.be/nqaZp3-AK4Q or you can search "Kitchen Table Conversations: Annihilation"

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-19141308 Thu, 07 May 2026 21:00:00 -0400 5489 Annihilation movie, Annihilation book, Area X, Southern Reach, Alex Garland, Jeff VanderMeer, Deleuze, refractory zone, biological horror, body horror, nature horror 1 17 full false Byung-Chul Han's The Agony of Eros Byung-Chul Han's The Agony of Eros James and I recorded this one in a parking garage for irreducibly ambiguous counter-reasons. All of the expected distractions of the parking garage environment were intended to illustrate the unintentional negativity necessary for a loving encounter with the Other. As two long term sober dudes, we're always looking for new Deleuzian "Lines of Flight" from the toxic positivity of the sort of self-optimization that our drinking used to protect us from. We would like to continue to actively ruin our lives and our time for the mechanisms of capitalistic capture by becoming "imperceptible," even to ourselves, and therefore as non-transactable yet productive as possible. Join us for a truly worthless conversation about the negativity of love, or the "Agony of Eros," as Byung-Chul Han put it. Whatever you're able to discern of the conversation over the noise of the cars passing by and the intense wind storm raging all around us in central Ohio's weirdly, windy clime, will certainly whet your whistle for the suffering gifted to true lovers by eros, not so much in the banal and idiotically positive vein of the Marquis de Sade, but rather in that of the erotic suffering of the negative excess of Georges Bataille "Accursed Share."

https://youtu.be/YXn2K8ESb-w if you prefer YouTube, James and I posted the video of us performing this material there, or search Reading Together in Recovery: The Agony of Eros by Byung-Chul Han

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> James and I recorded this one in a parking garage for irreducibly ambiguous counter-reasons. All of the expected distractions of the parking garage environment were intended to illustrate the unintentional negativity necessary for a loving encounter with the Other. As two long term sober dudes, we're always looking for new Deleuzian "Lines of Flight" from the toxic positivity of the sort of self-optimization that our drinking used to protect us from. We would like to continue to actively ruin our lives and our time for the mechanisms of capitalistic capture by becoming "imperceptible," even to ourselves, and therefore as non-transactable yet productive as possible. Join us for a truly worthless conversation about the negativity of love, or the "Agony of Eros," as Byung-Chul Han put it. Whatever you're able to discern of the conversation over the noise of the cars passing by and the intense wind storm raging all around us in central Ohio's weirdly, windy clime, will certainly whet your whistle for the suffering gifted to true lovers by eros, not so much in the banal and idiotically positive vein of the Marquis de Sade, but rather in that of the erotic suffering of the negative excess of Georges Bataille "Accursed Share."

https://youtu.be/YXn2K8ESb-w if you prefer YouTube, James and I posted the video of us performing this material there, or search Reading Together in Recovery: The Agony of Eros by Byung-Chul Han

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-19130016 Tue, 05 May 2026 14:00:00 -0400 2609 Byung-Chul Han, The Agony of Eros, sobriety, recovery, negativity, Professional Managerial Class, PMC, toxic positivity, self-exploitation, otherness, the Other, Levinas, irreducible ambiguity, self-employed, entrepreneur, German Idealism 1 16 full false Herman Hesse's Siddhartha. Herman Hesse's Siddhartha. Shawn and I discuss Siddhartha by Herman Hesse, and its relation to his recovery. Hesse has served as an introduction of Eastern thought to Westerners for over a century now. Hesse has been criticized by some of getting Buddhism wrong, or of "cultural appropriation" in general, or of being too individualistic and naive in his depiction of the spiritual journey as a solipsistic retreat into the balance and harmony of nature from the fallen, hectic world of family and work. While all those accusations may be valid to some degree or another, there is still much that recommends Hesse's version of authenticity or of Jungian "Individuation." Shawn recounts how the text helped him to come to certain essential realizations as he walked the paths of both decadence and recovery. It may be that JD Salinger and other Western authenticity hounds misused Hesse's thought to separate the world into the real ones and the phonies, but Hesse himself doesn't make any such facile categorizations. Shawn demonstrates how Hesse's thought can be understood as a sort of unification of opposites that neither resolves one into the the other nor becomes the sort of whole that Hesse and the great thinker of wholeness Karl Jung were both accused of. Hesse's whole is the wholeness that includes what can't be whole, something like Jung's individuation through the integration of the shadow, and it is this creative contradiction at the center of Hesse's work that still makes reading him worthwhile.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Shawn and I discuss Siddhartha by Herman Hesse, and its relation to his recovery. Hesse has served as an introduction of Eastern thought to Westerners for over a century now. Hesse has been criticized by some of getting Buddhism wrong, or of "cultural appropriation" in general, or of being too individualistic and naive in his depiction of the spiritual journey as a solipsistic retreat into the balance and harmony of nature from the fallen, hectic world of family and work. While all those accusations may be valid to some degree or another, there is still much that recommends Hesse's version of authenticity or of Jungian "Individuation." Shawn recounts how the text helped him to come to certain essential realizations as he walked the paths of both decadence and recovery. It may be that JD Salinger and other Western authenticity hounds misused Hesse's thought to separate the world into the real ones and the phonies, but Hesse himself doesn't make any such facile categorizations. Shawn demonstrates how Hesse's thought can be understood as a sort of unification of opposites that neither resolves one into the the other nor becomes the sort of whole that Hesse and the great thinker of wholeness Karl Jung were both accused of. Hesse's whole is the wholeness that includes what can't be whole, something like Jung's individuation through the integration of the shadow, and it is this creative contradiction at the center of Hesse's work that still makes reading him worthwhile.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-19054470 Tue, 21 Apr 2026 14:00:00 -0400 5036 Herman Hesse, Siddhartha, sobriety, recovery, spiritual journey, hero's journey, Nirvana, samsara, enlightenment, 1 15 full false Horrorstor by Grady Hendrix Horrorstor by Grady Hendrix Char and I cross over from our normally audio-only Desire of Horror Podcast to produce this Youtube video.

https://www.buzzsprout.com/2509184/episodes/19031864

https://youtu.be/XR8TvC5gfso

We discuss the book Horrorstor by Grady Hendrix. The book provides a somewhat obvious but nonetheless useful capitalist critique around the concepts of the Professional Managerial Class or corporate speak; Consumer Culture, especially influencer advertisement techniques; and the toxic positivity of constant "self-maximization." An Ikea-like furniture store is built on the past site of a particularly ignominious prison, and the spirit of its warden and his prisoners emerge from within the vast, deliberately disorientating halls of the "Orsk" furniture store to haunt its circulating corridors, which are already haunted by the gaze of capital and consumption. The former prison was one of Jeremy Bentham's infamous "Panopticons." A Panopticon was a prison designed to require minimal guards because the prisoners always had the sense that they were being watched by the guards who were placed in a watch tower in the middle of the prison complex, so that they were able to see the maximal number of cells from their vantage point. The Panopticon serves as a fruitful metaphor throughout the novel as the horror of the ineluctable, internalized gaze of the Lacanian "Big Other," which for horror fans is something like the incubus always speaking from inside of the possessed's head.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Char and I cross over from our normally audio-only Desire of Horror Podcast to produce this Youtube video.

https://www.buzzsprout.com/2509184/episodes/19031864

https://youtu.be/XR8TvC5gfso

We discuss the book Horrorstor by Grady Hendrix. The book provides a somewhat obvious but nonetheless useful capitalist critique around the concepts of the Professional Managerial Class or corporate speak; Consumer Culture, especially influencer advertisement techniques; and the toxic positivity of constant "self-maximization." An Ikea-like furniture store is built on the past site of a particularly ignominious prison, and the spirit of its warden and his prisoners emerge from within the vast, deliberately disorientating halls of the "Orsk" furniture store to haunt its circulating corridors, which are already haunted by the gaze of capital and consumption. The former prison was one of Jeremy Bentham's infamous "Panopticons." A Panopticon was a prison designed to require minimal guards because the prisoners always had the sense that they were being watched by the guards who were placed in a watch tower in the middle of the prison complex, so that they were able to see the maximal number of cells from their vantage point. The Panopticon serves as a fruitful metaphor throughout the novel as the horror of the ineluctable, internalized gaze of the Lacanian "Big Other," which for horror fans is something like the incubus always speaking from inside of the possessed's head.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-19031929 Fri, 17 Apr 2026 10:00:00 -0400 2652 psychoanalysis, historyofreligions, Freud, Foucault, capitalism critique, panopticon, profession managerial class, consumer culture, influencers, Grady Hendrix, Horrorstor 1 14 full false Nothing to Grasp Nothing to Grasp Doug and I discuss Nothing to Grasp by Joan Tollifson. Doug's spiritual journey has been one of continual exploration through his life and in his recovery itinerary. He has recently been getting deeply into nonduality in addition to his Christian practice. Our conversation about Tollifson's recovery sojourn and nondual practice allow us to discuss Doug's insights into being fully present now wherever we find ourself on the path.

https://youtu.be/eP3FMtZq15M

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Doug and I discuss Nothing to Grasp by Joan Tollifson. Doug's spiritual journey has been one of continual exploration through his life and in his recovery itinerary. He has recently been getting deeply into nonduality in addition to his Christian practice. Our conversation about Tollifson's recovery sojourn and nondual practice allow us to discuss Doug's insights into being fully present now wherever we find ourself on the path.

https://youtu.be/eP3FMtZq15M

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-19027735 Thu, 16 Apr 2026 13:00:00 -0400 1725 Joan Tollifson, Nothing to Grasp, Non-duality, recovery, sobriety, spirituality, addiction 1 13 full false The McKenna Brothers: High Weirdness Part 2 The McKenna Brothers: High Weirdness Part 2 There's a lot of hype right now about a "Psychedelic Renaissance." Dom and I get into the first two figures of the Book High Weirdness by Eric Davis, the McKenna Brothers, Terence and Denis. There is on the one hand, the scientific desire for certainty, which we associate with third-person, "objective" verifiability. This sort of inquiry and knowing is inline with what modern neurobiology imagines as the evolutionary design of the brain as a "prediction machine." If we are prediction machines, inquiry is for the reduction of uncertainty in order that we might be able to manipulate and control our environment better to our advantage. However, there is on the other hand, the religious desire to encounter the "Other," or that which we cannot reduce to the categories of scientific understanding and which cannot be reduced to a mere projection of our own intention either. The McKenna brothers encapsulate these two competing, perhaps, contradictory drives to make familiar and / or to encounter what is truly other.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> There's a lot of hype right now about a "Psychedelic Renaissance." Dom and I get into the first two figures of the Book High Weirdness by Eric Davis, the McKenna Brothers, Terence and Denis. There is on the one hand, the scientific desire for certainty, which we associate with third-person, "objective" verifiability. This sort of inquiry and knowing is inline with what modern neurobiology imagines as the evolutionary design of the brain as a "prediction machine." If we are prediction machines, inquiry is for the reduction of uncertainty in order that we might be able to manipulate and control our environment better to our advantage. However, there is on the other hand, the religious desire to encounter the "Other," or that which we cannot reduce to the categories of scientific understanding and which cannot be reduced to a mere projection of our own intention either. The McKenna brothers encapsulate these two competing, perhaps, contradictory drives to make familiar and / or to encounter what is truly other.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18922491 Sat, 28 Mar 2026 14:00:00 -0400 4962 High Weirdness, Eric Davis, Terence McKenna, Denis McKenna, psychedelics, religious studies, recovery, sobriety, Carl Jung, Mircea Eliade, mysticism, 1 12 full false High Weirdness High Weirdness Dom and I discuss High Weirdness by Eric Davis in relation to spiritual experience in general but also to Dom's personal experiences as a psychonaut before getting sober. We are interested in exploring the relation of psychedelic experience to the process of recovery. Of particular interest is the irreducible ambiguity, or weirdness, of psychedelic experience that can either be a nightmare or the ecstasy of release from habitual modes of thinking and being in the world. Infamously, Bill W., the founder of AA was a part of an early research project with LSD to "cure" alcoholics of their "obsession" with alcohol. Does the weirdness of the psychedelic trip have the potential to break one out of addiction's habitual binding, or is it just another form of "low-level" spiritual seeking that contains limiting bindings of its own?

https://youtu.be/HpIwJiy_zAw

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Dom and I discuss High Weirdness by Eric Davis in relation to spiritual experience in general but also to Dom's personal experiences as a psychonaut before getting sober. We are interested in exploring the relation of psychedelic experience to the process of recovery. Of particular interest is the irreducible ambiguity, or weirdness, of psychedelic experience that can either be a nightmare or the ecstasy of release from habitual modes of thinking and being in the world. Infamously, Bill W., the founder of AA was a part of an early research project with LSD to "cure" alcoholics of their "obsession" with alcohol. Does the weirdness of the psychedelic trip have the potential to break one out of addiction's habitual binding, or is it just another form of "low-level" spiritual seeking that contains limiting bindings of its own?

https://youtu.be/HpIwJiy_zAw

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18875018 Thu, 19 Mar 2026 16:00:00 -0400 4067 Eric Davis, High Weirdness, psychonauts, sobriety, recovery, religious studies, history of religions, esoteric religions, consciousness, psychedelic spirituality 1 10 full false My War Gone By My War Gone By Patrick and I discuss My War Gone By, I Miss It So by Anthony Loyd in relation to our journey's into sobriety and our mutual ADHD diagnoses. War was a sort of fantasy projection as well as a proving ground for Anthony Loyd, but what he proved to himself and shows to the reader is that almost nothing that is imagined or said about it is true, especially what he was led to believe about war and glory as it was depicted in the stories of his own military family's history. Patrick chose this book because it reflects struggles common to those attempting sobriety. In particular, recovery is a struggle to uncovered one's fantasy projections and to learn how to live without addictions that once helped to cover-over pain for which there where no other strategies at the time.

https://youtu.be/_Gn2l13UMzQ

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Patrick and I discuss My War Gone By, I Miss It So by Anthony Loyd in relation to our journey's into sobriety and our mutual ADHD diagnoses. War was a sort of fantasy projection as well as a proving ground for Anthony Loyd, but what he proved to himself and shows to the reader is that almost nothing that is imagined or said about it is true, especially what he was led to believe about war and glory as it was depicted in the stories of his own military family's history. Patrick chose this book because it reflects struggles common to those attempting sobriety. In particular, recovery is a struggle to uncovered one's fantasy projections and to learn how to live without addictions that once helped to cover-over pain for which there where no other strategies at the time.

https://youtu.be/_Gn2l13UMzQ

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18875215 Thu, 19 Mar 2026 12:00:00 -0400 4329 Anthony Lyod, My War Gone By, war memoirs, history, sobriety, addiction, recovery, ADHD 1 11 full false Part 3: Darkness Visible Part 3: Darkness Visible Warning: This discussion contains reference to severe depression, suicidal ideation, self-harm, and addiction. Tom and I wrap up our three part discussion about William Styron's Darkness Visible. We really get into some of the complexities of having a dual diagnosis, specifically both addiction and depression, and how any underlying conditions of addiction come on stronger than ever after self-medicating with alcohol, and / or one's drug(s) of choice, stops.

https://youtu.be/wqxZgj4b4ms

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Warning: This discussion contains reference to severe depression, suicidal ideation, self-harm, and addiction. Tom and I wrap up our three part discussion about William Styron's Darkness Visible. We really get into some of the complexities of having a dual diagnosis, specifically both addiction and depression, and how any underlying conditions of addiction come on stronger than ever after self-medicating with alcohol, and / or one's drug(s) of choice, stops.

https://youtu.be/wqxZgj4b4ms

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18874856 Thu, 19 Mar 2026 11:00:00 -0400 3640 William Styron, Darkness Visible, depression, recovery, the Dark Night, subjective destitution 1 9 full false Darkness Visible: Part 2 Darkness Visible: Part 2 Warning: we discuss severe depression, suicidal ideation, addiction, and self-harm. In this episode Tom and I discuss Darkness Visible by William Styron. We focus on Tom's experience with severe depression in recovery and Styron's considerations of Albert Camus's Myth of Sisyphus.

https://youtu.be/6qu4dmUZDxc

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Warning: we discuss severe depression, suicidal ideation, addiction, and self-harm. In this episode Tom and I discuss Darkness Visible by William Styron. We focus on Tom's experience with severe depression in recovery and Styron's considerations of Albert Camus's Myth of Sisyphus.

https://youtu.be/6qu4dmUZDxc

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18795803 Thu, 05 Mar 2026 09:00:00 -0500 3034 William Styron, Darkness Visible, depression, recovery, the Dark Night, subjective destitution 1 8 full false Darkness Visible: Part 1 Darkness Visible: Part 1 Warning: We discuss severe depression, suicidal ideation, and addiction. In this video Tom and I discuss Darkness Visible by William Styron. We relate Tom's struggle with severe depression in recovery to Styron's telling of his extremely difficult circumstances. We especially focus on mystical treatments of the "Dark Night of the Soul" as either a helpful or a dangerous framing of severe depressive states.

https://youtu.be/Eax1Oho-jKY

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Warning: We discuss severe depression, suicidal ideation, and addiction. In this video Tom and I discuss Darkness Visible by William Styron. We relate Tom's struggle with severe depression in recovery to Styron's telling of his extremely difficult circumstances. We especially focus on mystical treatments of the "Dark Night of the Soul" as either a helpful or a dangerous framing of severe depressive states.

https://youtu.be/Eax1Oho-jKY

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18795469 Thu, 05 Mar 2026 09:00:00 -0500 3247 William Styron, Darkness Visible, depression, recovery, the Dark Night, subjective destitution 1 7 full false Piranesi by Susanna Clarke Piranesi by Susanna Clarke James and I have been fast friends every since we met a couple of years ago. He's the one who talked me into making some of my work public. This podcast is certainly a part of that general move to sharing some of what I study with my fellow citizens. James doesn't like or listen to podcasts. I love them, especially one's about books, like this one. If I send a podcast to him, he probably won't listen to it. And if he does, he'll slow it down to 66 percent, or some BS, and use it to go to sleep. I'm not sure if he thinks their gosh or self-indulgence or just boring. He might listen to this one, but I'm not sure. Convincing him to do this with me was a kind of loving compromise on James's part. We both love books and reading them together. James made a momentous decision recently that's he'd stop being "precious" about the projects that he involved himself in, he's said "no" to some pretty big names, and so we have embarked on this journey together into books!

Our first book is an outgrowth of James's book club, of which I'm an original member in good standing. James and I have started many clubs together, adventure club, movie club (possibly defunct), dream club, game club, demonology club, and some others that I'm not remembering right now, but James is the founder and ultimate boss of book club. Piranesi has many of the themes that most interest me: esoteric religious practices, weird alternate worlds, mental disorders, and labyrinths. James didn't love the book, but he kindly brings his keen literary insights to it anyways. Please, enjoy this book talk.

James is also responsible for the cool vibes at the beginning and end of all my podcasts. jamesreeves.co

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> James and I have been fast friends every since we met a couple of years ago. He's the one who talked me into making some of my work public. This podcast is certainly a part of that general move to sharing some of what I study with my fellow citizens. James doesn't like or listen to podcasts. I love them, especially one's about books, like this one. If I send a podcast to him, he probably won't listen to it. And if he does, he'll slow it down to 66 percent, or some BS, and use it to go to sleep. I'm not sure if he thinks their gosh or self-indulgence or just boring. He might listen to this one, but I'm not sure. Convincing him to do this with me was a kind of loving compromise on James's part. We both love books and reading them together. James made a momentous decision recently that's he'd stop being "precious" about the projects that he involved himself in, he's said "no" to some pretty big names, and so we have embarked on this journey together into books!

Our first book is an outgrowth of James's book club, of which I'm an original member in good standing. James and I have started many clubs together, adventure club, movie club (possibly defunct), dream club, game club, demonology club, and some others that I'm not remembering right now, but James is the founder and ultimate boss of book club. Piranesi has many of the themes that most interest me: esoteric religious practices, weird alternate worlds, mental disorders, and labyrinths. James didn't love the book, but he kindly brings his keen literary insights to it anyways. Please, enjoy this book talk.

James is also responsible for the cool vibes at the beginning and end of all my podcasts. jamesreeves.co

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18783103 Tue, 03 Mar 2026 13:00:00 -0500 3541 Susan Clarke, Piranesi, book club, book talks, history of religions, religious studies, psychoanalysis, literary studies, esoteric religion, active imagination 1 6 full false Part 4: Atheism as Uberpiety Part 4: Atheism as Uberpiety In this video, we conclude our discussion of the introduction to Brook Ziporyn's book, focusing on the concept of "Atheism as Uberpiety." We contrast traditional religious experiences—which attempts to reduce uncertainty by providing cohesive rules and a stable identity—with a more profound, "decentering" religious experience that embraces ambiguity and radical paradigm shifts. We argue that rigid monotheism is stifling because it enforces a single, absolute truth and strict moral categories, thereby preventing individuals from experiencing the richness of multiple, open-ended possibilities. Instead, we suggest that authentic "ecstatic" religious experiences occur when we step outside of our conditioned programming and rigid identities.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> In this video, we conclude our discussion of the introduction to Brook Ziporyn's book, focusing on the concept of "Atheism as Uberpiety." We contrast traditional religious experiences—which attempts to reduce uncertainty by providing cohesive rules and a stable identity—with a more profound, "decentering" religious experience that embraces ambiguity and radical paradigm shifts. We argue that rigid monotheism is stifling because it enforces a single, absolute truth and strict moral categories, thereby preventing individuals from experiencing the richness of multiple, open-ended possibilities. Instead, we suggest that authentic "ecstatic" religious experiences occur when we step outside of our conditioned programming and rigid identities.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18782074 Tue, 03 Mar 2026 10:00:00 -0500 1873 Brook Ziporyn, history of religions, religious studies, history of philosophy, Kant, Hegel, mysticism, Taoism, Buddhism, Lacan, Deleuze, Freud, Structuralism, Saussure, Catholic Social Teaching 1 5 full false Part 3 of the Introduction to Ziporyn's Mystical Atheism Part 3 of the Introduction to Ziporyn's Mystical Atheism Scott and Marty discuss and ultimately reject the philosophical thesis that monotheism was a "necessary stage" in the transition from ancient religiosity to modern secularism, arguing instead—via Brook Ziporyn—that Chinese religions like Daoism and Buddhism achieved concepts of "no-self" and "purposelessness" without ever positing a unified divine intention. They trace the Western history of "demythologizing" the world, describing how the survival instinct to project agency onto nature (animism) evolved into the depersonalized "unmoved mover" of Greek philosophy and the "omni-God" of Israel, before finally being internalized by Kant as the "synthetic a priori" structures of human consciousness. The speakers contend that while this trajectory led to secular humanism, it retained the dangerous flaw of believing in a "single purposeful mind"—whether divine or scientific—which allows for the violent enforcement of a "unified good". Contrasting this with the psychoanalytic reality that human minds are inherently conflicted and ambivalent, they conclude that authentic religious experience lies not in control or purpose, but in embracing "irreducible ambiguity" and the "intentionless void" of the sublime

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Scott and Marty discuss and ultimately reject the philosophical thesis that monotheism was a "necessary stage" in the transition from ancient religiosity to modern secularism, arguing instead—via Brook Ziporyn—that Chinese religions like Daoism and Buddhism achieved concepts of "no-self" and "purposelessness" without ever positing a unified divine intention. They trace the Western history of "demythologizing" the world, describing how the survival instinct to project agency onto nature (animism) evolved into the depersonalized "unmoved mover" of Greek philosophy and the "omni-God" of Israel, before finally being internalized by Kant as the "synthetic a priori" structures of human consciousness. The speakers contend that while this trajectory led to secular humanism, it retained the dangerous flaw of believing in a "single purposeful mind"—whether divine or scientific—which allows for the violent enforcement of a "unified good". Contrasting this with the psychoanalytic reality that human minds are inherently conflicted and ambivalent, they conclude that authentic religious experience lies not in control or purpose, but in embracing "irreducible ambiguity" and the "intentionless void" of the sublime

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Scott Ellis and Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18699419 Tue, 17 Feb 2026 10:00:00 -0500 2051 Brook Ziporyn, mysticism, religious studies, history of religions, Kant, German Idealism, Jean-Luc Nancy, Nietzsche, Levinas, Zhuangzi, Taoism, no self, purposeless action, Wu Wei 1 4 full false Part 2 of Ziporyn's Introduction to Mystical Atheism Part 2 of Ziporyn's Introduction to Mystical Atheism We cover the second two sections of the introduction of Brook Ziporyn's book Experiments in Mystical Atheism, "Preaching to the Choir" and "Let's Assume a Brain Tumor." You can also watch our conversation on YouTube at Adventures in Mystical Atheism: https://www.youtube.com/@ske313/podcasts

Scott and Marty discuss the limitations of the "symbolic"—the rules, language, and culture used to navigate the world—arguing that it cannot fully contain the "irreducible ambiguity" of reality, which drives humans to seek a "meta-language" or "Big Other" to guarantee coherence and truth. While modern society often elevates scientific discourse to this role, the speakers use the debate regarding transgender identities to demonstrate that science alone cannot resolve questions rooted in deep, extra-rational values. They critique the "New Atheists" (specifically Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens) for employing material reductionism and secular humanism as totalizing narratives that attempt to eliminate mystery—such as reducing behavior to genetic survival or meditation to economic productivity—rather than acknowledging the "abyss" of meaning. Drawing on the work of Ziporyn, the discussion concludes by advocating for "inter-subsumption," a state where conflicting perspectives like science and religion coexist without one blotting out the other, allowing individuals to hold intentions loosely and accept the lack of a single, all-encompassing identity.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> We cover the second two sections of the introduction of Brook Ziporyn's book Experiments in Mystical Atheism, "Preaching to the Choir" and "Let's Assume a Brain Tumor." You can also watch our conversation on YouTube at Adventures in Mystical Atheism: https://www.youtube.com/@ske313/podcasts

Scott and Marty discuss the limitations of the "symbolic"—the rules, language, and culture used to navigate the world—arguing that it cannot fully contain the "irreducible ambiguity" of reality, which drives humans to seek a "meta-language" or "Big Other" to guarantee coherence and truth. While modern society often elevates scientific discourse to this role, the speakers use the debate regarding transgender identities to demonstrate that science alone cannot resolve questions rooted in deep, extra-rational values. They critique the "New Atheists" (specifically Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens) for employing material reductionism and secular humanism as totalizing narratives that attempt to eliminate mystery—such as reducing behavior to genetic survival or meditation to economic productivity—rather than acknowledging the "abyss" of meaning. Drawing on the work of Ziporyn, the discussion concludes by advocating for "inter-subsumption," a state where conflicting perspectives like science and religion coexist without one blotting out the other, allowing individuals to hold intentions loosely and accept the lack of a single, all-encompassing identity.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Scott Ellis and Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18597345 Fri, 30 Jan 2026 13:00:00 -0500 1843 Brook Ziporyn, Lacan, Deleuze, Hegel, Heidegger, Freud, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, no self, purposeless action, Wu Wei, history of religions, religious studies 1 3 full false Part 1: The Weird Idea of Mystical Atheism Part 1: The Weird Idea of Mystical Atheism We cover the first two sections of introduction of Brook Ziporyn's book Experiments in Mystical Atheism, "The Weird Idea" and "God as Default?". You can also watch our conversation on YouTube at Adventures in Mystical Atheism: https://www.youtube.com/@ske313/podcasts

Scott and I have been on a journey together for a long time. We met as undergraduates at Indiana University in 1991. We bonded around a love of philosophy and music. Over the past thirty-five years there have been countless late night conversations and warehouse parties (not so great for philosophical conversations), especially at those venues related to the underground Chicago House and Detroit Techno scenes. There have been three culminating events recently out of which this podcast was born: the 2025 Lack Conference, seeing Godspeed You! Black Emperor in a Detroit warehouse, and Brook Ziporyn's book Experiments in Mystical Atheism.

The picture that we're using as the podcast's art is of us getting ready to listen to Slavoj Zizek give the keynote at the 2025 Lack Conference, where at 52 I finally presented my first academic paper, which was on the connection between Jacques Lacan's "Real" and Jean-Luc Marion's "Saturated Phenomenon." The second event occurred early this Fall when I went up to Detroit to see Godspeed with my partner Charla and my friends James and Candy. Pulling into a ghostly, but now legal, massive warehouse complex "somewhere in Detroit," as the Underground Resistance puts it, brought back so much of Scott's and my history together in the holy temples comprised of dark remnants of the post-industrial collapse of our esoteric, midwestern lives. And Godspeed'salchemical drones and refractory repetitions accomplished for Scott and me the religious ecstasy that this music is designed to produce, without the assistance of any other mind altering substances. As Genesis P-Orridge put it, "music is psychedelic all by itself." Our bodies are indeed "temples," designed to receive, without the containment of an intention, the sacred vibrations of Marion's "Elsewhere," and of Giles Deleuze's "deterritorialized flows of intensities." Scott and I were at Church, and we knew it, the one true, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. I wept for most of the show and raised my hands and shouted "glory" and "hallelujah" to whatever it is that Meister Eckhart called the "God beyond God," which is what Scott and I call "love," and what Marion calls the love that precedes God as the "God Beyond Being."

The third event was the discovery of Brook Ziporyn's book a few months ago, which has helped us to frame our journey together into a religious practice that is without the intention of a totalizing intention. Ziporyn's presentation of the Daoist concept of "Wu Wei" as "purposeless action" has given us new concepts for a journey that isn't without purpose, or concepts, but without the sort of absolute purpose, or intention, that Western notions of God insist on. Ziporyn's aphorism "No God, but many gods," captures perfectly our unwillingness to throw out the sacred along with the Omni-God. We were born of the unconditioned, unintentional love that proceeded being's intentions, and our holy intention is for the purposeless inclusivity of this groundless ground of love.

Join us on our journey into the super-saturated darkness of love.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> We cover the first two sections of introduction of Brook Ziporyn's book Experiments in Mystical Atheism, "The Weird Idea" and "God as Default?". You can also watch our conversation on YouTube at Adventures in Mystical Atheism: https://www.youtube.com/@ske313/podcasts

Scott and I have been on a journey together for a long time. We met as undergraduates at Indiana University in 1991. We bonded around a love of philosophy and music. Over the past thirty-five years there have been countless late night conversations and warehouse parties (not so great for philosophical conversations), especially at those venues related to the underground Chicago House and Detroit Techno scenes. There have been three culminating events recently out of which this podcast was born: the 2025 Lack Conference, seeing Godspeed You! Black Emperor in a Detroit warehouse, and Brook Ziporyn's book Experiments in Mystical Atheism.

The picture that we're using as the podcast's art is of us getting ready to listen to Slavoj Zizek give the keynote at the 2025 Lack Conference, where at 52 I finally presented my first academic paper, which was on the connection between Jacques Lacan's "Real" and Jean-Luc Marion's "Saturated Phenomenon." The second event occurred early this Fall when I went up to Detroit to see Godspeed with my partner Charla and my friends James and Candy. Pulling into a ghostly, but now legal, massive warehouse complex "somewhere in Detroit," as the Underground Resistance puts it, brought back so much of Scott's and my history together in the holy temples comprised of dark remnants of the post-industrial collapse of our esoteric, midwestern lives. And Godspeed'salchemical drones and refractory repetitions accomplished for Scott and me the religious ecstasy that this music is designed to produce, without the assistance of any other mind altering substances. As Genesis P-Orridge put it, "music is psychedelic all by itself." Our bodies are indeed "temples," designed to receive, without the containment of an intention, the sacred vibrations of Marion's "Elsewhere," and of Giles Deleuze's "deterritorialized flows of intensities." Scott and I were at Church, and we knew it, the one true, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. I wept for most of the show and raised my hands and shouted "glory" and "hallelujah" to whatever it is that Meister Eckhart called the "God beyond God," which is what Scott and I call "love," and what Marion calls the love that precedes God as the "God Beyond Being."

The third event was the discovery of Brook Ziporyn's book a few months ago, which has helped us to frame our journey together into a religious practice that is without the intention of a totalizing intention. Ziporyn's presentation of the Daoist concept of "Wu Wei" as "purposeless action" has given us new concepts for a journey that isn't without purpose, or concepts, but without the sort of absolute purpose, or intention, that Western notions of God insist on. Ziporyn's aphorism "No God, but many gods," captures perfectly our unwillingness to throw out the sacred along with the Omni-God. We were born of the unconditioned, unintentional love that proceeded being's intentions, and our holy intention is for the purposeless inclusivity of this groundless ground of love.

Join us on our journey into the super-saturated darkness of love.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Scott Ellis and Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18501293 Tue, 13 Jan 2026 11:00:00 -0500 1674 Brook Ziporyn, history of religions, religious studies, history of philosophy, Kant, Hegel, mysticism, Taoism, Buddhism, Lacan, Deleuze, Freud, Structuralism, Saussure, Catholic Social Teaching 1 2 full false Preface to Mystical Atheism Preface to Mystical Atheism We've updated our introduction to the preface of the book to make it shorter and clearer. You can also see this episode on YouTube at Adventures in Mystical Atheism: https://www.youtube.com/@ske313/podcasts

Scott and I have been on a journey together for a long time. We met as undergraduates at Indiana University in 1991. We bonded around a love of philosophy and music. Over the past thirty-five years there have been countless late night conversations and warehouse parties (not so great for philosophical conversations), especially at those venues related to the underground Chicago House and Detroit Techno scenes. There have been three culminating events recently out of which this podcast was born: the 2025 Lack Conference, seeing Godspeed You! Black Emperor in a Detroit warehouse, and Brook Ziporyn's book Experiments in Mystical Atheism.

The picture that we're using as the podcast's art is of us getting ready to listen to Slavoj Zizek give the keynote at the 2025 Lack Conference, where at 52 I finally presented my first academic paper, which was on the connection between Jacques Lacan's "Real" and Jean-Luc Marion's "Saturated Phenomenon." The second event occurred early this Fall when I went up to Detroit to see Godspeed with my partner Charla and my friends James and Candy. Pulling into a ghostly, but now legal, massive warehouse complex "somewhere in Detroit," as the Underground Resistance puts it, brought back so much of Scott's and my history together in the holy temples comprised of dark remnants of the post-industrial collapse of our esoteric, midwestern lives. And Godspeed'salchemical drones and refractory repetitions accomplished for Scott and me the religious ecstasy that this music is designed to produce, without the assistance of any other mind altering substances. As Genesis P-Orridge put it, "music is psychedelic all by itself." Our bodies are indeed "temples," designed to receive, without the containment of an intention, the sacred vibrations of Marion's "Elsewhere," and of Giles Deleuze's "deterritorialized flows of intensities." Scott and I were at Church, and we knew it, the one true, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. I wept for most of the show and raised my hands and shouted "glory" and "hallelujah" to whatever it is that Meister Eckhart called the "God beyond God," which is what Scott and I call "love," and what Marion calls the love that precedes God as the "God Beyond Being."

The third event was the discovery of Brook Ziporyn's book a few months ago, which has helped us to frame our journey together into a religious practice that is without the intention of a totalizing intention. Ziporyn's presentation of the Daoist concept of "Wu Wei" as "purposeless action" has given us new concepts for a journey that isn't without purpose, or concepts, but without the sort of absolute purpose, or intention, that Western notions of God insist on. Ziporyn's aphorism "No God, but many gods," captures perfectly our unwillingness to throw out the sacred along with the Omni-God. We were born of the unconditioned, unintentional love that proceeded being's intentions, and our holy intention is for the purposeless inclusivity of this groundless ground of love.

Join us on our journey into the super-saturated darkness of love.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> We've updated our introduction to the preface of the book to make it shorter and clearer. You can also see this episode on YouTube at Adventures in Mystical Atheism: https://www.youtube.com/@ske313/podcasts

Scott and I have been on a journey together for a long time. We met as undergraduates at Indiana University in 1991. We bonded around a love of philosophy and music. Over the past thirty-five years there have been countless late night conversations and warehouse parties (not so great for philosophical conversations), especially at those venues related to the underground Chicago House and Detroit Techno scenes. There have been three culminating events recently out of which this podcast was born: the 2025 Lack Conference, seeing Godspeed You! Black Emperor in a Detroit warehouse, and Brook Ziporyn's book Experiments in Mystical Atheism.

The picture that we're using as the podcast's art is of us getting ready to listen to Slavoj Zizek give the keynote at the 2025 Lack Conference, where at 52 I finally presented my first academic paper, which was on the connection between Jacques Lacan's "Real" and Jean-Luc Marion's "Saturated Phenomenon." The second event occurred early this Fall when I went up to Detroit to see Godspeed with my partner Charla and my friends James and Candy. Pulling into a ghostly, but now legal, massive warehouse complex "somewhere in Detroit," as the Underground Resistance puts it, brought back so much of Scott's and my history together in the holy temples comprised of dark remnants of the post-industrial collapse of our esoteric, midwestern lives. And Godspeed'salchemical drones and refractory repetitions accomplished for Scott and me the religious ecstasy that this music is designed to produce, without the assistance of any other mind altering substances. As Genesis P-Orridge put it, "music is psychedelic all by itself." Our bodies are indeed "temples," designed to receive, without the containment of an intention, the sacred vibrations of Marion's "Elsewhere," and of Giles Deleuze's "deterritorialized flows of intensities." Scott and I were at Church, and we knew it, the one true, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. I wept for most of the show and raised my hands and shouted "glory" and "hallelujah" to whatever it is that Meister Eckhart called the "God beyond God," which is what Scott and I call "love," and what Marion calls the love that precedes God as the "God Beyond Being."

The third event was the discovery of Brook Ziporyn's book a few months ago, which has helped us to frame our journey together into a religious practice that is without the intention of a totalizing intention. Ziporyn's presentation of the Daoist concept of "Wu Wei" as "purposeless action" has given us new concepts for a journey that isn't without purpose, or concepts, but without the sort of absolute purpose, or intention, that Western notions of God insist on. Ziporyn's aphorism "No God, but many gods," captures perfectly our unwillingness to throw out the sacred along with the Omni-God. We were born of the unconditioned, unintentional love that proceeded being's intentions, and our holy intention is for the purposeless inclusivity of this groundless ground of love.

Join us on our journey into the super-saturated darkness of love.

https://www.martinessig.com

Baddass vibes mixed by James Reeves of Midnight Radio https://www.jamesreevesco.com

]]> Scott Ellis and Martin Essig Buzzsprout-18501167 Tue, 13 Jan 2026 10:00:00 -0500 2033 Brook Ziporyn, Freud, Lacan, Deleuze, Taoism, Buddhism, Whitehead, Process, Thomas Merton, Dorothy Day, Mystical Theology, Kant, Hegel, religious studies, history of religions, history of philosophy 1 1 full false