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Hosted by Jeffrey Howard, editor-in-chief of Erraticus, Damn the Absolute! is a show about our relationship to ideas.Themes and summary (AI-generated based on podcaster-provided show and episode descriptions):
➤ Pragmatist philosophy • truth, uncertainty, anti-dogmatism • democracy, polarization, deliberation • racism, economic injustice, community healing • postmodernism/metamodernism, literary culture • science as metaphor, mind • ethics, religion, expertise • climate, commons, localism, animal flourishing • education reform, parenting, Stoicism, BuddhismThis podcast explores how people form, defend, revise, and sometimes absolutize their ideas, with an emphasis on intellectual humility and keeping inquiry open rather than closing it down with dogma. Hosted by Jeffrey Howard, the show uses conversations with philosophers, scholars, and writers to examine how concepts like truth, knowledge, morality, and political legitimacy function in lived experience—especially when communities face conflict, uncertainty, or crisis.
Across the episodes, pragmatism is a recurring touchstone. Discussions often contrast representational or “mirror of nature” views of truth with more instrumental or fallibilist approaches, where beliefs are assessed by their consequences and usefulness in coping with real problems. This interest extends into debates about postmodernism and possible successor frameworks, and into questions about whether science provides literal descriptions of reality or relies on metaphors, narratives, and models that remain provisional.
The podcast also repeatedly connects philosophy to civic life. It examines the strains on liberal democracy—polarization, declining trust, authoritarian temptations, and disputes over education and public memory—and asks what kinds of cultural habits or institutions help societies deliberate under uncertainty. Several conversations treat political life not only as bargaining over interests but also as a process shaped by emotion, trauma, and collective wounds, including the legacies of racism and economic injustice.
Ethics and the cultivation of character appear through engagements with traditions such as Stoicism, Buddhism, and continental ethics, often focusing on responsibility to others and the challenges of moral life without fixed, universal rules. The show also branches into applied themes—climate change response, commons-based governance, localism and placemaking, education outside conventional schooling, and human relationships with nonhuman animals—using them as sites to test how ideas work in practice and how communities might build more inclusive, resilient forms of life.
