Today’s episode of How To Be Wrong welcomes back cohost John Kaag after a brief hiatus from the podcast and explores questions of assholery and humility with University of California Irvine philosopher Aaron James. Dr. James has written several fascinating books including Surfing with Sartre: An Aquatic Inquiry Into a Life of Meaning, Assholes: A Theory, and his most recent Money From Nothing: Or, Why We Should Stop Worrying About Debt and Learn to Love the Federal Reserve published by Penguin Random House in 2020. The conversation moves through Dr. James’ experiences as an academic, some of his work in Sumatra, and the ways in which surfing can generate humility.

John Kaag is Professor and Chair of Philosophy at UMass Lowell and External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute. John W. Traphagan, Ph.D. is Professor and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Fellow in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, where he is also a professor in the Program in Human Dimensions of Organizations.

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