Philosopher Podcaster: Nigel Warburton

We are tempted to call him a philosopher podcaster to the stars. Nigel Warburton has interviewed the most luminous in the cosmos of contemporary philosophers in the English-speaking world. From Peter Singer to Mary Warnock, two among the philosophical supernovae to be sure. For the gravity-bound, remember it was Peter Singer's 1975 book Animal Liberation which helped launch the modern animal rights movement.  Singer's recent work has highlighted his long-standing contention that the affluent among us have a duty to give to the poor in our midst. And it is Mary Warnock's name that is used as shorthand to recall two seminal reports issued to the British public, the first in the late 1970s on educating children with special needs and the second from the mid-1980s on the impact of new reproductive technologies. The Warnock reports could be called the Baroness Warnock Reports, I suppose, given that she is also a member of the House of Lords.

With all of this in mind, our real goal here is to give Nigel Warburton some time in the night sky. And we suspect he is cringing right now. It is not because he has many of the virtues (we really have no idea about that!) he so ably and clearly gets other philosophers to talk about in his very wonderful podcasts that traverse the world through his association with fellow podcaster, David Edmonds on  "Ethics Bites." He is instead, perhaps cringing about the star-studded talk.

But we have a right to say what we think, even if it full of black-holed cliches. And that is the first thing a2ethics.org members and readers should know about Nigel Warburton. His most recent book is called Free Speech: A Very Short Introduction.

I felt fortunate enough to hear Nigel on the subject in a talk he delivered in February, 2009 at The School of Life in London. That evening about 35 of us, presumably other "Ethics Bites" subscribers, met to talk with Nigel on the topic, "How To Speak Your Mind." 

Being comfortable about speaking your mind in a roomful of strangers is not always easy, even when the wine is flowing and convivial free speech has preceded the main event.  Good teacher that he is, Nigel started us off by assigning us to complete a survey on free speech issues we might want to speak our minds about that very evening. In addition to his life as an Internet broadcaster and author of other popular philosophy books, Warburton is a part-time senior lecturer at the Open University (located in Milton Keynes, England), where he chairs one 'suite' of courses, "Philosophy and the Human Situation" and teaches another called "Start Writing."

Not only did our group immediately start writing.  We started talking. And speechifying. Freely. Telling everyone what we thought. Listening to what everyone else thought. Clinging to some of our favorite cherished views. Trying out new ideas to see how they would fly. Dissenting from what we thought was inaccurate and mistaken. Offering the platform to some. Withholding it from others.  And finally, potentially giving offense or being offended ourselves. 

All in a night's work for Nigel Warburton. 

On a site like a2ethics.org, we know our readers expect the people we feature to inspire us, to do something, anything, to make a difference, and to help us to determine on own own and with others how to live the life well-lived.  We don't really know if what Nigel does during the day or night does make such a difference, but invite you to determine this on your own. 

You can do this by listening to an interview with him at: http://www.open2.net/ethicsbites/nigel-warburton-video.html.                      For information on "Ethics Bites" and Warburton's other incredible podcasts, known as "Philosophy Bites," please go to: www.open2.net/ethicsbites/index.html and http://www.philosophybites.com/.