Transmuting Libido w/ Cadell Last

Cadell Last is a philosopher (Ph.D.) with an interest in anthropology and psychoanalysis, and the author of Global Brain Singularity, Sex, Masculinity, God. In the conversation, we discuss everything from the practicality of philosophy to libido to the dialectical relationship between wholeness and lack.

A more expansive list of topics discussed includes:

• Breaking down the myth of armchair philosophy

• Flow states as a dropping of self-identity

• the philosophy of lack

• the most extreme version of wholeness is ideology

• the most extreme version of lack is suicide

• the dialectical relationship between lack and excess

• instincts are difficult for the mind because the mind doesn’t control instincts

• repressing evil leads to committing evil

• the energy that we call evil is energy that if you look at it and work with it can produce the highest good

• long term relationships can be the most adventurous because the perception of other and what love is, is constantly dying and changing.

• the paradox of dating

  • being adventurous and having sex with a lot of people and going out all the time actually becomes boredom and repetition and avoidance of deep feeling and emotion

    • a 5-10 year relationship is risky because it could end

    • now the problem is that no one is putting their heart on the line and thus we’re becoming cold and our relationships are shallow

• the key to long term relationships is cultivating sexual desire and long term love

• and the real you is constantly changing and shifting, the libido/life-force is constantly in motion

• when do polarity and differences turn into incompatibility

• why something is of value to me is because if I act in contradiction to that thing then I find myself in pain

• what’s missing in this metamodern space is a discussion about how all of this meaning crisis stuff is sexual in nature