Episode 203 – Distant Early Warnings: A Return to Marshall McLuhan's 'Book of Probes'

Back in episode 112, Phil and JF devised a gimmick for a show: randomly select one of the many aphorisms in The Book of Probes, a compendium of Marshall McLuhan’s prophetic quips designed by David Carson, and see what happens. It proved lively enough that they’re trying it again nearly a hundred episodes later. The resulting conversation touches the weird across a range of themes: tourism, the two kinds of truth, advertising, Kubrick’s marketing savvy, technology, orality versus literacy, and much more. A fitting feast for the mind as the year draws to a close.

From all of us at Weird Studies, happy holidays.

• Sign up for JF Martel and Erik Davis's upcoming course on Moby-Dick (weirdosphere.org/course/moby-dick).

• Join Phil, JF, and composer Pierre-Yves Martel for Weirdosphere's Solstice Story Hour (weirdosphere.org/course/winter-solstice-celebr…) on December 21.

• For dates, venues, and the full slate of Weird Academia events in Bloomington this January, visit the Centre for Possible Minds website (possibleminds.org/weird-academia).

• To participate in the Weird Academia Colloquium, email organizers Emma Stamm and Michael Garfield at elfthoughts@gmail.com

Header Image: NASA.

REFERENCES

Marshall McLuhan, Distant Early Warning Deck (mcluhangalaxy.wordpress.com/2010/06/26/the-dis…)

Thomas Mann, The Magic Mountain (bookshop.org/a/18799/9780679772873)

Plato, The Seventh Letter (classics.mit.edu/Plato/seventh_letter.html)

Marshall McLuhan, The Book of Probes (archive.org/details/bookofprobesmars0000mclu)

Toronto School of Communication Theory (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_school_of_commun…)

Walter Ong, Orality and Literacy (bookshop.org/a/18799/9780415538381)

Paul Kingsnorth, Against the Machine (bookshop.org/a/18799/9780593850633)

Charles Taylor, A Secular Age (bookshop.org/a/18799/9780674986916%C2%A0)

Plato, The Republic

Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media (bookshop.org/a/18799/9780415253970)

Jonathan Crary, 24/7

H. P. Lovecraft, The Color out of Space (bookshop.org/a/18799/9789359642819)

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