Our guest on this episode is Mark Johnson, author of Moral Imagination: Implications of Cognitive Science for Ethics.

In this podcast:

From Kansas Lutheran Republican to John Dewey and the rejection of mind-body dualism (1:15) — A naturalistic account of the interaction between organism and environment (3:00) — How can the imagination be moral? Doesn’t morality need to be rational? (5:45) — Against “moral fundamentalism” (8:45) — Conscientiousness, imaginative inquiry, and the growth of meaning (11:30) — Can you have indeterminacy without relativism? (13:30) — Imaginative dramatic rehearsal and moral imagination (15:15) — Is there any value to the trolley problem, or is it too artificial? (18:45) — How can one approach the NFL national anthem protests philosophically? (22:30) — Listening to other voices as the condition of a healthy society (24:15) — What about campus protests against controversial speakers? (27:30) — The need to expand the scope of people’s concerns; Philip Kitcher’s Ethical Project (29:15) — Developing empathy, imagination and understanding of others through studying  literature and philosophy (31:00) — Empathy is not the be-all and end-all (35:30) — Building up reserves of compassion: the problem of weakness of will (39:00)