On Thursday’s episode of Philosophy in Action Radio, Greg Perkins and I will answer questions on improving candidates for office, increasing psychological visibility, sleeping around, and more. This episode of internet radio airs at 6 pm PT / 7 MT / 8 CT / 9 ET on Thursday, 30 October 2014, in our live studio. If you can’t listen live, you’ll find the podcast on the episode’s archive page.

This week’s questions are:

• Question 1: Improving Candidates for Office: How can people improve the quality of politicians in office? Although it’s easy to condemn all politicians, some are better than others. How can we get more of the better politicians into office? Should people committed to rights run for office? Or should those people work to elect better (but still mixed) politicians? Or should they try to convince established politicians to embrace rights? What’s the best strategy for effective political change?
• Question 2: Increasing Psychological Visibility: How can I achieve greater psychological visibility? Recently, I realized that many of my emotional difficulties in life – such as in maintaining motivation or keeping serene – may be exacerbated by feelings of psychological invisibility. In other words, I feel uncared for and unnoticed, and the deep dissatisfaction stemming from that could be potentially affecting a lot of areas in my life. For instance, I recently spoke to my manager as to my problems at work, and it made me feel so uniquely good that I was able to finish my shift in peace and on-track, in contrast to the bitter, near seething prior hours. That unique feeling indicates that I may have a deep unfulfilled emotional need in their area, hurting other realms of performance. Thus, what is psychological visibility? What does it add to my life? How can I satisfy it?
• Question 3: Sleeping Around: Why would anyone even want to sleep around? Ayn Rand used Francisco D’Anconia to describe her view of sexuality in Atlas Shrugged, but while her explanation was easy enough to understand, there were some things she left out. Namely: why would someone, anyone, sleep around? I’ve met, and read articles by, women who describe their experiences in the “hookup” culture, and across the board they agree that most of the men they slept with were poor lovers who cared little for them once the act was finished. I know men like this in real life who seem surprised at how unfulfilling their sex lives (admittedly much more active than mine) really are. So I have to ask: why would someone choose to have sex with someone when they know, or at least have no good reason to not believe, that the person has no actual interest in them personally?

After that, we’ll tackle some impromptu “Rapid Fire Questions.”

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Philosophy in Action Radio applies rational principles to the challenges of real life in live internet radio shows on Sunday mornings and Thursday evenings. For information on upcoming shows, visit the Episodes on Tap. For podcasts of past shows, visit the Show Archives.