Person
Every book Diana Walsh Pasulka recommended on podcasts
Diana Walsh Pasulka appears on podcasts such as the Lex Fridman Podcast and Interesting Times as a professor of religion and author who investigates the intersections of belief, technology, UFO phenomena, and religious culture. Throughout her podcast appearances, Pasulka recommends and discusses intellectual works that examine human consciousness, institutional history, and fringe beliefs. She highlighted Friedrich Nietzsche's The Gay Science as a text that profoundly impacted her thinking. In the realm of history and ethics, Pasulka highly recommended Hannah Arendt's Eichmann in Jerusalem, detailing Arendt's coverage of the Nuremberg trials, as well as Arendt's massive philosophical work The Life of the Mind, which she regards as one of the best books she has ever read. To explore anomalous phenomena and religious language, Pasulka recommended Jeffrey J. Kripal's Authors of the Impossible and discussed Ray Kurzweil's The Singularity Is Near as a work written in fundamentally religious terminology. Tracing her academic roots in UFO studies, she also discussed Jacques Vallée's Passport to Magonia as an essential title bridging folklore and modern beliefs.
Books recommended by Diana Walsh Pasulka
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Authors of the Impossible
Authors of the Impossible by Jeffrey J.
Recommended“but he's um his i think his best book or the one that impacted me the most is called authors of the impossible”
Where to get it
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Eichmann in Jerusalem
Eichmann in Jerusalem by Hannah Arendt is a profound philosophical work reporting on the war crimes trial of Nazi Adolf Eichmann, famously introducing the influential concept of the banality of evil.
Recommended“she writes two books which i'll recommend one is called eichmann in jerusalem where she attend attends the nuremberg trials”
Where to get it
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On the Genealogy of Morals
On the Genealogy of Morals by Friedrich Nietzsche is a foundational philosophical text that investigates the historical evolution of moral concepts, specifically contrasting master and slave morality.
Recommended“and the nietzsche's gay science is one of them”
Where to get it
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The Life of the Mind
The Life of the Mind is a book by Hannah Arendt that explores the philosophical foundations of thinking, willing, and judging, alongside related works by the author on political theory and totalitarianism.
Recommended“she has another book called the life of the mind which is gigantic and i don't think anybody will read it but frankly it's one of the best books i've ever read and i've read it many times and basically the life of the mind and the life of the mind she asks a very simple question”
Where to get it
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The Singularity Is Near
Ray Kurzweil's The Singularity Is Near explores the future of technology, human evolution, and artificial intelligence.
Recommended“but when i read the um kurzweil's book about the singularity to me it read just like um religious language”
Where to get it
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Mutants & Mystics
Discussed“uh there's a great one he's written called mutants and mystics where he talks about the comic strips”
Where to get it
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On the Essence of Language and the Question of Art
Discussed“so another um philosopher that philosophers actually don't like at all but religious studies people do is martin heidegger so martin heidegger has some great essays one is called what is a work of art”
Where to get it
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Passport to Magonia
Passport to Magonia by Jacques Vallee is a seminal ufological text that posits modern UFO sightings are modern manifestations of ancient folklore, fairylike entities, and interdimensional phenomena.
Discussed“So one of the first books I read when I made the turn to study U.F.O. beliefs and practices was Jack’s "Passport to Magonia," which is a great book, one of the many great titles of books in the U.F.O. literature.”
Where to get it
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The Book of Genesis
Discussed“He uses a religious reference even he says you could think of the matrix of the movie as a new as the new um book of genesis for our new world”
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The Critique of Practical Reason
Discussed“so emmanuel kant is one of the he was uh basically in the 1750s he wrote critiques of reason and things like that”
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The Genealogy of Morals
Discussed“foucault this um other philosopher french philosopher actually takes up this idea and creates his own framework called genealogy from it so the genealogy of morals”
Where to get it
Books Diana Walsh Pasulka wrote
Appearances
Other mentions (4: passing, ad reads, own books)
“So I didn’t believe in U.F.O.s, had never seen "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."”
“So what I’m suggesting and I say this in my book, American cosmic, is that this is a new form of religion, actually.”
“So when I started the research for American cosmic, I said, O.K, this is going to be pretty easy because we have the internet here and we have all of this data.”
“they spoke the vedas which were the sacred traditions of india they wanted off”