They say this one is the real deal. In Episode 98 of Overthink, Ellie and David untangle the philosophy behind the way we compare, judge, and defend our reputations. From Machiavelli’s advice to despots looking to stay popular, to disgruntled students venting on their professors online, reputation can glide you to victory or trigger your fall from grace. Exploring concepts like the Matthew effect, the homo comparativus, and informational asymmetry, your hosts ask: Why do both Joan Jett and Je...
Welcome to Overthink, the podcast reputed to be the best of all possible philosophy podcasts.
I'm your co host, Dr.
David Pena Guzman.
And I'm Dr.
Ellie Anderson.
We do indeed love a lot of other philosophy podcasts too.
We're not actually saying that ours is the de facto best, but hopefully we do have a good reputation among them.
David, I want to start today by talking about a song that I can't not think of when the word reputation comes up.
In fact, it's been in my head a lot since we decided to do this episode, and that is the song Bad Reputation by Joan Jett and the Black Hearts, which is like, I don't give a damn about my red reputation.
Da da da da da.
I don't know.
I don't know the rest of the lyrics.
I just know the chorus.
I don't know them either, or I didn't until I googled them.
And I want to talk a little bit about these lyrics because I feel like they say something about how repp.
Reputation is conceived in contemporary society, which is that it has a bad reputation.
Let's say, like, it's not cool to care about your reputation.
Okay, let me look.
Let me look up the lyrics while you do this so that I'm looking at the same thing as you.
Oh, yeah, I'm gonna read you a little bit them, too.