Philosophy Portal courses

This course is led by Chris Cutrone and inspired by Cutrone’s two major works (Sublation Press): The Death of the Millennial Left (2023), and Marxism and Politics (2024).  

🕓 : 30+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Millennial Left, Contemporary capitalist politics with a focus on how "socialist unity” might be possible today, The unresolved questions and problems internal to Marxist political-economy.

Thinking dialectical form for our time

This course on Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit aims to use Hegel to understand the development of your own consciousness. The Phenomenology of Spirit is not simply a history of ideas. It is a map of how human beings move from immediate experience, to self-awareness, to reason, to spirit, and ultimately to a deeper understanding of themselves and reality.

Led by Cadell Last

🕓 : 30+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Stages of consciousness, self-consciousness, rationality, spirituality, religion and absolute knowing, The various forms of the Absolute Idea, The World Spirit.

Discovery, development, and contemporary thinking on the unconscious psyche

This course focuses on not only Freud, in the clinical discovery of the unconscious, but also Lacan, in the development of the original Freudian theory with philosophy and linguistics, and Žižek, as an example of the contemporary philosophical use of the discovery of the unconscious for our knowing today.

Led by Cadell Last, Bonus Materials with Todd McGowan, Samuel McCormick, and more.

🕓 : 15+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Understand Your Unconscious Motivations, Beyond Conscious Self-Awareness, Decode Desire, Explore the Alien Within, The Invisible Architecture of the Mind, The Philosophy of Desire, The Unconscious and Human Freedom, Why We Don't Know Ourselves, Thinking After Freud, The Revolution of Psychoanalysis, Understanding the Human Condition, A New Map of the Psyche, The Hidden Logic of Human Behavior, From Freud to Lacan to Žižek

Story of a Heart: what does it mean to really be alive in this world?

Nietzsche’s classic Thus Spoke Zarathustra is often described as an anti-Bible Bible, and the figure of Zarathustra often described as an anti-Christian Christ, a text that speaks directly to and from the heart (“a book for all and none”). What does this bleeding heart still have to say to us in the 21st century?

Led by Cadell Last

🕓 : 25+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Overman, Will to Power, Eternal Recurrence, God is Dead, Master-Slave Morality, Active vs. Passive Nihilism, Perspectivism.

Find the key to modern logic

The Science of Logic course is designed to open a window into how Hegel’s philosophical reinvention can mature your intellectual growth and self-reflexion. This class aims to provide a detailed introduction to this work and sense-make the science of logic in relation to your personal/professional life.

Led by Cadell Last + Guest Lectures by Thomas Hamelryck, Layman Pascal, Daniel L. Garner, Alex Ebert, Thomas Winn, and more.

🕓 : 80+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Objectivity of discourse, The foundations of Logic updated to Modern world in relation to subjective desire for knowing and freedom, The Logic of Life and Death itself, How does a Philosopher embody the relationship between language and life, The nature and truth of logical unfolding of stories

Theory connecting identity and its construction to a disorienting ontology qua sexual real

In this course co-led by Cadell Last and David McKerracher, and based on Alenka Zupančič’s acclaimed work What Is Sex?, you will explore one of the most provocative and original theories of sexuality in contemporary philosophy. The course goes beyond the traditional opposition between conservatism (“sex is a natural essence”) and constructivism (“sex is a social construct”) to explore what the Lacanian tradition calls the Real of sex: something that resists all our attempts at definition and identification.

Bonus session with Alenka Zupančič.

🕓 : 15+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Sexuation, The Real of Sex, Desire and Lack, Jouissance (Enjoyment Beyond Pleasure), The Incomplete Subject, Contradiction as a Creative Force, Beyond Nature vs. Culture, Psychoanalysis and the Human Condition, Hegel, Lacan, and Dialectical Thinking, Sex and Ontology

Core writings from the controversial psychoanalyst

This course is an in-depth exploration of Écrits, Jacques Lacan’s major and notoriously difficult work. Along the way, you will discover how Lacan engages with Freud, Kant, Hegel, and contemporary thinkers to develop a radically new vision of the human condition.

Led by Cadell Last, Guest Lectures by Peter Rollins, Todd McGowan, Isabel Millar, Richard Boothby and more.

🕓 : 60+ hours

Key notions 📚 : The Unconscious Structured as Language, The Formation of the Subject, Desire and Lack, The Symbolic, the Imaginary, and the Real, The divided subject, The Mirror Stage, The relationship between psychoanalysis, politics, and society, The transition from Kant to Hegel and then to Lacan, Contemporary interpretations of Lacan inspired in particular by Žižek.

Learn the essence and the consequences of Hegel’s political philosophy.

The course explores the main sections of the Philosophy of Right, including an emphasis on Hegel’s ethical system, and its culmination in his ideas about Absolute World Spirit.

Led by Cadell Last

🕓 : 20+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Hegel's concept of freedom, Why is the state important for Hegel, Property, Contract, Wrongdoing and punishment, Moral intention, Conscience, The limits of subjective morality, Ethical Life, The Family in Hegel's Political Philosophy, The State as the Highest Expression of Freedom, Recognition and Social Relations

Truth of religion is Christianity, truth of Christianity is atheism

A nine-session course on thinking about Christianity and religion through an approach informed by the transcendental turn and speculative dialectical analysis, including in-depth analysis of Kant, Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Lacan, Altizer, Žižek and Rollins.

Led by Cadell Last. Guest Lectures by Slavoj Zizek, Peter Rollins, Barry Taylor, Mark Gerard Murphy, and more.

🕓 : 50+ hours

Key notions 📚 : West’s Christian legacy, Modernist turn to secular atheism, Atheist transgression, Nietzsche’s Death of God and the Eternal Return, Nietzsche’s Death of God and the Eternal Return, Church of the Contradiction, Psychoanalytic Theology, Radical Theology

Lack-excess as the creative tension of modern philosophy

Led by philosopher Terence Blake, a ten-session course that delves into the philosophical intersections between Gilles Deleuze and Jacques Lacan, focusing on the dynamic interplay of lack and excess as central themes in their works

🕓 : 40+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Lacan vs Deleuze, Lack◇Excess, Rhizomatic analysis, Body without Organs (BwO), Oedipal myth critique, Micropolitics of desire., Difference between psychoanalysis and schizoanalysis, Deleuzian approach to the unconscious, Understanding the machine of desire.

From philosophy to the critique of political-economy

Explore the early works of Marx (primarily from the 1840s) as a key foundational transition from the thought of the post-Idealist Young Hegelians, and into the struggles of Marxist political-economy.

Led by Cadell Last, plus access to bonus sessions with Chris Cutrone, Michel Bauwens, Revol Press, and more.

🕓 : 70+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Situating Marx’s practical politics in philosophical relationship to Hegel, Thinking about how the historicity of Hegel and Marx thought is conditioned by the political struggles of their time, Left and right-wing political orientations, Socialist political-economy, Dialectic of labour and capital, The struggles and problems that birthed the Marxist tradition.

The history and current potential of radical theology

This course focuses on Peter Rollins’ notion of pyrotheology with an in-depth exploration of the Church of Contradiction, contemporary theorists and practitioners of radical theology, which both challenge the limits of conventional theology and theism, as well as open questions about the future of religion beyond church and denomination.

Led by Peter Rollins, Barry Taylor, John Feldman, LaVonne Chantal, plus bonus sessions inspired by the Rosy Cross anthology.

🕓 : 15+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Pyrothelogy, Peter Rollins, Church of Contradiction, Christianity, Protestantism, Radical theology, Hegelian philosophy, psychoanalysis.

The core of the technological singularity thought with philosophy

This course introduces you to the foundations of ideas that inspired the theory of technological singularity. The first half of the course focuses on the fundamental nature of machine learning, its relationship to ideas of artificial intelligence and artificial general intelligence, as well as situates these technologies in their human context. The second half of the course focuses on the nature of the human being as a story-telling creature, and invites participants into an exploration of choice, freedom, indeterminacy, as key notions to counter the ideological tendencies to determinism in relation to notions of post-human evolution.

Led by Thomas Hamelryck and Nikola Danaylov

🕓 : 20+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Machine learning, artificial intelligence, artificial general intelligence, mimetic rivalry, story-telling and narrative, science fiction, anthropology.

Contemporary life and politics from a Marxist perspective

This course represents four different and unique course processes led by leading Marxist and post-Marxist thinkers, philosophers, writers, and activists. Throughout the process you will be exposed to Chris Cutrone’s Marxist politics, Revol Press’s Gothic Capitalism, Michel Bauwens theory of the commons, and Michael Downs post-Marxist approach to technological singularity.

Lectures by Chris Cutrone, Mike Watson, Bram E. Gieben, Adam C. Turl, Michel Bauwens, and Michael Downs.

🕓 : 45+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Marxist politics, Gothic capitalism, neoliberalism, commons theory, Marxism and aesthetics, technological singularity.

What is society and freedom for Marxism?

Led by Marxist theorist Chris Cutrone, this seminar explores the philosophical and political foundations of Marxism through a critical examination of society, contradiction, capitalism, and the unfinished project of emancipation. Rather than treating Marxism as a fixed doctrine, the course approaches it as an open question about the possibilities and failures of modern freedom.

🕓 : 15+ hours

Key notions 📚 : The nature of social contradiction, The relationship between philosophy and politics, The legacy of Lenin and Critical Theory, The question of whether capitalism remains the defining contradiction of contemporary society, The meaning of Marxism today and the possibilities for social transformation in the future

What is Christianity becoming in the internet age?

This course brings together philosophers, theologians, psychoanalysts, cultural theorists, and contemporary Christian thinkers to explore the future of faith in an age of transition. Drawing from themes such as Church of Contradiction, Pyrotheology, Metagelicalism, Deconstructive theology, and more, the course examines Christianity not merely as a historical religion but as an evolving framework actively confronting meaning, suffering, desire, community, and transcendence in the 21st century.

Features lectures by Jim Palmer, Brendan Graham Dempsey, and more.

🕓 : 25+ hours

Key notions 📚 : The relationship between Christianity and modernity, The crisis of religious institutions, The emergence of post-religious spirituality, The role of Christianity in contemporary culture, The possibility of renewing religious life beyond traditional forms.

Can Plato still speak to us in the postmodern world?

Led by philosopher Dylan Shaul, this course explores the resurgence of metaphysical thinking in contemporary philosophy and asks whether the deepest questions about reality, being, truth, God, and existence can ever truly be abandoned.

Participants journey through ancient, modern, and postmodern philosophy to understand why metaphysical questions continue to reappear in the work of influential contemporary thinkers such as Alain Badiou, Slavoj Žižek, Quentin Meillassoux, and more.

🕓 : 15+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Platonic metaphysics, Theopolitics, Plato and Aristotle, Philosophy of Theology, Philosophy of Politics, Ancient Philosophy, Western Philosophy, Judaism and Christianity

A model for civilisational transition

Led by commons theorist Michel Bauwens, founder of the P2P Foundation and one of the world's leading theorists of the commons, this course explores how societies evolve, why civilizations rise and decline, and how new forms of cooperation emerge during periods of systemic crisis. The course examines the historical role of the commons, the emergence of peer production, and the potential for new economic and political institutions beyond the traditional opposition between market and state.

🕓 : 15+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Macro-history, Systems theory, Complexity science, Peer-to-peer networks, Commons-based governance, Contributive Economy, Cosmo-Localism

The unconscious psyche and power

In a course led by psychoanalytic theorists Helen Rollins and Alfie Bown of Everyday Analysis, discover the unconscious forces behind ideology, political identity, activism, and the psychological dynamics of contemporary capitalism. Moving beyond conventional political analysis, the course investigates the distinction between genuine political engagement and activism, the psychological effects of platform capitalism, and the unconscious dynamics that sustain contemporary left-right political identities.

🕓 : 15+ hours

Key notions 📚 : The foundations of psychoanalytic theory, The nature of clinical structures and their relevance to contemporary political life, How desire, fantasy, identification, and enjoyment operate within political movements, ideological commitments, and collective behavior.

The first half of this course is led by cultural theorist Todd McGowan introducing the core of Lacan and Lacanian psychoanalysis, and the second half of this course is co-led by psychoanalysts Edie Hitchcock and Sinziana Ravini in a series introducing you to three different clinical orientations in contemporary psychoanalysis. By bringing together philosophy, psychoanalysis, and clinical practice, the course provides a unique opportunity to understand not only what Lacan thought, but why psychoanalytic structure remains essential for understanding subjectivity, identity, relationships, and contemporary culture.

Bonus sessions led by Leo Weinstein, Peter Shabad, and Molly Witten.

🕓 : 24+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Including desire, the unconscious, the Symbolic, the Imaginary, and the Real—while also examining how different psychoanalytic traditions understand the formation of the self, psychological conflict, and human development.

Theopolitics as the Rose in the Cross of the Present

This course is a special offering inspired by a long-form mediation at Philosophy Portal of both Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, and the dialectical concept of Christian Atheism. The result of this mediation was the publication of the Rosy Cross anthology, inspired by Hegel’s axiom from the Philosophy of Right about the “rose in the cross of the present”. The course takes participants through key writings in the anthology, with relevance to contemporary conversations about both politics and theology.

Led by Cadell Last + Guest Lecturers from the Rosy Cross anthology, including Cleo Kearns, LaVonne Chantal, Eliot Rosenstock, and more.

🕓 : 20+ hours

Key notions 📚 : Hegel, Philosophy of Right, Christian Atheism, Radical theology, World Spirit and History.

The Portal investigates sexuality, community, metaphysics

In 2024 The Portal launched a year-long investigation of sexuality, community, and metaphysics. This series of courses gives you the option to join this investigation, which represents many different figures and perspectives inspired by the liminal web and underground theory scenes.

Led by The Portal in 2024.

🕓 : 40+ hours

Key notions 📚 : sexuality, libido, jouissance, community, communism, belonging, metaphysics, sacred, self-reference.