The Philosophy That Built the Liberal Mind: Descartes to Marx w/ Dr. Jordan Cooper

Why do we need a nuclear family? What actually determines the difference between a boy and a girl? These feel like brand-new questions, but the ideas that make them askable were actually seeded four hundred years ago. Dr. Jordan Cooper joins us to trace them back to their source. ABOUT THE EPISODE: Lutheran theologian and pastor Dr. Cooper walks Josh through the philosophical roots of the modern progressive mind and the broader philosophy of the left: Descartes and Cartesian doubt, Kant's Copernican Revolution, Hume's empiricism and skepticism, Hobbes's social contract theory, and Thomas Paine's radical individualism, the intellectual scaffolding beneath everything from critical theory to postmodernism. It's the same scaffolding underneath the questions above. Once Hume argues that even something as basic as cause and effect is just an assumption rather than a certainty, and Kant argues that categories like space and time are imposed by the mind rather than discovered in the world, the door opens to treating categories like family and gender the same way: not given, but constructed, and open to being remade. Dr. Cooper's book Makers of the Modern Mind grew out of years doing campus ministry at Cornell, watching students absorb progressive assumptions and secular philosophy they'd never actually examined. Drawing on his background in Lutheran theology and Christian apologetics, this conversation is a guided tour through where those assumptions came from, and why the question underneath almost all of them, in philosophy, politics, and the modern culture wars alike, is simply: what is a human being? 0:00 – Introduction 1:14 – Dr. Jordan Cooper 2:45 – Lutheran Branding Problem 4:21 – Makers of the Modern Mind 10:23 – Union With Christ Doctrine 16:30 – Descartes' Cogito Ergo Sum 26:38 – Kant's Copernican Revolution 31:33 – David Hume's Skepticism 42:35 – Thomas Paine & Liberalism 51:21 – Right Vs Left Liberalism 56:52 – Applying Philosophy Today ABOUT THE GUEST: 📖https://www.amazon.com/Makers-Modern-Mind-Thinkers-Formed/dp/1952295823 Subscribe to The Remnant Radio newsletter and receive our FREE introduction to spiritual gifts eBook. Plus, get access to: discounts, news about upcoming shows, courses and conferences - and more. Subscribe now at TheRemnantRadio.com. Support the show ABOUT THE REMNANT RADIO: The Remnant Radio exists to equip believers who are hungry for the radical middle of both Word and Spirit. Subscribe for twice-weekly content on theology, church history and the gifts of the Spirit. 📧 SUBSCRIBE TO NEWSLETTER 📚 COURSES & CONFERENCES 🛒 SHOP MERCH 💝 SUPPORT OUR MINISTRY: • Leave a Tip • Become a Patron • Make a Tax-Deductible Donation 🌐📧 Check Out Our Church Pages Josh's Church Miller's Church Rowntree's Church