Episodi & Post
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24 SET 2026 · You bought the printer. You bought ink that fits it. Then the manufacturer updated the machine you already paid for and disabled it because you didn't buy the company’s approved cartridges.
Rick Robinson brings that question to Inquiry respondent Steven Hall: What does ownership actually mean when manufacturers can remotely change, restrict, or disable products after the sale?
The conversation examines contracts of adhesion, unread terms-of-service agreements, digital licensing, right-to-repair laws, planned obsolescence, subscription features, vehicle software, property taxes, and the difference between owning an object and receiving conditional permission to use it.
Rick and Steven also consider how courts, corporate lobbying, and changing consumer expectations have allowed companies to retain control over products long after customers have paid for them.
If ownership can be rewritten after the sale, did you ever truly own the product—or did you merely purchase temporary access?
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11 SET 2026 · A map may look objective, but every map reflects choices about what to enlarge, what to shrink, what to center, and how the world should be understood.
Aggie the Barkeep questions Steven L. Hall about the Mercator projection, its usefulness for navigation, and the enormous distortions it creates when representing Africa, Greenland, Europe, and other parts of the globe. They examine proposed equal-area alternatives and ask why the renewed push to change familiar world maps is happening now.
The conversation moves beyond cartography into colonialism, historical revisionism, national borders, natural resources, migration, population growth, and the political narratives attached to geography. Can a more accurate map correct an old distortion without becoming a vehicle for a new agenda?
It’s an Inquiry into how maps shape perception—and who gets to decide what the world looks like.
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27 AGO 2026 · John Locke famously described humanity's natural rights as life, liberty, and property. When Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence, however, property became the pursuit of happiness. Was that merely more poetic language—or did it change what America was promising its citizens?
Rick Robinson brings the question to Inquiry, where respondent Steven Hall examines the relationship between property ownership, economic independence, and political liberty. They discuss why a person who cannot control property or maintain independent means can quickly become dependent upon those who hold economic power.
The conversation expands into competing definitions of happiness, capitalism versus socialism, the government’s power to tax, property assessments, unrealized gains, and whether Americans ever truly own property if the state can continually charge them for keeping it.
It’s a discussion about the philosophical foundation of the American experiment—and whether replacing something tangible with something subjective created consequences the Founders could not have anticipated.
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27 APR 2026
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