Month: February 2014
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How a hedonist says goodbye to hedonism
This reflection, springing from this morning’s philosophical conversation, is an attempt to iron out the transition out of hedonism. Because the transition was not as clear as I would have liked, I seek to clarify it in the following. * We want to begin not with a theory of hedonism but with a phenomenology of…
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Philosophizing’s folding back on itself
This meditation is inspired by a philosophical conversation that took place earlier this morning. * As living discourse between philosophical guide and philosophical friend, philosophizing ‘folds back’ on itself. If, unlike sages and gurus, philosophers never come with answers in hand, then they must inquire in order to understand. Then, how would the inquiry have to…
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Philosophical portraiture: The common ear
The screen shot included below is an example of philosophical portraiture by Aleksandra Marcella Lauro. Philosophical portraiture is concerned with the project of self-cultivation–specifically, with how one comes into contact with what is higher. Here, the figure on the viewer’s left is wholesome, earnest, yet naive in the ways of the world. The figure on…
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Why do those who care about others so rarely care for themselves?
Here is the puzzle: I have philosophical conversations with those who work in the caring professions, with social entrepreneurs, with lawyers concerned with social justice, and with those who devote their lives to noble causes. These people care quite a lot for others, and many of them are universalists who believe that everyone should be…
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Emily Dickinson on being in pain
In ‘Pain Has an Element of Blank,’ the poet Emily Dickinson (1830-86) seeks to bring into sharper focus the unique quality of being in extraordinary pain. That quality is expressed in a particular experience of time. She writes, PAIN has an element of blank; It cannot recollect When it began, or if there were A…
Andrew Taggart, Ph.D. 
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