Category: ethics
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Stepping off the self-preoccupation machine
As a child, the great Bertrand Russell was very unhappy. He remained unhappy until he hit upon a rather old idea: forget about the self. He realized that self-absorption was an obstacle to genuine happiness. As the years went by, Russell tells us, he seemed to be getting more and more happy for he had…
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We’re all hustlers now
The Cynic In New York, you’re always in somebody’s way and somebody’s always in yours. If you manage to avoid one person, you’ve thereby become, as if by pre-established disharmony, the obstacle for the next. And no matter how flawless your plan of life, you’d do well to act as if each step were improvised,…
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The 3 figures of the philosopher
On a field trip to the museum, you see a few philosophical specimens. Not as interesting, of course, as the curiosities bobbing in wait for you just around the corner: the brains curing in vats, the elephant men whose feet are mercilessly swollen, the gnarled dwarfs preserved in jars. Still, worth a quick peek before…
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Philosophical biography
Writing a philosophical biography could involve asking three related questions: 1. How did this philosopher live? 2. What did he believe (in particular, about human flourishing)? And 3. Did he live according to his beliefs? Were we to undertake writing such a book, what might we find? That he lived well or poorly; that he…
Andrew Taggart, Ph.D. 