Category: ethics

• October 22, 2013

  Sweetness and gravity

  ’15. From MAXIMUS, self-mastery and stability of purpose; and cheeriness in sickness as well as in all other circumstances; and a character justly proportioned of sweetness and gravity; and to perform without grumbling the task that lies to one’s hand.’ –Marcus, Meditations, Book I
• October 21, 2013

  The phenomenology of caffeine

  I have been incrementally decreasing the amount of black tea and coffee I drink in order to observe the effects of caffeine on the quality of my attention. I no longer drink English breakfast tea at noon or in the afternoon, and I have less than two cups of coffee in the morning. Soon, I…
• October 16, 2013

  Perceptive Sensemaking: Coalescing into the Many Things

  My love Aleksandra Lauro has been thinking carefully about her consultancy, Perceptive Sensemaking. By ‘perceptive sensemaking,’ she means the ability to draw and reorient the viewer’s attention to an excellent way of life: to an exemplar of the contemplative life; to the qualia–that is, the inner feel, the grainy look, the general mood–of a beautiful place; to…
• October 15, 2013

  Philosophical horror: Making the world anew

  Perceiving political disorder, religious strife, social unrest, or economic collapse, philosophers have not infrequently regarded themselves as saviors who could, from out of the resources of the mind itself, create the world anew. This, argues Stephen Toulmin in Cosmopolis, is what occurred to Descartes who, upon witnessing the Thirty Years’ War, believed that he could…
• October 11, 2013

  Sageliness within or kingliness without

  I am reading Yu-Lan Fang’s A Short History of Chinese Philosophy alongside Plato’s Republic. According to Fang, the leitmotif of Chinese philosophy is that of ‘sageliness within’ and ‘kingliness without.’ Plato speaks similarly of the Philosopher-King as being the one who, just because he has wisdom, is also fit to rule. Years ago, I believed that the philosopher…