Category: meditation

• August 25, 2014

  A review of Chapter One of Sam Harris, Waking Up: Preliminary questions

  I recently read Chapter One of Sam Harris’s forthcoming book, Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion and found myself thinking, ‘This may not end up being an excellent book, but for all that it is an important and prescient one.’ (You can read Chapter One here on his website.) Harris’s principal question, which goes unstated…
• August 21, 2014

  Truthfulness in philosophizing

  I have come to believe that the two virtues required for anyone to philosophize with me are truthfulness and courage. Often, I have spoken of bravery, so this virtue can be put off to the side in this post in order to consider truthfulness on its own. Truthfulness involves putting a desire to know something about…
• August 12, 2014

  The Good Life and Sustaining Life: Vague Words and Well-specified Questions

  Certain philosophical terms have been slowly creeping into business culture and everyday speech, terms such as ‘meaning,’ ‘value,’ ‘direction,’ and ‘purpose,’ without its being possible, with any clarity or analytical rigor, to pin down their meanings. Calling a project ‘meaningful’ implies that one is drawing a line between projects that are not meaningful and those…
• August 8, 2014

  The Good Life and Sustaining Life: Definitions (Excerpt)

  Preliminary Remark The good life and sustaining life are two separate, albeit connected, concepts. How they are connected, when they are connected properly, is the subject of this philosophical investigation. Definitions and Distinctions  1. By ‘the good life,’ I mean that for the sake of which one ultimately lives.  2. Throughout the course of this…
• August 7, 2014

  Philosophical Portraiture: Listening Intently and Considering Closely

  In Aleksandra’s most recently completed portrait, the subject is in the midst of a philosophical conversation. In the figure on the left, we see a man listening intently. He is either ready to hear another speak or, more likely, is in the middle of hearing someone make a claim. He is listening–but in what manner? Intently,…