Tag: Philosophical Conversation

• February 11, 2014

  Rewriting Wittgenstein’s opening ‘Remarks’

  I have returned time and again to Wittgenstein’s opening statements on method from ‘Remarks on Frazer’s Golden Bough‘: One must start out in error and convert it into truth. That is, one must reveal the source of error, otherwise hearing the truth won’t do any good. The truth cannot force its way in when something else…
• January 27, 2014

  Preparing for the unforeseen (A welcome joke)

  Darkness. Philosophy. Not knowing what is coming but coming prepared anyway. How? Laughter. Eagerly anticipating (is that so?) or slightly unsteady. Fearful, maybe a little. Meanwhile, as still as the desert sand, life is. Are we? Not knowing but here and ready. We say. I tell the story about the pupil who wants to learn…
• January 19, 2014

  Preparation for having a philosophical conversation

  The following post is addressed to new conversation partners as well as to philosophical friends. This worksheet (if that is what it is) is the result of a few years of conversing with conversation partners and philosophical friends over Skype. It should be considered a work in progress. That is, it is open to adjustments, reconsiderations, and…
• November 29, 2013

  Inclining the ear of the mind

  A rare and lovely morning free. A time for reflection… Addressing the young cenobite, St. Benedict speaks of ‘inclining the ear of the heart.’ Reading this, recalling it, meditating upon it this morning, I am put in mind of philosophical conversation: of the activity which teaches one how to incline the ear of the mind. In…