Soren Kierkegaard In this introduction to Soren Kierkegaard’s (1813-1855) philosophy I want to do three things: (1) make it clear what Kierkegaard’s fundamental problem is; (2) make it clear what his solution to the problem is; and (3) discuss the… Read more ›
Ernest Becker, in his Pulitzer Prize winning book The Denial of Death (New York: Free Press, 1973), argues that “the problem of heroics is the central one of human life, that it goes deeper into human nature than anything else… Read more ›
Many people think love and duty are mutually exclusive. This exclusivity is a popular theme in romantic literature from the middle ages (for example, Tristan and Isolde as well as Heliose and Abelard) all the way up to Game of… Read more ›
Get on the Ground: A Reflection for Russell Ippolito’s Memorial Service at Westchester Community College Dwight Goodyear Over the last five years I had the good fortune of talking with Russ almost every week on Thursday evenings. We both had… Read more ›
The Greek tragic playwright Sophocles presented a truly terrifying image of man: he is the species whose ability to master nature is paralleled only by his failure to master himself (cf. Antigone, 368ff). J. Peter Euben elaborates: “Humans are, at… Read more ›
There is certainly something wonderful about people expressing themselves without any formal training. For example, the punk movement included many young people who just decided to form a band and THEN learned a little bit in order to be heard.… Read more ›
In this post I would like to present an argument against the death penalty based on the philosophical position known as fallibilism. What is fallibilism? Well, the word ‘fallible’ means capable of being mistaken. If we add an “ism” on… Read more ›
Tristan Tzara, in his Dadaist Manifesto of 1918, argued that Dadaists were out to “assassinate beauty”. But why would anyone want to assassinate beauty? In the previous post in this series (go here) I discussed, with reference to Plato’s Symposium,… Read more ›
For centuries it was understood that if something was art then it was beautiful. However, in the 19th and 20th centuries many artists turned their backs on beauty. Here we could think of various works created within the romantic movement… Read more ›
Many people make resolutions on New Year’s Day. It is a day of beginnings and endings and is often accompanied by faith and hope in the new. But can there ever really be a new beginning? Well, the making and… Read more ›
In his book Daybreak (Cambridge, translated by R.J. Hollingdale), Friedrich Nietzsche writes something remarkable about vanity: “Vanity is the fear of appearing original: it is thus a lack of pride, but not necessarily a lack of originality.” (aphorism # 365)… Read more ›
In a previous post (see here) I presented an essay exploring the relationship between freedom and critical thinking. Here I want to briefly suggest that human freedom, that most elusive yet visceral of phenomena, can be understood in a very… Read more ›
The last two posts I looked at the interactive models of education proposed by Socrates (470-399) and John Dewey (1859-1952). Now it is time to briefly compare the two models and draw some conclusions for individual and political growth. Similarities… Read more ›
Anyone who studies the philosophy of education will quickly discover that there are two central models of how knowledge comes to be acquired: on one hand, we have an ignorant and passive pupil who receives information from an active and… Read more ›
Anyone who studies the philosophy of education will quickly discover that there are two central models of how knowledge comes to be acquired: on one hand, we have an ignorant and passive pupil who receives information from an active and… Read more ›