Salon
We come together, in fellowship and goodwill, and search for wisdom that will help us.
Once every 2 weeks, at 1 p.m. CET on a Wednesday afternoon, I offer a philosophical salon for premium members.
The basic idea of the salon is to start doing philosophy from where we are. We will begin with something in our lives, in our daily experience, that, for whatever reason, matters to us.
We then do something very simple and very basic, something that I suspect is as old as human beings themselves: we come together, in fellowship and goodwill, and together we search for wisdom that will help us.
Now some details for people currently attending the salon (I'll add to this from the top, so the stuff on the top of the page will always be the most current):
Prep for the next salon: December 6, '23
I've got an idea for our next meeting and I think it's a good 'un.
In the last salon, we spoke a little about both a) nihilism and b) experiences of value, and of whether one refutes the other. I think this is really rich stuff that all of us care about (tell me if I'm wrong, obviously) and I think we could productively focus on that for a while.
So, as the starting point for the coming week's meeting, would you indulge me by doing the following bit of prep?
- In preparation for our meeting, could you please recollect one experience of value that you've had?
- It could be an experience of God, it could be playing with your kid, it could be the snow on the trees, etc. etc. etc - anything at all, any value at all.
- Recollect the experience and the value it was an experience of (love, beauty, courage, truth, etc).
- And then, think about this very open question, which we'll use to structure the discussion: What, if anything, did that experience tell you about reality?
- Did it tell you something about the world? Did it tell you something about yourself? Both? Neither?
- Did it affect your beliefs? Your actions? Your emotions? How?
- Did it affect the meaning of some part of your life? That is, did it affect the stories you tell about yourself, your relations with others, your place in the world, etc etc etc?