Over the years Don has contended for a thorough going cause/effect description of reality. We’ve enjoyed exchanges exploring the possibility or impossibility of free will. This story is for you, Don. “Explain free will,” I said. “Imagine a copper penny that is exactly like an ordinary penny except that for this discussion it has…
Read this in the NY Times this morning. What would possess us to kill/eliminate/obliterate a species forever?……. Are we mad? SAN FELIPE, Mexico — In the shallow sea waters of the Gulf of California swims a porpoise that few have seen, its numbers dwindling so fast that its very existence is now in peril….
Monday, the work week begins. As usual seated at Starbucks, keyboard at my fingers, I realize that those around me, baristas behind the counter, and the regulars purposely striding in to place their beverage orders, are all connected in a vast network of communication and purpose which we call work. It is a living…
Tuesday evening our Philosophy Discussion Group meets at Beans & Leaves Cafe in Long Grove. Our “launch pad” essay for last night was POLITENESS by Quinn Norton. Quinn Norton is a blogger, journalist, photographer. She comments upon the movements that roil our post-modern, globalized, social world. You may have a look at one of…
Tuesday morning, gray sky, warm and a light rain is falling. Feels like May in late February. Wish that I knew what this radical momentary departure from winter means. Perhaps it means nothing, portends nothing that is to come. After all, it’s weather and weather is change on a daily basis, forgettable. Or maybe…
Another restless night battling this sinus infection. Slept fitfully in the TV room. My condition was not the only thing troubling me. I thought of my co workers, especially the news of a yet to be diagnosed heart condition of one of the men. He is much younger than I. I also could not…
Our culture idolizes youth. The images selected for commercial promotion are adults and children, in the bloom of health, active, energized by joie de vivre, apparently eternally young. The message directly voiced, or indirectly implied is the product under offer, is the secret to this well being. I wish that were true. Last night…
So, do you mean to say, “love thy neighbor as thyself” is the best that we can do for an objective moral principle? Yes. Then it seems that I need to get right to work on better loving myself. Yes.
A spirited discussion developed on the topic of morality. Where does one begin to think about such an expansive idea? A promising launch point was suggested. Morality, what is good, and it’s opposite, is rooted in our visceral response to the external world. In short pleasure is an indication of what is good, and…
Another day, a weirdly warm fifty degrees, but the usual gray for February. Was reflecting upon a meeting with friends last night. I flashed back to the 60s where coffee shops were places for songs of resistance to a war, and for building alternative community. Our colonial forebears likewise met in the public houses…
