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Dostoevsky and Aristotle, skepticism and intuition

Dostoevsky Aristotle Living at our best, we go forth upon the field of experience, and in various kinds of interaction we cope in a way that is grounded, poised, and intuitive. Aristotle saw that we need a kind of courage to establish intuition (or is there a kind of intuition at the …

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Socrates: Goodness, the first steps

Growing in Goodness, Philosophy

Socrates Philosophical decision-making clarifies the truth--or meaning--of the facts and specific value most relevant to the situation. Socrates’ reasoning about whether to escape or to remain in prison is presented in Plato’s dialogue, the Crito. After some preliminaries, Socrates expresses …

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Socrates and Rembrandt: wisdom integrates fact, meaning, and value

Philosophy

In the Louvre hangs a Rembrandt painting titled Philosopher in Meditation. The painting presents an old man, richly illuminated by golden light streaming through the window, in a room dominated by a …

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Darwin’s virtues as a scientist applied in scientific living everyday

Philosophy of living general

Charles Darwin (1809-82) and his son William in 1842 As a scientist, Darwin developed and exercised virtues that we can apply in daily life. We do not have to be a gifted, trained, and experienced scientist in order to grow in these essential qualities. In Darwin I find, above all, hunger for …

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A spiritual renaissance to break up the log jam of planetary problems

Philosophy of living general

Prophets, theologians, and secular idealists have proclaimed a glorious destiny for human history; but their visions and hopes seem discredited while we struggle through our logjam of biological, social, economic, and political problems. In order to break up the logjam, we need a …

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Love your neighbor . . . realistically!

Character, Science

Freud provides another example of keen psychological observations mixed with needlessly anti-religious philosophy. He challenges the religious idea, found in the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself." While Freud approved of altruism in certain …

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