Philosophy & Great Books
Stoicism, ethics, classic books, political philosophy, consciousness and AI, and the art of living.
About this list
This reading list brings together items from the sources selected for Philosophy & Great Books. Open each item at its original source for the complete article, episode or video. This is a selection of current coverage, not a complete archive.
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How to become a great conversationalist
A while back, I was at a party in London where a friend introduced me to an actress who had just been in a big theater production. I was excited to talk with her. Throughout our conversation, she asked brilliant questions, and I enjoyed answering them. She was great at making people feel seen and important. But whenever I asked her something back, with real curiosity about her life, she gave a brief, polite answer and turned the spotlight back on me: “But enough about me, tell me more about you.”
New: “Why Teach Philosophy?”
Why Teach Philosophy is a new series of interviews with philosophers known for their teaching, their research on philosophy pedagogy, or their work on curriculum design.
The ancient environmental archive hidden beneath a northern bog
I need to move on and find my field plots, but pausing here has caused my feet to sink. They are now completely buried by peat; only my shins remain visible. I shift my weight from side to side and point my toes to break the suction, releasing a loud squelching retort and sending tiny bubbles to the surface.
What total darkness reveals about who you really are
Could removing light be a key to discovering who you really are? That’s one idea behind dark retreats*, an experience that’s about as close to a complete sensory deprivation chamber as you can get. Participants spend extended periods in total darkness, stripping away the inputs and distractions of everyday life. Andrew Holecek, an interdisciplinary scholar-practitioner in Tibetan Buddhism and other nondual wisdom traditions, believes in the transformative power of dark retreats. Holecek says in today’s society, we’ve become “light junkies,
Current AI is not conscious
NYU philosopher Ned Block explains why he thinks today’s AI isn’t conscious, what the hard problem still leaves unanswered, and why biology matters.
Blade Runner, Gnosticism, and the more than human
What does it mean to be human — and could a machine become one too? For philosopher Gigla Gonashvili, Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner is not a film about artificial intelligence but something older and stranger: fallen angels, trapped light, and the secret of human nature. Here, Gonashvili argues that humanity is defined not by the film’s famous empathy test, but by a sense of shared mortality, and an elegiac awareness that every captured moment is already slipping away.
How mental disorders play havoc with our motivation
Feeling energised to do something depends on a cost-benefit analysis that psychiatric conditions scramble in different ways - by Matthias Pillny Read on Psyche
AI Use in STEM and Philosophy Dissertations
We’ve asked before: “What is your department’s AI policy?” Perhaps you think a good academic AI policy should, to the extent possible, be sensitive to
How Not to Waste Your Life
“Let me not seem to have lived in vain,” the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe whispered on his deathbed, not realizing that the astronomical tables he was leaving behind would become the portal through which Kepler arrives at the laws of planetary motion; not realizing that the measure of an unwasted life is not what outlives it but how it was lived — how much integrity and authenticity and creative vitality filled these numbered days, these unrepeatable hours.
Einstein’s general relativity equations: explained in plain English
Although Albert Einstein is a legendary figure in science for a large number of reasons — including E = mc², the photoelectric effect, and the notion that the speed of light is a constant for everyone — his most enduring discovery is also the least understood: his theory of gravitation, general relativity.
03 | Unsteady State | What the Right gets wrong about Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche is a difficult figure to pin down politically. He’s popularly known as the favourite philosopher of the architects of the Holocaust, and of today’s neo-Nazis and far-right ideologues who venerate strength, domination and the exercise of traditionally male-coded virtues. But then there’s the other Nietzsche, the Nietzsche who was a fierce critic of German nationalism and antisemitism, and whose work has gone on to become central to feminism and queer theory.
Exploring a world full of minds in Los Angeles
After witnessing the horrors of World War I, the naturalist Henry Beston retreated to a tiny cabin on the dunes of Cape Cod in search of a peace that human civilization had shattered. There, watching the birds and creatures around him, he began to question humanity’s place in the natural world.
An Introvert’s Field Guide to Friendship: Thoreau on the Challenges and Rewards of Candid Connection
"We only need to be as true to others as we are to ourselves that there may be ground enough for friendship."
Before Jules Verne, Edgar Allan Poe imagined the Space Age
It may be tempting to dismiss out of hand the notion that Edgar Allan Poe — popularly conceived of today as an almost mythic figure cloaked in ravens and tell-tale hearts — was the “grandfather of realistic spaceflight fiction” and had a significant effect on the conceptual development of the spacecraft. But it is no tall tale. The young orphan who walked the night-lit streets of Baltimore, the first American city with gas streetlamps, had a mind that strove to encompass not only the macabre but the entirety of the cosmos.
Musonius Rufus, Lectures - Women, Men, and Philosophy - Sadler’s Lectures
This lecture discusses key ideas from the ancient Stoic philosopher Musonius Rufus' Lecture 3, in which he addresses the question whether women just as much as men ought to study and practice philosophy, to which his answer is "Yes, of course". He then provides reasons for this, starting with the fact that women and men as human beings share the same capacities, which they ought to rightly cultivate. He then goes on to consider each of the four cardinal virtues, noting why women as well as men need to develop these virtues.
Reasons to Remain Single #animation #love #theschooloflife
The pressure to be in a relationship, and the suggestion that anyone who isn’t in one is weird and pitiable, has very bad consequences for us all, forcing people into choices they shouldn’t necessarily have to make. Enjoying our Youtube videos? Get full access to all our audio content, videos, and thousands of thought-provoking articles, conversation cards and more with The School of Life Subscription: https://t.ly/klPNs Be more mindful, present and inspired. Get the best of The School of Life delivered straight to your inbox: https://t.ly/B6Yz6 FURTHER READING “Anyone who lives alone and manifests no longing to be in a relationship is – in our times – almost automatically (though more or less secretly) viewed as both pitiable and deeply troubled. It’s simply not thought possible to be at once alone and normal. This sets us up for collective catastrophe, for it means that a huge number of people who have no innate wish to live with anyone else, and are at heart deeply ill-suited to doing so, are every year press-ganged and shamed into conjugal life, with disastrous results for all involved...” MORE SCHOOL OF LIFE Watch more films on RELATIONSHIPS in our playlist: http://bit.ly/TSOLrelationships SOCIAL MEDIA Feel free to follow us at the links below: Download our App: https://goo.gl/g6MK6V Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theschooloflifelondon/ X: https://twitter.com/TheSchoolOfLife Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theschooloflifelondon/ CREDITS Produced in collaboration with: Martin Stacey http://www.martinstacey.co.uk/ Neil Evan http://www.neilevan.com/ #TheSchoolOfLife
You Are Living in the Greatest Museum in the World
What if the everyday objects filling our homes—our toasters, sneakers, and packaging—are actually the artifacts of a future museum? Andy Warhol famously pointed out that if you lock a department store for a hundred years, it becomes a museum. Start your free Membership trial – 2,000+ articles, 1,000+ videos, 50+ courses, free for a week: https://www.theschooloflife.com/membership Yet we often reserve our awe only for historically endorsed relics while ignoring the peculiar brilliance of the present. In this film, we explore a revolution in living: learning to view our daily lives not as mundane routines, but as an extraordinary exhibition waiting to be appreciated right now. "One of the most penetrating things Andy Warhol once said was: ‘If you lock the doors of a department store for a hundred years, when you open them up again, it will be a museum.’ In other words, all those objects of everyday use - our toasters and sneakers, our tights and perfumes - will eventually speak to our successors of an era we don’t even notice ourselves living in..." 📖 Go deeper – read the full article (Members get full access): https://www.theschooloflife.com/article/you-are-living-in-the-greatest-museum-in-the-world/ ✉️ Weekly Lessons + 10% off your first order: https://www.theschooloflife.com/signup OUR COLLECTIONS https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwxNMb28XmpcEwc0qydf2jSszQFSht81E https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwxNMb28XmpckOvZZ_AZjD7WM2p9-6NBv https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwxNMb28XmpeUL1vz9Su7OmeghBDgmj7X https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwxNMb28XmpeypJMHfNbJ4RAFkRtmAN3P https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwxNMb28XmpcpxBm1RoGRx4mVKNRIrKkG https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwxNMb28Xmpcp7jXVszdNruKUtHZ2zuZb https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwxNMb28Xmpfv2COuuJaKzy6E2n8nSMdi https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwxNMb28Xmpc1qCJ6RYYh4rKNOOlKtFIK SOCIAL MEDIA Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theschooloflifelondon Facebook: https:/
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