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Literature and Life
When it comes to seeing things as they really are, it’s not only a matter of seeing, because you can see without recognising, if you don’t know what you’re looking at. If you want to correct this then it’s not enough to simply look: you must learn what to look for. This is why Iris Murdoch thinks it’s so important for human beings to study literature.
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Solitary and Poor
When society is so much junk, it leaves you longing for a life that is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. (Or at least the first two…)
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The Livestock Landscape
It is difficult to correct a misperception when it has become established: people tend to see what they believe, and so if they believe wrongly, they will see wrongly. I want to show you some images that I think speak for themselves. They show two different landscapes. One of these landscapes reflects the reality of growing vegetables in contemporary Europe. The other reflects the reality of livestock farming in contemporary Europe. […]
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Diogenes the Cynic
Diogenes sees a mouse, happily running about, not looking for money or prestige, and finds a lesson in the mouse’s behaviour: Nature has given us a relatively easy life, but we’ve overlaid it with nonsense. We make life difficult for ourselves by wanting more than our nature needs. Diogenes implores us to realise this, offering us a walking talking living breathing lesson with his own example. […]
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Nature, Society, and Government
Society is necessary for human beings to overcome the difficulties of nature. Society ameliorates some of these difficulties but adds an entirely new set of difficulties. Government is necessary to overcome the difficulties of society. Government ameliorates some these difficulties but adds an entirely new set of difficulties. We are always adding to our difficulties with difficulties of our own making. This explains why it’s true to say that people run to society to escape the evils of nature, but run to nature to escape the evils of society. ‘We are everywhere in chains!’, says the pessimist.
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Craft Your Nature
As natural as it should be to live in accordance with nature, we don’t take to it naturally. It takes practice and training and an amount of philosophical education to understand what nature requires and to align your will with those requirements. Our untrained nature often leads us astray. We’re naturally inclined to follow our […]
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Align Your Will with Nature
Diogenes the Cynic sees a mouse, happily running about, not looking for money or prestige, and finds a lesson in the mouse’s behaviour: Diogenes says the gods have given us an easy life but we’ve made it difficult for ourselves by overlaying it with nonsense. Even in Diogenes’ time, to talk of ‘the gods providing’ […]
An experiment with philosophy as a way of life
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