Midterm Re-upload

 James Robinson

Section 10

Mid-term question

14 October 2020

A cool October breeze rolls by outside the doors of the James E. Walker Library. The temperature is perfect. A few leaves blow by as I stroll in to work on my philosophy midterm. As When I make it to the Buchanan reading room, I see them Julian Baggini, Kurt Anderson and Nigel Warburton. I hesitate to step inside, but am greeted with three smiles. I introduce myself “ Hello gentlemen I'm James, nice to meet you.”

 I start by asking “Do you think philosophy can help people learn to respect truth, facts, reality, and one another, and to reject falsehood, superstition, selfishness, polarization, partisanship, and mutual hostility based on differences of race, religion, ethnicity, nationality, belief, etc? Nigel Warburton responds first, saying “philosophy can only help these people if they engage with it, a bystander to philosophy does not get nearly as much from it as someone who freely and openly engages in it.” For example Hannah Arendt  he said “She was interested in coming face to face with a product of the Nazi totalitarian state, to understand this man, get a sense of what he was like; and how he could have done such terrible things.”(LH 127) “So you’re saying her involvement in philosophy helped her and the people she influenced grow?” “Exactly” he responded. Baggini spoke up next saying “Some idea of oneness or unity is found in many great philosophical traditions. the major schools of Indian philosophy, assert a basic oneness of all being. That our individual selves are part of the universal self, the ‘One’:” (HWT 117) “So yes, philosophy can help with polarization and divisiveness. However it must happen through peaceful conversation and mutual action.”  Kurt Anderson responded last with “philosophy means nothing without rational thought. Philosophy must take everything into account not just one world view or belief.” Like I said in my book. The American experiment, the original embodiment of the great Enlightenment idea of intellectual freedom, every individual free to believe anything she wishes, has metastasized out of control.(FL8) 

“Well said everyone, this brings me to my next question.” “What is this world going to be? What is life eventually to make of itself?" Anderson decides to answer this first by saying “Whatever we all agree it to be. Life will continue to make life.” “like forks in the road, politics lead us to what the world is going to be “This book has traced the route that our country has taken to arrive at this latest version of itself. Now we can see how each fork in the road tended us toward the next, and the next, and then the next. (FL 344)”

Baggini was next to respond saying “As cultures grow closer the decisions they make will shape how the world is. It is up to our decisions to decide what life will make of itself. Each culture can learn something from the other” mentioning his book he says “The deep connection between individuals and groups in East Asia has a consequence that many Westerners find puzzling: the way families and communities share responsibility for wrongdoings and failures of their members. This is not simply a feeling of shame, for which the person bringing the shame is blamed. Rather, a deeper sense of really sharing responsibility.”(HWT 145) 

Warbuton responds last with “ The world will be filled with philosophers all sharing and sharpening their ideas. In their own way everyone is a philosopher. Even with their differences at the end of the day they could respect other opinions.” Berkeley is an example of a philosopher who was prepared to follow an argument wherever it went, even when it seemed to lead to conclusions that defied common sense. Voltaire, in contrast, had little time for this kind of thinker, or, indeed, for most philosophers.”

I reviewed my notes one last time before leaving them. I thank them for their time and ride off into the October sunset. 

I thought I would include a video on what stuck most with me Pascals wager:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2F_LUFIeUk0