Public Philosophy

The Ethics of #DeleteFacebook

Facebook’s foibles keep stacking up. It’s well known that the platform enabled Russian trolls to peddle propaganda and sow division before the 2016 election,...

The Dawn of AI Philosophy

There is more to artificial intelligence and philosophy than the questions we’re asking. The philosophical study of artificial intelligence (AI) remains in its infancy. Among...
University of Washington Quad cherry blossoms 2014

Happiness and Ignorance

In Sense and Sensibilia, J. L. Austin warned philosophers against the “constant obsessive repetition of the same small range of jejune ‘examples.’ ” We place...
"Socrates teaching Pericles" by Nicolas Guibal (1780)

Philosophizing in the Streets

One of the big discussions of our time centers on the nature of what is often called “public philosophy.” What is it? How do...

Philosophy in the Contemporary World: Wittgenstein in the Digital Age of Communication

In 2014, Sue Shellenbarger, writing for The Wall Street Journal, described the frustration and stress we often feel when trying to decipher a cryptic...

An Act of Racist Terrorism

Doing her best to offer Republican spin on the horrific October 27 shooting at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life Synagogue, Counselor to President Donald Trump...

In the Face of Climate Collapse, Resist Hope

The United Nations’ Paris Agreement, which went into effect in 2016, set a goal of containing global temperature increases between 1.5 and 2° Celsius...
Horse

What Makes a Life Meaningful?

In the 2010 book Meaning in Life and Why It Matters, Susan Wolf asks “what kind of lives are meaningful” and proposes that meaningful...

I’ve hosted “Ask a Philosopher” for two years. Here’s what I’ve learned.

For the past couple of years, Brooklyn Public Philosophers—the public philosophy event series I organize—has set up a booth at New York City farmers’...