About us
You may sometimes wonder about fundamental things. Philosophers incline to it non-stop. At their best, they make trouble in the world of ideas. They open worm cans. Bring your can openers!
We have explored — or will (or will again) — age-old topics like God's existence, the nature of people and things, truth, justice, knowledge, free will, determinism, fatalism, birth, death, the right way to live or die... as well as theories in the major divisions of philosophical thought such as logic, metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, and aesthetics. Exploring these core areas can help with understanding what is at stake in the more concrete topics we also address, which include controversies around abortion, infanticide, capital punishment, suicide (physician-assisted and otherwise), economic and social equality, criminality, genetic engineering, neuroscience, artificial intelligence, technology, over-population, depopulation, war, terrorism, racism, sexism, feminism, transhumanism, antinatalism, procreation ethics, speciesism, sexuality, human "rights," animal rights, the "rights" of (or to) anything whatsoever!,... as well as important issues in medical ethics, political philosophy, environmental ethics, bioethics, philosophy of law, of art, of literature, of religion, of science and its methods; and the nature, history, and methods of philosophy itself... not to exclude philosophical topics as yet uninvented.
In fact, "inventing topics" is a side effect of asking hard questions, which inevitably lead to still harder questions. Often enough, "new" topics are not really "new" but old, even ancient, unsettled concerns resurfacing. And it is those unsettled issues that are the real philosophical problems. As one philosopher once said, "If it has a solution, it was probably just science anyway." Any important subject whose fundamental ideas invite critical examination is ripe for our can opener... eventually we may work our way up to the really big can: the point of it all! (But don't expect pat answers — we don't do self-help.)
This club is open to serious approaches to philosophy — analytic, "Continental," and otherwise. Philosophy in the anglophone world (for better or worse) is still dominated by some form of conceptual analysis. What characterizes the analytic approach to philosophy is attention to clarity and as much rigor as we can muster in our concepts and arguments — while, hopefully, keeping one foot in reality. (It's not "clear" that "reality" has anything to do with "clarity" or "rigor.") We ply "belief systems" with questions framed against such values. But you may know better! Philosophical traditions, no less than individual philosophical views, are error prone. Any "philosophy" worthy of the name should be comfortable with this.
We will try to stay focused on the topics under discussion, realizing that this is difficult. If one thing doesn't connect with another, it can't be that important. We draw on the insights of some of the brightest thinkers we know, both living and dead. Celebrated authority is no guarantee of being right. In fact, we already know at least half of the great philosophical thinkers must be wrong because the other half disagrees with them. But which half? (Even to assume only half are wrong is being more than a little optimistic. Why would any of them be right?)
Though we range widely in the topics we cover, we try not to let anything go in our discussion. The point is to rise above the level of BS that too often passes in informal discussions for philosophy. Beyond a certain respect for clarity and rigor, we do not have an axe to grind. You may bring your own axe, we may sharpen it for you... or we may grind it to a stump. We mostly open worm cans, remember? You decide what to do with the worms!
Skepticism and disagreement are to be expected, even encouraged. We should try to make the best case we can for our side and attend to what others say. We should expect that expressions of conviction may be forceful and that’s fine, as long as they are respectful of others and rational, which, in the context of a philosophy club, means to attempt to offer reasons to believe — reasons that are thought out and not themselves more controversial than the claims they are meant to support. These are aspirations, of course, not actual descriptions of what happens in even earnest philosophical discussions. We should nevertheless try...
A word about etiquette, again: philosophy, by its nature, is contentious. Expect disagreement and treat each other respectfully. Failure to do so may be cause for removal.
See the collection of archived writeups for perspective on the topics we have and may cover. Check out recorded sessions.
The group is international and mostly online. Formal membership is not required to attend and participate. Contact us for the video link if you just want to try it without membership. Our meetings and resources are free and open to the public. Auditing is perfectly fine.
Recording policy
Online meetings hosted by me may be recorded but will not be publicly shared except by request to club members who could not attend or wish to review an event. However, if an attendee has any concerns about this, please let me know, and either the recording will not be shared at all or your participation edited out. You are free, of course, to attend anonymously or without your mic and/or camera on. Other hosts may set their own policies.
Finally, if you know something about a topic and would like us to address it or you would like to present and host it yourself, let us know. You don't have to be an expert. We will work with you. So long as we can make out a philosophical angle — it addresses fundamental questions about an important subject, we would love to explore it.
Contact us with any questions.
— Victor Muñoz, organizer
Upcoming events
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Psychological egoism and altruism
·OnlineOnlineEgotist, n. A person of low taste, more interested in himself than in me.
– Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s DictionaryUnderstanding our circle of concern may help us understand what a “self” is.
We won’t be saying much about egotism with a “t.” Psychological egoism is a technical phrase in philosophy. Egoism is not necessarily the same nasty character trait we point out when we accuse someone of being “egotistical.” Psychological egoism is a theory in moral psychology which claims that, unless pathologically irrational, people always act in their self-interest. It is, in fact, assumed by major theories in ethics such as utilitarianism and Kantianism.1
A story, likely apocryphal, goes that Abraham Lincoln, riding in a coach between towns to give campaign speeches, was having an argument with a companion about whether people always act in self-interest. Lincoln took the side that they do. In the middle of the discussion, as they were crossing a stream, they saw pig struggling in the mud on the bank, apparently unable to get free. Lincoln ordered the coach to stop. He waded into the mud to help the pig, soiling his formal attire. Back in the coach, his companion called out this seeming hypocritical behavior on Lincoln’s part. Didn’t he blatantly put the interest of the pig before his own?
“No,” said Lincoln, “I wouldn’t be able to live with the thought of not helping the pig. I took minor pains to avoid the greater distress I know it would cause me not to help the pig. In what way is that not looking out for my well-being?”
Psychological egoism asserts that, assuming we know what we are doing and are not mentally indisposed, whenever we act, we act so as to minimize our own distress or optimize our welfare. Even when it might appear that others are the target of concern, the controlling concern is ours. Certainly, we may make sacrifices for others, but it is because their distress would cause our distress that we act. It always comes back to us.
But this theory is questioned by some since it seems to deny the possibility that a rational human act can be solely concerned with another. It seems to deny the possibility of altruism, the idea that pure other-regard is possible. Indeed, psychological egoism seems, as defined, to be vacuously true: true, but not very enlightening, a bit like saying the Pope is Catholic. We want, sometimes, to say that some acts can be somewhat or utterly selfless – acts where the motivation in little or no way includes self-interest. (Maybe these are rare, but they don’t seem impossible.)
To get a clearer picture of moral psychology, we will also look at counter-theories to psychological egoism – theories that suggest that there is more to human motivation than self-interest. Self-interest alone doesn’t explain much of our evolutionary success (such as it is), nor explain our reaction to disasters that do not implicate us directly except through a capacity to transcend ourselves and, not only ourselves, but the interests of larger communities, even everyone – even everything alive.2
But first, what would it take not to be an egoist?
Suppose an agent acts in such a way that greatly benefits another but the agent in this case actually gains nothing, may even know they will feel guilt for having helped the other in this apparently benevolent way. Suppose you come to learn that someone you absolutely detest and whom you wish nothing good has a rare blood type and will die without a transfusion, and you also have this rare blood-type, and, at little cost to you, could donate your blood and save their life. Suppose, this person is a recognized blight on humanity and whose continued existence would be an evil, an evil you would be complicit in bringing about. Your community fully supports this judgment… Still, in spite of this, you donate blood to them. Are you insane?You stand to gain nothing from your act, have every reason to know you will regret it, but do it anyway. Would this be an act of altruism? An utterly selfless act?
Something like this is what it would take to falsify psychological egoism...
‽
We should make clear a further distinction around egoism. Psychological egoism, as we are using the phrase here, is the conceptual claim that rational human acts are self-interested. It is not the same as ethical egoism, which is not a descriptive, rather a moral, theory in its own right which enjoins that we should act in our self-interest. The first, if true, is a fact about the human world; the second is a normative claim about how we ought to act. Ayn Rand is a famous exponent of ethical egoism. She argued that even if our acts are not egoistic, they ought to be. Psychological egoism, in contrast, claims – to the extent we are not insane or ill, to the extent we are capable of having coherent motivations at all – we will be self-interested.
Beyond egoism – is it possible to be rational and not be self-centered?
If we can be rational and not self-centered at once, what does that entail about our moral relation to ourselves? Can we choose to count ourselves as less worthy of consideration than others? The interesting question is not is this required. Almost no moral theory suggests that, but, rather, is it permissible and still be rationally justified? Or would it risk being judged mentally disturbed? Or maybe the question should shift to what it means to be rational? Is there any tight relation between self-preservation and rationality?3 Or is rationality neutral on the matter?In our recent discussion of the Lars von Trier film, Melancholia, it dawned on the protagonists that, within a few days, the world was going to end in a flash – completely, utterly, with no survivors – and there was nothing to be done about it. One of the characters, Justine, was psychologically prepared for the event by her debilitating depression. Depressed people often have a more lucid view of reality than the optimistically-biased “healthy” person. Though our species did not survive this long by throwing up our hands at every setback, there must have been some advantage in retaining the (perhaps) recessive trait of pessimism, as well. Or, if only optimism had survival value, its absence would long ago have been weeded out of the gene pool. It is seldom remarked, but too much optimism is very close to stupidity (a theory of which will be its own upcoming topic); it, too, can be toxic, like jumping off a cliff expecting to evolve wings on the way down.4
Justine, in the second part of Melancholia, seemed almost to check out from the panic swirling around her. Her life more or less ended in the final scenes of the first part. She seemed merely to be waiting for the world external to her psyche to confirm that her mental condition was tracking reality accurately. She seemed to be almost sleeping through the panic. She did wake from it when her desperate sister, Claire, tried to conjure up a bit of ceremony to give some kind of meaning to their fate – having a glass of wine on the terrace. Justine commented on her sister’s idea, saying it was “a piece of shit,” and that the world was evil, its disappearance a good riddance, and that nobody would miss it. She was, for all intents and purposes, resigned to the idea of her own extinction, except for one thing: her own illusions may have fled, but she was still capable of being moved by compassion for those who still needed their stories. So she contrived a little myth to console her still, too young, uncomprehending nephew, yet sufficiently transparent to dignify adult awareness better than a glass of wine: a magical cave made of eight sticks that would shield them from full consciousness until the moment when no shield would be needed, the post-extinction, post-consciousness moment. The adults, the sisters, had had a lifetime to prepare, only the boy needed the magic. The adults could only claim a need to hold each others’ hand.
The important part here is Justine’s final act of utter self-disinterestedness. She made it clear she would not share in her sister’s illusions, only, of course, in her fate. She, by this point, had already lost all claim to anything, her only excuse for further involvement was that she saw that she could do something for someone else. Psychologically, she predeceased her sister and nephew.
Samuel Scheffler’s thought experiment
We introduced, in the Melancholia writeup, Scheffler’s idea that we are constitutionally not as self-involved as psychological egoism seems to suggest. We are more complicated than that. If you somehow knew the world would end thirty days after your own life had taken its natural course, the quality and duration of your life in no material way affected, you would still be devastated to have this knowledge... It would undercut a pervasive continuity of identification with the history of your community, from friends and family all the way to that of your species, and maybe much of life, and all its artifacts, beyond that. The claim is that this is characteristic of conscious beings like us. Someone utterly immune to this identification and reaction would be an exception. We cannot, in the typical case, seal ourselves off from an affinity-based identification with the rest of social environment even if we wanted to....Scheffler concludes with the striking claim that we actually are more concerned that humanity survive than we are with any prospect of our personal survival.
The reason this may seem striking is that we ordinarily take our death as inevitable but humanity’s survival for granted. If only we knew humanity’s survival was as certain to be cut short at a not too distant point in the future as we are convinced ours will be, we would be far more distressed by the non-survival of the former. This creates the illusion that we always care more about ourselves than about others. Outside some fictional or philosophical scenario, it rarely occurs to us that humanity’s days are as numbered as ours are. The upshot for Scheffler is that we are not as egoistic or as individually-minded as psychological egoism suggests. Concern for the survival of others is at least as built-in to our literal raison d’être as any for personal survival, and probably more. The value-laden content of our lives, not just its duration, is premised on this assumption. The reason we may not be so conscious of this, again, is because species survival is not so obviously circumscribed as we know ours, as individuals, to be.
More discussion in the full writeup...
Notes
1. These theories assume psychological egoism in order to pit themselves against it. At face value, two other important theories, Virtue Ethics and Moral Sense theory, seem less prone to the assumption; whether this is ultimately the case is controversial.
2. Even sometimes aspects, or the whole, of inanimate nature as in certain non-anthropocentric theories of environmental ethics, theories that suggest nature has value irrespective of whether we here to regard and value it.
3. The question can be asked both at the individual and at the community or species level.
4. Check out the Darwin Awards for examples.13 attendees
The Philosophy of Trust in the Age of AI
·OnlineOnlineWhat is the difference between a used car salesman and ChatGPT?
Trust has always been problematic, but trust has taken on renewed importance as we advance (or plummet) headlong into the age of artificial intelligence.
What is trust, and why would we extend it to algorithms and silicon?
Join us for this important discussion.
For now, here's a start for analysis:
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy trust articleAdditional resources forthcoming...
This is a joint event with the Northwest AGI Forum
7 attendees
Philm | Le vieux fusil / The Old Gun (1975 – Robert Enrico)
·OnlineOnlineOn the psychic cost of killing even when arguably justified – especially then.1
All ethical theories from Divine Command Theory to Utilitarianism condemn killing. They give different reasons but they all agree it is a bad – except when they are busy justifying it in “special cases.” All species kill, especially, ours: the species that is compelled to come up with theories to condone or condemn it. Not content to be determinists, we attribute responsibility when we do it. Exceptions are carved out from imperatives against killing because abstract justice sometimes wants to insist that it can be understandable in some circumstances, even beyond that, legitimate. The idea that it is, in principle, wrong and there can be no exceptions offends our animal instincts. The worry that it is always wrong, no matter our instincts, is hard to let stand unresolved.
In Robert Enrico’s classic WW II revenge thriller, principled pacifism is put to the test. It follows the transformation of a surgeon in the midst of the carnage of war, disgusted by the human-inflicted horror he tries to mitigate everyday around him in his hospital. He is transformed from saver of lives to literal serial killer.2
But this is not a Rambo-style spectacle of violence… The film explores the clash between principled, comprehensible pacifism and a visceral sense of justice. It illustrates why “an eye for an eye” reasoning will not go away. It should, maybe, but won’t.
Can it ever be moral to kill? This can be related to the legal question but it is different. The moral question is not looking for answers in cultural or institutional practices. It is asking for an ultimate justification rooted in the fact that we commonly regard ourselves as rational creatures, and not merely animals. Various moral theories attempt to offer such justifications. The theories have at times served to both justify and condemn killing. The impulse to kill challenges the distinction between animal and human. The strain comes from trying to mediate between these.
In light of current events (when is killing not a “current event”?), we will explore what makes people think (or feel) killing can be justified.
...
Watch Le vieux fusil here with Philippe Noiret and Romy Schneider, in French with English subtitles. There is one particularly horrific scene, but it is central to the film. Be aware.
Resources
- “Americans Love The Death Penalty,” attorney Leeja Miller sums up the absurdity: the case of Christa Pike.
- “Capital Punishment: to 'blot out from the catalog of the living',” (2016) Victor Muñoz, writeup for one of our first meetups ten years ago.
- From a review of Le vieux fusil:
"A film you absolutely must see at least once in your life.
"Philippe Noiret embodies the staunch pacifist, the humanist bourgeois who has accumulated years of happiness alongside his wife and daughter, brutally murdered by desperate Germans on the eve of liberation. Devastated and numb by this gratuitous act of barbarity, he decides to take revenge with an old rifle kept in a corner of the chapel and kills the Germans one by one, Rambo-style, in a variety of deaths that would make him green with envy.
"The extremely understated yet violent direction succeeds in bringing out a raw power that allows us to share the emotions driving the poor man better than many more recent and far more expansive films. The flashbacks to happiness, which sometimes slow the film’s pace, are by no means saccharine or corny. The simplicity of the flashbacks, devoid of special effects or fanfare, perfectly complements the relentless, blind, and calculated revenge plot carried out by the protagonist, whose heart is already dead. Everything is filmed with a simplicity and starkness that nonetheless reveals a high level of quality in the direction, the choice of images, the dialogue, and, of course, the legendary actors."
The full review in French is here.
Notes
1. I say “especially” because “justification” in the face of “psychic costs” may not be relevant for a psychopath.
2. The film is loosely based on the massacre at Oradour-sur-Glane in Nazi-occupied France on 10 June 1944.8 attendees
Philm series
·OnlineOnlineThis is not a post for a specific future event but a follow up to suggestions about scheduling film discussions. Here is a list of proposals from me and others. Feel free to add your own suggestions in the comments. The idea is to settle on a film, each of us watch it independently, then come together online to discuss it. The film should be engaging and provocative. Of course, each of us may have different ideas of what that means. And pretty much all great films can be that...
I think another requirement is that it be freely accessible online. The ones listed below, I think, are. (If they are not where you are, let us know. We may find another way to make them accessible.)
You are invited to vote for or give a rating (say, 1 to 10) on any of these films in the comments to help us choose. This could be a regular ongoing series, depending on interest, so it might not be either/or, we may do all of them eventually. (This is not the first time we have had a film discussion. A number of years ago, just before the pandemic, when the club was still meeting in person is Seattle, we did Dogville, Lars von Trier's cinematic provocation.)
The Last Man on Earth (1964) with Vincent Price [interesting in light of the recent pandemic]
Russian Ark [a cinematic tour de force]
Lars von Trier's Dancer in the Dark [Bjork's performance is legendary in this musical tragedy]
Carlos Reygadas' Silent Light [I think this is one of the most powerful and sublime films I have ever seen but I am still looking for a free version with English subtitles]
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? [Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton show how to do dysfunctional relationships right]
19 attendees
Past events
154
