Profs & Pints Napa: Embracing Our Insignificance

Profs and Pints Napa presents: “Embracing Our Insignificance,” a thoughtful look at the value of knowing that you truly don’t amount to much in the great scheme of things, with Joshua Glasgow, professor of philosophy at Sonoma State University.

[Tickets available only online, at https://www.ticketleap.events/tickets/profsandpints/napa-embracing-insignificance .]

Have you ever questioned whether being more important would make for a more wonderful life? If so, you’re hardly alone. The legendary baseball player Ted Williams famously said, “All I want out of life is that when I walk down the street folks will say, ‘There goes the greatest hitter that ever lived.’”

Maybe, however, the opposite holds true. Maybe the best thing we can do for ourselves is look up at the stars and contemplate our insignificance when it comes to the bigger picture.

Spend a thoughtful night reconsidering the human drive for significance and alternatives to it with the help of philosopher Joshua Glasgow, author of The Significance Impulse: On the Unimportance of Our Cosmic Unimportance and The Solace: Finding Value in Death through Gratitude for Life.

Professor Glasgow, who has taught courses titled “The Good and Meaningful Life” and “What It Means to Be a Person,” will walk you through a deep discussion of life’s meaning that separates questions of fame from questions of real importance.

He’ll argue that none of us is tremendously important to the cosmos, even if we are the only valuable things in it. In the end, we only have little value, cosmically speaking.

He acknowledges that some find this thought disturbing. The mathematician, physicist, and philosopher Blaise Pascal wrote: “When I consider the short duration of my life, swallowed up in an eternity before and after, the little space I fill engulfed in the infinite immensity of spaces whereof I know nothing, and which know nothing of me, I am terrified.”

Professor Glasgow will show, however, how that such fear is misplaced. Instead, he’ll argue, we should feel optimistic about our relatively insignificant lives. Being much more significant would not have made life any better for us. On the contrary, it would have made our lives less free.

This will be a celebration of the ordinary life, and it might just leave you feeling much better about yours. You’ll be able to remind yourself of the lessons you learn here by looking up at the night sky. (Advance tickets: $13.50 plus processing fees. Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID. Doors open at 5:30 and the talk begins at 6:30.)

Image: From a photo by Benh Lieu Song / Wikimedia Commons.