About us
Philosophers and Gamblers is a philosophy reading group for people who want to engage seriously with academic philosophy.
Our main weekly event is a Monday reading seminar where we work through philosophical papers slowly and carefully. We often spend multiple weeks on a single paper, reading passage by passage, reconstructing arguments, clarifying concepts, and debating what the author is actually claiming. The point is not to rush through material or collect impressive titles. The point is to understand the argument deeply enough that we can explain it, challenge it, and think with it.
Topics may include ethics, political philosophy, metaphysics, philosophy of mind, epistemology, social philosophy, philosophy of science, and other areas where serious arguments are being made. We keep a shared archive of past readings, so the group has continuity rather than just floating from topic to topic. You can see our past readings here: https://app.notion.com/p/Philosophy-Meetings-2332a602b2fc804f9be6e50c13d7d3a8?source=copy_link
This is not a casual opinion circle or a motivational discussion group. It is a place for people who enjoy reading difficult texts, asking precise questions, and staying with an argument until it finally starts to give up its secrets.
Some events in the group may be hosted by other organizers and may follow different formats, including online discussions. The Monday seminar is the core reading event: slow, focused, text-based, and argument-driven.
Upcoming events
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The Living Tool – Aristotle’s Politics
·OnlineOnlineNov. 8 – We will read Politics I.4. So the complete household [1] has both freemen and slaves, [2] comprises of three distinct relationships (master-slave, husband-wife, and parent-child), and [3] requires four branches of craft-knowledge for household management {oikonomia}, the fourth of which is the art of gaining wealth.
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The first relationship will read next is that of master-slave.
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We are live-reading Aristotle's Politics, the treatise on the practical governance of the city-state for the sake of enabling and promoting its citizens individually to flourish.
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The prerequisite to this treatise is a familiarity with Aristotelian ethics—whether that be Nicomachean ethics, Eudemian Ethics, or Magna Moralia.
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The project's cloud drive is here, at which you'll find the reading texts, notes, and slideshows.7 attendees
Short Meditation then Chat
·OnlineOnlineWe do a short meditation via Buddhist Monk Professor B Alan Wallace or Sam Harris podcast, then casually discuss our experience (optional)
Excellent free resources
https://soundcloud.com/emotionalbalance/sets/alan-wallace-guided-practices
https://dynamic.wakingup.com/shareOpenAccess/SC3D92926?share_id=440D041D
https://beherenownetwork.com/joseph-goldstein-insight-hour-ep-216-satipatthana-sutta-series-pt-13-mindfulness-of-mind/
excellent resources here also - with weekly group lessons
https://member.coreyjackson.com.au/share/ZYZLarLoPH8Fu3Ak?utm_source=manual3 attendees
Aristotle’s Organon — Topics II — Live-Reading
·OnlineOnlineNovember 10 – We are reading chapter 4. The previous chapter 3 was on the many ways P is said of Ss that are beyond the well-known homonymous ways; there are also the contrary ways, the means-vs.-end ways, the coincidental simply vs. inherently ways of attributing, and the ways of complex terms, especially among relative terms.
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Organon means "instrument," as in, instrument for thought and speech. The term was given by ancient commentators to a group of Aristotle's treatises comprising his logical works.Organon
|-- Categories ---- 2023.02.28
|-- On Interpretation ---- 2023.12.12
|-- Topics ---- 2025.10.21
|-- Topics Book II ---- 2026.09.29
|-- Sophistical Refutations
|-- Rhetoric*
|-- Prior Analytics
|-- Posterior Analytics(* Robin Smith, author of SEP's 2022 entry "Aristotle's Logic," argues that Rhetoric should be part of the Organon.)
Whenever we do any human thing, we can either do it well or do it poorly. With instruments, we can do things either better, faster, and more; or worse, slower, and less. That is, with instruments they either augment or diminish our doings.
Do thinking and speaking (and writing and listening) require instruments? Yes. We do need physical instruments like microphones, megaphones, pens, papers, computers. But we also need mental instruments: grammar, vocabulary words, evidence-gathering techniques, big-picture integration methods, persuasion strategies. Thinking while sitting meditatively all day in a lotus position doesn't require much instrumentation of any kind, but thinking and speaking well in the sense of project planning, problem-solving, negotiating, arguing, deliberating--that is, the active doings in the world (whether romantic, social, commercial, or political)--do require well-honed mental instruments. That's the Organon in a nutshell.
Are you an up-and-coming human being, a doer, go-getter, achiever, or at least you're choosing to become one? You need to wield the Organon.
Join us.
5 attendees
Past events
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