About us
We're a community that practices and discusses philosophy, being free and open to all levels and backgrounds. We offer seminars, a variety of discussion formats, and the occasional lecture / guest speaker.
Many meetings will have fewer RSVPs than people who actually attend. This is because overtime people stop making use of Meetup.com and instead communicate with their groups via Discord, Slack, Zoom, E-mail, or similar You can think of the list of events hosted on this Meetup as advertisements for groups seeking new participants.
Our philosophy offerings are organized and facilitated by volunteers. If you have a philosophy offering - or an offering that compliments the study of philosophy, such as in literature, the sciences, and so on - that you'd like to advertise through this Meetup, please contact the organizer. We're grateful to those who want to enrich Seattle with study and discussion!
Participants must speak, write, and act in a considerate, professional, and respectful manner, and be prepared for the meetings that they attend, having reviewed the materials to the degree necessary to participate. If you haven't reviewed the materials but still wish to attend an event, please consult the event facilitator regarding the best manner for you to be present.
We look forward to studying philosophy together!
Upcoming events
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Ethical Goodness & Theōria — Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics
·OnlineOnlineSeptember 6 - We are reading the 3rd third of NE X.8 (1178a9–1179a32) and X.9. Aristotle focuses his attention on us humans and on how we are to live our best sort of a flourishing life, given our compound nature.
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August 16 - Having informed us finally in X.7 (1177a12–1178a8) what he means by the life of theōria and why it is the most flourishing sort of life that is possible for any being with the god-like power of nous, Aristotle will argue further that we human beings are compound in nature. We will distinguish between the life of theōria as described by Aristotle and the activity of theōria as exercised from our intellectual virtue and capacity {hexis} of intellect {nous}.
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August 9 - Back in NE book I chapter 5 (1095b14–1096a10), Aristotle names four ways of living that stand out as representative of how any human being might choose to live his own life for the sake of flourishing. Aristotle elaborates on three of these four ways of living in the chapter: the life of pleasure, the life of honor, and the life of money making. As for the fourth way, the life of theōria, Aristotle promises to get to it later (1096a4–5).
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It is now later. After having discussed all matters concerning the virtues, friendships, and pleasures, and after again summarizing in X.6 (1176a30–1177a11) the conditions of human flourishing, Aristotle at book X chapter 7 (1177a12–1178a8) will finally tell us what he means by the life of theōria.
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We are live-reading and discussing Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, book X, which is about pleasure and human flourishing.
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The prerequisite to this book is our answering for ourselves these questions from the prior books, to which we will briefly review:
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1. What is the full-time job of being a human being?
2. What is the systematic structure of the human potential?
3. What is a virtue of character {ēthikē aretē}?
4. How does one come to acquire any of it? (E.g. pride, ambition, bravery, gentlemanliness, generosity, candor, fairness, friendliness, …)
5. How does one formulate right desires?
6. How is one to recover from being bad to becoming a good person?
7. What is entailed in and what is required of being a friend?
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The project's cloud drive is here, at which you'll find the reading texts, notes, and slideshows.4 attendees
Sober Philosophy: Existence or non-existence of God (Noha presents)
Graduate Hotel lobby, 4507 Brooklyn Ave NE, Seattle, WA 98105, Seattle, WA, USWhen thinking about what to write in this introduction, i instantly regretted not specifying the topic more!
“The existence of god or not or something in between!” is a very wide topic! It's the present research mission of my life!
Here are questions that come to mind:
Ontological, empirical, existential:
- I think the first thing that has to be defined (just for the sake of directing the discussion) is what do we mean by god? Are there specific standards that have to exist in order to say that we are talking about “god”? For example, is god an entity, separate / connected, a conscious being, a process, a universal truth or a relative thing/being based on individual and/or space and time, controlling or limited…
- Can we actually find an answer whether god exists or not? Is it through personal experience and what others say, through social trends, through science, through historical patterns? Or is it impossible to know?
- I remember reflecting with my sister Lina, if we are all going to die, and all humanity and life will cease to exist, and the earth and sun and stars and galaxies will one day die, and the universe will expand into an ultimate heat-death, why should i choose to continue to live? Why should i do anything good? Why should i condition myself from doing acts that may hurt others? Do we need to believe in god to ground us in the face of this tragic existential reality?
- Do we need the idea of god to answer existential questions? Like how did we exist, how is the evolution of the universe so intricate and beautiful, what is the purpose of our existence, what is the purpose of the evolution of cosmic/natural/human history, what is the end and/or after the end… My sister Lina also shared with me once a beautiful example: If we suddenly exist to find ourselves in a flying plane… don't we need to know who is driving/controlling the plane, why are we in this plane, and where is it going? Do we need the idea of god to answer these questions?
- Especially the question of existence… i remember when i was in the beginnings of questioning religion after the Egyptian revolution, i was sitting in a cafe in central Cairo with friends, including a father of a revolutionary martyr, and i asked him, if we say that the existence of the universe is not possible without a god, then we should say that the existence of god is not possible without the existence of another god, and so on, then how can we explain god. And he answered me: if we go on saying existence came from a god, then this god came from another god, and that god came from another god, and so on for eternity, then what if god is eternity itself! How can we deal with the question: where did existence come from?
Psychological:
- What are the psychological (and material, and social) conditions that drive the individual to believe in a god or not or something in between?
- Is god an innate idea that develops in the individual? Or does it need a community to be developed?
- Does the individual psychologically need to believe in a god? Or does it harm the individual? Or is it something not important for the individual's life? And does the benefit or harm or no need for belief in a god proves or disproves their existence? Related to this also is personal “suffering” and the endurance of it…
- How is death and the end of existence psychologically related to the belief or non-belief in god?
Historical and social:
- What are the material and socio-historical conditions that affect a society's understanding of what god/truth is and how does it affect it?
- What is the historical evolution of the idea “of god, or like Morgan Freeman calls it, The story of god” in his National Geographic show? Are there different paths of the historical evolution of the existence or non-existence of the idea of god in different civilizations or regions of the world? What caused these different paths? Also, are the trends of globalizing civilizational/cultural conditions may ultimately unify the idea of god or no-god across the globe?
- If there is a discerned historical evolution of the idea of god, can we say that there's a discerned historical end or purpose of it, kind of like how Georg Hegel and Karl Marx tried to discern a purpose for the process of history?
- How did the “system of domination” with all its faces (elitism, capitalism, hetero-patriarchy, racism, nativism, imperialism, nationalism, you-call-it!” throughout human civilization use god to benefit its presence? And how was god a tool for fighting this system?
- Does society largely need to believe in a god for its functioning? Or does it largely harm society? Or does it both benefit and harm society fairly equally?
- Will the elimination of the system of domination (hopefully one day!) eliminate the idea of god or not necessarily?
Ethical:
- Do we need to believe in god to not do unethical acts? And I mean by evil acts, not the ones defined by the system of domination, but acts that severely hurt others?
- Sometimes the idea of god drives the human or society to do unethical acts, like human and animal sacrifices, or hurting other people because they do or don't believe in god, or hurting animals and the environment because they are not sanctified by god like humans. What are your thoughts?
- Do we need to believe in god/eternal-truth to sacrifice our needs/time/energy to help others or a social/environmental cause?
- I witnessed people boldly facing death in the Egyptian revolution. And even though they did it in the name of freedom/justice/dignity, i don't think that they would've willingly sacrificed their lives if they didn't believe in god and after-life. i don't think i would've faced death at that time, if i didn't believe in them. Do you think we need to believe in god to sacrifice our personal life for a moral/social/environmental cause?
- How did humans explain or deal with evil, suffering, and injustice in the world through the idea of god’s existence or non-existence?
i know that these questions are so varied and many! We cannot even cover a few of them. Maybe i can suggest each question for a topic in later times. So if the group prefers, we can choose one of these questions to discuss for the day.
To throw out a personal suggestion that i’m presently struggling with, we can focus on the following sub-topic: “god, suffering, and death”:
How can suffering be personally endured with or without the belief in god/truth/eternal-purpose? If the need for this belief is present, do we search for existential answers, or do we suppress this need and seek other means to solve it or distract away from it? Even if one is fully enjoying life without suffering, how can one deal with the fact of ultimate death of self and loved ones and the universe without belief in god/truth/eternal-purpose? And even if one distracts oneself from this tragic fact to enjoy life, doesn’t the existence of death/end itself necessitates a faith in a beyond/god or is hedonistic momentary joy the only truth? How can we deal with or explain the presence of suffering, evil, and injustice in the world in terms of god’s existence or not? Do we need to believe in a god/truth/eternal-purpose to sacrifice our needs (and especially our lives) to fight against the system of domination - and especially here, does there need to be such a belief among people who are prosperous especially in Western countries in order for them to sacrifice their prosperity for fighting this system and liberating others from oppression and suffering? If the presence of prosperity and the reduction of suffering limits the need to believe in a god/truth/eternal-purpose (presently), but then the very fact that this prosperity comes at the present and historical expense of the suffering and death of other trillions of humans, animals, and the environment, does that make the thoughts emerging from present prosperity (like disbelief) morally valid? if reaching joy or distraction for peace of mind eliminates the need for the search for god/truth/eternal-purpose, but throughout history, morality or beauty is sacrificing one's needs, joy, and even sacrificing life to death, to share suffering with others, reduce their pain, fight for justice, then doesn’t that mean that the search for god/truth/eternal-purpose is historically inevitable, and perhaps the end-purpose/god of personal and socio-historical evolution is the complete sacrifice/death of self and social power/wealth/prosperity to eliminate and purify the person and society from all the suffering and exploitation that has been caused throughout the evolution of history to countless humans, animals, and other creatures for the accumulation of life and prosperity of the surviving?
P.S.: My style in writing may be a bit strange, especially with regard to incorporating personal experiences, but i’m very interested in a style of writing named “auto-ethnography”, so this is my explanation!
A video you may like of an AI debate for the existence and non-existence of god:
Does God Exist? AI debates (Atheist vs Believer)
https://youtu.be/EjxL2oB7J-o?is=tTHM8R76FH2j-PqcSymptom-free (of potentially contagious disease) people with the capacity to listen considerately to diverse viewpoints are invited to attend after successfully RSVPing.
We begin the meeting at 1:00 pm sharp at the mezzanine above the lobby of the Graduate Hotel in the University District: 4507 Brooklyn Ave NE, Seattle, WA 98105.
Directions for first-timers at the Graduate Hotel:
From the front hotel entrance go to the right. Turn left around the corner to enter through the north valet entrance. If the valet questions you just say you're here for the philosophy group. Go straight to the main lobby and turn right behind the large bookshelves before the elevators. Enter the stairway on your left, go up one flight, and go through the first door you encounter to enter our meeting area.2-MINUTE OPENING ROUNDTABLE FORMAT (2ORF):
- The topic presenter begins the discussion by taking up to two minutes explaining why they are interested in the topic and some introductory thoughts on it.
- Each participant in turn going clockwise from the presenter has up to two minutes to describe their general thoughts on the topic.
- If one is not ready to speak they can just say “pass” and the next person speaks.
- After we've gone around once anyone who passed will get a second chance to comment.
- Once everyone has given opening remarks or passed twice, Opening Roundtable is completed and the meeting shifts into TDRF>4 below.
TIMED DIRECTION FORMAT (TDRF>4):
If there are 4 or less people present we will have unstructured discussion, otherwise we will use the format below.- We will divide up the timed direction discussion time by the number of participants plus one (for a buffer). A timer will be set for this amount of time.
- Each participant in turn will become a Discussion Director and lead the group discussion.
- If one is not ready to direct they dimply say “pass” and the next person becomes the Discussion Director.
- Anyone who arrives after step 1 (above), may participate but will not get a turn as Discussion Director.
- The Discussion Director can make statements or ask questions, or interrupt or redirect the discussion at their discretion.
- The discussion participants can state their own opinions only when asked by the Discussion Director, not Interrupt others and accede to the Discussion Director’s interruptions or redirections.
- When the timer goes off the person speaking finishes their thought and then the next participant clockwise becomes the next Discussion Director.
- After we've gone around once anyone who passed will get a second chance to direct.
At the end of the meeting, participants will have an opportunity to vote on the topic and format for the following meeting.
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Past events
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