Quote of the day

 "Respect, compassion, and love are all ways of asserting that someone matters. They are melodies sung in the same key." - Kieran Setiya, Life is Hard: How Philosophy Can Help Us Find Our Way

Quote of the day

 "A perfect solitude is, perhaps, the greatest punishment we can suffer." - David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature (1739-40)

Via Life is Hard: How Philosophy Can Help Us Find Our Way by Kieran Setiya

Quote of the day

 "We have to live in the world as it is, not the world as we wish it would be." - Kieran Setiya, Life is Hard: How Philosophy Can Help Us Find Our Way

Quote of the day

 "We are creatures made as much by art as by experience and what we read in books is the sum of both." - Andy Miller, The Year of Reading Dangerously: How Fifty Great Books (And Two-Not-So-Great Ones) Saved My Life

Quote of the day

 "Never call yourself a philosopher, and don't talk among laymen for the most part about philosophical principles,  but act in accordance with those principles ... And accordingly, if any talk should arise among laymen about some philosophical principle, keep silent for the most part, for there is a great danger that you'll simply vomit up what you haven't properly digested ... For sheep, too, don't vomit up their fodder to show the shepherds how much they've eaten, but digest their food inside them, and produce wool and milk on the outside. And so you likewise shouldn't show off your principles to laymen, but rather show them the actions that result from those principles when they've been properly digested." - Epictetus, Handbook

In other words: don't talk your philosophy, embody it. Live it.

Quote of the day

 "[W]hile the unjust may be happy, they do not live well." - Kieran Setiya, Life is Hard: How Philosophy Can Help Us Find Our Way

Baleful quote of the day

 "If you think social media platforms are already doing all they can to avoid the victimization and exploitation of their most vulnerable users, you need to think again." - Laura Bates, Men Who Hate Women: From Incels to Pickup Artists: The Truth about Extreme Misogyny and How it Affects Us All

A thought experiment

 A few months ago I began to draft a post in which I challenged myself to list the the character traits a role model would have, after which I was going to note that Donald Trump is almost the complete antithesis of everything I think an admirable person would be. I got this far:

List the qualities that you find admirable for a person to have. 

For me: confidence humility kindness generosity intelligence discipline temperance honesty decency virtuous

If you were to build a person from scratch who did

I had intended to return to the draft and finish, but having come across this reposted essay from a few years ago, I think this already says everything I might have thought to have written.

Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem. For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace

One thing I might still note, however, is that some people might see my list and say that Trump does, in fact, have a great deal of confidence. I beg to differ. My conception of confidence is Stoic: it is inwardly focused self-awareness that can not be affected by external circumstances. Trump does not have this: he has arrogance (false confidence) - and much of it.