Daily Philosophy

Every so often, a student comes to tell me they’re planning to step away from studying for a while. They want to go out into the world, they say — to gain some real experience. There’s a particular weight to the way they say it, something almost moral in the tone, as if the library has been holding them back from something more honest and more serious. I never argue with them in the moment. But a…

October 26, 2025 Exploring Israel’s assault on truth, reason and respect ...with touches of Hume, Hobbes and Hannah Arendt Let us start with David Hume. Context, caveats and nuances come later. Here is Hume, writing with regard to alleged miracles: (more...)

Plato presents Socrates' skepticism toward the written word, and the limits of what can be derived through the process of reading, in the Phaedrus . In this dialogue, Socrates supports his arguments against the written word by relating the myth of Theuth and Thamus, criticizing writing as inert or static. It cannot answer questions, defend itself or adapt to and change the soul of the reader for …

Carrara, M., De Florio, C., Lando, G., & Morato, V. (2026). Contemporary Metaphysics. Cham: Springer Nature Switzerland. 289 pages, 92.05 Euro, 99.99 USD (hardcover); 79.20 USD (Kindle). If you like reading about philosophy, here's a free, weekly newsletter with articles just like this one: Send it to me! An interesting idea and a great table of contents, but the execution is unclear about who th…

Artificial intelligence is reshaping contemporary life, not because machines are developing minds, but because humans have created tools strong enough to reorganize social reality. AI’s influence comes from its capacity to perform certain tasks with extraordinary efficiency, speed, and scale — often surpassing human performance in narrowly specified domains. Yet this performance rests on a crucia…

When we see another being suffer, something happens in us. It is not abstract, not cognitive nor philosophical, it is a visceral feeling which occurs. We feel a discomfort that is not their pain but is definitely related to it. This phenomenon, feeling pain for pain, may be the deepest emotional root of ethics. Before rules, before reason, before social contracts or priests and gods, there has be…

Dieser Artikel auf Deutsch Why does 2+2=4…? The answer may not be as simple as one thinks. One should add that 2+2=4 is usually thought of as true, indeed the very paradigm of a truth, a certain necessary truth. 1 By ‘certain’ is meant that one can be sure that it is true. By ‘necessary’ is meant that the truth could not be otherwise. The matter of certainty is an epistemological one: how we know…

For most of history, more people meant more power. I came across this X post that I initially found alarming for Western civilization: Source: Arnaud Bertrand on X But what I realized is that the argument is subtly incorrect, because it fails to recognize the important shifts happening. It’s easy to see why a negative birth rate society is concerning to most. In “On the Origin of Species,” Darwin…

Erich Fromm on Our Relation to Technology Rediscovering ancient skills in everyday life According to Erich Fromm, modern technology is to be blamed for constant surveillance, destruction of the planet, and widespread AI-caused unemployment. (more...)

Old Age and Death Epicurus on trouble in the soul The ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus emphasises that, in a world that works according to physical laws, nobody ought to be afraid of either the gods or one’s own death. (more...)

The Ultimate Guide to the Philosophy of Erich Fromm Biography, ideas, books A comprehensive overview of Erich Fromm’s philosophy of happiness. We discuss his life, his ideas and his main works, both in their historical context and how they are still relevant for us today. (more...)

New Video Series: Western Ethics Theories The Shortest Possible Overview A new series of Daily Philosophy whiteboard explainer videos has just been published on YouTube. It gives a very short, and hopefully amusing, introduction to the main theories of Western ethics. (more...)

A Reply to Andrei Mirovan This letter is a reply to:Andrei Mirovan: Pyrrhonism: Some Clarifications Compared to other Hellenistic schools of thought, like Stoicism and Epicureanism, Pyrrhonism was systematically neglected throughout the history of Western philosophy… (more...)

Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527) was interested in self-reliance, self-preservation and self-promotion. These things motivated his writing of The Prince and these were its themes. His aim was to impart to the ruling Prince, Lorenzo dé Medici (1492–1519) what he had learned of these components of statecraft and, in doing so, so impress him that he would return to political favour and to his previou…

The interview took place in Rome at the Cinema Festival. I had met Paul B. Preciado near the Auditorium, and by all accounts, I should have addressed him as a director. This is where my first mistake lies. Paul was there to present, with his Italian publisher Fandango, his first film—a hybrid of autobiography and a celebration of the first truly queer thinker in Western history, Virginia Woolf. T…

Solon stood before the people of Athens, their murmurs rising and falling like the waves crashing against the harbor behind him. When he spoke, his voice carried conviction enough to command them all. “Fellow Athenians! I am tasked to give just laws to this polity, but I do not know the meaning of that word. Send forth the wisest among you, that I may task him to go out in search of it.” His spee…

Dieser Artikel auf Deutsch 1. It is often taken for granted that love where it exists may be a primary feature of the relationship between people. No other properties or conditions need be present applied across the relationship for it to be said truly that the relationship is one of love. This essay will deny this claim. It will be argued that respect is a necessary condition for love . Respect …

If you’ve studied philosophy for a while, you’ve probably come across the ontological argument for the existence of God. This argument attempts to show that God’s existence necessarily follows from God’s essence. In other words, given God’s nature, it is impossible for Him not to exist. But did you know that the same reasoning can be used to prove the *non-*existence of the Devil? At least, if we…

Let us start with David Hume. Context, caveats and nuances come later. Here is Hume, writing with regard to alleged miracles: When any one tells me, that he saw a dead man restored to life, I immediately consider whether it be more probable, that this person should either deceive or be deceived, or that the fact, which he relates, should really have happened. (Abridged extract, An Enquiry Conce…

Trapped in the flow of time Michelstaedter has been one of the few geniuses in human history who attempted to come to the very core of human suffering; to detect its true aetiology, and cure it once and for all. Born in Gorizia – currently at the Italian-Slovenian border – in the well-to-do Jewish family of Alberto Michelstaedter, the director of an insurance company and bibliomaniac, and Emma Lu…