The Blog : Cogito Ergo Blogo

The Right to Privacy

27 January, 2012, 10:13 am

This week we’ll be asking about the Right to Privacy.

This is one of those times when we need to start by disentangling concepts. We use ‘private’ and ‘privacy’ in several different ways. Both words derive from ‘privus’ in Latin which means `single’ or `individual’. Being private is usually opposed to being public; privacy means withdrawn in one way or another from the public.

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Philosophy in Fiction

20 January, 2012, 02:49 pm

Some famous and not-so-famous pieces of philosophy are, strictly speaking, fiction: the Dialogues of Plato, Hume and Berkeley and Nietzsche’s Zarathustra, for example. And Rousseau’s Emile has some novel-like elements. Among the less famous are my own Dialogues. (In case you are interested, the are Dialogues on Personal Identity and Immortality, and Dialogue on Good, Evil and the Existence of God. Both published by Hackett publishing. Small and inexpensive, they make great gifts.)

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Is Democracy a Universal Value?

13 January, 2012, 12:37 pm

The program broadcast this Sunday asks the question: “Is Democracy a Universal Value?” According to the dictionary:

“Democracy.” A system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.

The dictionary definition leaves a lot of room for variation. In a direct democracy, for example, the people collectively decide political matters. In a representative democracy, the people elect representatives to make the political decisions. And exactly who is an "eligible member"? Only those over 18? Or 21? Only men? Only property-owners?

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The Examined Year: 2011

08 January, 2012, 09:08 am

This week, we do something special. We take a look back at the past year, though the lens of Philosophy. We call the episode -- The Examined Year: 2011. But this is not your typical year in review show -- not by a long shot. We take our inspiration, from Socrates who said that the unexamined life is not worth living. For us, that implies that that the unexamined year is not worth living through. Fortunately for us all, though, 2011 was a year well worth living through and well worth examining. It was best of times and the worst of times -- a year in equal parts inspiring and troubling.

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Nihilism and Meaning

30 December, 2011, 09:37 am

'Nihilism’ is based on the Latin word for `nothing’: nihil. Nihilism is used for a lot of positions in philosophy… that there is nothing at all; that we know nothing at all; that there are no moral principles at all, and virtually any other position that could be framed with the word `nothing’. But the most common use, and what we'll explore today, is nihilism as the view that nothing we do, nothing we create, nothing we love, has any meaning or value whatsoever.

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What would Jesus do?

23 December, 2011, 09:13 am

Millions of people believe that Jesus is the Lord, the Son of God, sent to earth to teach us how to live. Many others, including some of the founding fathers like Jefferson, modern Unitarians, and a lot of people who don’t consider themselves Christians at all, aren’t convinced that Jesus is the Son of God, but think he was a great moral teacher. When they confront an ethical decision, or a morally loaded issue of public policy, they may ask, ``What would Jesus Do?”

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What’s to be done?. A blog for Christmas

18 December, 2011, 01:30 pm

Posted by John Perry

While trying to get my C.V. in order for some university committee that wanted it, I stumbled across an article I had written for a journal called "Topoi" on the topic What’s to be done?. I think they asked a couple of hundred philosophers to write short essays. This was in 2006, but since I mostly deal with timeless topics, my views haven't changed. So I thought I would recycle it as a Christmas blog, since it's sort of cheerful and with respect to the Eastern APA, seasonal.

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Is it wrong to wreck the earth?

16 December, 2011, 10:51 am

This week's topic is, ``Is it wrong to wreck the earth?”

I suppose the obvious answer is “yes”. The answer may be more obvious than the meaning of the question. We’re not asking if it’s wrong for me or you to wreck the earth for everyone else, but something more like whether the people that are currently alive and busy polluting the streams and rivers and oceans, warming the globe, killing off species, and the like, and thus making the earth a less agreeable place for future generations, are doing something wrong.

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To Forgive and Forget

11 December, 2011, 06:02 pm

This week’s episode is about “Forgetting and Forgiving.” Frankly, though, the ‘forgetting’ part is sort of throw-away. You should never forget the wrongs done to you. Why would you want to? Forgiving, though, is another thing entirely. When somebody wrongs us, negative emotions can eat away at us. If we let go of our anger and resentment, we experience healing and reconciliation.

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The Military: What is it Good for?

27 November, 2011, 05:41 am

Our topic this week is the military. And we’re asking “What is it good for?” Let me start out by granting the obvious. Though a few of my most left-leaning friends think we could do entirely without any sort of military, there has never been and will never be a vast and populous nation like ours without armed services. But even if we take it as a given that any nation, especially a nation that wants to be a significant player on the world stage, is going to have a military of some sort, that still leaves lots of questions open. Here are just a few of them. Exactly what sort of military should we have -- a compact military, adequate for homeland defense and little else or a large and robust force, capable of projecting power around the globe? Who should serve in the military? Should all able-bodied citizens be compelled to serve? Or should the burdens of service be left to volunteers? To whom should the military be accountable, and how, exactly, can it be held to account? And do we civilians owe our military leaders a high degree of deference?

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Past Blogs

  • May 01, 2013 : Good, Evil, and the Divine Plan
    Posted by JP This Sunday we're asking about Good, Evil, and the Divine Plan. The question is: if...
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  • April 29, 2013 : The Demands of Morality
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  • April 25, 2013 : Religion and the Art of Living
    Posted by JP   Religion offers us a comforting and inspiring vision of human existence.  ...
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  • April 12, 2013 : Dance as a Way of Knowing
    Posted by LM The title of this week’s show might sound a little mysterious. How can dance, of all...
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  • March 28, 2013 : Truth & Other Fictions
      We've titled this week's show "Truth – and Other Fictions."  Now that’s a provocative...
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