A Pragmatic Approach to Ideas
Literary theorists of the past half-century—who now dominate the humanities—encourage us to assume ill-intentions of one another. This contrasts with the ’empathetic’ humanities, which aim for more understanding and less judging in our daily lives.
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P.L. Travers, who hung out with British mystics and studied alongside a Zen Buddhist master, would have approved of the Mary Poppins sequel.
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Here are five recent research findings worth considering when weighing the wisdom of “follow your passion” or pursuing a calling in life.
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To better understand how anxiety works in us, we have to see fear in the context where it evolved—with hunter-gatherers thousands of years ago.
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Philosophers are exemplars in disagreeing vehemently but civilly with others. Like them, using these 4 principles can help us have arguments that are effective against extremism.
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The Christmas Truce of 1914 was the final happy memory some soldiers would have. Today, in our polarized culture, ‘Joyeux Noël’ reminds us to soften our social and political barriers.
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It’s said that our actions are based on immediate intuitions, informed by accumulated stereotypes. Are we merely puppets of inherited ideologies?
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Ishiguro has been praised for his unapologetic investigation of loss and hope, and the “inevitable sadness” inherent in his novels.
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Karl Ove Knausgaard often uses religious language in his fiction—but as religion recedes, does he think literature can create ecstatic experience?
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For Kant and Schopenhauer, scientific understanding deepens our experience with the Sublime, elevating our spiritual strength.
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Once resembling the relationship between a devoted father and an admiring son, Freud and Jung split over the question of culture’s origins.
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We can’t make claims about human nature when studies only represent a narrow slice of humanity: mostly college students, middle-class respondents living near universities, and highly educated residents of wealthy, industrialized and democratic nations.
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