I failed to post advance information about this event which took place yesterday. Donald Sloan of Oxford Brookes University, led a discussion with me and two of the UK’s most admired chefs, Antonio Carluccio and Michael Caines, to explore our relationship with food.
ReadIt is absurd to claim that anything that is not essential to our survival is a “luxury” we should not be concerned about. This is not a humane viewpoint, but a deeply anti-humanist one. Why, after all, are we so concerned that many people do not have the necessities of life? Not because we think that mere survival is the purpose of existence. We want people to have food, shelter, health and education so that they can thrive and flourish. To put it another way, we want our “middle-class indulgences” to be available to everyone.
ReadThe self is more the product than the producer of conscious activity. As Descartes should have put it: there are thoughts, therefore I am.
ReadNo one has infallible access to moral truth and there is more than one good way to live. But that does not mean that no one has any moral insight and that there aren’t many wrong ways to live. The alternative to unjustified confidence in the one true way is not a misguided faith in the validity of all paths.
ReadVIDEO: ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION FROM STOICISM FOR EVERYDAY LIFE EVENT. The full round-table discussion (one hour long) from the Stoicism for Everyday Life event at Birkbeck, University of London, on November 30th. Participants included Prof. Chris Gill chairing Julian Baggini, Jules Evans, Antonia Macaro, Richard Sorabji, and Mark Vernon.
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