Simon Critchley: To Philosophize Is to Learn How to Die | The New School

[@ptrckmccarty1]

Just the sort of person we need to save us from analytic sterility.

[@CC3GROUNDZERO]

Obviously because some of us simply cannot believe in the afterlife. It's not a choice.

[@TheDuttyProfessor]

this was excellent, thank you

[@highway234]

10:50 spinoza's death, i think, is my favorite.

[@vicalieg]

I'm worried about the time before I was born. Lots of terrible things happened back then.

[@esterdot]

Manhattan restaurants do not need to bring skeletons. The place received its reminder of mortality in a form of terrorist attack on WTC. Still fresh in the memory of people...

[@yasha12isreal]

No, to philosophize is to love wisdom!

[@lukelemmon475]

Why love wisdom?

[@sammcgehee4116]

Absurd Hero philosophy means "love of knowledge" . Hegel turns this into 'actual knowing'

[@63doughnut]

I'm going the way of aviscenna - sounds good to me !

[@pick734]

to scrutinize it is just names in history do you think they feel them now?

[@dprestons0318]

If philosophy is about accepting death without appealing to an afterlife, then if he can't say how this way of approaching death is more beneficial than believing in an afterlife why do philosophy. If philosophy is about this, then why is it valuable, why do it?

[@sammcgehee4116]

David Stubblefield the highest value of philosophy is that it isn't pragmatic or necessary in any way! Philosophy is simply not on the same level of basic practical things like feeding and clothing ones self or finding a solace in the face of adversity. Philosophy's value is in its utter uselessness.

[@pipetheory]

Did Zizek dislike this?

[@pick734]

sacrifice need not to be justified then the only road to adore your sacrificed as god that means you are foolish even if that is based philosophically why*** ** * **** ask yourself

[@highway234]

sorry, leibniz, i meant.

[@dantean]

Wrong. To philosophize is to learn to retreat from the outside world into the life of the mind. I mean this in a positive way for the most part, and even include WITHIN it "being philosophical" about one's own inescapable destiny (i.e., to die) but do not see where philosophy's primary and fundamental value, role, or function is the single-minded focus upon the one's own demise.

[@collinsmugodo380]

Sublime Music Channel I've not watched the video yet but I can think of one context where "learning how to die" is what we're actually doing while thinking honestly about the world(philosophizing). The main Part of speaking honestly is setting aside one's biases in favor of truth. It's asking the question...how would the world seam without me as it's subject. It makes for a good title but it does need clarification in the talk. I'm curious to see what he says but that's my intuition.

[@lukelemmon475]

Am I philosophizing when I day dream for hours about being in another world?

[@LaureanoLuna]

Tiresome anecdotes, little philosophy.

[@Iceni007]

Philosophy has absolutely nothing interesting or insightful to say about death as this talk inadvertently demonstrates. Great literature such as Tolstoy and Saul Bellow is where you find the greatest meditations on death and dying in western thought. As the great anti -philosopher Wittgenstein put it: "“A serious and good philosophical work could be written consisting entirely of jokes.”

[@TristanDeCunha]

Fail. Try again.

[@Iceni007]

TristanDeCunha That's a really compelling, very thorough, well argued point of view. You must be a philosopher.

[@jlink09]

+ocelot salarian Well, philosophers can provide interesting points of view on death. Perhaps Critchley does not do so here (I wouldn't know, I haven't finished watching it) but take a look at one of the sources in reference by the title of this lecture, Montaigne's "To Philosophize is so Learn to Die" (I think the quote at 13:25 is from this. Yes, I realize its origin is in Cicero. But I think most people would reach Montaigne before Cicero in the process of digging through the classics.); It is a very well thought out piece - and very non-fiction one - as per usual from Montaigne. Besides, you shouldn't write off the entirety of the category of philosophy as an invaluable tool for understanding death. It is one of the chief topics that have sustained the conversation for these last twenty-five hundred years or so. But more importantly, there is an assumption in your comment - and probably your thinking in general - that the literature you're referring to does not contain philosophy because it is literature. I have difficulty thinking of any literature that does not contain philosophical perspective, even if its not explicit or even understood by its author (which, for example, is not the case with Tolstoy, who openly pulled philosophy and his morality from the cannonical gospels. His thinking was influenced so strongly about these texts to the degree that he revised those four texts into a single, unified gospel. Not the most academically sound endeavor but an interesting one to say the least.) Anyhoo, don't make the assumption that art is devoid of philosophical content, because outside of pulpy, kitchy productions it is clearly not the case. P.S. Wittgenstein was a philosopher in just about every sense of the word, even if he did heavily criticize its general sweep and views of his peers.

[@TristanDeCunha]

***** Look, I'm not trying to be a troll or bust your balls, but try and hear me out: forget the designation "philosopher." Let's just use writers/thinkers for now. Sure, Tolstoy, Bellow, and many other writers of "literature" have given us much in the way of insight and wisdom regarding death. But so have artists, scientists, poets,playwrights, war veterans, theologians, garbage collectors, drunks, grandfathers, and indeed philosophers. There is a lineage, a tradition in the Western canon (and others in the near and far East, as well as Africa and South America), which goes back several thousand years and contains many, many highlights which I would advise you to at least give a chance. I will list just a handful of my favorites. You may rightly feel that they do nothing for you, but for me, I guarantee you, in complete earnest and from the bottom of my heart, they have helped me learn how to live - both via their written works and the lives they led - and (precociously, of course)how to die: Cicero, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius, Socrates, Cato, Euripides, Anaximander, Zeno, Thomas Aquinas, St Augustine, Montaigne, Rousseau, Nietzsche, Kant, Leopardi, Chesterton, Heidegger, Celine, Artaud, Ionesco, Bukowski, Einstein, Feynman, Clement Rosset, Ray Brassier, Quentin Meillassoux, Reza Negarestani, Alain Badiou, Zizek, Avital Ronell, Mishima, Mann, Schelling, Schlegel, Sloterdijk, Ligotti, John Gray, Thomas Metzinger, indeed Critchley, and many many more. Just forget the notion of philosophy as some haughty discipline so strictly separate from certain other fields and perhaps there won't be so much friction.

[@Iceni007]

TristanDeCunha Fair point Tristan. I was being a bit confrontational. I actually studied philosophy at Essex Uni in the UK (where Critchley studied too - but he was a post grad at the time - I saw him around but didn't really know him) so I read a fair few of the above you mention. Nietzsche has some interesting insights on death for sure. Heidegger - when you unpick the rather turgid, obscure prose is fairly platitudinous. But I'm not dismissing the whole canon. However, no philosopher can compare to Tolstoy - I believe 'The Death of Ivan Illych' is the most profound and moving meditation on mortality ever written, which simply transcends what is possible to convey in philosophical prose. Essex was strong on Wittgenstein and as the great man put it: "Philosophy simply puts everything before us, and neither explains nor deduces anything...Philosophy leaves everything as it is".