Philosopher Alan Watts on the difference between money and wealth

What would you do if money was no object?

  • Philosopher, Alan Watts believed we too easily mistake the symbolic for the real.
  • If money was no object, we'd seek what we truly desire.
  • Watts believed we can only have so much ostentatious consumption.
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watts dao lifestyle possessions enlightenment money alan watts zen alan wisdom buddhism tao taoism philosophy

3 Flavors of Liberalism: Rational, Romantic, Realist

Are noble 18th-century norms fit for 21st-century life? Especially when, as Yuval Harari says, liberalism’s “factual statements just don’t stand up to rigorous scientific scrutiny.” 

Illustration by Julia Suits, The New Yorker cartoonist & author of The Extraordinary Catalog of Peculiar Inventions

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adam smith Anna Alexandrova Bentham Dennis Rasmussen enlightenment etymology founding fathers hume kant liberalism locke trolley problems Yuval Harari

Science is catching up to the Buddha

Does happiness require a rebellion against evolution?

Illustration by Julia Suits, The New Yorker cartoonist & author of The Extraordinary Catalog of Peculiar Inventions

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buddhism delusion dukkha enlightenment Essentialism evolution fundamental attribution error Jerome Kagan judgement not-self Robert Wright science

Taking Liberties With Workable Liberty

It's time to get real about key ideas that run our lives, which have been taking laughable liberties with human nature – and with the logic of livable liberty.

Illustration by Julia Suits, The New Yorker cartoonist & author of The Extraordinary Catalog of Peculiar Inventions

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Julia Suits logic liberty rationality psychology philosophy Enlightenment Samuel Hammond Prisoner’s Dilemma Game Theory morality

'God is dead': What Nietzsche really meant

The death of God didn’t strike Nietzsche as an entirely good thing. Without a God, the basic belief system of Western Europe was in jeopardy.

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Simon Critchley Alain de Botton Friedrich Nietzsche Christian atheism Twilight of the Idols God Is Dead The Gay Science Enlightenment