Explore philosophy through its most famous quotes! Today: Socrates on knowing that you know nothing. (more...)

Explore philosophy through its most famous quotes. Today: Marcus Aurelius, Meditations: “It is in our power to have no opinion about a thing, and not to be disturbed in our soul…” (more...)

A history of philosophy in its most famous quotes. Today: Jeremy Bentham on the suffering of animals: “The question is not, Can they reason? nor, Can they talk? but, Can they suffer?” (more...)

Should a Liberal State Ban the Burqa? by Brandon Robshaw, is a very clear, instructive and carefully argued book that shows off philosophy at its best. (more...)

Altogether this is the most comprehensive account of how the phrase ‘the meaning of life’ came to attain its current ubiquity that has yet been written. (more...)

Joseph Harris (2022). Misanthropy in the Age of Reason: Hating Humanity from Shakespeare to Schiller. Oxford University Press. 304 pages. Hardcover: 73. (more...)

From ancient China and the European Middle Ages, to zombies, Frankenstein’s monster and HAL 9000, our literary tradition is full of robots – sometimes helpful, sometimes threatening, and always questioning what it really means to be human. (more...)

Adam Davidson describes the “Passion Economy” in a book released in 2020. This article shows why Davidson’s proposal is not a sustainable solution to fix our current relationship with work. (more...)

Economist Daniel Kahneman studied the effects of memory on our perception of past experiences. He distinguishes experienced from remembered happiness. (more...)

The rhetoric or metaphor of refuge from the world has largely disappeared from religious, social and ethical debate. The contrast with the past is striking. (more...)

We visit three very different hermits: Agafia Lykova in remote Siberia, Mauro Morandi on a Mediterranean island paradise, and Lincolnshire nun Rachel Denton. What unites them and gives their lives meaning? (more...)

Tom Neale spent a total of fourteen years alone on a little island in the Suwarrow Atoll in the South Pacific, where he found peace and happiness in solitude. We have a look at this extraordinary life. (more...)

A new series of Daily Philosophy whiteboard explainer videos has just been published on YouTube. It gives a very short, and hopefully amusing, introduction to the main theories of Western ethics. (more...)

We examine the basic ideas behind the four main Western ethics theories: utilitarianism, Kantian ethics, social contract ethics and virtue ethics. (more...)

Vaccination ethics is a surprisingly rich field of philosophical inquiry, and it covers issues from all major moral theories, reaching into world politics, poverty, the role of the state and the morality of taxation and car seat belts. (more...)

Ethics and the law are not the same and it can indeed be morally right, and even indicated, to break the law in certain situations. (more...)

In this episode, Ezechiel and Andy finish their discussion of moral relativism. If we don’t want to be relativists, what ways are there to know whether one country or system is better than another? (more...)

Ethical arguments against veganism are examined and refuted. (more...)

Descartes admired her intelligence and Leibniz stood at her deathbed, but during most of her life, she was a penniless refugee. Meet Elisabeth, Princess of Bohemia. (more...)

Aristotle (384-322 BC), born in Stageira, Greece, is one of the most influential philosophers who ever lived. He worked not only in philosophy, but also wrote dozens of books on all topics, from astronomy and biology to literary theory. (more...)

In 1935, a bad trip triggered Jean-Paul Sartre’s deep-rooted fear of sea creatures. Suddenly, he found himself surrounded by crabs and lobsters. (more...)

There have been increasingly clamorous calls for the banning, removal, or controlling, or censoring of ‘misinformation’ as an enforced general policy. (more...)

We, the Jury, duly impaneled and sworn, upon our oaths, do find the defendant, of her own free will, as to Count One, guilty of First-degree Murder. (more...)

Irvin Yalom’s (b. 1931) The Spinoza Problem: A Novel (Basic Books 2013) intertwines history and philosophy, offering a fresh perspective on two distinct but connected lives. (more...)

Here, instead of five people versus one person, the trolley is heading toward N cows and diverting it will kill one person. (more...)

My question was – and still is – a short good life with a pain free death, or no life at all, which would you prefer? A reply to Petrică Nițoaia. (more...)

Aspiring hermits have many motivations. Smith eloquently testifies to his reasons, some of them deeply personal. (more...)