I recently had a conversation with someone I had not talked to in a long while. I was feeling particularly unenthused with my life this day and was not especially in the mood for some mindless chatter. Something about the combination of the pandemic and the perception of the decay…
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In Another Life: To Be A Writer
Science fiction movies are filled with tropes about parallel universes and travel to them. It makes one stop and wonder about the different ways one’s own life could have been different. I like to think of my own life as a kind of tree, where each pivotal decision point can…
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A Kuhnian Re-Threading of the Needle
It is 3 a.m. Dutifully, my phone replays “Questions In a World of Blue” by Julee Cruise for what seems like the millionth time. My headphones have long since broken, so Cruise’s soothing, yet haunting, voice now just sounds tinny. I think that everyone has gone through a sort of…
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‘The Good Place’ is a surprisingly good place to learn the basics of philosophy
NBC’s hit comedy “The Good Place” will return for its fourth and final season Sept. 26. Also this fall, William Jewell College students return to classes such Responsible Self, Business Law and Ethics, and History of Western Philosophy. These two facts seem to have nothing in common, but surprisingly, they…
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