The Latest Breaking News from Socrates

“You have many months to live,” my palliative care doctor told me recently. She must’ve thought that was more polite than saying “less than a year.” I have finally advanced to the stage predicted by my oncologist, who said seven years ago, “I’m thinking years, not months.”

FICTION: An idealistic college student plans to drop out to focus on community organizing, while his old-school Asian activist parents try to dissuade him.

“If people do not stand up and fight for their lives and liberties, no document, no Constitution can save their lives and liberties”

Questions being asked over speed of executions, legal representation, and the ethnicities of the condemned.

My favourite subject at school was Philosophy. I loved it because it showed me that many of the questions I lazily pondered at night — such as why we should do right over wrong, and how we know who we are — have been vigorously debated for thousands of years.…

From the Phaedrus dialogue: Socrates…. Where is deception most likely to occur—regarding things that differ much or things that differ little from one another? Phaedrus. Regarding those that differ little. Socrates. At any rate, you are more likely to escape detection, as you shift from one thing to its opposite,…

Fine acting and lively dialogue save this philosophical play from feeling static as it applies Athenian ideals to modern dilemmas

Playwright Howard Brenton asks why ancient Athens turned on its famous citizen, and how such an uncompromising free-thinker might fare in our own ‘age of rage’

Whataboutism is an argumentative tactic where a person or group responds to an accusation or difficult question by deflection. Instead of addressing the point made, they counter it with “but what about X?”.