Activity last 6 months
Questions 3
Discussions 4
Why “I’m sorry you feel that way” is not an apology
What a prison reading class taught me about reading an ancient text for the first time
Frankfurt’s unwilling addict and the men in my prison reading class
Reflective equilibrium or tidy prejudice? How a prison reading class changed my view on punishment
Reading groups 2
Recent replies
- Epictetus was a slave and I drive the 413. What counts as ‘up to us’ at work?
I read Epictetus with men in a prison in Nairobi. Some find him freeing: their judgement is the one thing the prison can't confiscate. Others are suspicious, for exactly your union rep's rea…
- Reading group for complete beginners: Plato’s Apology, slowly, in three sittings
Sitting 3. I've read this with my prison class, so I'll only add what they said: the line about the unexamined life lands differently when you have years to examine yours. And his last words…
- Hobbes’s ‘sudden glory’ explains far more laughter than its critics admit
For the narrower thesis. In the prison class the humour is relentless, and much of it is about rank: who's new, who's soft, who's been inside longest. But there's also a laugh that…
- Parfit was right: identity is not what matters in survival
I teach a reading class in a men's prison in Nairobi. One man, twenty-two years in, said of the boy who committed his crime: "I would not let that boy into my house." Parfit actually co…
- If a cheat wins the match, has he even played the game? Help me with Suits
One small worry. In the prison class I teach, a man told me the game he grew up in had rules that were themselves rigged, and cheating was the only way to have any game at all. Suits's account se…