Hierarchy and the Political Economy
Introduction: The term Political Economy has been expunged from contemporary discourse; politics and economics are regarded as separate, specialist subjects. However, like wealth and power, the two are inextricably linked. This was well understood in the past: most great thinkers were polymaths, eg. Benjamin Franklin and Leonardo da Vinci. Today we have “specialists” and information is […]
Open Borders: Unconditional Hospitality
Unconditional hospitality is a central idea in contemporary ethical philosophy and it has important implications for psychology. Its political equivalent is the notion of open borders as a utopian critique of nationality and national identity. We can become good hosts by temporarily interrupting the self and our habitual concerns about ‘me’ and ‘mine’ and also by reframing […]
Santayana as Social and Cultural Philosopher
A talk on Santayana, is, I think, timely. For many years he’s suffered undeserved neglect in Britain; he doesn’t – as I believe he should – occupy a major place on university philosophy courses, or in the philosophy section of bookshops and libraries. The neglect is curious in view of the fact that in the […]
The Grecian Club
Hidden within the archives of the National Secular Society were the minute books and attendance records for a small but influential society called The Grecian Club.
Famous Connections
In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries Conway Hall Ethical Society was connected to both the great and the good of the age. Many came to address the Society at their Sunday and mid week lectures including Bertrand Russell, William Morris, Sidney Webb and the suffragettes Marion Phillips and Marion Holmes.
Golden rules of human behaviour
The ‘golden rules’ of human behaviour and are central concepts in humanism.