Philosophical Exercises

    I am setting myself a challenge: in 2024, I commit to practicing one new philosophical exercise each month. And then write about it! For January 2024, I took on Plutarch’s anti-curiosity exercises, described in his essay On Curiosity. 1 The reason why I selected this practice to start off the year is because I was wondering if these exercises could help counteract Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. I have OCD myself and I am part of a team of philosophers who is leading an inquiry into this condition. We are trying our best to put the voices of the people who have OCD at the center of the discussion. The project is called Stuck on the Puzzle 2 : it involves a podcast being produced, a blog calling for guest-posts, and hopefully, eventually, the design of a philosophical exercise that could perhaps help when dealing with OCD.      Reflecting on my own OCD, I came to agree with Juliette Vazard ’s assessment that this disorder must have something to do...

The following article was originally published as “The Trustful Approach: introducing an original philosophical exercise to live social discord mindfully” as it was meant to serve as a first introduction to this philosophical exercise. However, since it is a long article, which goes a lot into details regarding the theory behind the practice, and since my thinking has evolved regarding some aspects, I have since then published another post , which is a shorter and way better introduction to the exercise. I encourage you to read it. In the end, the new title of the present article reflects better what is in it.           The trustful approach is a philosophical exercise that I have developed in order to deal with heated disagreements and chronic outrage. It is especially tailored to political disagreements, though it can be useful in other cases. The aim of the practice is to make you a more focused, lucid, and serene interlocutor, without losing your grip o...