Core Topics in Philosophy
Why all night?
Because at night we see things from a different perspective. Daytime is busy. You have things to do. You have to look after the ends of your actions. At night, you sleep, it’s a break, it’s a parenthesis. It’s a moment when you have time and are liberated from busyness. The link between philosophy and night is historical, too.
The owl of Minerva spreads its wings only with the falling of the dusk
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What do you think about the fact that you have inspired philosophy events around the world, such as the recent Night of Philosophy and Ideas in Brooklyn?Â
The Night of Philosophy and Ideas in Brooklyn was organized on the model of my event but I did not organize it. I gave the new Brooklyn Public Library’s VP of Arts and Culture advice as he wanted to use my concept.
But it was very different to my event. That’s why it was called A Night of Philosophy and Ideas. Ideas are not necessarily philosophical and they open up to thoughts and methods that are not my focus. My focus is philosophy and art.
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It depends on the goal of the event, but we are at a time when people need to feel more empowered and need to experience something different than the normal system of thinking.Â
I view these events as a way to empower people: to put them at the center of a world and to give them choices. It’s not only about giving people intellectual food, but rather giving people the possibility to listen to a lecture, to drink, or to see a performance, and not to impose anything on them. It’s a staging, not a festival or program. It is delicate. It’s exactly the contrary of programming.
Unprogramming?
It’s unprogramming through a very tight program, but it has to be full and shouldn’t be one thing imposed on everyone. It should be like presenting a world to the participant, who will need to ask themselves: do I go left or right?
It’s not about people or names, either. It’s about simultaneity, that is, creating multiple ways of looking at things.
It’s important not to embrace only one point of view, but to create a dialectic which blurs what should be thought. Maybe there is not one right thought. At the core of these events is diversity of thinking and different ways of looking at things.
The Nights of Philosophy are very successful. Thousands of people participate. Why do you think they are so popular?
Yes, each time it is very popular. I have done seven Nights of Philosophy so far, and I’m going to be doing more in Helsinki, Paris, Berlin and, probably, central Europe next year. And very soon I will go to the next one in Lima on April 21, 2017. I would like to come back to do one in a museum in the U.S. There is a real thirst for these events.
They’re popular because they’re very different. They’re a novelty. Philosophy has always been privileged and attractive. These events give people a chance to judge that by themselves.
I think people also like the multiplicity, the opening up, the all-night long experience, and the fact that they don’t know what’s going to happen. Uncertainty is very interesting. Life is like that. You really don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow.
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