Philosophyspeaking topic
“Naming is something like attaching a label to a thing.”
— Ludwig Wittgenstein
practice with this topic
Set the timer (5-30 min), take 20 seconds of prep if you like, start talking. Jot your thoughts onto the sticky-note board.
similar topics
- To be happy, you have to stop thinking about happiness; chase it directly and it runs away. Maybe the things we want most only arrive once we stop wanting them. Is desire, then, something that sabotages itself?
- The panopticon: does a person who knows they might be watched start policing themselves, even when nobody is looking? If the mere possibility of an invisible authority is enough to change our behavior, where does freedom begin?
- Before acting, you tell yourself 'I could have done otherwise'. But rewind time and replay the exact same brain, the same memories, the same moment: would you really do anything different? If not, you are not free; and if you would, what caused the difference, pure chance?
- Optimistic nihilism, the idea that if nothing ultimately matters, we are free to decide what matters, and why millions find that comforting.
- Some fish live near the surface, others on the ocean floor, yet they never fight over 'this is my land'. Could property, borders, and deeds be entirely human inventions, or does nature run on some invisible form of ownership too?