Nearly everyone thinks about philosophy.
People ask philosophical questions and make philosophical assumptions all the time–about fairness, freedom, and friendship; obligation, family, and the environment; objectivity, taste, and facts vs. opinions; God, purpose, and what it is to live a meaningful life.
Chances are you’ve had many thoughts about these things, probably even recently.
Philosophy is not just for white-bearded men with no practical care in the world. Philosophy is relevant for us all.
Today, however, sustained philosophical thinking is practiced mostly in universities. Its benefits are bestowed only on the select few who enroll in a philosophy course.
We can do better.
Founded in November 2015, the Center for Public Philosophy is making this happen through a wide variety of programs. Some of our initiatives engage the public directly in philosophical activities; others apply insights from the history of philosophy to urgent problems of current public concern.
As citizens in a democratic society, it is our civic responsibility to make choices in a well-reasoned and informed way. And yet, today more than ever we are exposed to vast amounts of information and a wide variety of opinions that claim our attention and demand response. Impatience, overconfidence, and bias are perennial obstacles to sound reasoning, which the Internet and contemporary media have only intensified. Attention in the face of distraction; the ability to assimilate inconvenient information; a tolerance for uncertainty and not knowing the right answer—these need to be cultivated in our youngest generations, nourished in our communities, and celebrated in public discourse. Through programming, events and media, the Center seeks to empower the public with the tools and insights of philosophy, and to help foster a more thoughtful, engaged community of thinkers. Our projects include:
High schools across Northern California travel to UC Santa Cruz to discuss a wide range of contemporary ethical questions via a promising alternative debate format called the Ethics Bowl.
Faculty and graduate students from UC Santa Cruz bring philosophy to children at local elementary and middle schools, engaging them in sustained discussions of philosophical questions.
Inmates at local correctional facilities strengthen skills of reason, deliberation, and communication through supervised discussion of contemporary ethical questions.
The Center finds substantial importance in the identification and development of projects in which philosophers, in close collaboration with colleagues both inside and outside academia, explore what both groups conceive to be a promising application of a specific philosophical idea, perspective or tradition to a distinct issue of urgent public importance.
A UC Santa Cruz initiative that seeks a radical change in how we think and talk about the value of life in all its diverse, natural forms. It envisions a transformation in humanity’s ethical relationship to nature through discovery and development of what Aldo Leopold called “values as yet uncaptured by language.”
The Center for Public Philosophy is grateful to the many, many individuals who have supported our work. We are especially grateful to individual donors such as Ann & Tim Shannon and Iris Fraser. We are also grateful for generous support from the following organizations and units:
