Translation of what I said at my first philosophical symposium
Below is the faithful translation of what I said in Greek in this video, starting at the 10:47 mark: https://protesilaos.com/news/2025-02-06-vlog-about-first-philosophical-symposium.
The video starts now. All good. I am not sure I am visible. Let me have a seat. But let us all be visible.
Thanks to Philippos for organising this symposium. I believe it is the first symposium we have here at the village and I am very happy for this.
What is, then, the “philosophical symposium”? And this is our topic today. Let’s examine what the words “philosophy” and “symposium” are and how they combine together, in order to understand what this is about.
Philosophy is the friendship one has towards wisdom. What is wisdom? It is our ability to understand the big picture of things. Thus, to be able not to remain in the specifics in our life but to be able to zoom out, as it were. To be able to see the general lines and understand what is happening overall. To understand our experiences and those of other people, and historical events, and to be able to see things more spherically. This basically is wisdom.
The philosopher, then, and philosophy… The philosopher is the person who tries in their life to always act in accordance with wisdom. Always, in the specifics of what they are doing to also have a general idea of what is happening. So that they do not remain stuck in their own understanding but see things more spherically. And thus to not get confused by difficult details and not lose their general direction. This is generally wisdom and this is generally philosophy.
The philosopher is the person who has to approach wisdom. But to approach wisdom they must be able to think. To think, we all have the capacity for it. We all have a brain and we all have intelligence. This is not enough though. To think we need courage. You need to dare to think. You need to dare to tell yourself, first and foremost, that “I may be wrong”. “Let me think about it, and I might be right, but I might also be wrong”. To do anything, you have to recognise that there is the possibility to succeed as well as the possibility to fail. Thus, it requires courage.
As the poet (Andreas Kalvos) has said, “liberty requires virtue and courage” and this is how philosophy is more-or-less, because to think for yourself you have the freedom to think for yourself. You will not just say what somebody else told you. You might agree with someone, but you will agree following your own initiative. Meaning, somebody told you something, you thought about it, and said “yes, I agree”, or “no, I disagree”.
Philosophy also requires sincerity. It requires honesty. When I think of something—anything—, I do not try to fool myself. I do not try to tell myself that I am better than I truly am or that I know more than what I truly know. But I tell myself “you know, here is where you were wrong”, “you know, this is not something you have knowledge of”. When we have this honesty, we have a basic humility. This humility is not a mere internal affair. Humility is expressed towards other people but also towards the topics we study. It is expressed towards other people like through the symposium and every discussion we have. Because, when I state anything, I do not say it out of a belief that I am infallible. I will say something and we will discuss it. I may be wrong. I may be right. I may be partially right but something still eludes me, so you will tell me “hey, you forgot this; if you think of it from this angle you will reach a different conclusion; let us discuss it”. So I want to have the sincerity to be honest with myself, but also to have the courage and sincerity to talk with my fellow human. And to recognise in my fellow human that he or she also has experiences, thoughts, moments, that I do not have and from which I may learn something. And the same for everyone: we may all learn something.
Why, then, “symposium”? Why it matters to have “philosophical” and “symposium” and why I think these things should go together. Because philosophy is something we do daily. Philosophy does not only concern books. Of course, it also is a study that encompasses books. But not only books. It also concerns quotidian life. What must I do? What is my purpose? Which are my values? I have to be able to reason about those things and to talk about them. Not to take them for granted, because anything I take for granted, anything I do not subject to critical thinking, has the potential to be wrong. And if it is wrong, so is everything I do that is based on it. So I want to have the sincerity to talk with the other person; the sincerity to sit at a table with others and for all of us to be equal. We all sit at the same table, we all share the same wine, the same food. There is not one who is smarter, one who is more experienced, et cetera, who is infallible and whom everybody else listens to. All make mistakes. All have something right to say and, precisely, we have the humility to recognise these qualities in all other people.
And this, basically, is the idea of the symposium. It is, then, to bring people close and demonstrate to them that you too can dare, that you to can think, that you too can have the courage of opinion; the courage not to be right and faultless, because no-one is faultless, humans always make mistakes; but the courage to make the mistake. The courage to make the mistake, though, within a social environment. In an environment of solidarity. Because if I say something wrong here, you will not use it against me. If I say something wrong here, I have trust in you that you will correct me. There is, thus, a basic solidarity, a community, a society, that depends on trust. On trust is embedded the courage to think, the courage to say my opinion, the courage to say something right, the courage to make a mistake. And whatever happens. This is, in a few words, the essence of philosophy.
Then, of course, there are lots of technical topics which, depending on the degree of technicality will require extensive study for a long time. But you do not need to be a specialist to do philosophy. You need to be a specialist to do special topics. What you need to do philosophy is to be honest. Do not fake it. Do not pretend that you know it all but also do not be afraid to make mistakes. And to trust other people, that they will be by your side when you commit an error to tell you about it. And the idea to have other people beside you and to have trust in them at your moments of error is exactly to recognise that you make mistakes. Because when we do not recognise our nature, when we do not recognise our self, when we do not recognise that we can make mistakes, it is then that we will make them, then is when we will not have the natural stop.
[ Others are joining and I say that we are basically done and ready for the open discussion. Then someone suggests I summarise for them to have an idea of where we are. ]
Just to conclude with this. Basically, philosophy has two dimensions. The one dimension is the personal dimension. The person must have the courage to voice an opinion, the courage to think, the courage to do something right, the courage to do something wrong. It also has an interpersonal dimension, a social dimension. Which is the dimension of what we have today at the symposium. Which is that what I will do, to express myself, my opinion, to say what I have in mind, I will tell it to you because I trust you. And, if I say something right, we will agree and elaborate on it, and if I say something wrong you will tell me “hey, you are wrong” and you will help me. And always this happens within the confines of solidarity and trust, the confines of friendship. This is the rationale and this is the idea of “philosophical” and “symposium”, which go together.
And this is what I wanted to basically talk about. We now have an open discussion and can talk about anything you want.