Search

My five-year old daughter lied to me. I’m quite used to her lying, because she lies to me in a funny way many times: “Daddy, I won’t annoy you any longer, I promise” while jumping on my stomach once again, I reply “Stop it, don’t do it again, It hurts”, but I expect and want her to do it again. This time, it was different.

Morning. Our living room full of small pieces of paper. Mess! Me: “Who did it?!” Daughter: “It was Franta”. I rebuked my two-year old son for making such a mess. I cleaned up the mess. My daughter was watching.

In times of crisis, such as the times we are struggling to endure now, one can easily see the need for quick problem solving. When the pot breaks, we reach for glue. When one’s car breaks down, one calls a workshop. In a pandemic crisis, we need Medicine (the discourse as whole) to respond. Quickly. We need vaccines, ways of treating and combatting the virus. We need all the doctors, nurses, janitors and cleaners we can find. And we need to rely on the experts. Suddenly, we see them. Sanitizers, nurses, researchers.

The measures taken by the Czech government to try to curb the spread of the coronavirus also affect the activities here at the Centre for Ethics. For example, we are now not able to meet each other physically, and web-based alternatives replace our seminars. If someone would want a proof that thinking is not a mental activity, or that thinking is not done by the brain, this is it: the physical presence of others is important in philosophical thinking, and nothing else can fully substitute it.