“The unexamined life is not worth living,” allegedly declared Socrates while he was on trial for corrupting the Grecian youth. While it appears that through its endless chatter modern culture constantly examines life, its motivation seems to have nothing to do with the pure and unconditional love of wisdom, or how the ancient greeks called it: philosophy.
In an attempt to familiarize the general public with the oldest of the sciences, one unlikely duo—a Hollywood actor and a professor of philosophy, James Franco and Eliot Michaelson respectively—has launched a YouTube series called Philosophy Time.
In four published episodes so far, the hosts share 6-minute-long fragments of their conversations with fellow academics on topics like language, beauty and the ethics of abortion. Amongst the academics are Elisabeth Camp, philosophy professor at Rutgers University, who discusses the utility of metaphors and different types of imagination in helping us create a shared human experience.
In another clip, Elizabeth Harman, a professor of Philosophy at Princeton University with a special interest in morality, explains her views on the moral status of a fetus.
Andy Egan, also a professor of philosophy at Rutgers, tries to explain the concept of beauty by feeding Franco and Michaelson a lime after shutting down their sour receptors with “miracle fruit”.
Philosophy Time was conceived years ago when Franco and Michaelson, who met as a student and professor and became friends afterwards, wanted to work on something together. While many know James Franco as an A-list Hollywood actor, he is increasingly known for his writing, poetry, painting and music and being a kind of an academic junkie. Everyone wants to crack open his productivity secrets, because he has somehow…
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