“Those who are wise, do not speak. Those who speak are not wise.”
So says Lao Tzu in the Tao Te Ching. Much respect for it, but we’re gonna go ahead and speak about wisdom anyway. I’m curious to see what you know about various wisdom traditions, what you think wisdom is to begin with, and how to attain it. Is it something to strive for, alongside things like intelligence, virtue, success, happiness, or love? Where do you even learn it? Whom do you know who is wise? Do you even know anybody who is striving to be wise? What does wisdom bring you in life? Or is it all a bunch of subjective bullshit?
Your homework for today is to spend 12 days and 12 nights in a dark cave, alone, to consider the question. If you don’t have a cave, or you don’t have twelve days, try spending five minutes in your browser on an image search for “wisdom quotes”. Hopefully it will have the same effect.
EXISTENTIAL TUESDAYS
Existential Tuesdays are small weekly* lunch discussions in the Nook of the TUD Library. Practice your critical thinking skills, learn to see the world from different perspectives, and hang out with your fellow deep thinkers in Delft.
Interested in other events in the Nook? Sign up for the newsletter to find out what else we’re planning.
* no sessions during exam weeks or study weeks
Explore SG’s and the TUD Library’s related events this quarter on the theme: Language x Power
The stories we tell construct our reality, shaping our minds and the way we see the world, ourselves, and each other. But who wrote these stories, and to what end? Are we telling ourselves tales to liberate or dominate, to hope or despair? Can we tell those stories differently? And if so, what would we change?
11 Feb 12:45 | Existential Tuesday: What is language? @ TUD Library, the Nook
18 Feb 12:45 | Existential Tuesday: What would life look like in a scientific dictatorship? @TUD Library, the Nook
25 Feb 12:45 | Existential Tuesday: How do you become wise? @ TUD Library, the Nook
27 Feb – 27 May | Exhibition ‘In the Beginning was the’ @ TUD Library Hall
27 Feb 16:00 | Exhibition Opening Reception
3 March 20:30u | SG’s Critical Mass: Kolonialisme en taal: wie claimt het verhaal? @ Theater de Veste (in Dutch)
4 March 12:45 | Existential Tuesday: What is our culture’s grand narrative? @ TUD Library, the Nook
11 March 12:45 | Existential Tuesday: A workshop in paradoxical logic @ TUD Library, the Nook
13 March 16:30-18:30 | Politics of the Unsaid | Negation x Writing Workshop @ TUD Library
18 March 12:45 | Existential Tuesday: How do you manipulate people with words? @ TUD Library, the Nook
20 March 19:00 | Documentary Film night | The Mindscape of Alan Moore | VOX Film Club @ TUD Library
29 March SG’s festival For Love of the World @ Theater de Veste
