Let’s stop – just for a moment – let’s stop pretending that being alive is normal, and that it’s natural to progress from childhood to a working life, raising children, paying taxes, and going to your grave at some unscheduled and highly inopportune moment. Instead, let’s take a look at the deeper drives that guide our choices; the desires that shape our destiny.
Perhaps you want happiness? To be loved? A moderate share of power? Fame? To make an impact, and leave the world a slightly better place than you found it? Or perhaps you have no idea at all?
The question “Do you know what you really want in life?” is a deeply personal question, but today we’re going to make it philosophical too. After all, how can you know what you really want? Is there some cognitive method for that? What is desire, and can it exist free from social pressures, biology, and circumstance? Does life simply overcome us, or do we decide what we want?
Let’s see if we can find some answers. Just for a moment, during lunch break this Tuesday.
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.
Join us for a deep dive into the non-rational. Check out our upcoming programme here.
April 30th – Existential Tuesday – Have you ever had an independent thought? – the Nook, TUD Library
May 14th – Existential Tuesday – Is everything somehow alive? – the Nook, TUD Library
May 21st – Existential Tuesday – Can you control your feelings with your thoughts? – the Nook, TUD Library
May 28th – Existential Tuesday – (How) Do you know what you really want in life? – the Nook, TUD Library
June 5th – VOX Book Club – We, by Yevgeny Zamyatin – the Nook, TUD Library
June 10th – SG Café Het buikgevoel (in Dutch) – Theater de Veste
