Series
Three short lectures on what it means to live a whole human life.
Why be a philosopher at all? What does it mean to think on purpose, to keep a pure heart, and to treat the body as something that forms you? A compact mini-series that sets up the whole project.
Start with
41:20Standing in front of a painting of Plato's cave, Dr. Firestone asks 'Who am I and who should I become?' and answers by tracing his own path from Trinity and Hong Kong to a PhD in Scotland, arguing that what matters most in life (love, justice, truth, courage) cannot be seen with the naked eye, and that aspirational goals require mentors.
Lecture-style series build on themselves. Numbered so you can follow the thread.
41:20Standing in front of a painting of Plato's cave, Dr. Firestone asks 'Who am I and who should I become?' and answers by tracing his own path from Trinity and Hong Kong to a PhD in Scotland, arguing that what matters most in life (love, justice, truth, courage) cannot be seen with the naked eye, and that aspirational goals require mentors.
44:03Using a queen-sacrifice chess game and a nearly missed Amtrak train as case studies, Dr. Firestone contrasts autopilot living with intentional, conscious thought and introduces analytic versus synthetic (contextual) logic as tools for turning routine moments into meaningful ones.
47:00Asking whether a pure heart is always a good thing, Dr. Firestone tells stories of refusing a bribe at a Chicago chess tournament, frozen brakes in Hot Springs, and a stranded attempt to surprise his wife, arguing that moral philosophy is rooted in lived moral experience and that grace shown to others tends to come back around.
51:47Closing the mini-series, Dr. Firestone argues from the blended biblical and Greco-Roman view of the person that sports and fitness are formational, recounting how basketball took him from college courts to the streets of Hong Kong and a game against the People's Liberation Army, and how mountain biking shaped his years in Arkansas.
7 episodesA Kant scholar on why he joined Turning Point, and what Charlie Kirk got right.
5 episodesKierkegaard on risk, Aristotle on courage, and what to do when life becomes unlivable.
5 episodesA five-part walk through the Meditations, 25 minutes at a time.
