Being Pragmatic Versus Being Practical About Responsibility -- Online

To all who RSVP, I will send the link to the online meeting (and its password) about roughly, maybe 10 minutes before the event.

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Following the meeting last time, https://www.meetup.com/The-San-Diego-Philosophers-Roundtable/events/270869354/ let us next discuss some theories concerning responsibility.

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Everybody knows what responsibility is, right? So why talk about an obvious idea? Everybody knows, too, that our society has been suffering from systematic irresponsibility, and we re seeing that consequence all around us, especially now, right? So why bring up the obvious prescription? Well, maybe there is something more to discover about what responsibility and why it isn t so obvious to be responsible.

However old you are as an adult, ask yourself this question: What do I want my life ideally to be?
And given the state of the world where you live, ask next: How likely--honestly--will that life be realized?

Whatever answer you come up with to the second question will hinge ultimately on your notion of responsibility. There are many such notions, but we can group them into two broad theories.

One way to state the problem is, it is easier to be pragmatic about responsibility than it is to be practical about responsibility.

Another way to state the same thing is, the conventional approach to responsibility is not practical because it is pragmatic.

What does it mean to be practical? What does it mean to be responsible in a practical way? And why is this practical way not the same as the conventional approach to responsibility?

These are the questions that flow from last week s meeting on "Commitment to Beauty" [masked]).

To help latecomers, here is the philosophical trail we ve been following:

1. Given some guideline for living the good life in the right way, what steps can a person take to turn that guideline into a sort of second nature for quick acting?
2. What conscious decisions can the person take to make a beautiful life?
3. With decisions made or still in the making, what obstacles are there to overcome?
4. Beyond overcoming obstacles as means thereto, why are commitments necessary to a life, especially to a life of beauty?
5. And commitment leads to responsibility.

But talk is cheap. Life is about action. What matters next is, will my actions really get me there?

From popular culture, we get these related ideas floating about:
1. With great power comes great responsibility. (Uncle Ben, in Spider-Man comics)
2. With privilege comes responsibility. (Concerning white privilege, and #BlackLivesMatter, https://www.huffpost.com/entry/with-great-privilege-come_b_10873228 )
3. With wealth, there s noblesse oblige (Concerning social responsibility)
4. Respect, self-respect, and responsibility go together. (Concerning morals and appraisals)

What say you about being responsible in a practical way?

[Pic: A depiction of self-responsibility (as cropped from a blog https://sandysjourneytolife.wordpress.com/2014/04/12/day-268-how-can-you-stop-blaming-and-start-taking-responsibility/ ]

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Are you living, or does life happen to you? Answering the question cannot help but to bring in one s philosophy (Jan. 6, 2019 (https://www.meetup.com/The-San-Diego-Philosophers-Roundtable/events/zjdxnqyzcbjb/)).

This meeting is for anyone to report on his findings in practicing philosophy. What applications of the general science have (or haven t) worked? What impractical consequences have resulted from errors? What further inquiries need to be done from the discovered implications? Share your evaluation of the practices in relation to that work-in-progress that is your life.

Post the topics you want to discuss in the comments section.