Some of my understanding of what philosophy and ethics is has changed very slowly. One thing that has changed is this for quite a long time I bought-into the idea that philosophy is basically about arguments. I'm increasingly of the view that it isn't. The most interesting things in philosophy aren't arguments. The thing that I think is underestimated is what I call a form of attending. I think that philosophy is at least as much about carefully attending to things as it is about the structure of arguments.

The idea that there is a sharp boundary between our true, inner selves and the outside world is pervasive, but highly questionable. The boundaries of the self might well be more porous than we ordinarily think.

Metaphorical tone deafness is when people are unable to discern what is of value in something. I think I'm tone deaf to poetry, for instance. Despite having studied it into a second year of university, most of it just leaves me cold.

To become a stoic is to endorse the truthfulness of its world view and accept its prescription for how you ought to live, not just to like how it makes you feel.

I think that a lot of social movements, political movements, powerful ones - certainly they form, collectively, an idea of the truth which becomes hard to question. It becomes a dogma, and from the inside it starts to look like common sense.

If we now find ourselves looking down on the cheap and convenient, it is only because we now have better things which are affordable.

The very act of questioning whether you exist proves you do, because you must be there for the doubt to be entertained in the first place.