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The thinking place: Dr. Todd
May (inset) will deliver a talk
on “Decency in an Indecent
Place” at the Brooklyn Public
Library’s third annual “Night of
Philosophy and Ideas” on Feb.
2, which attracts hundreds of
visitors each year. Todd May
A decent proposal
Philosopher talks goodness at all-night idea festival
COURIER LIFE, J 24-7 AN. 25-31, 2019 45
By Julianne McShane Call him the voice of reason.
How can you be a good person
when it feels like you’re in the
Bad Place? The philosophy consultant
behind the NBC afterlife comedy “The
Good Place” will reveal the answer at
an all-night celebration of big ideas at
the Brooklyn Public Library’s Central
Branch on Feb. 2. His lecture “Decency
in an Indecent Place” can also apply to
our most fraught political debates, said
the author and academic.
“How do we look across at people
that we don’t necessarily agree with?
If we bring decency to the table, that
actually helps make things a little less
polarizing,” said Dr. Todd May, who
also teaches philosophy at Clemson
University in South Carolina.
May will deliver his 30-minute talk
at 11 pm, during the library’s free, thirdannual
“Night of Philosophy and Ideas,”
a 12-hour philosophy fest that will feature
dozens of discussions, lectures, and
performances between 7 pm on Feb. 2
and 7 am the following morning.
The scribe’s lecture will cover ideas
that he examines in more depth in his
upcoming — and 15th — book, “A
Decent Life: Morality for the Rest of
Us,” which argues that empathy and
awareness can create more compassionate
and fulfilling relationships, he said.
“The fundamental recognition behind
decency is that other people have lives to
live — they want their lives to be meaningful,
they’re probably afraid of death,
they have periods of loneliness — and
that that recognition can motivate us
towards a sense of treating other people
as if they actually are people,” he said.
May said the main character in “The
Good Place” — a woman working to
become a better person to justify her
cushy spot in the afterlife — illustrates
the idea that connecting with others can
help make us better people.
“One of the lessons of the show is
opening ourselves to the humanity of
others can have this cyclical effect, so
that as we see that humanity, that allows
us to become a little bit better than we
were,” he said.
In addition to May’s lecture, the
night will also feature a keynote address
on “defeating tribalism” by the New
York Times Magazine’s “Ethicist” columnist,
Dr. Kwame Anthony Appiah,
at 7 pm; a puppet show featuring the
figures of Noam Chomsky and Karl
Marx, at 10 pm and 2 am; free coffee
from Nespresso, and a French poetry
reading delivered directly into the ears
of audience members, among many
other events.
“A Night of Philosophy and Ideas” at
the Brooklyn Public Library’s Central
Branch 10 Grand Army Plaza at Eastern
Parkway in Prospect Heights, (718) 230–
2100, www.bklynlibrary.org. Feb. 2 at 7
pm to Feb. 3 at 7 am. Free.
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