Marginalia: Daily Philosophy

One philosophy question every morning. Pick a side, then see who stood with you: the thinkers who argued each answer, and how professional philosophers voted when the PhilPapers Survey asked the same thing. Would you pull the lever to save five? Can you know the sun will rise tomorrow? If your next decision is already settled, are you still to blame for it? There are 365 questions, one for each day of the year. Each comes from a real text by Plato, Zhuangzi, Hume, Kant, Simone de Beauvoir, Derek Parfit or one of more than 200 other thinkers. Under your answer you get both sides in a line or two, the survey numbers where they exist, and the idea behind the case in a few short paragraphs. In the evening a second question brings it back to your own day, and you can write down your answer. Your answers place you on five lines: duty or outcomes, reason or experience, fate or freedom, virtue…