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Known as a Socrates Cafe, the group at El Diablo is just one of 150 or so that meet in coffee shops, bookstores, libraries, churches and community centers across the country. Founded by Christopher Phillips, a former journalist and teacher, the cafes are designed to get people talking about philosophical issues. Using a kind of Socratic method, they encourage people to develop their views by posing questions, being open to challenges and considering alternative answers. Adhering to Socrates' belief that the unexamined life is not worth living, the cafes focus on exchanging ideas, not using them to pummel other participants...
...about much more than good conversation. "It's grass-roots democracy," he says. "It's only in a group setting that people can hash out their ideas about how we should act not just as an individual but as a society." To avoid divisive dead-end arguments, the cafes frequently turn current events into broader philosophical questions. For example, rather than asking whether the U.S. and its allies should have invaded Iraq, a group asked, "What is a just war?" Instead of arguing about whether gay couples should marry, another cafe asked, "What is an excellent marriage...
After quitting work as a free-lance writer, Phillips held his first Socrates Cafe at a Borders bookstore in Wayne, N.J., in the summer of 1996. Within a month, he met a woman named Cecilia, who was the only person to show up at one meeting. "We held a dialogue on the question What is love? and fell in love," he says. Married in 1998, the couple put their belongings in storage four years ago, and now travel year-round promoting Phillips' books and helping form new groups around the country. His first two books, Socrates Cafe (Norton; 224 pages...
...mood, tone and topic of discussion for each cafe vary greatly, depending on the participants. Typically, the topic is decided by group vote, and anyone can suggest an idea. At El Diablo, the mostly middle-aged crowd (ages 25 to 66), clad in earth tones and comfortable shoes, settled on a tough one: Do nation-states with greater power have a greater responsibility to act ethically? "Is any act that a nation makes in its own self-interest ever moral?" asked Matt Waller, 40, a technical writer. "I say no." "Well, what's the nature of self-interest?" retorts housepainter...
...York City Socrates Cafe, held inside the large glass atrium at Sony Plaza in midtown Manhattan, the dialogue takes on a decidedly bookish tone. The seven men and one woman huddled around a marble-topped table on a stormy night settled on a question inspired by the writer Ayn Rand. "Can you objectively infer an ethical principle?" asks Al Ostroff, 76, an artist and writer. "Kant would emphatically say yes," replies Evan Sinclair, 53, who works in marketing. "Plato would think differently," counters Larry Hui, 43, an attorney...