TH-001 to TH-012
Twelve thinkers
Hover or focus any card to see the modern connection. The thinker is on the front; our reading is underneath.
Showing 11 of 11
TH-001 · The Questioner
Socrates
Do you actually know what you think you know?
c. 470 – 399 BCE
A modern reading
Self-awareness, critical thinking and the habit of asking who benefits from what everyone assumes.
TH-002 · The Idealist
Plato
What if the world you see is a copy of something truer?
c. 428 – 348 BCE
A modern reading
Social media, appearances and perception: the gap between how things look and how things are.
TH-003 · The Observer
Aristotle
Is a good life something you do, or something you become?
384 – 322 BCE
A modern reading
Habits, character and the difference between being busy and living well.
TH-004 · The Doubter
René Descartes
What is left once you doubt everything you can?
1596 – 1650
A modern reading
Consciousness, machines that think, and what it would take to be certain of anything.
TH-005 · The Moral Architect
Immanuel Kant
Could everyone do what you are about to do?
1724 – 1804
A modern reading
AI ethics, responsibility, autonomy and what it takes to make a decision morally one's own.
TH-006 · The Dialectician
G. W. F. Hegel
What if disagreement is how ideas grow up?
1770 – 1831
A modern reading
Conflict, social change and recognition: how we become who we are through other people.
More minds
TH-008 · The Challenger
Friedrich Nietzsche
Are your values really yours?
1844 – 1900
A modern reading
Individuality, conformity and purpose: whose definition of success are you following?
TH-009 · The Free Man
Jean-Paul Sartre
What do you do with a freedom you did not ask for?
1905 – 1980
A modern reading
Freedom, responsibility and the roles we hide behind.
TH-010 · The Situated Self
Simone de Beauvoir
How much of who you are was made for you?
1908 – 1986
A modern reading
Gender, social roles and what we owe each other's freedom.
TH-011 · The Rebel
Albert Camus
If nothing is guaranteed, why go on?
1913 – 1960
A modern reading
Burnout, meaning and finding a reason to continue without a promise of an ending.
TH-012 · The Archaeologist of Power
Michel Foucault
Who decided what counts as normal?
1926 – 1984
A modern reading
Surveillance, data, norms and the ways we police ourselves.