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January 9, 1999
THINK TANK
Very Espresso Philosophy
By PAUL APPLEBOME
Is there a future in America for the café-philo, the philosophical discussion
sessions in public cafes that have become the rage in France? Judging from the one Bernard
Roy moderates at the cozy Le Poème bistro at Prince and Elizabeth Streets in Little
Italy, the answer has to be a Kierkegaardian "Maybe."
Roy, a philosophy professor at Baruch College, has clearly reached critical mass for his
sessions, which began in September and drew more than 20 participants on Thursday for the
topic "Is There a Value in Excess?" But the colloquy, which turned on the two
touchstones of Nietzsche and football, at times raised another question: Is America now so
divided that any discussion immediately devolves to something akin to the House of
Representatives with everyone launching arguments like cruise missles?
The current wave of cafés-philo began in France in 1992 when Marc Sautet, a Nietzsche
scholar, inaugurated sessions on philosophical issues at the Café des Phares on the Place
de la Bastille. Cafés-philo began cropping up across France and in other European cities.
There are now some 200 cafés-philo in France.
Roy, a 54-year-old native of Paris who has lived in New York since 1969, decided to start
one here.
It regularly draws a diverse group, including students, a bioethicist, a retired
accountant and others who sit around a long wood table over couscous, split pea soup and
French bread.
Louis Marinoff, a philosphy professor at City College, runs another one at a nearby Barnes
& Noble, but Roy feels a gathering over food and drink in a cafe is more
receptive to the populist instincts of the café-philo than one in a bookstore. Outside of
New York and San Francisco, he said, the café-philo in the United States might prosper
best in shopping malls ("the American agora").
To get his thinkers thinking about excess, Roy distributed a sheet with quotes from
the Bhagavad Gita, Plato, Aristotle and Mo-Tzu, the Chinese philosopher, along with
Hammacher Schlemmer catalogues and a recipe for Omelette Louis XV for 12 (24 ortolans, 18
pheasant eggs, 6 whole black truffles . . .)
No one quite agreed on what excess is, but the discussion careered along nonetheless. Are
the virtues of the mind inherently loftier than the virtues of the body? Is a consensual
communal orgy valuable excess, or is it inherently laden with dark gender issues? Is Elvis
Presley serious art? Can Dvorak compare to Mozart?
Most of the thought played out on the comfortable axis of acceptable New York liberalism,
with a fur-clad veteran of a Tibetan monastery setting much of the tone for the discussion
with denunciations of capitalism, consumerism and particularly the herd instincts that
drive people to sports events -- "circuses," she shuddered, "where people
think they're having a good time, but are they really having a good time or are they just
salivating when they're told to salivate?"
Her foil turned out to be Jason L. Smilovic, a 24 - year-old networking consultant who was
favorably disposed toward football, Bruce Willis's life style and other heresies so
extreme that one woman began looking at him as if he were a yak with two heads.
"Where did you go to school?" she asked at one point. "These arguments are
so -- I can't even think of the word. You are such an apologist for the status quo, it's
unbelievable."
After a few minutes of further squabbling, others objected to the ad hominem turn of the
discussion, and it drifted back toward broader questions about excess, consumer culture,
elevator music and Nietzsche, who led Herbert Marcuse, John Stuart Mill and Aristotle by
far as the most frequently cited philosopher.
Things ended with relative comity, though Smilovic, a first-time philosopher, still felt a
bit beleaguered.
"I thought some people had fair and just opinions and other people were just immersed
in elitist snobbery," he said.
Still, most of the participants found the session a good one overall and the excesses par
for the course. "It's just one of the hazards of the business," said Will Fisk,
the bioethicist.
Even Smilovic seemed to think so. He figures he'll be back again, perhaps on Jan. 21 for
the next session, on "The Selfishness or Unselfishness of Sympathy."
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CAFÉ PHILOSOPHERS
Saturday, May 9, 1998
 o the Editor:
" Thought for Food: Cafes Offer Philosophy in
France" (Arts and Ideas, May 2) quotes Pascal Hardy, one of the founders of the cafe
philosophy movement, as saying that he demurs at the suggestion that philosophy, like
science, religion or psychoanalysis, could be construed as a "refuge" because
philosophy is about "doubt" and "questioning."
But clearly doubt and questioning
are not exclusive features of philosophy; science, religion and psychoanalysis also doubt
and question plenty.
That which makes all disiplines,
including philosophy, good candidates for refugedom is the trust that each devotee
develops for the respective methodologies.
Methodology is the more or less permanent
scaffolding each discipline erects to make ongoing necessary repairs.
BERNARD R. ROY
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ARE CLINTON' S AIDES SO INNOCENT ?
Tuesday, September 22, 1998
o the Editor:
You suggest
(news article, Sept. 17) that President Clinton might choose pastoral counselling over
psychological counselling because for many politicians, the latter is the "ultimate
taboo." Yet both alternatives seem to be misguided because they place the
President, or any potential counselee, on the defensive.
In counseling,
there is another alternative that Mr. Clinton ought to consider: philosophical counseling.
Philosophical counselors do not begin with the assumption that a right or wrong has been
committed but with an analysis of the various beliefs that underlie the individual' s
actions. The process plumbs intellectual rather than emotional or confessional depths.
BERNARD R. ROY
New York, Sept.17, 1998
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CAN DOLE PROPOSAL TRASCEND PARTY?
Thursday, December 17, 1998
o the Editor:
Bob Dole is most likely right in conjecturing
that no one believes "the required 67 Senators would vote to convict the
President" (Op-Ed, Dec. 15). Why, then, go through with the costly and all-consuming
process of impeachment?
Would a district attorney, knowing that he had no
chance of winning a trial, indict a suspected wrongdoer? Not unless he had some ulterior
motive.
My guess is that the House majority hopes that the
President, fearing the embarrassment of being held responsible for paralyzing the
Government, will resign. If, however, the President calls Republicans' bluff on this, it
remains to be seen who will be blamed for paralyzing the Government. Regardless, it is
wishful thinking to hope that President Clinton will resign or that he'll agree to the
joint resolution suggested by Bob Dole.
BERNARD ROY
New York, Dec. 16, 1998
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A BIT OF HYPOCRISY MAKRS THE POLITICIAN
Feb. 6, 2001
o the Editor:
Alan Ehrenhalt ("Hypocrisy Has Its Virtues," Op-Ed, Feb. 6) astutely notes that
the moral standards that our society champions are more awe-inspiring than practicable.
Hence we all occasionally fall victim to moral weakness, but that's nothing to worry too
much about because moral weakness has not prevented certain individuals from making
lasting contributions to society.
Mr. Ehrenhalt's call for tolerance is kind and honest, and ought not to be seen as a
harbinger of cynicism. If we are candid about moral weakness when we teach moral values to
our children, the vulnerability we convey says more about honesty than all the commands we
may give them to tell the truth.
BERNARD ROY
Bronxville, N.Y., Feb. 6, 2001
(To read the original New York Times contributions you must register with the NYT site
for free
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GHOSTS OF VIETNAM, BACK ON THE AMERICAN STAGE
April 27, 2001
o the Editor:
Re "Ex-Senator Kerrey Says Raid He Led in '69 Killed Civilians" (front page,
April 26):
Bob Kerrey's confession raises two issues that ought to be kept separate. One asks whether
or not the standards of morality that inform our behavior in peacetime can be expected to
be operative in combat. The other issue asks whether or not the recollections of those who
were present on that dreadful night in Thanh Phong, Vietnam, can be relied upon.
My position on the first issue is that if morality has anything to do with rationality,
clearly, active war combat, being madness, gives combatants a temporary moral exemption.
As to the second issue, we have ample evidence that eyewitness testimonies of traumatic
experiences often conflict. If the truth in this case is desirable, the eyewitnesses or
participants who examine their memories will have the truth revealed to them. It will then
be up to them to decide whether or not to go public with it.
BERNARD ROY
Bronxville, N.Y., April 26, 2001
The writer is a guest faculty member in philosophy,
Sarah Lawrence College
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31 December 2005
From Today's New York Times
o the Editor:
I wonder whether Timothy D. Wilson should heed his own advice ("Don't Think Twice, It's All Right," Op-Ed, Dec. 29).
Is he not, after all, reflecting on reflection?
Is this reflection, according to the studies he cites, likely to have "little benefit"?
I fear that his advice may have the undesired consequence of churning out a society of automatons.
Aristotle,
whom he mentions, emphasized bodily activity, but each activity
required an accompanying activity of the mind if it was to have any
value in the building of an individual's character.
Bernard Roy
New York, Dec. 29, 2005
The writer is an assistant professor of philosophy at Ramapo College of New Jersey.
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