Just saw [Astra Taylor's](http://www.zeitgeistfilms.com/film.php?directoryname=examinedlife&mode=filmmaker) newest documentary [Examined Life](http://www.zeitgeistfilms.com/examinedlife/), and man. Feeling the vindication. For going to grad school to study philosophy, and for liking to waste my free time thinking about ethics and art. Amazing film.
Taylor manages to humanize some of the most renowned philosophers of our day, by taking them out of both the written and academic contexts where we find them so opaque, and interviewing them on the streets, in environments that have meaning to them. The result is incredible: you’re able to get a much more personal and grounded vision of the philosophers’ theories, as well as a palpable sense that these ideas do in fact come from *embodied human beings thinking about the meaning of life*. Even in grad school, when I studied with or closely read these peoples’ books on a daily basis, I didn’t often feel like the ideas had a weighty reality to them. Taylor’s job is helping philosophers shed their ivory tower bad rep.
One of the dominant themes in the film, which each of the interviewees hit on in his/her own way, is the idea that there is value in what’s ugly in the world. Suffering, garbage, immorality–Cornel West summed it up in a great talk about why Romanticism (in his rendering, the idea we should all strive for what’s ideal) doesn’t cut it. He hits hard on the notion that people with the “right idea” start with a respect for imperfection–and try to focus on how we do beautiful things despite nastiness in the world.
The lineup includes some zingers: [Cornel West](http://www.cornelwest.com/), [Martha Nussbaum](http://www.law.uchicago.edu/faculty/nussbaum/), [Peter Singer](http://www.princeton.edu/~psinger/), [Slavoj Zizek](http://www.egs.edu/faculty/zizek.html), [Judith Butler](http://rhetoric.berkeley.edu/faculty_bios/judith_butler.html), [Avital Ronell](http://www.cddc.vt.edu/feminism/Ronell.html), [Sunaura Taylor](http://www.sunaurataylor.org/), [Michael Hardt](http://fds.duke.edu/db/aas/Literature/faculty/hardt), [K. Anthony Appiah](http://www.appiah.net/). They perform beautifully. I’m particularly fond of Appiah’s discussion of [cosmopolitanism](http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/cosmopolitanism/), which you can get a sense of by listening to this [interview with him](http://cdn3.libsyn.com/philosophybites/Appiah1MixSes.MP3?nvb=20090430205902&nva=20090501210902&t=0504f803400216504f5fe).
Astra Taylor’s eye is subtle, caring, and smart. It’s rare to leave a discussion of philosophy lead by philosophers feeling relaxed and more human, but she leads us (and her subjects) gracefully in that direction. I’ve found myself a new muse. Can’t wait to see her [other films](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2025391/).
