What we’re about
Welcome to the Toronto Philosophy Meetup! This is a community (online and in-person) for anyone interested in philosophy, including newcomers to the subject. We host discussions, talks, reading groups, pub nights, debates, and other events on an inclusive range of topics and perspectives in philosophy, drawing from an array of materials (e.g. philosophical writings, for the most part, but also movies, literature, history, science, art, podcasts, poetry, current events, ethnographies, and whatever else seems good.)
Anyone is welcomed to host philosophy-related events here. We also welcome speakers and collaborations with other groups.
Join us at an event soon for friendship, cooperative discourse, and mental exercise!
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Feel free to propose meetup topics (you can do this on the Message Boards), and please contact us if you would like to be a speaker or host an event.
(NOTE: Most of our events are currently online because of the pandemic.)
"Philosophy is not a theory but an activity."
— from "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus", Wittgenstein
"Discourse cheers us to companionable
reflection. Such reflection neither
parades polemical opinions nor does it
tolerate complaisant agreement. The sail
of thinking keeps trimmed hard to the
wind of the matter."
— from "On the Experience of Thinking", Heidegger
See here for an extensive list of podcasts and resources on the internet about philosophy.
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See here for a list of other philosophy-related groups to check out in the Toronto area.
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Since 2016, the Toronto Philosophy Meetup has been holding regular events that are free, open to the public, and help to foster community and a culture of philosophy in Toronto and beyond. To help us continue to do so into the future, please consider supporting us with a donation! Any amount is most welcome.
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Featured event
Classical Chinese Poetry: The Book of Songs / 詩經 (1046–771 BC)
The 詩經 or Shijing (alternately known as the "Classic of Poetry", "The Book of Songs", and other names) is the oldest collection of poetry in world literature and a cornerstone of Chinese cultural heritage. Compiled between the 11th and 6th centuries BC, it preserves 305 poems that capture the voices of early Zhou society — from folk songs sung in villages to ceremonial hymns performed at ancestral rites and political odes composed for rulers. Centuries later, the Shijing would become central to Confucian philosophy and re-interpreted (many would argue mis-interpreted) as a guide to moral cultivation, social order, and ritual propriety.
The collection's verses — simple yet profound — cover themes of daily life, love, family, longing, work, nature, and politics, offering insight into both the inner lives of common people and the ideals of rulers. It has deeply influenced Chinese literature, philosophy, culture, and aesthetics for over three millennia.
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This is a series of meetups to discuss the rich tradition of classical Chinese poetry. At this third meetup (Oct 12), we'll continue live reading selections from the 詩經 or The Book of Songs, a collection of poetry dated to 1046–771 BC from the cultural region of the Zhou Dynasty. If there's a poem from the collection you'll like us to discuss at this meetup, please let us know in the comments!
Various translations of the Book of Songs we'll be using for our reading and discussion:
- The classic mid-20th century English translation by Arthur Waley can be viewed here. Possibly still the best one in its combination of readability and fidelity to the original text.
- The complete Chinese text with a classic 19th century translation by James Legge is available through the Chinese Text Project — you can get character-by-character translations of the Chinese by clicking on the blue arrows by each stanza and then hovering your cursor over individual characters.
- A brand new 2025 translation by Edward Shaughnessy published by the Chinese University of Hong Kong is here. While new, I don't think it's necessarily better than the Waley or Legge, just different, and it's always nice to have another rendering to compare with. Shaughnessy also includes interpretive prologues to each poem which were interpolated by later Confucian scholars but which were NOT part of the original. (I suggest NOT reading the prologues until after thinking through the poetry for yourself.)
- You can also copy the Chinese text into ChatGPT and ask it for a character-by-character translation which can be helpful and efficient for interpretive issues (better yet if you tell the A.I. to translate it from the "ancient Chinese" since the meanings of Chinese characters have shifted and evolved over the last 3000 years). If you're really serious about studying ancient Chinese texts though you need Paul Kroll's Student's Dictionary of Classical and Medieval Chinese.
We previously discussed the selections from Michael Fuller's An Introduction to Chinese Poetry: From the Canon of Poetry to the Lyrics of the Song Dynasty (2018, Harvard University Press) which includes multiple translations of each poem. We'll return to this text when we're done with the Shijing.
Upcoming events
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•OnlineHegel's Science of Logic (Chapter 1: Being)
OnlineThe agenda for this meeting is the same as last week, only the 4th remark should also be read. At this meeting we'll be discussing primarily "Remark 3: The Isolating of These Abstractions", which begins on page 93, and perhaps also "Remark 4: Incomprehensibility of the Beginning", which begins on page 103.
Also, for those who are interested, at the end of the meeting we'll be talking about Stephen Houlgate's On Being: Quality and the Birth of Quantity in Hegel's 'Science of Logic' , Vol. 1. I think reading the first 3 sections of Part One, up to page 58, should be sufficient. It is available here (link).
During the meetings we'll be using the Miller translation. The pdf of the Miller can be found here (link).Hegel's Science of Logic (1812–1816) is a landmark in German idealism and a radical rethinking of logic as the living structure of reality itself. Rather than treating logic as a neutral tool or set of rules, Hegel presents it as the dynamic structure of reality and self-consciousness. He develops a system of dialectical reasoning in which concepts evolve through contradictions and their resolutions. In contrast to his early collaborator and philosophical rival Friedrich Schelling, who emphasized the role of intuition and nature in the Absolute, Hegel insists that pure thought — developed immanently from itself — is the true foundation of metaphysics. The work is divided into three major parts: Being, Essence, and Concept (or Notion), each tracing the development of increasingly complex categories of thought. For Hegel, logic is not abstract or static; it is the unfolding of the Absolute, the rational core of existence.
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This is a discussion group for Hegel's Science of Logic. We have read several of Friedrich Schelling's works, including Philosophical Investigations into the Essence of Human Freedom (1809), Ages of the World (c. 1815), and the Historical-Critical Introduction to the Philosophy of Mythology (1845), Anyone with an interest in philosophy is free to join in the meetings.
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23 attendees
Past events
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