Danielle Sands/ Anatasia Scrutton/ Tom Stern
Listen to the recording here
The ‘most depressing lesson’ of suffering, Slavoj Žižek writes, is that ‘there is nothing to be learned from it’. Is Žižek’s bleak view convincing, or is there evidence to suggest that suffering can educate or even improve us? If so, do some types of physical or mental suffering have more value than others? What is it that we learn? Does suggesting that suffering has meaning or value validate or demean the experience of suffering?
Speakers
Danielle Sands
Lecturer in Comparative Literature and Culture, Royal Holloway, University of London, and Forum for European Philosophy Fellow
Anastasia Scrutton
Associate Professor in Philosophy and Religion, University of Leeds
Tom Stern
Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, University College London
Chair
Peter Dennis
Fellow, Department of Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method, LSE & Fellow, Forum for Philosophy
Recorded on 24 October 2016 at the LSE
