Robbie: Created page with "; ''Learn liberally?'' : Yes, as a free, autonomous person, using your own judgment, making your own choices, thinking for yourself in the company of others. ; ''What company?'' : What else but the company of others who also learn liberally, looking on their lives and lifeworld from within, speaking as they see fit? We learn liberally in a community of peers, all of whom learn liberally in interaction with one another. ; ''Where do I find such company?'' : Don't look for..."

2026-05-05T15:56:27Z

Created page with "; ''Learn liberally?'' : Yes, as a free, autonomous person, using your own judgment, making your own choices, thinking for yourself in the company of others. ; ''What company?'' : What else but the company of others who also learn liberally, looking on their lives and lifeworld from within, speaking as they see fit? We learn liberally in a community of peers, all of whom learn liberally in interaction with one another. ; ''Where do I find such company?'' : Don't look for..."

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; ''Learn liberally?''
: Yes, as a free, autonomous person, using your own judgment, making your own choices, thinking for yourself in the company of others.
; ''What company?''
: What else but the company of others who also learn liberally, looking on their lives and lifeworld from within, speaking as they see fit? We learn liberally in a community of peers, all of whom learn liberally in interaction with one another.
; ''Where do I find such company?''
: Don't look for it ready-made. The admissions office won't recruit it. You learn liberally by learning liberally, making choices, using your judgment, selecting a company of peers — "my exemplars who learn liberally" — and interacting with them autonomously, thinking for yourself, with them, in your unique lifeworld.
; ''How should I select and interact with these peers?''
: That's what we try here to figure out, by(?) — that's right — by learning liberally, by working together to disclose our respective answers to these questions.
; ''Wait! Aren't we spinning in circles!''
: Indeed, '''like a wheel'''. To move, it begins to turn, and keeps turning, round and round. Begin to turn. Think of that old cliché, "learn by doing." How can it start? Not with a lesson learned, but with an act, a doing. To learn by doing one must do, then one may learn. To start to learn liberally, one must learn liberally, act freely, make choices, use judgment, risk consequences, turn a wheel and set things in motion.
; ''How might I start?''
: In many ways — the ''how'' is in the starting. Try picking for yourself an exemplar of learning liberally — someone who discloses in your judgment what human autonomy, making choices, using judgment, thinking for oneself, entails. Make it several. Make them persons you can get close to and carry with you yet hold in mind with a certain disinterest, exemplars with a full, tangible work accessible to you, moving work — a film, painting, book, or activity with which you can commune throughout your effort to learn liberally. Ask yourself. Possess the question as yours to answer and you will have started to learn liberally.
; ''I'm not sure what you mean. Can I have an example?''
: Do you want a companion in your search for companions? Try Friedrich Nietzsche's [[Schopenhauer as Educator|''Schopenhauer as Educator'']] and think liberally about what your choice might aim at, not to copy Nietzsche's choice, but to accompany you in choosing reflectively your own exemplars. Make the question your own — not "can I have an example?", but "is this the example I can and should use?"<ref>Friedrich Nietzsche, ''Schopenhauer as Educator'', in Nietzsche, ''Untimely Meditations'' (Daniel Breazeale, ed., & R. J. Hollingdale, trans., New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997) pp. 125-194.</ref> Remember the key: to learn liberally, begin. Begin. Begin.
; ''Well, should I just leap in? Will anyone or anything do?''
: Choosing must have a start, arbitrary and surprising, but to complete your choice of exemplars won't be easy — different possibilities will beckon and many deserve consideration. And each of us has multiple sides and interests — your exemplar may prove to be several, and as the vicissitudes of life unfold, you can and should change them. Nor will hagiography help — exemplarity derives, not from idealized virtue, but from what the beholder extracts from telling examples, good, bad, and indifferent. As the Platonic daughter of Necessity said, "Virtue is without master [teacher]; each shall have more or less of her according as he honors or dishonors her. The responsibility is his who chooses. God is not responsible."<ref>Plato, ''Republic'' 617e (R. E. Allen, trans.)</ref>
; ''OK. As I start to learn liberally, what can and should I do then?''
: Use your judgment. Perhaps having made our choices, recognizing that we are the ones responsible for them, we can and should explain our choices to ourselves and others. Why do you find this person and her work exemplary in a quest to learn liberally? Can you help others consider their choices as possible exemplars for them in turn? What's accessible, difficult, especially valuable, engaging, obscure, inspiring, tricky, perhaps even dangerous in communing with them? By explaining your choices, you test their exemplarity for yourself and exercise the liberality of your own learning. As many of us do that, we can build up from our responses, not a canon, not a pantheon, but a growing, diverse sampler of potential companions, informing responsible choices that others may make in starting to learn liberally.
; ''Sounds good. I guess I'm ready to start.''
: Then let's do it and start filling the digital commons with a rich sampling of [[Recent voices on liberal learning|Recent voices on liberal learning]]. It's a start — '''''a start'''''. We can and should volunteer '''other starts''' as well, ones that in the judgment of others suits them better — better to set them in motion to learn liberally.

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<p class="no_indent"">An exemplar of learning liberally, Gargantua looks upon the Abbé of Thélème</p>
https://www.learnliberally.org/pictures/Learn-Liberally-Abbe-Théleme.png
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"In their Rule there was but this clause: '''Do what thou wilt''',
because ... persons who are free, well-born, well-bred, conversant in
honest company, have by nature an instinct and spur, which always
prompts them to virtuous actions and withdraws them from vice ;
and this they style honour."<ref>Illustrtation by Gustave Doré from François Rabelais (1494?-1553), '''Oeuvres de Rabelais''' (Texte collationné sur les éditions originales avec une vie de l'auteur, des notes et un glossaire par Louis Moland. Illustrations de Gustave Doré, 2 vols., Paris: Garnier Frères, 1873). Vol. 1 Plate between 166 & 167. Get from Gallica: https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k1044326s?rk=21459;2. Text, slightly revised from Rabelais: The Five Books and Minor Writings, w. F. Smith, trans., (2 vols., London: Scribners, 1893), Vol. 1, p. 191. Consult at Hathi Trust: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015014639929;view=1up;seq=7.</ref> </p></div>

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