Against Cynicism: A philosopher's brilliant reasons for living

The title here gives a clue as to what someone else got out of it. "Against Cynicism: A philosopher's brilliant reasons for living." We might infer that this was about reasons for living, that they are brilliant, and that cynicism isn't part of those reasons. And yet, I'm not entirely sure that "reasons for living" are what Sloterdijk is even addressing. It seems more like he's addressing the concern of minimizing suffering in a culture that's largely given up God. He's an atheist who admits that religion in general and the belief in God in particular has utility, and he's exploring replacement therapies. An eminently reasonable thing to do. But this isn't a reason for living: for the vast majority of people, the "reason for living" is simply that the alternative, death, is petrifying.

I agree, but how can secular people and communities practice spirituality in a way that will cause these changes without sharing a common set of beliefs, practices and language?

2) banal observations once you finally figure out WTF they are talking about. check.

3) lauded for being the smartest, greatest, most brilliant intellectual of their age. check.

4) books with inscrutable titles like Bubbles: Spheres Volume I: Microspherology and Rage and Time. check. (LOL! How big do your balls have to be to give a book a title like that?)

5) constant name-dropping of fashionable intellectuals. check.

Must be European philosophy!

UPDATE: quote from Amazon description of Bubbles. Behold the enormity of Peter Sloterdijk's balls:

    "reinterprets the history of Western metaphysics as an
    inherently spatial and immunological project, from the 
    discovery of self (bubble) to the exploration of world 
    (globe) to the poetics of plurality (foam)."

Cicero is immortal as both the greatest and last defender of the Roman Republic.

Reminds me of watching the series "Lost", where the expectation was set from the beginning that there was a logical, rational explanation for the whole thing. In the end they producers basically lied, and it ended up being a big shaggy dog story.

If anyone can extract the "brilliant reasons for living" from that article, please post them here. I don't expect much of a list.

This sums up Sloterdijk pretty well. I highly recommend reading him.

"Sloterdijk’s ideal is not Pauline conversion but Trinitarian 'perichoresis,'"

Unfortunately, I don't think Sloterdijk has understood the theological context of perichoresis which he goes on to define:

"'Perichoresis means that the milieu of the persons is entirely the relationship itself,' he writes, envisioning love as a total mutual absorption."

Perichoresis is literally "mutual interpenetration" and refers to the greek choros and their dances around (peri) each other in interlocking rings in the theatre. In the theological appropriation of this imagery, this has more to do with the depth and interdependence of the relationship than with the "milieu" - though it's not clear what he means by that.

We need to recover, and give to one another, the trust that we once gave our placentas.

Wow! It's so refreshing to hear something like that put so strongly. When discussing politics, people often say competition and struggle is normal and lets us have all the nice things, but I like this radically different outlook much more, man should not be predator to man. After all, we can also invent things because it makes ourselves and others happy, just as an expression of our creativity or intelligence... I would even say we can't avoid it. Competition is nice, sportsmanship and/or cooperation are nicer.