In life, we have to seek out our original partner to be re-united. Only then are we complete. From this story, we take the expression ‘other half’ for our beloved. And once we have found them, we want never to let them go again.

Plato’s story is a myth. But all lovers understand it. We understand the deeper truth that it represents. Without love, we feel empty: a deep yearning for wholeness. All the riches of the world cannot shield us from it. And we do not love because it will make us healthy or wealthy. We want health and wealth so that we can love.

Curiosity got the better of me and I started reading them. It was just a bit of fun at first, much as one looks through old family photo albums and sees pictures of an earlier self. But I started also to find a philosophical interest in the hobby. Some of the work was bad, with embarrassing mistakes. In other instances a case is made for a view I now reject but reading through the argument allowed me to see why I once attracted to such a conclusion. My earlier self was even able to challenge my present thinking. I work in a discipline where it is always useful to rehearse an argument one accepts again and again, where one should always be sceptical, to see whether one’s theories really do stand up to scrutiny.

But I still don’t know whether reading myself is pure self-indulgence, just like looking at those old photos. Can I count it as research if I’m reading my own work? Just to play safe, I’ve been doing it in evenings and weekends so that it’s not on company time. Then again, I also get a feeling that my current work will benefit from a little retrospective rethinking. Occasionally I’ve found a good unpublished argument that I had forgotten about and thought that I must use in the future. I also wonder whether it is only in philosophy that reading one’s earlier work is beneficial.

I’d welcome views of readers.

I encountered these questions recently when viewing a new collection of Russian war posters at Nottingham: Windows on War: Soviet War Posters, 1943-45. These posters seemed beautifully designed with vivid colours and dynamic layouts. They all had an original artist but had been subsequently mass-produced through stencilling for wide distribution. The posters were large, folded and now fragile but were being preserved, restored and then digitised for future use. All those with interests in history, politics, art, Russian studies and digital humanities will find them fascinating. But as a philosopher it was the tension between aesthetics and ethics that struck me most.

It is easy to enjoy the superficial appearances of the images. They are pleasing to the eye and one can be swept along by the sentiments conveyed. But there is always a lurking uneasiness. The posters are, among other purposes, in praise of Stalin. Nazis are at times shown to be sub-human. Hitler is caricatured as a pig. Now of course no right person is going to defend the Nazis in World War II but we know that all sides committed atrocities in this conflict. The feeling of uneasiness is nevertheless in the knowledge that propagandists wanted me to enjoy these posters and thereby gain my favourable sentiments. They wanted the viewer to take inspiration and redouble their efforts for the Red Army and Joseph Stalin.

The question of whether an ethical flaw produces also an aesthetic defect comes into the foreground. On the other side, Leni Riefenstahl was producing seemingly beautiful cinematography in praise of Hitler. It was a war of art. But just as I have viewed and enjoyed Riefenstahl’s films, I can discern an artistic content in these Russian posters: something that lies behind the propaganda and can be appreciated in its own terms.

The online exhibition of Soviet war posters can be found here: http://windowsonwar.nottingham.ac.uk/

But today is Easter Sunday. It is said to be the day that Jesus was resurrected from the dead and is thus the most holy day of the Christian calendar. Now is the time to broach the topic. I am not sure how many believe the resurrection to be a literal truth or whether the Bible is largely read metaphorically. I confess to feeling very few religious inclinations. Having read essays such as Russell’s ‘Has Religion Made Useful Contributions to Civilisation?’, it is easy to think of religion as an unmitigated blight. With churches trying to hold back women’s equality and gay marriage while remaining silent on the plight of the poor, I can’t see any signs of improvement since Russell wrote. And having watched the old Swedish film Häxan it is tempting to dismiss religion as part of a primitive and pre-scientific view of the world in which evil spirits could be blamed for wrongs. Prayer to God could be seen as a desperate lack of understanding.

Through the years, however, I’ve come to be more accepting of those who do not see the world the way I do. And I have also tried hard to understand the continuing appeal of religion and why many people of science seek to retain spirituality and reconcile it to an enlightened outlook. I think I get something of it. There is more to the world than matter, wealth and the claims that are verifiable empirically.

With a sole aim for the acquisition of material possessions, a bleak and empty existence awaits. More important are abstract ideas, learning, appreciation of the arts, intercultural understanding, morality, love and friendship irrespective of wealth. These all enhance and improve our lives and give us a sense that there is something deeper and more meaningful to the world that what we are usually given. This sense – that there is something more – is what tempts us to explore a spiritual dimension of life. And as I follow Plato in thinking of the world of ideas as the most important realm, I see that I too am spiritual, with a small s, despite my atheism. I see that there is a common feeling I share even with those whose beliefs stand so far from my own.

Happy Easter to all true Christians! Peace to those of other faiths!

Other animals may have got there before us: whales and birds have their own musical song. But it is the music we humans have created for ourselves that is the most truly meaningful to us. And while there have been great composers through the ages, music can also be immediate and of its time, as much of pop music is.

In recent weeks I have realised that I have a new favourite album. The tunes in pop music tend to be simple but designed in that way deliberately so that they stay in the listeners’ heads. That’s how I often realise I have a new favourite. The song’s there even when it’s not playing.

I have a long, growing list of former favourite albums. They last about half a year and are superseded. But that is good because I can then look back and think of them as forming the soundtrack of my life. Old favourites evoke memories of past times, good and bad. Each of the following carries a distinct meaning for me, which I shall not relate here. In rough order in which they have been my favourites, and without remotely attempting to be complete, I have loved in my time Queen’s News of the World (my first album record when I was 13), Joy Division’s Closer, Birthday Party’s Junkyard, Einstürzende Neubauten’s Drawings of Patient OT, Sonic Youth’s Dirty, Homogenic by Björk, Electric Ladyland by Jimi Hendrix, virtually every Pet Shop Boys album as it came out, Pink Floyd’s first album featuring Syd Barrett, and a recent rediscovery of Sparks had me fall in love with both Propaganda and Hello Young Lovers. It’s an admittedly eclectic mix. But good music can be found in any genre. There was even one summer I was into Beastie Boys’ Licensed to Ill!

If you know some or all of these albums, then you know at least some of my life. And if you tell me your favourites, I will know something about yours. So what has been the soundtrack to your life?

A mere lack of entertainment is one thing. But some of us don’t want merely to be entertained. We want to do things. We want to be active and productive. I could at least have written an Arts Matters blog post in that same stretch of time or made progress reading a book. In a finite life, no one wants to waste an hour. Idleness is a very sorry ordeal.

Bertrand Russell was one of the few philosophers to have written on idleness. He recognised that enforced unemployment is a wretched position to suffer. Meanwhile, those with paid work are often much too busy and no one ever has the work-life balance they want. Wouldn’t it make more sense, he thought, if the work was divided more evenly, such as if we all worked four hours a day?

But Russell was also writing in praise of idleness, and I understood why when I was stuck on that plane. I came slowly to a realisation that, alone with my thoughts, I had just spent the previous 20 minutes in completely idle contemplation. My mind had wandered over diverse subjects. I had been making plans in my head, speculating, thinking of priorities, what future books I would like to write, what I should do with my remaining life, and so on. So unselfconscious was the thinking that just through accidental free association I seemed to have gained new ideas. I got off the plane refreshed, with a new spring in my step.

This was part of Russell’s rather paradoxical defence of idleness. Only if we have some pause for thought, away from the urgent and practical demands of life’s necessities, can we be freely productive of what is important to us. Great works of literature, philosophy, painting and music are produced only if there is some supply of idleness. And shouldn’t we then share it equally? The devil will not make work for such hands; rather, humanity can exercise its potentiality in an authentic rather than alienated manner. Ultimately, that is where a civilisation is built.

To stand before this original work, which Vincent crafted with his own hands, is to experience so intimately the labours of the man. The brush became an extension of his body and the tiniest of strokes mark his presence and the movement of his hand. Yet we also get a glimpse inside his mind. The work displays his perception of the world and how he sought to represent it. Yet still we don’t know exactly his thinking and what drove him to produce his art so compulsively.

There is also a distasteful mystique around Van Gogh. His madness, the almost true fact that he never sold a painting in his life, and his eventual suicide, seem partially responsible for the object-fetishism over his works and their astronomical market value. Standing before one of his self-portraits, staring into his eyes, one is struck by the brightness and the pleasing image. But to think that this simple painting on canvas, that weighs so little in its plain wooden frame, is worth millions of any currency, it almost defies logic. Why would a society value a picture so much?

Van Gogh’s genius now seems so obvious. He broke with the past, defying classification. Undoubtedly there were influences upon his style, from earlier impressionists and imported Japanese art, but he produced something so novel and different that it was both misunderstood in his lifetime and yet now accepted as some of the greatest art of all time. Originality, that most ethereal and elusive of attributes, existed in Van Gogh’s work. We place a high premium on new ways of thinking. Imitators may be able to produce something that looks similar but what counts is that Van Gogh was the original.

Humanity has constructed skyscrapers that stretch to the heavens, supercomputers that fit in your pocket, bridges and tunnels, and rockets that can reach the outer edge of our solar system. But these simple paintings hanging in Amsterdam are some of the most treasured objects of all. I’m very glad of that. That we revere art above so much else tells me that civilisation still has a hope.

For those with time who can sit quietly, with no sounds or distractions, and for an extended period, then they know the height of luxury. For that time, they live like a god or goddess. How else would one live if all material needs were met? Take a book from the shelf. Turn the pages. Touch the paper. Is it an old book or a new one? They smell very different but both are delicious. And then become immersed in the mind of the author. Inhabit their world. Revisit it day after day until the whole is complete and the back cover is closed. That book is now part of you.

Commitments prevent me from reading as much as I would like. In more innocent times I thought nothing of giving my day over to a book. Often I would read with no particular purpose in mind. I read many of Bertrand Russell’s books for no reason other than pleasure and he wrote on a diverse range of subjects. I had the joy of learning about early German Social Democracy from him, and then all about Marriage and Morals, but also more challenging topics such as An Essay on the Foundations of Geometry. He even had a couple of books of fiction, all devoured with pleasure. Out of pure curiosity, I also read Anselm’s Proslogion, Hofstadter’s Gödel, Escher, Bach, Camus’ L’étranger, Hughes and Cresswell’s Introduction to Modal Logic. I read Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil. And what a joy it then was when I discovered the light relief of Charles Dickens and how I loved devoting weeks’ worth of free time to one of his novels.

When I read now, it is usually with some specific research purpose in mind. That’s not so much fun. It’s too pragmatic. But it will not always be so. My retirement will be spent working through the remainder of Dickens and I will have so much fun! Please tell me some of your favourite books.

Perhaps it is based on something as vulgar as economic prosperity, but there is certainly a growing self-confidence in those northern countries that has seen a rise in their cultural impact on the world: in film, TV, literature, furniture design and fashion.

Nations know that the way in which their greatness will be judged by history is through their cultural legacy. And it is certainly Scandinavia’s time. It is not just that they have the confidence to give us original-language productions, but it’s also what we want. We watch because we want an authentic Nordic cultural experience, which couldn’t possibly be complete without the language.

I love the way Danish/Norwegian has nine vowels. As well as counting y as a vowel, they also add ø, å and æ. And in Danish, consonant sounds have almost disappeared. Fun is made of this in Broen when the Swedes can’t pronounce lead Danish character Martin Rohde’s name right (and I once had a tough time asking directions to Køge, south of Copenhagen). I also love the way that Norwegians and Danes pronounce the language so differently, even though it is virtually identical when written. There’s a running joke between them that they can’t understand each other. Swedes have a different language yet Norwegians and Danes understand them better than they understand each other.

The rise of Scandinavia has to do with more than economic power, however. I’ve come to know those countries well in many visits over the past 15 years. And there is indeed something wonderfully appealing about the societies that have been created. They have not yet achieved utopia but the outsider sees a society far more at peace with itself than back home. There is better gender equality, the police sometimes seem more like social workers, and the gap between rich and poor is visibly narrower. And everyone is so darn cool, young and old alike, in dress, attitudes and behaviour. Why wouldn’t we all want to be Scandinavian? It’s aspirational.

I am a bit nervous about making observations like these. I fear lapsing into cultural stereotypes, especially when I have seen such beautiful Norwegian mountains and fjords and met so many wonderful, calm and thoughtful Scandinavian people. That may be inevitable when I move mainly in academic circles. At least all those crime dramas show that there is a darker side. To avoid those oversimplifications, it’s important that our universities maintain a proper academic study of cultures, languages and literatures. The benefits of better intercultural understanding are too numerous to list; and the dangers of cultural misunderstanding sometimes too catastrophic to contemplate.

I’m expecting world interest in Scandinavia will continue to grow. I think we are going to see more Nordic knitwear on show in the UK, more tourists visiting the northern countries, more reading the literature and more even speaking the language. Tusen takk. Vær så god!

The degree to which we are driven by the prospects of approval and disapproval is a matter over which a careful judgement is to be exercised. To pander to popularity is considered vulgar and inauthentic; yet to ignore adverse feedback is considered arrogant and self-indulgent. The right attitude seems to be a mean between these two extremes.

And we can make more than a retrospective judgement of the comments we receive. Feedback can be used to feed forward, to prompt self-criticism and improved future work. This, we assume, is the purpose of comments written on student essays. But published authors too would do well to consider carefully the reviews and referee reports. Some of those could be perfidious but others more genuine. The artist should reflect carefully. A difficult decision is whether the critic is right or wrong. If one can tell those apart, there is a good chance one’s next work will be better.

I’ve had a week that seemed dominated by feedback. Our students finally got their semester 1 results after IT problems caused their delay. And while the lecturers were busy feeding back to the students, those same students were busy feeding back to the University about its IT. I’ve also been thinking hard about the way in which we deliver feedback on our students’ written work: what is the best way to do it and how can we return it more quickly. And my twitter followers will know that my highlight of the week was to receive positive feedback in a review of my own short introduction to metaphysics.

Feedback and feed forward are much broader notions than mere marks and criticism, however. In any social interactions, our skills are a function of our ability to listen to others and adapt our future behaviour accordingly. Good communication depends on giving and receiving feedback: listening and learning – talking and teaching.