by Bonnie Butcher
The Meeting of the Minds is an annual play held by the UWG philosophy department and the West Georgia Philosophical Society. The question posed this year was, “How can we attain happiness?” Six philosophy students answered the question on behalf of famous philosophers at the event on March 22.
The philosophers portrayed at this year’s gathering were Epictetus, Albert Camus, Simone de Beauvoir, Al-Ghazali, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Martha Nussbaum.
UWG student Aaron Weddle, who played Nietzsche, explained that happiness could be attained when one exerts their “will to power.” His philosophy is to exert power in such a way as it makes you truly live, rather than just be alive.
Aaron (as Nietzsche) said, “Nonsense, it’s all nonsense. Happiness is an accidental feature of existence, not a primary goal. It is necessary to endure suffering--this is an unavoidable feature of living. The force of life that provides this living is something else entirely. It is a fool’s challenge to eliminate suffering and breed perfect happiness; that is, it is a lie.”
Student Christie Path, as de Beauvoir, argued that happiness is attained when people utilize their rights. She notes that a lot of the disenfranchised and oppressed people around the world happened to be women. Feminist de Beauvoir believed that there must be serious change in how we as a world view and treat women for everyone to be able to attain happiness.
“I really wanted to do Meeting of the Minds because two of my favorite things to do are acting and promoting feminism,” said Christie.
Although the play was scripted, there was an open discussion afterwards for any questions from the audience.
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