Front Porch Republic
Dissonance, Harmony, and Expectation: On Music and Life
Sometimes in life, silence pervades our stories. The dissonance has passed, and we wait. We wait for resolution; we wait for harmony.
The Abolition of the Human
AI is a technology that eliminates process. It offers the grail without the quest.
Birmingham in June
Colby said the two men settled their dispute like men, but they looked more like buffoons than men to me.
An Agrarian Prayer
If you have ever prayed the Lord’s prayer, then you have prayed for the soil and its earthworms—even if you didn’t intend to.
Happy are Those who Know the Causes of Things: Recovering Aristotle’s Four Causes
Science can only provide partial truths because it does not consider form or end.
News, Notes, & Podcasts
Newsletter Editor:
Jeffrey BilbroEnter your email to receive a weekly newsletter highlighting what’s new at FPR.
Cancer Cures, Manatees, and Enology
“We are Letting Schools Poison our Children.” Hadley Freeman has some harsh (but accurate) critiques of ed tech: “You don’t need to be Mr Gradgrind to be repulsed by this…
Handshakes, Extinction, and Chess
“The Intellectual Virtues of the Small Magazine.” Jeff Reimer brilliantly narrates the joys of an intellectual life and the role that small magazines can play in foster this: ‘Now remember…
Local Porch in NOVA: The Tech Exit with Clare Morell
Join Ben Christenson and others for a discussion with Clare Morell.
Aristotle’s Virtue Ethics
Laurie Johnson is teaching an introduction to Aristotle's virtue ethics for the Maurin Academy this summer. The schedule and details are here: We need a solid understanding of ethics now…
More Articles
A Formidable Formative Institution – The Fair Marches On
You have to cut through the glitzy, loud elements—the carnival rides and the tractor pulls and the cotton candy—to see the heart of the fair...
Reflections on Alasdair MacIntyre
Dependent Rational Animals offers both a satisfying philosophical exclamation point and a sorely needed ethical and political vision appropriate for the struggles of our own day.
Fuel, Food, and Fault: Rethinking the Emissions Debate
If we are serious about sustainability, we need to rethink where and how we apply pressure.
Friendship and its Paradoxes
Friendship is a fulfillment of our nature: the recognition that loving another for their own sake is, paradoxically, itself essential to our own flourishing.
Responsibility as Destiny: Thoughts on the MAHA Movement
What exactly is health? What do we mean by that word? What is a proper understanding of it?
The Crisis of the Self in an Age of Solutions
We live under the impression that we can do for the human community and the individual human soul what physicists have done with the atom.
Erich Maria Remarque’s Grief
He decides to write about his experience. Two earlier novels were dismal affairs. But now in 1927, over the course of a few months, he fills each page with pain and sorrow
Helping Narcissists Regain Solid Ground
For most people, that’s where their focus on their image ends—they’ve made themselves presentable. But for some, that morning routine was only the beginning.
How One Group Is Disrupting Isolation With Reading
Impressed by this unusual way of cultivating community in a city—NYC, that is—known for its “alone together” anonymity, I decided to reach out
The Waters of Mirabah
In quiet Ottawa County, Michigan, a water crisis is not merely brewing—it is already here.
The Proper Education of Ambition
Politics, at its best, requires those willing to risk greatness.
The Census Taker in a Church Pew, Part 7
His hands remind me of a topographical map. Even now with their nail scars, do Jesus’ hands bear also the marks that come with age and years as a craftsman?
From the Archive