The Grateful Dead and Philosophy contains essays from 20 professional philosophers whose love of the Dead's music and scene have led them to reflect on different philosophical questions that have arisen from the enigma that is the Grateful Dead. Coming at the Dead from a variety of perspectives, ancient and modern, Eastern and Western, this book considers how the group fits into the broader trends of American thought running through pragmatism and the Beat poets. There's a pertinent analysis of how the parking lot scene with its tie-dyed t-shirt and veggie burrito vendors was both a rejection and embrace of capitalism, and much more. The lyrics of the Grateful Dead s many songs are also the basis for several essays considering questions of fate and freedom, the nature-nurture debate, and gamblers ethics.
Half baseball game, half church / Steven Silberman -- Saying thank you for a real good time -- Some folks trust in reason -- In the parking lot-fireworks, calliopes, and clowns : the culture of the Dead -- Keep your day job? : tie dyes, veggie burritos, and Adam Smith in the parking lot / Steven Gimbel and Brendan Cushing-Daniels -- Community at the edge of chaos : the Dead's cultural revolution / Horace L. Fairlamb -- The everyday miracle of the occasional community / John DrabinskiI -- Performance and property : archive.org, authorship, and authenticity / Peter Bradley -- Soundcheck : describing a band beyond description -- The electric Nietzsche deadhead test : the birth of tragedy and the psychedelic experience / David MacGregor Johnston -- How dead beats became deadheads : from Emerson and James to Kerouac and Garcia / Gary Ciocco -- Tolstoy's favorite choir / Michael Gettings --^
He's gone and nothing's gonna bring him back : the dead, the dead, and the Grateful Dead / John Uglietta -- Who's to guide you? : ethical questions in the lyrics of the Grateful Dead -- A touch of grey : gratefully dead? / Randall E. Auxier -- Me and my uncle-- and Thomas Hobbes : on the ethics of leaving his dead ass there by the side of the road / Johannes Bulhof -- Buddhism through the eyes of the Dead/ Paul Gass -- Blind hope : wharf rat, Levinas, and the face of August West / Stephen Stern -- Eyes of the world : Santayana's ontology set to music / Jessica Wahman -- What shall we say? : shall we call it by a name? the nature of nature and knowledge -- Thoreau-ing stones : wildness at the end of the natural world / Allen Thompson -- Mama tried : biological determinism and the nature-nurture distinction / Charles Ward -- You don't need space : a question of musical value / Mary MacLeod -- Who was wise? : decision theory in "lady with a fan" / Stephen G. Dillingham --^
^Mysteries deep and vast : metaphysical quandaries -- I'm just playing in the band : stoicism, taoism, and freedom / Matthew Turner -- Death don't have no mercy : on the metaphysics of loss and why we should be grateful for death / Ian Duckles and Eric M. Rubenstein -- Goin' down the road : the Grateful Dead discography -- Playin' in the band.