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A Comparative Philosophy of Sport and ArtSport, Art and the Meaning of Life

A Comparative Philosophy of Sport and Art: Sport, Art and the Meaning of Life [Prompted by Bernard Suits’ classic study The Grasshopper, I turn in this chapter to the fundamental question of what gives meaning to a life—what makes it worth living. Suits believes that the only activity that gives life meaning is game playing. Rejecting Suits’ view, and reflecting on the life of the legendary figure of Sisyphus, I suggest that we derive a sense of meaning in life from three main factors—three convictions—namely, that our lives serve some useful purpose, making at least some contribution to the well-being of the world; that our lives have direction, moving towards at least one goal that seems worthwhile to us; finally, that we are connected with the world in at least some significant ways, in particular, with other people whose lives intersect with ours. I compare sport and art with regard to the respective contributions they make towards these meaning-giving features of life, and conclude that on all three factors, art fares better than sport. But I argue that it is the purist—the one who views sport simply for its moments of beauty and drama—whose sense of meaning in life benefits most from their interest in sport.] http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png

A Comparative Philosophy of Sport and ArtSport, Art and the Meaning of Life

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References (4)

Publisher
Springer International Publishing
Copyright
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
ISBN
978-3-030-72333-0
Pages
141 –163
DOI
10.1007/978-3-030-72334-7_10
Publisher site
See Chapter on Publisher Site

Abstract

[Prompted by Bernard Suits’ classic study The Grasshopper, I turn in this chapter to the fundamental question of what gives meaning to a life—what makes it worth living. Suits believes that the only activity that gives life meaning is game playing. Rejecting Suits’ view, and reflecting on the life of the legendary figure of Sisyphus, I suggest that we derive a sense of meaning in life from three main factors—three convictions—namely, that our lives serve some useful purpose, making at least some contribution to the well-being of the world; that our lives have direction, moving towards at least one goal that seems worthwhile to us; finally, that we are connected with the world in at least some significant ways, in particular, with other people whose lives intersect with ours. I compare sport and art with regard to the respective contributions they make towards these meaning-giving features of life, and conclude that on all three factors, art fares better than sport. But I argue that it is the purist—the one who views sport simply for its moments of beauty and drama—whose sense of meaning in life benefits most from their interest in sport.]

Published: Jun 17, 2021

Keywords: Bernard Suits; The Grasshopper; Games and meaning in life; Myth of Sisyphus; Sport and meaning in life; Art and meaning in life; Nozick and connectedness

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