The Invited Philosopher Sofia C. This was the 21st dinner & philosophy event, and the 5th virtual dinner. Sofia had dinner in Quito, Ecuador. I had dinner in Stuart, Florida. Menu Paty’s dinner: Thai curry tofu with sweet potatoes and broccoli, served with basmati rice. Paty’s wine: Bodegas Manzanos 111 Red Blend, year 2023. Sofia’s dinner: Fruit and cheese platter. The Philosophy Nishida Kitarō (1870–1945), founder of the Kyoto School, was shaped by Western thinkers, especially Kant, Hegel, neo‑Kantianism, phenomenology, and William James, while also grounding his thought in Zen

practice. His early work “An Inquiry into the Good” (1911) engages with William James’s concept of pure experience, which he reinterprets through Zen: pure experience is the moment of awareness before we interpret it via thoughts or action. This is illustrated by Ueda Shizuteru’s example on how Japanese describe hearing a sound: Japanese: “The sound of the bell is heard.” English: “I hear the bell.” The Japanese phrasing captures the event before the ego appropriates it. Later, Nishida reformulates his philosophy around basho which means “place” in Japanese. He also…