The prominent philosopher Bernard Williams (1985) opened his Ethics and the Limits of
Philosophy with: “It is not a trivial question, Socrates said: what we are talking about is how one
should live” (p. 1) and asked whether Socrates’ question is the proper starting point for moral
philosophy. In this paper, I will explore an effect of a very specific life event: a “cliff-edge”
retirement. I will look at the concept of ground projects and show how cliff-edge retirements
create ill-shaped projects…
Read moreThe prominent philosopher Bernard Williams (1985) opened his Ethics and the Limits of
Philosophy with: “It is not a trivial question, Socrates said: what we are talking about is how one
should live” (p. 1) and asked whether Socrates’ question is the proper starting point for moral
philosophy. In this paper, I will explore an effect of a very specific life event: a “cliff-edge”
retirement. I will look at the concept of ground projects and show how cliff-edge retirements
create ill-shaped projects reflecting the loss of important workplace benefits such as purposeful
work and social collaborations. This type of retirement prematurely closes the ground project
before its natural conclusion. I will argue that attempts to recover it will likely prove difficult,
inauthentic and will not remedy the project’s wrongful shape.
