Play and Purpose: or, Exuberance and Ethics

Human beings play, as do so many of our fellow creatures on this earth we share. What is “play”? What makes us—and other animals—play? What is play for, and is there any relationship of play and ethics? It is not oxymoronic to take play seriously, as it is a universal human phenomenon—but at the same time, it can be fun!

Robert J. Berson, Ed.D., Ph.D. is Leader of the Ethical Society of Northern Westchester and a clinical psychologist with a practice in Manhattan. He is a graduate of the Childrens Sunday Assembly of the Riverdale-Yonkers Society for Ethical Culture and of the Ethical Culture Fieldston School. He graduated from Haverford College and earned graduate degrees from Harvard University, Bank Street College of Education, Teachers College, and the City University of New York. He taught in the Ethics Department at Fieldston, has worked in the counseling services of several area colleges and universities, and supervises graduate students in clinical and counseling psychology doctoral programs.