Philosophy in Malaysia with Dr. Mohammad Alinor Abdul Kadir, President of PPFPM

We're delighted to announce our next Philosophy Bridges dialogue — a conversation with Dr. Mohammad Alinor Abdul Kadir, President of the Malaysian Association for Philosophy and Thinking Education (PPFPM). Founded in 2018, PPFPM plans and organizes philosophy-related activities across Malaysia — from training Malaysian students for the International Philosophy Olympiad to running programs in philosophy and critical-thinking education, with an affiliation to the International Federation of Philosophical Societies. Dr. Alinor's own path to philosophy is anything but conventional. He holds a PhD in Pure Mathematics, specializing in Category Theory, from the University of Wales, Bangor (2000) — a foundation in abstract structure that now informs his research on Malay ethno-philosophy and the comparative study of Malay, Islamic, Indian, and Western civilizational thought. He also serves on the Board of Directors of the Selangor Public Library Corporation (PPAS), and has presented internationally on Southeast Asian philosophy's place in world philosophical discourse, including at forums with the Philosophical Association of Japan. In this conversation, we ask Dr. Alinor to reflect on Malaysia's place at the crossroads of Islamic, Malay, Chinese, Indian, and Western intellectual traditions — and what a genuine dialogue between Malay-Islamic and Russian (Slavic-Orthodox) philosophy might look like.