Over the last weekend of June, six philosophers gathered in the village of Leusden near the Dutch city of Amersfoort. In 1916 the philosopher Martin Buber, the mathematician L.E.J. Brouwer and the writer Frederik van Eeden founded the International School for Philosophy in Leusden. The idea was to build a place where leading thinkers would discuss cultural progress.

The school still exists; in 2010 a hotel was added to it. The hotel rooms are named after famous thinkers, and the hotel itself is named Philosophy Hotel.

More than a year ago I was asked to host a weekend of talks about good and evil at the International School for Philosophy. I was going to interview several philosophers about this subject. An audience would be present and would be able to ask questions. The interviews would be taped as well. Thus people who could not make it to Leusden but were nevertheless interested in good and evil could buy a CD, so they could listen to the interviews while driving to work or cleaning the kitchen.

The word “philosopher” was stretched to the broadest sense. A sociologist counted as a philosopher, as well as a novelist—even a theologian, if I wanted.

A novelist is by definition a layman. (Perhaps also in the field of literature, you can be a good novelist without knowing anything about the theory of literature.) I was a bit afraid that conversations between a layman and an expert would cause dreadful misunderstandings and painfully reveal my lack of knowledge. To avoid really embarrassing situations I carefully read most of the books by the different philosophers. Experience taught me that nothing is worse than an interviewer who believes that reading a book simply means reading the blurbs on the dust jacket.

One of the more pleasant and insightful conversations that weekend was with the Israeli philosopher Avishai Margalit. I’d met Avishai Margalit many years ago in New York where we saw a German movie about the last days of Hitler, Downfall, together with a common friend.

Mr. Margalit’s last book in English is titled On Compromise and Rotten Compromises. It was this book that was the basis of our conversation. He argues that compromise is one of the pillars of democracy. A compromise, in other words, is a compromise for the sake of peace. But there are certain compromises that are rotten and should be avoided at all costs: namely, a compromise that enables a regime that supports radical evil. Radical evil, according to Mr. Margalit, is “an attack on morality itself,” which means an attack on the idea of shared humanity.

It was refreshing and I would even say important to listen to Mr. Margalit, especially in these times when both the idea of shared humanity and the idea of compromise are under attack.