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The genius of Geraldine
So if you’re in the knitting business, at some point in the process of turning wool into a sweater you will need to take a large, washer-like disk of steel and punch little notches into its outer rim, for some use in the process which I do not know. You will gradually collect a zillion… Continue reading
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Return from New Zealand
My family and I just returned from two weeks in New Zealand. Short version: a fun, magical tour, with highlights of Belgian food and a man who made copied a medieval tapestry out of metal bits and masking tape. Long version follows. We landed in Auckland, and spent a day and a night there on… Continue reading
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Well, now: THAT was interesting
I was at the U of Utah yesterday, and had a great time in a number of activities. I visited my friend Mariam’s class, and we debated whether the evolutionary account of religious inclinations should cause a believer to doubt. Then I had lunch with six engaging grad students, and visited Elijah Millgram’s Nietzsche class,… Continue reading
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Because I would not stop for Death…
… he kindly dropped by my office for a photo opp. This is William Holloway, Philosophy major, completing a creative assignment for another class. Continue reading
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Music update
I’ve been to two chamber music concerts this year, both of them excellent. The first was last September, with the Shanghai Quartet. They played fascinating, difficult, and very compelling pieces by Penderecki and Yi-Wen Jiang. They have an incredibly balanced tone — very unified, and highly expressive. But it was their performance of Schubert’s “Death… Continue reading
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James Kugel’s How to Read the Bible
Most readers are probably familiar with the Documentary Hypothesis. The basic idea is that the Bible, as an artifact, is best explained by supposing that it is a compilation of several ancient texts, written by different people in different times and cultures. Somebody (“the Redactor,” maybe Ezra) compiled many of the texts by the third… Continue reading
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Free will fictionalism
Let’s first assume determinism is true, at least with respect to all human actions. Next, let’s agree that we inevitably talk and think about what we could do, or could have done, even if we end up doing or having done something else. That’s what deliberation is: mapping out what we could do, predicting results,… Continue reading
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Final causes
My friend Kleiner has been trying for years to get me to understand what final causes really are supposed to be. When I’ve talked about them in various classes, I’ve always called them the ‘pulling cause’: a final cause pulls the little acorn into becoming an oak, pulls the embryon into becoming a human, etc.… Continue reading
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My flat-footed filosophy
For whatever reason, I’ve felt the need lately to try to articulate my broader philosophical view. And that’s always fun to share, especially when someone points out problems. So here goes. CH’s principles of philosophy 1. My metaphysics ought to be continuous with science. I don’t deny that there are significant controversies within science, nor… Continue reading
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There are nice-looking donkeys …
… and then there are the beautiful ones: Continue reading
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Nature’s reclamation
The canal running behind my home is now closed forever, due to the tragic collapse this summer. But nature is finding new uses for it. Continue reading
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Oxford philosophical report, part 2
Graham Parkes, author of Composing the Soul (perhaps my favorite book on Nz), presented what was to me easily the best address of the conference. The first half of his presentation was a discussion of the links between Nz and meditative practices in eastern philosophy. Nz hiked and walked extensively, claiming that he didn’t trust… Continue reading
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Oxford conference: philosophical report, part 1
I thought I’d share some of my impressions of some of the papers I attended. The conference featured seven plenary addresses, which everyone attended, and three groups of concurrent session. I’ve recounted now, and I guess I only heard 16 papers in all (counting my own), not 19 as I had thought. I don’t have… Continue reading
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Oxford: the video
The soundtrack, by the way, is an old 78 of Jelly Roll Morton and His Red Hot Peppers, with the great, growling Bubber Miley on horn. Continue reading
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All OK in the UK
More than ok, in fact: simply freaking awesome is more like it. This was my first trip to the UK, and as I told several people there, my impression is that the sun always shines and people know a helluva lot about Nietzsche. I’ll give an overview of my time there. Last Wednesday I was… Continue reading
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What’s been going on?
It appears I haven’t posted in about a month. What’s up? Well, a cluster of little things. There’s been painting the house, the kids starting school, me starting teaching, etc. I have been rewriting a paper on Nietzsche for the upcoming “Nietzsche on Mind and Nature” conference at Oxford, and arranging travel, etc. That’s next… Continue reading
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Gotta read some Dewey
“Philosophy recovers itself when it ceases to be a device for dealing with the problems of philosophers and becomes a method, cultivated by philosophers, for dealing with the problems of men.” – John Dewey, quoted by Menand, Metaphysical Club. Continue reading
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Core features of naturalism?
I’m working on a paper on whether Nz is a naturalist, so I’ve been forced to think about what naturalism is. I don’t think it’s enough to simply say “it’s the denial of supernatural stuff” (since then I need to know what “supernatural” is) or to say “it’s what physicists/chemists/biologists presume for their theories” (since… Continue reading
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Reflections on Darwin and Holmes
I’ve been reading a weird variety of books lately, two of which are The Cambridge Companion to Charles Darwin and Menand’s The Metaphysical Club (actually, re-reading this one). Several of the essays in the Darwin book concern Darwinism and ethics. I think a reasonable view of the connection between the two is as follows. There… Continue reading
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One more dead idol
Leszak Kolakowski. Wish I’d met him. See my posts about him here. UPDATE: The Times has a good obit. Continue reading
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Making meaning
I’ve been thinking about Michael Drake’s post over at Strange Doctrines on Nihilistic Meaning. As anyone who knows me would suspect, I’m very skeptical of a human life being meaningful in virtue of playing some role in a deity’s big plan. (Indeed, that seems to me a recipe for absurdity.) So I usually fall back… Continue reading
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