Winning over the gap lovers
Listener Jack posted a comment here on the site which poses a great question that I would like to throw open for general discussion. Here is his comment in full. But the thrust of it is that he encountered a philosophy tutor who was skeptical about the value of "minor" figures in the history of philosophy, and also of non-Western (for instance Chinese) philosophy. Jack's question is, how should we approach people like this - whose opinions are obviously far from unusual - and win them over to an approach like the one being taken on HoPWaG?
My own strategy would probably be to just give concrete examples: mention your favorite "minor"/non-"western" philosopher, and don't just say he or she is interesting, explain how they are interesting by explaining a certain position or argument found in their works. And then give more examples to drive home the point. If the person you are talking to is interested in philosophy, they are more likely to respond to this strategy of "leading with the philosophy" than to being hectored not to be so racist/Eurocentric or blinkered in their historical approach, which will just get their back up.
Of course to use this strategy you have to have examples ready to hand that fit the bill, but the podcast will hopefully have equipped you with plenty of these.
Other suggestions or relevant experiences?
In reply to Wow! A full blog response - by Jack
But my advice would be to
But my advice would be to lead with something you yourself find interesting, like, "wow, I can't believe this thinker said that, how cool!" And try to infect your tutor with your enthusiasm.
How one goes about addressing
How one goes about addressing skeptics will depend on the reasons for their skepticism. I'll offer a way of addressing a general criticism I've encountered, and give two examples of skepticism, each with apparently different motivations, both of which have come up when I have attempted to engage Western philosophers in discussions about Indian philosophy.
My favorite of the Indian philosophers is Sankara. It's not difficult to show that he made arguments similar to Western philosophers from Plato - Sankara proposes basically Meno's paradox when discussing our ability to know Brahman - to Descartes - Sanakara makes arguments about doubt requiring the existence of a self. Pointing those things out seems to help address those who claim to be concerned with cultural relativism.
One philosopher complained that Sankara, and much of Indian philosophy in general, seems too wrapped up in theological or soteriological concerns. In this case, the philosopher making the complaint was a Descartes expert! I had to stifle a laugh, and point out the irony of this being his concern. Just this much seemed to be sufficient to suggest to him that he was being parochial.
I've also seen similar concerns about Indian philosophy being too "mystical." This leads me to wonder why similar concerns aren't raised about the pre-Socratics, or Neoplatonists, or even German Idealism? This is to say nothing of thinkers like Cantor, or L.E.J. Brower. But complaints of mysticism also seem to use that term in very fuzzy ways. It's not always clear whether the concern is the relevant philosopher reporting so-called mystical experiences, or with that philosopher drawing what might be called mystical conclusions. Mystical experiences strike me as nothing more than empirical claims, like any phenomenology. Mystical conclusions often rely on these experiences, but may or may not follow from a careful consideration of the description of the experience. These, hwoever, are logical or epistemological concerns. Couching those kinds of concerns in terms of mysticism doesn't seem helpful, and it certainly isn't sufficient to leave an entire culture's philosophy out of our discussions.
In reply to How one goes about addressing by Neil
I like the story about the
I like the story about the Descartes expert. Based on my admittedly still pretty incomplete expertise in Indian thought, I find the accusation that it is "mystical" pretty flimsy - I mean, that does turn up but no more so than in ancient and medieval European philosophy and there are plenty of groups who are extremely far from mystical, like Nyaya, Carvaka, etc. So I think the right response there would not really be trying to justify that mysticism is philosophy too (though as everyone must know by now, I think it is) but to deny the premise.
Here's my first stab at an
Here's my first stab at an answer: People who are 'skeptical about the value of "minor" figures in the history of philosophy, and also of non-Western (for instance Chinese) philosophy' should consider the following question: Are you interested in the history of philosophy or in confirming your prejudices? By analogy, you might think of the strategy you'd pursue to solve a crime: Would you just go for the 'obvious suspects' or also consider the figures hidden in the dark? - The point is that we have good reason to treat history like a crime scene: we don't (yet) know who was responsible for what or whose thought triggered what. If we just go for the obvious suspects or the great figures, we're unlikely to learn anything.
In reply to Here's my first stab at an by Martin Lenz
It's not obvious that the
It's not obvious that the reason to consider minor figures and the reason to consider figures from non-western traditions are going to be much alike.
On minor figures first. I think something like Prof. Lenz's answer to the question of considering minor figures is basically right. If you want to make a make a mythology rather than a genuine history of philosophy, then consider only a discrete set of canonical figures in isolation from the context they philosophized in. The minor figures a major figure was in conversation with are important parts of that context.
I do think that once we have done this, many of these minor figures will rightfully still be considered to be minor figures. Those who study them will do so primarily because of the light they shed on the more significant ones.
But there is no reason to think that this is true of all of them. Some minor figures are rightfully somewhat neglected because they aren't as insightful as a Kant or a Hume. Some are neglected not because of the quality of their work but because of the social circumstances in which they produced them. I think there is some reason to suspect that, of the neglected figures in the history of philosophy, prolific writers who weren't wealthy white dudes are more likely to have something interesting to say -- beacuse part of the explanation for their neglect might come not from the quality of their work but from the inequalities of their social position, unlike the work of neglected wealthy white dudes.
The work done by the white
The work done by the white male men in Athens cannot be surpassed or replaced. It is outstanding forever and ever. Not because they were white male men from Athens. But because of the unsurpassable insights they brought to humankind. And because, somebody always has to be the first. If not Athens, then some other place in some other civilization. Could have been India or China as well. But it was not to be. Once the wheel is invented and you have seen it, you cannot invent it a second time. You only can improve it or invent other things using the wheel. Also the ancient Greeks did not invent a second time what was invented before them, for example the art of writing. The invention of writing will always be with the Near East. Is this now "Near-East-centrism"?
To avoid so-called "Eurocentrism" etc. I suggest a totally different approach: I suggest to emphasize that the civilizations of Antiquity do not exist any more. There are no ancient Greeks any more today. We are not identical with them. (And who is the "we" assumed by the anti-Eurocentrist ideology? Canadians? Australians? South Africans?) We (we human beings, who else?) are all "only" heirs. And everybody can make himself such an heir. Nobody is prevented to do so. We are all human beings.
The same is true for other break-through insights, e.g. Immanuel Kant, who is, if you have not noticed yet, dead. "We" are not Kant. We only inherit his thoughts. We? Yes. We all.
I also cannot see the "great man" approach in this. The Greek philosophy is a development over centuries, by many men (and even some women, if you look very closely). Also Kant is not a "great man" if you know the development of philosophy. And of course the periods of a traditionalistic type of religiosity are less valuable in their philosophic production. Not worthless, not at all, but inevitably less valuable. There is no justification for relativism. Some things are simply more important than others. (If you now think of "European" things, then you have not read carefully what I said.)
In reply to The work done by the white by T. Franke
PS: For the "gaps" you could
PS: For the "gaps" you could argue in the following way: You only see the importance of the hotspots of philosophy, and how they developed, if you have a look at the gaps. And: Forgotten or minor parts of philosophy can be a starting point to find something really important which has been overlooked so far - thinking has not come to an end, yet.
A lot of "minor" figures are
A lot of "minor" figures are viewed as such due to contingent circumstances and the investment costs of understanding them properly. Scotus and Ockham are prime examples. I'm not sure there have been any sharper, more powerful, and more imaginative philosophers than these two. They are both enormously influential. But to read them involves (minimally) getiing used to a formal architecture which is quite foreign and offputting at first. This allows a quick invalid inference from "this is hard for me to understand" to "this is not worth understanding" to "this is just rehash and rubbish".
I once pointed out to a contemporary metaethicist that his arguments were a lot like Scotus' and he looked at me like I was eating a cat (mixed with condescension).
In reply to A lot of "minor" figures are by Aaron Garrett
I think that's a great point
I think that's a great point about investment. In a way it's the investment perhaps more than the subject of one's investment which is doing a lot of the work: 5 minutes on Rawls or Locke or Marx isn't going to give as much as a few weeks on, well, anything. But that few weeks is really a training. Maybe it's my age (forties) but when I go through that part of me becomes a new person. And then I'm faced with a new tradition or approach and I'm like "this is really uncomfortable..." and I think part of that great discomfort is sometimes thinking I won't have time to do justice to all these different thinkers before I die - something applicable particularly to the No Gaps project - and wondering at what point I can stop and just say I've got enough for the time being, I can go and write a paper.
I completely agree with this
I completely agree with this strategy -- of shifting the focus from the person to the philosophical question. However, I also think it can be useful to ask the person who focuses on 'major' figures to engage in a bit of historiographical reflection: What does the PWFMF take to distinguish major from minor figures? Is that distinction well thought out? Should we apply the same distinction to writings in contemporary philosophy? Philosophers are so flat-footed with historiography, seemingly taking a kind of naive Hegelianism as the only way of thinking about intellectual history.
Thanks for all the responses
Thanks for all the responses guys. Some of these points are just plain sound advice, while others (amongst whom I would highlight Neil, Kris, Aaron and of course Peter in particular) have offered useful insights into nature of the phenomenon in question. Franke's comment also raises important points along these lines for which I am thankful, but since he also takes a somewhat different stance in relation to my original question, I think offering the following as points of rebuttal to help clarify my own position.
I do not believe that whoever comes first should receive the overwhelming attention of historians to the exclusion of anyone else. Firstly, in some cases the same or very similar phenomena can arise independently of each other, and in such cases I feel we can better understand the phenomena by looking at its multiple origins. Philosophy seems to be such an example, having arisen independently in (at the very least) Greece, India and China. Even if the Greeks came first, I believe that studying the Indian and Chinese traditions as well can help understand what philosophy is, what value it offers, how it relates to human nature, and so on. Secondly, even one something is simply 'imported' from one tradition to another, the newer tradition can still offer interesting innovations and also further insight into the nature of the phenomena in question. The import of Greek philosophy into the Islamic world offers a good example: aside from the philosophical innovations made within the Islamic tradition, the debate it engendered over the usefulness of philosophy for Islam offers an interesting case study for the question of the extent to which philosophy transcends culture. Ironically enough, I would actually offer Franke's example of writing as a good point of comparison. Writing first emerged in Sumeria, yes. But it also emerged independently in (at the very least) China and Mesoamerica. And of course other cultures made interesting innovations after importing writing, the introduction of the alphabet being a well-known example. Quite clearly, if historians of writing were to focus on the Sumerians to the overwhelming exclusion of the Chinese, Mesoamericans, and Phoenicians, then historiography would be impoverished as a result. This, I would argue, is the current situation with regards to philosophy, and I would argue that the consequences are just the same.
All this ignores of course, the question of whether the Greeks really were the first, and I'm not so sure. The earliest Upanishads, for instance, probably predate Thales. And at any rate, I at least believe that philosophical thinking is sufficiently tied to human nature that to refer to any one person or culture as inventing whole cloth is a priori implausible. A recent work by Marc van de Mieroop – Philosophy Before the Greeks: The Pursuit of Truth in Ancient Babylonia – provides a good illustration of how such thinking can be too simplistic.
In my original comment I referred to the historiographical tendency I'm criticising as a 'great man' approach to history. I use this phrase on the basis of a few parallels with the much criticised approach to political and social history. First, a great man approach leads historians to downplay the importance of broader social trends that make possible and shape the great men. In historiography of philosophy, an example of this would be to study Plato and Aristotle, without given serious attention to questions about the religious, social and political context that made philosophy possible and innovative in fourth-century BCE Athens, or for their texts to survive the many centuries since. Second, a great man approach leads historians to distort the historical narrative by studying periods only through the lens of an influential, but not necessarily representative, great man. In the podcast we've seen this most notably occur in the case of medieval scholasticism, where the common impression of the period as being an attempt to rationalise Christianity and reconcile it with Aristotelianism is surely derived from the tendency of historians to treat Augustine, Anselm and Aquinas as its only worthwhile representatives. Third, a great man approach leads to focus on details about the details about the great men that are rather unimportant for actually understanding history. While this tendency is perhaps the easiest to identify the case of great man political history, I'll concede that this is my most controversial contention in the case of the history of philosophy. What I have in mind is something like the way that the Cartesian Circle is usually taught. In a standard class, the issue of the circle will be brought up while going through the relevant sections of the Meditations. An essay question will then be set asking whether Descartes' argument really is circular. A student will then research for their essay by trying to find any writings of Descartes' that they think might be relevant, and consult a host of secondary literature written by people who have done the same. Such literature essentially sees the writers offer their own view as to why Descartes' argument is not circular, how he adequately responded to the issue in the Objections and Replies, and so on. (I trust that readers can easily think of examples from other philosophers following the same structure). All of this seems perfectly natural from the perspective of the great man approach, but it is very odd if one is to approach history thematically. From the issue of studying epistemology, how much does it really matter what Descartes' own response to the accusation of circularity is? Surely the more interesting questions are to do with what an ideal response would be, whether such a response is possible, or how prominent the issue is within epistemology generally. What strikes me as the most interesting question about the Cartesian Circle is that of its relationship to what Roderick Chisholm has called the problem of the criterion – but such a question is much less likely to come up.
I certainly agree with Franke that not all eras or places should receive equal attention. Clearly, philosophy in fourth-century BCE Athens deserves more attention than philosophy in fourth-century CE Athens. I would disagree, however, that the period between 200 and 1500 can accurately be characterised as one of “a traditionalistic type of religiosity”. At the very least, it baffles my mind that anyone could think that Aristotle has contemporary relevance while denying the same status to the scholastics.
In reply to Thanks for all the responses by Jack
Jack,
Jack,
I agree in many respects: Yes, you can invent the wheel a second time, if you have not seen the wheel, yet. And even after you have seen it, you still can improve it. As I said above.
But I think that beginnings are always of major interest. For many reasons. One is that beginnings always silently enshrine some aspects which are overlooked, first, but can be unfolded later.
I also deeply agree that philosophy is tied to human nature. Unfortunately, this idea -- common to thinkers in the line of the humanistic tradition -- is not shared by all. Islamic Traditionalism, for example, rejects philosophy. Having caught an idea before others have caught it brings about the duty to spread the word, as it seems. Depending on your ethics.
Concerning the discussion of the great man approach: Is not Plato right that human beings do not learn only by their rationality, but also by their emotionality? Isn't the presentation of "great thinkers" helpful to learn? Isn't this how stories always have been told among human beings? And how can history be understood, if not as a good story?
And is there not a pedagogic necessity of the order of learning things? Is it not in the nature of human learning to concentrate first on major issues, and only later on details (or even to leave the deepening of thoughts completely to experts)?
I doubt that the History of Philosophy without any Gaps podcast is helpful for a beginner in the field, if not listened selectively but continuously ..... yet, on the other hand, HoPwaG itself provides a certain structure following to a certain extent the "great man" approach: There are 16 episodes on Plato, but only one on Empedocles. Hey, this is not fair! And even 18 episodes on Aristotle! Two more than about Plato: You can't believe it! And only two episodes on poor Socrates. Well. I would say HoPwaG is OK for beginners, too, but only, because it *does* concentrate on major thinkers more than on others. It keeps a reasonable balance.
Concerning the scholastic Aristotelianism: It was bound to the church's doctrines. Aristotle first was banned by the church, and later became acceptable only because certain teachings of Aristotle were silenced. Of course, under the given circumstances, scholasticism did very well. But it was not the same. And scholastic Aristotelian teachings even gained dogmatic status and prevented progress. I wonder what Aristotle would have said to that strange development. I think there is a major difference between Aristotelianism and Scholasticism.
In reply to Jack, by T. Franke
Thanks for the reply Franke,
Thanks for the reply Franke, as this post will make clear, it seems we agree on more than I'd thought.
For starters, I absolutely agree that the beginnings are of major interest. And, though I would maybe want to use a more nuanced term than 'beginnings' to describe the developments in Classical Greece, I would never claim that historians of philosophy should ignore them - only that reasonably similar events occurred independently in, at the very least, China and India, which historians should not ignore to the extent that they currently do. I'm not sure why you bring up contemporary Islamic traditionalism though. My point with tying philosophy to human nature was to challenge the notion that any one group of people - Greek, Chinese, Indian or otherwise - could have invented it. I also agree that chronological ordering is often a very useful pedagogical tool, but even if that would mean the Greeks should be studied first (and I'm not sure that it would), it wouldn't mean that we should only study the Greeks and the traditions they inspired.
I also agree that major thinkers should receive more attention than minor ones. As I stated in my previous though, I object when this leads to of the following three things: (i) downplaying the context in which the great men arose; (ii) it distorts the historical narrative; (iii) focusing on the great men themselves rather than their place in history.
I even agree (partially) in your assessment of Scholasticism, in that it certainly was not the same thing as Aristotelianism. How could anyone say that Ockham and Burley, Aquinas and Bonaventure, Buridan and Autrecourt all represented Aristotle accurately? I raised the point about Aristotle because it seems that so many Scholastic debates arose in what could be considered an Aristotelian framework: if, for instance, one is interested in Aristotle's logic, I fail to see why medieval logic wouldn't be interesting. I disagree, however, in regards to your claim that Scholasticism "gained dogmatic status and prevented progress". If it's the Galileo affair you have in mind, you might be interested to know that very few historians accept the 'science vs religion' account these days.
In reply to Thanks for the reply Franke, by Jack
Jack, one major reason why
Jack, one major reason why the Greeks are so important for us today, is, that they form a common basis of culture with the so-called Islamic world, and are crucial to overcome wide-spread traditionalism in growing Islamic communities in Europe. It is really a pity, that exactly in the very moment when we need the Classics to form a common basis of understanding they are pushed back at schools while at the same time "Islamic teachings" are introduced in schools (in Germany, and elsewhere in Europe) and Islamic religious traditionalist groups are entitled by our governments to define what is taught in these "Islamic teachings". They should have better introduced Greek & Latin teachings for all (sarcasm off). Philosophy is naturally always a political thing. You cannot go searching for truth and humanity without encountering the clash with raw inhuman power, as today represented by Her Holy Blindness Ms Merkel & friends. That is, too, my interpretation of the Galileo affair: Scholasticism and its willing alliance with power encountered fresh and free thinking of Galileo, either right or wrong, no matter.
In reply to Jack, by T. Franke
Just a quick note on the
Just a quick note on the extensive coverage of Plato and Aristotle, as compared to other figures: I actually wrestle a lot with how much coverage to give "major" figures since I don't want them to overwhelm the story, but I realize listeners are going to be especially interested in them, plus they do tend to be very influential. So, one reason I covered Plato and Aristotle so much was precisely that we needed to understand them to understand so many minor figures later on (and they are kind of a special case, especially Aristotle who is the major authority in philosophy for well more than half of the history of philosophy, in both Europe and the Islamic sphere).
Another point here is that I also want to extend the "gapless" approach to the major thinkers, so for instance I started off talking about Plato by looking at two dialogues hardly anyone studies in college - and I have also tried to give well-rounded portraits of other figures like Augustine, Aquinas, Avicenna (and, I guess, some major thinkers who don't start with A too). The point of my approach, in short, is not to skip or skimp on the major figures but to contextualize them by looking at the minor figures who surround them - and occasionally pointing out that supposedly minor figures are not so minor.
In any case, as a whole, if you looked at the podcast series and totaled the number of episodes on major figures, they are well less than half of the series I guess.
In reply to Just a quick note on the by Peter Adamson
Peter, all agreed. Your work
Peter, all agreed. Your work is invaluable, and since you are the first who is trying it, you have the privilege that you cannot really go wrong. Beginnings always have their particular charme. In an unexplored land, every step is a success. And it is in the nature of the thing itself, that Plato and Aristotle need more coverage. I am really excited which new insights will spring from your work in the future to come. I recommended your podcast to my Indian colleagues here in Germany. They get a totally new perspective on the history of thought of their own country, and bring up their children with this perspective, too.
Update: the lecturer (who is
Update: the lecturer (who is not the tutor I mentioned, but seems to share the same view on the period) spoke about the course's gap in class yesterday. She mentioned that she knows too little about the period, and said it would be interesting to hear an expert on medieval or Late Antique philosophy give a defence of its value. While disclaiming any claims to such expertise, I offered to write up and send her a 1-2 page summary of the period that defends its value to philosophy generally and to the course in particular, which is on metaphilosophy. It's quite likely that I'll follow up by doing something similar for non-western traditions.
When I finish writing it up, I'd like to be to link to it from here so anyone interested can offer feedback. Obviously, a 1-2 page summary of such a large period will necessarily be woefully inadequate, but I do think some contribution from others might at least make it less woefully inadequate.
In reply to Update: the lecturer (who is by Jack
That's excellent. Please do
That's excellent. Please do share it here when it's done! (I was also wondering what your tutor would think if they saw the discussion that has erupted here on the blog...)
In reply to That's excellent. Please do by Peter Adamson
Will do! I'm a little
Will do! I'm a little reluctant to share it with him, given how intemperate my initial remarks about him were. Nevertheless, I think I will have to do so, given that (i) I'm listing this site as a further resource and (ii) as a layperson, I really feel that provide access to what more informed people think about my summary.
As it turns out I'm violating my 1-2 page size limit quite severely - at present, I'm at about three, and I've barely even started on the Islamic tradition! The concise way to do it is to just list the names of positions and arguments adopted, but given that my aim is to show the value of these thinkers, and the first two thinkers I cover in any detail are Plotinus and Augustine, I immediately felt like this approach would be self-undermining. When possible, I have basically done this (e.g. describing Augustine's position on free will simply as "arguably the canonical expression of libertarianism"), but for these two that's rarely possible. My current intention is to get around this somewhat by beginning with a (hopefully) one page summary at the start of the piece.
One thing I'm struggling with is my own insistence on a thematic approach - what I've called great man history is much easier to write! I decided to abandon that goal entirely for the Late Antique period, but fortunately the task should be easier for Islamic World and Latin Medieval philosophy, owing to the Cambridge History of Medieval Philosophy and the later chapters of The Cambridge Companion to Arabic Philosophy. (Thanks by the way!) I was initially hoping to have it done tomorrow, but that's looking increasingly unlikely...
In reply to Will do! I'm a little by Jack
One thing you could point out
One thing you could point out is that Augustine and Plotinus are actually Great Men anyway - so you aren't even asking very much of your reader (I would say both are among the 10 most influential thinkers in Western philosophy). A real commitment to a "gapless" approach would mean, in the case of late antiquity, taking seriously figures like Tertullian, Gregory of Nyssa, or Iamblichus! But, one step at a time I suppose.
In reply to One thing you could point out by Peter Adamson
Oh absolutely. My first
Oh absolutely. My first response to anyone who disputes that they are the two outstanding thinkers of the era is the 'incredulous stare' David Lewis referred to. Of course, a gapless approach to over 1000 years of philosophy would be asking an awful lot of a work originally intended to be less than two pages! Nevertheless, I do think a thematic treatment is ideal. One advantage of such an approach that has become apparent to me just while trying to write this is that it can more precisely explain where it is they are original or where their influence was less than it should have been. (The example that made me appreciate this point was Avicenna's work on proof theory, that according to the SEP article on Arabic and Philosophy of Language and Logic is extraordinarily sophisticated but seemingly without impact on the later traditions).
That being said, I've also come to the conclusion that such a work would be better off covering the whole period of ancient philosophy than restricting itself to Late Antiquity. The philosophers of Late Antiquity are so profoundly embedded within the context of a broader ancient tradition that I feel a thematic dialogue of ideas approach does itself something of a disservice by truncating off itself into Classical and Late Antique periods. (As a side note, perhaps that explains why The Cambridge History of Hellenistic Philosophy is the only such volume to take a non-thematic approach).
Also, just a heads up, at this point I'm thinking I'll just get the Islamic World tradition done today, upload what I've got and try to get the Latin Christian stuff done throughout the week. If I continue focusing unilaterally on it like I have for the last two days or so I'm going to fall really behind on my studies.
In reply to Oh absolutely. My first by Jack
A day later than anticipated,
A day later than anticipated, I've finally finished my section on the Islamic World! The Latin medieval tradition is still to come, as is a bibliography.
https://docs.google.com/a/student.unimelb.edu.au/document/d/1MSaEcoxp_c…
In reply to A day later than anticipated, by Jack
I've noticed that the link
I've noticed that the link above leads to some very strange formatting (and might not work for those outside my university). The link below is updated a bit, and should solve any formatting problems.
In reply to I've noticed that the link by Jack
Wow! That overview is great -
Wow! That overview is great - you have really been listening closely, I guess. Thanks so much for making this available to everyone.
In reply to Wow! That overview is great - by Peter Adamson
Sorry about the delay. I
Sorry about the delay. I could've sworn I'd uploaded this about a week ago.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/2lb3v0uqt8xeunm/The%20Gap%20Period%20in%20the…
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Wow! A full blog response -
Wow! A full blog response - talk about the royal treatment! Certainly I intend to come prepared with a ready made list of examples to future tutorials - having to try and come up with them on the spot is surprisingly difficult. Doing this is somewhat complicated by the fact that I've been unable to find out anything about him online. All I know about his tastes in the history of philosophy are that he thinks Schelling is underrated and that he seems to think Descartes has predecessors in his discussion of the mind-body problem. His ability as tutor to choose the topic of discussion whenever he wants doesn't help either...