I chanced upon this freely available review of Rorty’s notorious PMN (30th anniversary edition). It reminded me that I’d read PMN long before reading Oakeshott and that coming across Rorty’s invocation of Oakeshott’s conversational metaphor had no resonance for me. Even though I’m not in sympathy with Rorty and Oakeshott’s relativism I’m amazed at the…
I chanced upon this online version of arguably my favourite philosophical book. The opening paragraph should be something every student should read and have posted above ones desk: An interest in philosophy is often first aroused by an irrelevant impulse to see the world and ourselves better than we find them. We seek in philosophy…
One can’t help but marvel at eclectic breadth and the prolific output of Nicholas Rescher. Now in his 83rd year, there are no signs of this phenomenon slowing down. I first met Nick at the Bradley Society conference held at Harris Manchester College, Oxford in about 1998. Unlike so many other stars of a younger…
The old firm of Taylor and Perry interview Dan Little for Philosophy Talk Is history just a series of events, or an interpretation of those events? Is there progress in history? Can history be objective, or is it, as Napoleon said, just the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon? Ken…
John Searle’s philosophy of mind lectures freely available on iTunes.
Here is me old chum Tony Quinton being interviewed by Bryan Magee on Wittgenstein. Here we have a master expositor being interviewed by Magee who has done so much to bring philosophy to a popular audience without vulgarizing it. I think this was a series of interviews taken from a late night Channel 4 series…
Here’s a curiosity – Joseph Bonaparte, Napoleon’s elder brother, was an elected member of the American Philosophical Society. What association or society (aside from The Royal Society) could claim intellectual giants such as Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton, Paine and Madison as its members? Here’s Joseph’s obituary from the Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. 6,…
Some lovely reflections from Leon Malinofsky: Skydiving is three things: It is a submission after years of willfulness; it is wholly absorbing, and therefore distracting from our cares; and it is the rational, peaceful contemplation of death, and eternity made less fearsome. Excerpt from Why Skydive? See also Imagine, Freefall, and my favourite Home. (This is…
Joshua Knobe, Kwame Anthony Appiah, Tim Maudlin, Timothy Williamson, Brian Leiter, and Ernie Sosa discuss in The New York Times “Philosophy’s New Take on Old Problems: Do experimental methods offer new horizons for philosophy departments, which have come under attack for being impractical?”
Here is a review of an intellectual biography of Ernest Gellner.
manwithoutqualities 