Professor Kristin Boyce (Mississippi State University) will present her paper, “A Philosophical History of Analytic Philosophy of Literature“; graduate student Elliot Trapp (NSSR) will respond.
February 27th Friday 4:30-6:30, 80 Fifth Ave. Room 529, The New School
Abstract:
The history of analytic philosophy of literature could be written as a narrative of the efforts to formulate and solve a series of interrelated paradoxes. This kind of approach will strike many as uncontroversially part and parcel of an analytic philosophy of literature. I argue, though, that this is neither the only nor the best form that a distinctively “analytic” philosophy of literature can take. Instead of writing a survey of paradoxes formulated and solutions attempted, I shift to what I call “the paradox of philosophy and literature.” On one hand literature (along with the arts more generally) has consistently been of marginal importance as an object of philosophical reflection. On the other, or so I will argue, it has been of special methodological importance for analytic philosophy from the beginning.
The marginalization of aesthetics within analytic philosophy is no secret. By contrast, the methodological centrality of the literary arts for analytic philosophy has not until recently been recognized at all. From its inception, the analytic tradition has worked hard to disentangle itself from other humanistic enterprises, especially art and religion, and to secure its proximity to modern science. Recent work in the history of early analytic philosophy by Cora Diamond and others, though, has made it possible to see how deeply tied the “analytic” ways of doing philosophy that emerged were not just to developments in the sciences, but to those in the literary arts and criticism as well. I argue that this work has important implications for aesthetics generally, and for philosophy of literature in particular, that have not yet been recognized or explored. A philosophical self-understanding, which more adequately reflects the proximity of the work of philosophy to the work of literature, should make possible new and by some measures better ways of reflecting philosophically on art.
*For a copy of the paper, please email nycwittgensteinworkshop@gmail.com
Professor Karen Lewis (Columbia) will present “Reverse Sobel Sequences in Static Semantics” in Room 302, NYU Philosophy Department, 5 Washington Place, New York City.
ABSTRACT: Sobel Sequences are consistent sequences of counterfactuals like the following:
(1a) If Sophie had gone to the parade, she would have seen Pedro dance.
(1b) But of course, if Sophie had gone to the parade and been stuck behind someone tall, she wouldn’t have seen Pedro dance.
But reverse the sequence, and it does not sound so good at all. This observation – that order makes a difference to the consistency of the sequence – motivated Kai von Fintel and Thony Gillies to abandon the classic Lewis-Stalnaker semantics and adopt a dynamic semantic account of counterfactual conditionals. Subsequently, Sarah Moss defended the classic Lewis-Stalnaker semantics against the charge that it need be abandoned because of Reverse Sobel Sequences, arguing for a pragmatic account of the infelicity of the sequences. I argue that ultimately both the dynamic semantic account and Moss’s account are untenable, but that seeing what is good about each account points the way to the right positive story. Finally, I defend a positive view that attributes the effect of counterfactuals on the context to pragmatics, but treats the effect of the context on counterfactuals as semantic.
If you wanted to prepare for the topic in advance, the paper by Sarah Moss on Sobel sequences is available online here.
In the seventeenth century Descartes fundamentally transformed mathematics, and this transformation enabled in turn Newton’s revolution in the practice of fundamental physics. It was left to Kant, in the eighteenth century, to revolutionize the practice of philosophy. In nineteenth-century Germany, the practice of mathematics was again transformed, this time by Riemann, Dedekind, and others, and this transformation enabled in turn both Einstein’s revolution in the practice of fundamental physics and the emergence of quantum mechanics. Has philosophy similarly been again revolutionized? Some, I think, would say that it has as evidenced, and catalyzed, by the development of mathematical logic and concomitant rise of analytic philosophy. But this is a mistake. Mathematical logic, in particular, our standard first-order quantificational logic, as well as the philosophical work to which it has given rise, remains merely Kantian. The revolution in philosophy that is needed in the wake of the nineteenth- and twentieth-century revolutions in mathematics and physics has yet to happen. I aim to help it along not only by showing that it has not yet been achieved but also by uncovering some of the resources required for a transformed logic.
Arianna Falbo
Simon Fraser University
“Why Two (or more) Belief-Dependent Peers are Better Than One”
1:00-3:00 PM, Room 202
NYU Philosophy Department
5 Washington Place, NYC
Joint NYU Department Tea & SWIP-Analytic Reception to Follow
ABSTRACT: The following principle is widely assumed in the literature surrounding the epistemology of peer disagreement: When S disagrees with a group of epistemic peers P1, P2, P3. . . Pn concerning the truth of p, if S has already taken into account the dissent of P1, then S’s disagreement with P2, P3. . . Pn does not need to be accounted for if the beliefs of these subsequent dissenters are not independent of P1’s belief that p. Hence, S can be rationally excused from considering these subsequent dissenters. I call this assumption ‘Belief-Dependence Excusal’ and argue that it is false. This is because the epistemic perspective of a peer can itself be evidentially significant irrespective of whether or not her beliefs are independent of other dissenters that I have already rationally accounted for. I focus on testimonial belief-dependence as it applies to a group of dissenters whose beliefs are all (at least partly) justified by the same report.
Everyone (men & women, philosophers & non-philosophers) is welcome at our public events.
SWIP-Analytic is a branch of the New York Society for Women in Philosophy dedicated to providing a forum for women in the New York area working on language, mind, metaphysics, logic, ethics, epistemology, and philosophy of science. It strives to continue NYSWIP’s commitment to being resource for all women in philosophy in the New York area.
SWIP-Analytic Spring 2017 Events
Friday February 10th, 11am- 1pm
GC, CUNY, The Committee for Interdisciplinary Science Studies, Room 5307
Roundtable Discussion: “Women in Philosophy: Publishing, Jobs, and Fitting In”
Speakers:
Elise Crull (City College)
Una Stojnik (NYU)
Denise Vigani (Drew College)
Friday March 10th, 10am- 12pm
NYU, Philosophy Department, Room 202
Speaker: Romina Padró (The Saul Kripke Center, GC, CUNY)
Title to be confirmed
Friday April 21st, 10am- 12pm
NYU, Philosophy Department, Room 202
Speaker: Winner of the SWIP-Analytic Essay Prize (TBD)
Friday May 5th, 11am- 13om
GC, CUNY (Room TBA).
Speaker: Alyssa Ney (UC Davies)
“Physics and Fundamentality”
CALL FOR PAPERS
SWIP-Analytic
2017 Graduate Student Essay Prize
SWIP-Analytic invites women graduate students to submit abstracts and papers in the areas of language, mind, metaphysics, logic, ethics, epistemology, & philosophy of science for consideration for a two-hour presentation at SWIP-Analytic in NYC.
https://philevents.org/event/show/29366
One student’s paper will be accepted for presentation on April 21st, 2017. The student will be awarded the 2017 SWIP-Analytic Graduate Student Paper Prize of $250. The winner will also be reimbursed for up to $250 of travel expenses.
Submission Requirements
(1) a pdf, .doc, or .docx of a maximum 300 word abstract and 5,000 word paper prepared for blind review
(2) document of identification with name, institution, and email address
Email both to swipanalytic@gmail.com by February 15th, 2017.
Notifications of decisions will be sent by March 15th 2017. The winning student paper presentation will take place on Friday, April 21st 2017 in New York City.
Please send any questions to swipanalytic@gmail.com.
SWIP-Analytic is made possible through the generous support of NYU’s New York Institute of Philosophy, The John H. Kornblith Family Chair, and The CUNY Graduate Center Department of Philosophy, and The Committee for Interdisciplinary Science Studies.
SWIP-Analytic continues the Society for Women in Philosophy’s commitment to being a resource for all women in philosophy by providing a forum for women working in language, mind, metaphysics, logic, ethics, epistemology, and philosophy of science. Let us know at swipanalytic@gmail.com if you’d like to subscribe or unsubscribe from the SWIP-Analytic email list.
In my talk, I wish to outline an alternative to a chapter in the history of modern philosophy, and present Kant’s tenets in the Critique of Pure Reason in the spirit of the Vienna Circle, the origin of analytic philosophy.
According to the traditional narrative, Kant overcame the limitations of British empiricism (Hume) and German rationalism (Leibniz) and with his “transcendental philosophy” raised philosophy to a new and superior level. Contemporary Leibnizian critics failed to appreciate the novelty of his approach. Although Kant complimented Salomon Maimon (1753-1800) for having best understood him among his critics, he saw no reason to accept Maimon’s criticism.
From the point of view of the Vienna Circle in the 1920-1930, the traditional narrative should be reversed. In the view of its members, there are no synthetic judgments a priori, and the Kantian project was therefore misconceived in principle. The “Kantian intermezzo”, as Neurath called it, should be skipped and philosophy should rather return to Hume and Leibniz. Exactly this was Maimon’s position. He characterized himself as a “rational dogmatist and empirical skeptic”, referring explicitly to Leibniz and Hume respectively.
I will present Maimon’s criticism of Kant’s synthetic judgments a priori and claim that it is valid. With this, questions concerning the progress of philosophy and its historiography will naturally rise.
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Gideon Freudenthal is professor emeritus at the Cohn Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Ideas, Tel-Aviv University.
He is the author (or co-author) of:
Atom and Individual in the Age of Newton (1986)
Exploring the Limits of Preclassical Mechanics (1991)
Classical Marxist Historiography of Science: The Hessen-Grossmann-Thesis (2009)
No Religion without Idolatry. Mendelssohn’s Jewish Enlightenment (2012)
Presented by The New School for Social Research (NSSR) Philosophy Department.
The standard way to show the consistency of a theory, or the independence of a given statement from that theory, is to exhibit a model. But there’s more than one thing that’s been called a “model” as this notion has evolved from its original role in 19th century foundations of geometry to its current role as a universallyapplicable tool in logic. This talk investigates some of the changes that bring us to the modern notion, and asks to what extent various kinds of model do, or don’t, successfully demonstrate various kinds of consistency and independence.
When: Friday October 20, 11:00am-1:00pm (with reception to follow)
Where: NYU Philosophy Department, 5 Washington Place, Room 202
Nina Emery (Mount Holyoke), November 3, The Graduate Center, CUNY
9:15 – 9:30 Coffee & Opening Remarks
9:30 – 10:50 Anna Katsman: Freighted Love
11:00 – 12:20 Federica Gregoratto: Eros and Freedom Today
12:20 – 1:30 Lunch Break
1:30 – 2:50 Sara Macdonald: The Art of Friendship: Hegel and Plato
3:00 – 4:20 Gal Katz, “Love’s Rage Is Shame”: Hegel on Sex
4:20 – 4:45 Break
4:45 – 6.05 Paul Kottman: Love as Human Freedom
New York German Idealism Workshop
A joint undertaking of the philosophy departments of Columbia University & the New School for Social Research presents:
MATTERS OF LOVE: A CONFERENCE
A number of philosophers working on Buddhist traditions have recently explored similarities between the cultivated experience of not-self, and the clinical experience of depersonalization. In this talk, I will offer some reflections on this theme. But my primary aim will be to push a similar kind of exploratory project one step further. Drawing on tools from cognitive and computational neuroscience, as well as insights from Yogācāra Buddhist philosophy, I will explore some of the most significant similarities and differences between anomalous experiences evoked by meditation, and anomalous experiences that are commonly labeled as hallucinations. I will then argue that understanding how such experiences are produced offers a powerful framework for thinking about the socially and historically situated nature of everyday experience.