Book discussion on Gwenda-lin Grewal’s, Thinking About Death in Plato’s Euthydemus. A Close Reading and New Translation (OUP 2022)
Speakers:
Gwenda-lin Grewal (NSSR)
Cinzia Arruzza (NSSR)
Nicholas Pappas (CUNY)
Thinking of Death places Plato’s Euthydemus among the dialogues that surround the trial and death of Socrates. A premonition of philosophy’s fate arrives in the form of Socrates’ encounter with the two-headed sophist pair, Euthydemus and Dionysodorus, who appear as if they are the ghost of the Socrates of Aristophanes’ Thinkery. The pair vacillate between choral ode and rhapsody, as Plato vacillates between referring to them in the dual and plural number in Greek. Gwenda-lin Grewal’s close reading explores how the structure of the dialogue and the pair’s back-and-forth arguments bear a striking resemblance to thinking itself: in its immersive remove from reality, thinking simulates death even as it cannot conceive of its possibility. Euthydemus and Dionysodorus take this to an extreme, and so emerge as the philosophical dream and sophistic nightmare of being disembodied from substance. The Euthydemus is haunted by philosophy’s tenuous relationship to political life. This is played out in the narration through Crito’s implied criticism of Socrates-the phantom image of the Athenian laws-and in the drama itself, which appears to take place in Hades. Thinking of death thus brings with it a lurid parody of the death of thinking: the farce of perfect philosophy that bears the gravity of the city’s sophistry. Grewal also provides a new translation of the Euthydemus that pays careful attention to grammatical ambiguities, nuances, and wit in ways that substantially expand the reader’s access to the dialogue’s mysteries.
The Center for Philosophy of Religion at Rutgers University is pleased to host an in-person, working-papers conference on the Psychology and Epistemology of Religious Experience. We are seeking abstracts (150-350 words) from those interested in participating. The tentative date is 15-16 April 2023. And the deadline for submission is 28 February 2023. Participants with accepted submissions will be given hotel accommodations and a modest honorarium to help defray travel costs.
Theme
The overall theme of the workshop is the Psychology and Epistemology of Religious Experiences. Philosophers of religion frequently assign religious experiences important epistemic roles, such as justifying religious beliefs. But religious experiences of the kind philosophers are interested in are also studied in other fields as well, such as psychology and religious studies. However, the psychology and epistemology of religious experiences are presumably not independent; studying them together is likely to be insightful in various ways. To that end, we are interested in bringing together scholars working on the psychology and epistemology of religious experiences. Potential topics include:
· The nature of religious experiences
· Taxonomies of religious experiences
· Potential psychological mechanisms and accounts of religious experience
· The relation between perception and religious experiences
· The epistemology of religious experience
· The interactions between the psychology and epistemology of religious experience
· The relation of cognitive science of religion to religious experience
Any proposed papers on these topics, or similar ones, are welcome. Papers exploring interdisciplinary approaches are also welcome.
Instructions
Please submit an abstract (150-350 words), long abstract (350-650 words), or full paper to Timothy Perrine at tp654@scarletmail.rutgers.edu. Submission should be prepared for blind review. In a separate document please provide your name, institutional affiliation (if applicable), and contact information. Submission deadline is 28 February; acceptances will be decided by 5 March; and the workshop will be held 15-16 April.
Rutgers Epistemology Conference
The importance of incorporating value pluralism into a theory of justice is recognized in many conceptualizations of justice. This pluralism is often seen as a reason to attend to a range of perspectives, perspectives which can function as a source of information in determining which principles should guide justice. However, philosophy’s ability to properly attend to different perspectives has received extensive attention in the criticisms of various non-ideal theorists, who argue that ideal-theoretical philosophy runs the risk of excluding important aspects of actual social problems. Taking these criticisms on board, this paper builds on non-ideal theory by arguing for a Wittgensteinian family resemblance approach to justice. I will explain how this linguistic practice-embedded understanding of justice can be a helpful tool for non-ideal theory, as it can give us insight into why, in various similar but different cases, the notion of justice is seen as applicable. In light of this approach, I will suggest a reorientation of the pluralist demand towards an empirical starting point.
What is critique? According to the Kantian tradition, it is an investigation of the transcendental conditions for the possibility of thinking and experience. While later critics shifted the focus to material conditions, core metaphysical commitments and procedures of critique remained unchanged. Critique of Critique (Stanford UP, 2023), the subject of this talk, probes critique as an orientation of thought through its historical manifestations from Plato to the Frankfurt school and present-day critical theory. In the process, it asks us to consider what critical thinking is and whether it can assume orientations other than critique.
Bio: Roy Ben-Shai, a New School graduate, is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Sarah Lawrence College. His recently published book, Critique of Critique (Stanford University Press, 2023), is the first volume in a trilogy on the concept of “orientation” in critical thought. He is currently working on the second volume, Emancipatory Thinking, or the Art of Thinking Otherwise.
How does objectivity shape power, and how does power shape objectivity?
Welcome to “Unmasking Objectivity: A Critical Examination of the Nexus between Universal Truth Claims and Emergent Power Structures,” a conference that plunges into the intricate relationship between knowledge and power. In this conference, we will uncover how epistemological standpoints intersect with systems of coercion, marginalization, and oppression. Our topic extends to alternative visions of knowledge, truth, and learning, offering the potential for shared beliefs while addressing the adverse impacts of entrenched power structures.
How have claims to absolute, objective, or scientific truth driven oppression through ideologies like religious absolutism, colonialism, technocracy, and scientific sexism and racism? Contemporary debates further emphasize the significance of this intersection.
Our discourse will also scrutinize epistemic injustice, examining whether universalist epistemologies privilege specific knowledge systems while silencing valid alternatives. We aim to shed light on social and political issues overlooked by dominant knowledge frameworks through inclusive dialogues. This conference fosters critical exploration and inclusive discourse, drawing on interdisciplinary studies in philosophy, sociology, and political theory.
Together, we will assess the ethical implications of our epistemological practices and explore pathways to creating more equitable systems of knowledge and social learning. Join us at “Unmasking Objectivity” as we navigate the intricate web of knowledge and power, aiming for a just and inclusive future where the notion of objectivity is both scrutinized and harnessed for social transformation.
This talk reads contemporary debates about structural racism and US history from the perspective of philosophical questions about identity and difference. While many people have argued that America needs to come to terms with or “work through” the racism in its history that has shaped and continues to shape its present structures, it remains difficult to explain what connects this past and the present. Are we talking about one racism with many different past and present forms? Or are there multiple racisms that only share some similar features? In this talk, I draw attention to how these divisions play out particularly in contemporary Black Studies and argue that the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze can offer us resources for thinking about these questions through his discussions of repetition. I argue that understanding our conversations about structural racism and history as conversations about a racism that repeats, can help us to better understand why racism seems to reappear, how to think its disparate forms together, and what presuppositions operate in many attempts to “work through” the past.
Bio: Eyo Ewara is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Loyola University Chicago. His teaching and research explores the relationships between 20th Century Continental Philosophy, Critical Philosophy of Race, and Queer Theory. His work has appeared in Theory and Event, Puncta, Philosophy Today, Critical Philosophy of Race, Political Theology, and other venues. His current research project is particularly interested in engaging work in Continental Philosophy, Queer Theory, and Black Studies to address questions of identity and difference amongst concepts of race, forms of racism, and forms of anti-racism. How can we better account for the relations between at times radically disparate concepts, structures, and practices such that they can all specifically and recognizably be called racial? What might our account of these relations say about our ability to address racism’s harms?
The Rutgers Epistemology Conference is a pre-read conference. The papers, the finalized schedule, and further information about the conference will be posted soon.
Registration
There is no registration fee for the conference, but please notify Caroline von Klemperer, the conference manager, if you plan to attend by sending an email to rutgersepistemologyconference@gmail.com. If you wish to participate in the meals, please send a check made out to “Rutgers University” to Caroline von Klemperer by April 15 ($80 if you are a faculty member or a postdoc; $60 if you are a graduate student or an undergraduate). Checks should be sent to Caroline von Klemperer; Rutgers Epistemology Conference; 106 Somerset St, 5th Floor; New Brunswick, NJ 08901. Everyone signed up for conference meals by April 15 will be listed as a participant on the conference website.
https://philevents.org/event/show/112086
Where to stay
All sessions will be held at the Hyatt Regency in New Brunswick, NJ. A limited number of reduced-priced rooms are available to those attending the conference. The reduced rate is $170 per night for a single or double room. You can reserve a room here: https://www.hyatt.com/en-US/group-booking/EWRRN/G-RE01.
If you are a graduate student or a postdoc and would like to attend the conference and stay with a Rutgers graduate student, please contact the conference manager at rutgersepistemologyconference@gmail.com. We will try to provide all graduate students and postdocs a place to stay, but we cannot make any promises.
Accessibility
Information about accessibility of the conference venue can be found here.
How to get there
Plane & Train: If you are flying, it is best to fly into Newark Airport. It is about 25 miles from the Hyatt Regency in New Brunswick. The best way to get from the airport to New Brunswick is via NJ Transit. The train stops at the airport and it is a 25 min train ride from the airport to New Brunswick. When you arrive at Newark Airport, follow the signs to the monorail “airtrain”. The airtrain will take you to the NJ transit train stop. Trains run from Newark Airport to New Brunswick about every half hour. A oneway ticket Newark Airport – New Brunswick is about $14. You can buy tickets at the vending machines at the Newark Airport train station or on the mobile app MyTix. The Hyatt is a 5 min walk from the New Brunswick train station.
Train: The best way to get to New Brunswick from New York or Philadelphia is via NJ Transit. The Hyatt is a 5 min walk from the New Brunswick train station.