Certain intellectual challenges can neither be resolved by the discovery of missing pieces of information nor by construction of better arguments. Yet what is called for in such cases is not mere persuasion, but a form of intellectual transformation. Wittgenstein sought to respond to the problems of philosophy along similar lines. And the need for the notion of intellectual transformation arises in other contexts, as well, including the context of moral progress, which Cora Diamond explores in her recent work. But various philosophical difficulties stand in the way of embracing the idea that transformation has any role to play when it comes to questions or truth and of value. In particular, it seems that we must either bracket the psychological, historical and anthropological perspectives that the notion of transformation opens up, or else succumb to some form of relativism. My aim in this paper is to show how Wittgenstein and Diamond chart a middle course between these two extremes
Recently, Rebecca Kukla – among others – has argued that consent language is too narrow to adequately capture the ethical obligations and failures arising in the context of sex. Instead, she offers more nuanced scripts for the kinds of communication that occur throughout sex, not just at the beginning. I agree with Kukla that consent language is too narrow; however, I argue that she overlooks the fact that intimate personal communication requires an emotional attunement to context precisely because it cannot be fully scripted. To demonstrate this I turn to Cavell’s category of the passionate utterance which gestures at this dynamic dimension of performatives, but doesn’t deliver a detailed account. In this paper I will expand on Cavell’s idea of the passionate exchange in order to shed light on the active interpretive role of the audience, and how it contributes to performative success.
One of the central questions facing human beings is how we should respond to the humanity of others. Since the enlightenment, secular Western ethics has gravitated towards two kinds of answer: we should care for others’ well-being, or we should respect them as autonomous agents. Largely neglected is an answer we can find the religious traditions of Judaism, Christianity and Buddhism: we should love all. Analytic philosophers have started to pay more attention to love. But unlike those working within religious traditions, for whom an ideal of love for all serves as the central, organizing ideal in ethics, most of these philosophers see love as confined to the domain of intimate relationships between friends, family, romantic partners and the like. This paper argues that an ideal of love for all, of agape, can be understood apart from its more typical religious contexts and moreover provides a unified and illuminating account of the the nature and grounds of morality. Against challenges to the idea that love for all is possible, I offer a novel account of what it would be to love all. I go on to argue that while it is possible to love all, most of us should not, as doing so would rule out the possibility of loving particular friends and families. Instead, we should approximate love for all. I argue that the minimal approximation of love for all is, surprisingly, respect, deriving the basic, structural features of deontological ethics (including anti-welfarism and anti-aggregation) from my account of love for all.
Reception to follow.
NYC Wittgenstein presents:
Professor Rupert Read (Personal Website link) will be joining us on the 22nd of October from 1-3 PM EDT on Zoom in presenting the introduction from his book, Wittgenstein’s Liberatory Philosophy: Thinking Through His Philosophical Investigations, in which he argues that “the key to understanding Wittgenstein’s later philosophy is to understand its liberatory purport.”
Thursday, September 29th, 2022
Christina Van Dyke (Barnard College)
Title “I feel it in my fingers, I feel it in my toes: Imaginative Meditation and Experience of Love in Medieval Contemplative Philosophy”
4:10-6:00 PM
716 Philosophy Hall
Thinking Across the Humanities on Valentines’s Day
Tuesday, Feb. 14 of course! 4pm, McShane Center 311
A fun student-faculty roundtable discussion on topics related to love in all of its fabulous variety: erotic love, unrequited love, love and justice, love of friends, love of the Divine, sanctioned and unsanctioned love, personal and political love, and so much more! What insights can we, along with some of our favorite artists and thinkers, offer on love? Come for a roundtable where a small group of faculty and students will jump off with brief prepared remarks, followed by a discussion, food, and fun!
RSVP here
Well-being, also known as prudential value, refers to whatever makes a life non-instrumentally good for the person living it. Well-being is the object of immense practical, philosophical, and scientific concern. Assessments of well-being help to guide our decisions in everyday life, from relationships, to health decisions, to education and career choices. Well-being is increasingly the object of governmental and institutional policy, and even policies that are not aimed directly at promoting it can be evaluated in terms of their impacts on well-being. Colleges and universities routinely offer programs designed to help students maintain their well-being in the face of academic and personal stress. However, debates over the nature of well-being have raged since the beginning of philosophical inquiry, leaving us in a bad position when it comes to making headway on addressing those practical and scientific concerns. The goal of this talk is to show how the application of naturalistic methodology can help us to resolve the philosophical stalemate and thus to make progress in our practical and scientific projects relating to well-being.
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Talk link — Email cruzdavis <at> umass.edu or jrc2266 <at> columbia.edu for the passcode
The NYC Wittgenstein Workshop presents:
March 31st — Sandra Laugier (Université Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne) will be presenting on Wittgenstein and Care Ethics
April 14th — Camila Lobo (PhD candidate in Philosophy at Nova University of Lisbon and visiting scholar) will be presenting on Wittgenstein and hermeneutical justice in connection with the so-called “problem of the new.”
April 21st — Harmut von Sass (Humboldt University Berlin and a visiting scholar) will be presenting on gratitude.
April 28th — Janna van Grunsven (Delft University of Technology) will be presenting on How Social Media Platforms Disrupt the Field of Social Affordances and Threaten Human Flourishing.
With the exception of our last talk (which will take place over Zoom), workshops will be in person from 4 to 6 pm EST, followed by a reception. As always, snacks and drinks will be provided.
Look out for an email closer to each event with more details regarding the location and materials the speaker would like to circulate.
The Avoidance of Intimacy: A Reorientation in the Moral Philosophy of Love
Presented by Columbia University Dept. of Philosophy