This is a reminder for:
Title: PG WIP: Chris Wilcox
USYD Philosophy Postgraduate Work-in-Progress Seminar
Chris Wilcox: 'McDowell and Rorty on Answerability to the World'
ABSTRACT:
I plan to bang on for a bit about the dispute between John McDowell and
Richard Rorty over answerability to the world. McDowell is an empiricist
in that he thinks that we need more than a merely causal notion of
answerability to the world in order to give a satisfactory account of how
our beliefs can be about the world. Rorty, taking himself to be following
philosophers like Brandom and Davidson, claims that we don't need anything
stronger than a causal link with the world. Indeed, he believes that we
should replace objectivity with solidarity as the notion via which we
attempt to make sense of our lives by situating them in a larger context.
Overall, I think that McDowell fares a little better in the debate but a
lot of broad and interesting issues come up along the way. These include:
how we are to face up to the contingency of our historical (and physical)
situation, whether or not there is something ratification-transcendent in
our engagement with the external world (and what this
ratification-transcendence might amount to), and what one considers to be
an adequate reponse to external world scepticism.
If I have time, I'd also like to talk a little bit about the sense in which
McDowell's quietist picture may be deemed to be too quiet. That is, it may
be claimed that McDowell doesn't do justice to the way in which our
confrontation with the external may be unsettled (or unsettling). In
thinking about this claim I have in mind the potential applicability of the
work of philosophers such as Stanley Cavell, Cora Diamond, and Emmanuel
Levinas (anyone who can help to make my thinking with regard to these
philosophers [or indeed any others!] less amateurish will be warmly
welcomed).
Everyone is welcome to attend.
If you would like to present or require further information, please contact
Nick Malpas at [email protected]
The format is 30 minutes for presentations followed by 1 hour of
discussion. Since the primary aim of this seminar is to generate
discussion, presentations need not be particularly polished or formal.
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When: Mon Mar 21 3:30pm – 5pm Eastern Time - Melbourne, Sydney
Where: Philosophy Common Room (Main Quad, University of Sydney)
Calendar: Postgraduate Events
Who:
* [email protected] - creator
Event details:
https://www.google.com/calendar/event?action=VIEW&eid=bjdvdmlzYWNyN3JqbW9rYzR0YmZycm01MGsgMmJlcm9za3ZqcjJnMjRyam50cWxxZWdzNm9AZw
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