philopapers

Tim Madigan on the curmudgeon who preached compassion. “Poor Schopenhauer had this secret guilt, too, in his heart, the guilt of cherishing his philosophy more than his fellow men.” So wrote Friedrich Nietzsche in his incisive essay from Thoughts Out Of Season, ‘Schopenhauer as Educator’ (1874). Nietzsche goes on to say: “He often chose falsely […]

Kevin S. Decker on John Dewey’s unique political contribution. John Dewey (1859-1952) was hailed in his lifetime as “America’s philosopher of democracy”. His work on educational theory and social psychology at the Universities of Michigan – Ann Arbor and Chicago was one of the foundations of early 20th century progressive social work. He worked alongside

David Boersema describes how two very different thinkers were on the trail of similar ideas about the nature of consciousness. Charles Peirce (1839-1914) and Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) were two towering figures in philosophy who wrestled with issues of consciousness and the ego, or self. These are matters that have long concerned philosophers and cross the

Michael Allen Fox argues that old approaches to the problem don’t work. Who am I? That’s a difficult question to tackle, and each of us must do so for him- or herself, if it is to be tackled at all. But importantly related to this question is another: Am I the same person now as

Patricia Railing explains the philosophical ideas behind some of abstract art’s most famous abstractions. There has been much philosophical speculation on the relationship between artistic materials and artistic experience down through the centuries. Christopher Perricone pointed this out in his article ‘Does the Philosophy of Art Have a Mind/Body Problem?’ back in Issue 46. Now

Jeffrey Gordon rereads a correspondence on war between Einstein and Freud. In 1932 the greatest genius of the Twentieth Century wrote an urgent letter to the century’s most influential psychologist. In that letter, Albert Einstein asked Sigmund Freud, “Is there any way of delivering mankind from the menace of war?” It was the same year

Gordon Marino explains how we talk ourselves out of doing the right thing. There is a strong movement afoot calling for more ethics classes, workshops and review boards. The presumption is that our citizenry is in dire need of more knowledge of ethics, and more practice in the art of analysis. While all this may

Mathias Brochhausen envisages Wittgenstein Hitchhiking around the Galaxy. There are probably many people who have had the following experience in recent years: When confronted with the question of the meaning of life, the number forty-two automatically and almost compulsively crosses their minds – only to be banished in favour of a long and elaborate answer

Kile Jones explains the differences between these ways of thinking. Shakespeare never met Wittgenstein, Russell, or Ryle, and one wonders what a conversation between them would have been like. “What’s in a name, you ask?” Wittgenstein might answer “A riddle of symbols.” Russell might respond “An explanation of concepts,” and Ryle might retort “Many unneeded

Russell Berg has fifteen criteria for scientificness and he knows how to use them. The ‘scientific method’ is a group of methods and procedures. But since Thomas Kuhn argued in the 1960s that the concept of ‘falsification’ formulated by Karl Popper is insufficient on its own to determine the scientificness of an idea, there has