Dr. Theodore George Professor and Head Department of Philosophy
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A Hermeneutic Phenomenology: the Death of the Other Understood As Event
Journal of Applied Hermeneutics March 20, 2017 The Author(s) 2017 A Hermeneutic Phenomenology: The Death of the Other Understood as Event Harris B. Bechtol Abstract This is a phenomenological description of what is happening when we experience the death of another that interprets surviving or living on after such death by employing the term event. This term of art from phenomenology and hermeneutics is used to describe a disruptive and transformative experience of singularity. I maintain that the death of the other is an experience of an event because such death is unpredictable or without a horizon of expectation, excessive or without any principle of sufficient reason, and transformative or a death of the world itself. Keywords Death, Mourning, the Other, Event, Phenomenology, Derrida And you, O tree, whose branches already are casting their shadows on one poor body and soon will be overshadowing two, preserve the marks of our death; let your fruit forever be dark as a token of mourning, a monument marking the blood of two lovers. (Ovid, 2004, 4.157-161) Poetry, literature, and art in general have a unique ability to expose us to common experiences so that we see the heart of these experiences as we live them out in everyday life. Art can function as a mirror of our deepest philosophical concerns by highlighting our average, everyday understanding of phenomena. Though classified under myth, Ovid’s account of how the mulberry tree came to bear red instead of white berries functions in just this way. He shows in the tragic love of Thisbe and Pyramus how the death of a loved one is carried by the world itself through the world’s own metamorphosis. -
International Yearbook for Hermeneutics Internationales Jahrbuch Für Hermeneutik
International Yearbook for Hermeneutics Internationales Jahrbuch für Hermeneutik edited by Günter Figal in cooperation with Damir Barbaric´, Béla Bacsó, Gottfried Boehm, Luca Crescenzi, Ingolf Dalferth, Nicholas Davey, Donatella Di Cesare, Jean Grondin, Pavel Kouba, Joachim Lege, Hideki Mine, Hans Ruin, John Sallis, Dennis Schmidt, Bernhard Zimmermann 15 · 2016 Focus: Humanism Schwerpunkt: Humanismus Mohr Siebeck Authors e-offprint with publisher’s permission. Editorial team/Redaktion: Jon Burmeister, Ph.D. Dr. David Espinet Dr. Tobias Keiling, Ph.D. Nikola Mirković, M.A. Jerome Veith, Ph.D. Contents Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg Philosophisches Seminar Platz der Universität 3 79085 Freiburg Focus: Humanism Germany Schwerpunkt: Humanismus The Yearbook calls for contributions in English or German on topics in Philosophical Hermeneutics and bordering disciplines. Please send manuscripts to: yearbook@philo Bernhard Zimmermann (Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg) sophie.uni-freiburg.de. All articles, except when invited, are subject to blind review. Humanismus und humanistische Bildung . 1 We assume that manuscripts are unpublished and have not been submitted for publi- cation elsewhere. Citations are to be made according to the style in the present volume. Gert-Jan van der Heiden (Radboud University) Detailed information on formatting manuscripts can be downloaded from: http://www. philosophie.uni-freiburg.de/iyh. Technology and Childhood. On a Double Debt of the Human . 16 Das Jahrbuch bittet um Zusendungen auf Deutsch oder Englisch zu Themen der Philoso- (Freiburg) phischen Hermeneutik und angrenzender Disziplinen. Bitte senden Sie Manuskripte an: Antonia Egel [email protected]. Alle Artikel, die nicht auf Einladung des Heraus- Warum lesen und wenn ja, dann was? gebers verfasst worden sind, werden in einem blind review-Verfahren begutachtet. -
Hermeneutics, Exteriority, and Transmittability
Research research in phenomenology 47 (2017) 331–350 in Phenomenology brill.com/rp Are We a Conversation? Hermeneutics, Exteriority, and Transmittability Theodore George Texas A&M University [email protected] Abstract Hermeneutics is widely celebrated as a call for “conversation”—that is, a manner of in- quiry characterized by humility and openness to the other that eschews the pretenses of calculative rationality and resists all finality of conclusions. In this, conversation takes shape in efforts to understand and interpret that always unfold in the transmis- sion of meaning historically in language. Yet, the celebration of hermeneutics for hu- mility and openness appears, at least, to risk embarrassment in light of claims found in Heidegger and Gadamer that conversation is always contingent on “prior accord.” Critics of hermeneutics have, for some decades, interpreted this claim of prior accord to refer to a common tradition, so that the understanding achieved in conversation is restricted to those who belong to the same heritage. In this essay, the author argues that although Heidegger and Gadamer often suggest this prior accord is a matter of common tradition, crucial threads of Gadamer’s thought, in particular, recommend a different view. Gadamer, in these threads, offers that “prior accord” concerns not a common tradition, but, on the contrary, the call to participate in hermeneutic trans- mission as such, even—and no doubt especially—when those in conversation are not familiar with the tradition or language of the other. With this, we are called to converse not first by what the other says, but by the fact that we do not yet understand, that we have already misunderstood, and that we perhaps cannot understand. -
Hegel's Philosophy of Biology?
Article title: Hegel’s Philosophy of Biology? A Programmatic Overview Short title: Hegel’s Philosophy of Biology? Article type: Research article Authors: Andrea Gambarotto (corresponding) & Luca Illetterati Affiliation: Institut Supérieur de Philosophie, UC Louvain, Belgium Email: [email protected] Abstract: This paper presents what we call ‘Hegel’s philosophy of biology’ to a target audience of both Hegel scholars and philosophers of biology. It also serves to introduce a special issue of the Hegel Bulletin entirely dedicated to a first mapping of this yet to be explored domain of Hegel studies. We submit that Hegel’s philosophy of biology can be understood as a radicalization of the Kantian approach to organisms, and as prefiguring current philosophy of biology in important ways, especially with regard to the nature of biological organization, the role of teleology in biological explanation, and the relation between life and cognition. 1 I. Introduction The concept of life is a key concept of classical German philosophy as a whole and it would be reductive to think of it only in biological terms. The attention to the notion of life in the post-Kantian debate has a critical function with respect to all forms of dualism that have marked modern philosophy: those between soul and body, thought and world, and therefore, of course, spirit and nature. Life is, in fact, for post-Kantian philosophers, an embodied soul or an animated body, a mind that is never entirely separated from nature. From the very beginning of his philosophical quest, Hegel’s work presents itself as a ‘philosophy of life’, that is a philosophy that must do justice to the multiform experience of life, without falling into the abstract image provided by the intellect (Verstand), where the dynamism and vitality (Lebendigkeit) of concrete reality gets lost. -
Brady Dehoust CV
1 Brady M. DeHoust Contact: Office: YMCA 321 [email protected] Texas A&M University (757) 777-5042 Education: Ph.D. in Philosophy (in progress) August 2020-Present Texas A&M University B.A. in Philosophy (with Distinction) and Communication Studies May 2019 Summa Cum Laude, Honors Program Christopher Newport University Research Interests: 19th and 20th Century Continental Philosophy (esp. hermeneutics, existentialism, and phenomenology), Philosophy of Rhetoric and Communication,Ethics (esp. virtue ethics, history of ethics), Ancient Greek Philosophy, Philosophy of Mythologyand Literature (Secondary Interests: Aesthetics, Philosophy of Technology[esp. media ecology], Environmental Philosophy, Philosophical Theology/Philosophy of Religion[esp. Christian philosophy], Philosophy of Language) Teaching & Related Experience: Instructor of Record,PHIL/ENGR 482: Engineering Ethics (Summer Term II), Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, July 2021. Teaching Assistant, PHIL/ENGR 482: Engineering Ethics (two sections), Dr. Martin Peterson and Dr. Glen Miller, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, August 2020-May 2021. ➢ Spring 2021: sections 925 and 928 ➢ Fall 2020: sections 912 and 917 Philosophy Tutor (CRLA Certified), Center for Academic Success, Christopher Newport University, Newport News, VA, August 2017-April 2019. Writing Associate, Dept. of Philosophy and Religion,Christopher Newport University, Newport News, VA, January 2018-April 2018. Undergraduate Publications: “Rhetoric and Virtue: Toward an Ethics for the Symbol Using Animal,” The Cupola, CNU Office of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity, vol. 13, June 2019, pp. 91-111. 2 “‘Of Men and of Angels’: An Axiology of Communication,”The Cupola, CNU Office of Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity, vol. 12, June 2018, pp. 124-151. -
Eligible Journals (PDF)
Last Update: 2021-07-08 CUP Open Access Agreement UNIVIE 2020-01-01 until 2022-12-31 Eligible Journals Acta Neuropsychiatrica Acta Numerica Advances in Archaeological Practice Africa African Studies Review Ageing & Society Agricultural and Resource Economics Review AI EDAM AJIL Unbound American Antiquity American Journal of International Law American Journal of Law & Medicine American Political Science Review Americas Anatolian Studies Ancient Mesoamerica Anglo-Saxon England Animal Health Research Reviews Annals of Actuarial Science Annals of Glaciology Annual Review of Applied Linguistics Antarctic Science Antimicrobial Stewardship & Healthcare Epidemiology Antiquaries Journal Antiquity ANZIAM Journal Applied Psycholinguistics APSIPA Transactions on Signal and Information Processing Arabic Sciences and Philosophy Archaeological Dialogues Archaeological Reports Architectural History arq: Architectural Research Quarterly Art Libraries Journal Asian Journal of Comparative Law Asian Journal of International Law Asian Journal of Law and Society ASTIN Bulletin: The Journal of the IAA Australasian Journal of Special and Inclusive Education page 1 of 8 Australian Journal of Environmental Education Australian Journal of Indigenous Education Austrian History Yearbook Behaviour Change Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapy Behavioural Public Policy Bilingualism: Language and Cognition Biological Imaging Bird Conservation International BJHS Themes BJPsych Advances BJPsych Bulletin BJPsych International BJPsych Open Brain Impairment Britannia British -
Introduction
Introduction Poetizing and Thinking Charles Bambach and Theodore George The very gesture of thinking, Plato tells us inTheatetus , finds its origin in the experience of wondering (θαυμάζειν).1 But to wonder at or about something is to experience its strangeness, its irregularity, or its difference. It is with the other that philosophy begins. What confronts us as other brings us to a perplexity that opens us to the experience of questioning as the very movement and dynamic of thinking itself. Pondering such strangeness, interrogating its anomalous disparity, we see how thinking not only begins in wonder at the other, but its every turn toward questioning is borne by such wondering as what makes it at all possible. In his 1955 Cerisy lecture “What Is That—Philosophy?” Heidegger put forward the claim that “the pathos of wonder, does not simply stand at the beginning of philosophy. Wonder bears and thoroughly governs philosophy.”2 But if otherness belongs to such wonder, then we might also say that otherness—in the sense of ineradicable alterity—likewise bears and thoroughly governs whatever philosophy might undertake. What is other belongs to philosophy as its ἀρχή and ruling origin, one that it does not, however, leave behind as it makes its way within the world. Rather, in recognizing what is other as intimately belonging to its origin, philosophy confronts otherness as having an essential relation to whatever constitutes its own and proper task. In this sense, philosophy not only requires its other in order to be itself, but it is precisely this relation to its other that allows philosophical questioning to attend to the questionability of all that is. -
Kierkegaard's Socrates: a Venture in Evolutionary Theory.” Modern Theology 17(4): 442-473
1 THE PROBLEM OF KIERKEGAARD ’S SOCRATES DANIEL WATTS This essay re-examines Kierkegaard’s view of Socrates. I consider the problem that arises from Kierkegaard’s appeal to Socrates as an exemplar for irony. The problem is that he also appears to think that, as an exemplar for irony, Socrates cannot be represented. And part of the problem is the paradox of self-reference that immediately arises from trying to represent x as unrepresentable. On the solution I propose, Kierkegaard does not hold that, as an exemplar for irony, Socrates is in no way representable. Rather, he holds that, as an exemplar for irony, Socrates cannot be represented in a purely disinterested way. I show how, in The Concept of Irony , Kierkegaard makes use of ‘limiting cases’ of representation in order to bring Socrates into view as one who defies purely disinterested representation. I also show how this approach to Socrates connects up with Kierkegaard’s more general interest in the problem of ethical exemplarity, where the problem is how ethical exemplars can be given as such, that is, in such a way that purely disinterested contemplation is not the appropriate response to them. Socrates … this puzzling, uncategorizable, inexplicable phenomenon (Nietzsche) A plausible general hypothesis about Kierkegaard is that he modelled his work as an author on Socrates. This supposition helps to explain many features of his work: his self- withdrawing and maieutic gestures, his focus on ethical self-knowledge, his eye for paradoxes, his animus against those he regarded as modern-day sophists, his professions of ignorance. 1 Further, 1 This hypothesis has long guided Kierkegaard studies, going back at least to David Swenson’s way of introducing Kierkegaard to Anglophone readers, in the 1940s, as a “Danish Socrates” (1983 [1941]). -
Spirit's Embeddedness in Nature: Hegel's Decentring of Self-Legislation
doi:10.1017/hgl.2020.33 Hegel Bulletin, Page 1 of 20 © The Hegel Society of Great Britain, 2021 Spirit’s Embeddedness in Nature: Hegel’s Decentring of Self-Legislation Heikki Ikäheimo Abstract A recently widely accepted view has it that the nature-spirit distinction in Hegel is to be understood as a distinction between a space or realm that is not normative, or does not involve norms, and one that is or does. Notwithstanding the merits of this view, it has tended to create a separation between nature and spirit which is both philosophically troubling and difficult to reconcile with the picture of Hegel as the arch enemy of abstract or unreconciled dualisms. In this paper I aim to show that the defining phenomenon for this view—collective self-government by norms—is on Hegel’s account both dependent on living nature that involves normativity broadly conceived all the way down and also subject to the ultimate normative or evaluative principle of Hegel’s Philosophy of Spirit —concrete freedom—the essence of spirit according to him. This is to say that for Hegel the normativity of collectively administered norms is neither the most basic nor the highest form of normativity. I. Introduction The view according to which Geist or ‘spirit’ in Hegel stands for some metaphys- ically suspicious, spooky entity, transcendent principle behind the appearing world, or a neo-Platonic One whose emanation the world is, has been out of favour for quite some time now. The recently widely accepted view, one that has demarcated itself against the first mentioned one, is that ‘spirit’ in fact stands for the Sellarsian ‘space of reasons’, or as it is often put the ‘space or realm of norms’ or the ‘nor- mative realm’. -
Philosophy Alumni Newsletter, Fall 2011
University PhilosophyPhilosophy DepartmentDepartment University Alumni Newsletter of Dallas Alumni Newsletter IssueIssue 11 Fall,Fall, 20112011 Dear Alumni and Alumnae, Inside this issue: You are holding in your hands (or reading on your screen) the first issue of a newslet- ter that, henceforth, the Philosophy Department of the University of Dallas intends to The 2011 Aquinas 2 publish once every semester. The purpose of the newsletter is to extend the reach of Lecture our Department at least a little bit outside the proverbial “ivory tower.” Academics— including, of course, philosophy professors—are often in dialogue only with each A Royal Visit at UD 2 other (in conferences, publications, and so forth) and with their students. Once the students leave, the interaction ends, and this happens although both sides might well profit from and enjoy a continuing exchange. An Interview with 3 Robert P. George Thus, we plan to keep you “in the loop” through this newsletter. It will update you on developments in our undergraduate and graduate programs, share the names of our The Graduating Class 4 recent graduates, inform you of their plans and current activities, feature stories of 2011 about visiting speakers who have come to UD, and occasionally let you know of our own work. News from the 4 In turn, we would like to know what our majors have done with their degrees. Some Graduate Program have gone on to study philosophy in grad school, but many others have chosen differ- ent paths. How has your philosophy education at UD impacted your life and profes- Notable Publications 5 sional career? Has reading Aristotle, Aquinas & Co. -
Rachel Elizabeth Zuckert Department of Philosophy 5728 N. Kenmore
Rachel Elizabeth Zuckert Department of Philosophy 5728 N. Kenmore Ave, 3N Northwestern University Chicago, IL 60660 Kresge 3-512 1880 Campus Drive home: (773) 728-7927 Evanston, IL 60208 work: (847) 491-2556 [email protected] Education: 2000 PhD, University of Chicago, Department of Philosophy and the Committee on Social Thought 1995 MA, University of Chicago, Committee on Social Thought 1992 B.A. (1), Oxford University (Philosophy and Modern Languages) 1990 B.A. (Summa Cum Laude; Highest Honors in Philosophy; Phi Beta Kappa), Williams College Areas of Specialization: Kant and eighteenth-century philosophy Aesthetics Areas of Competence: Early modern philosophy Nineteenth-century philosophy Feminist philosophy Languages: French German Academic Employment: 2018- Professor of Philosophy, Northwestern University; affiliated with the German Department 2008-18 Associate Professor of Philosophy, Northwestern University; affiliated with the German Department 2011-18 2006-2008 Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Northwestern University 2001-2006 Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Rice University 1999-2001 Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Bucknell University Zuckert 2 Publications: Books Kant on Beauty and Biology: An Interpretation of the Critique of Judgment, Cambridge University Press, 2007. Awarded the American Society for Aesthetics Monograph Prize (2008); reviewed in British Journal for the History of Philosophy, Comparative and Continental Philosophy, Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal, Journal of the History of Philosophy, Metascience, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, Review of Metaphysics, and subject of review essays in Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism and Kant Yearbook Herder’s Naturalist Aesthetics, Cambridge University Press, forthcoming (2019). Edited Volume Hegel on Philosophy in History, co-edited with James Kreines, Cambridge University Press, 2017. -
Hermeneutic Responsibility: Vattimo, Gadamer, and the Impetus of Interpretive Engagement
Duquesne Studies in Phenomenology Volume 1 Issue 1 Hermeneutics Today Article 4 April 2020 Hermeneutic Responsibility: Vattimo, Gadamer, and the Impetus of Interpretive Engagement Theodore George Texas A&M University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://dsc.duq.edu/dsp Recommended Citation George, T. (2020). Hermeneutic Responsibility: Vattimo, Gadamer, and the Impetus of Interpretive Engagement. Duquesne Studies in Phenomenology, 1 (1). Retrieved from https://dsc.duq.edu/dsp/vol1/ iss1/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Duquesne Scholarship Collection. It has been accepted for inclusion in Duquesne Studies in Phenomenology by an authorized editor of Duquesne Scholarship Collection. H ERMENEUTIC R ESPONSIBILITY VATTIMO, GADAMER, AND THE IMPETUS OF INTERPRETIVE ENGAGEMENT THEODORE GEORGE Texas A&M University Few fields of study have drawn more attention to questions of responsibility—moral, social, and political—than contemporary Continental philosophy. In recent writings, Gianni Vattimo has returned to focus on his radical, even revolutionary hermeneutical considerations of responsibility.1 Within this context, his Gifford Lectures and related essays (published as Of Reality: The Purposes of Philosophy) address questions of hermeneutic responsibility elicited by the renewed philosophical interest in realism in our times. For Vattimo, as we shall see, it is our hermeneutical responsibility to resist, even to engage in interpretive conflict against, what he will describe as the “temptation of realism.” Both within the discipline of philosophy and in larger spheres of society and politics, realism is often lauded not only as, say, a metaphysical position but, moreover, as an ideal or even as an attitude.2 ‘Realism’ often stands for belief in the progress of knowledge through research in the sciences, suspicion of intellectual sophistication that obscures the facts, and, accordingly, trust in sound common sense.