tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post897223674405289867..comments2024-03-25T11:49:21.281-07:00Comments on The Splintered Mind: Confessional PhilosophyEric Schwitzgebelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11541402189204286449noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-39844235478331500492009-09-23T12:45:09.949-07:002009-09-23T12:45:09.949-07:00Thanks for this, Eric. As I've been writing my...Thanks for this, Eric. As I've been writing my own philosophical blog, I've noticed just how many <a href="http://loveofallwisdom.com/tag/autobiography/" rel="nofollow">autobiographical</a> entries show up on it. I sometimes worry that this is a little narcissistic, but I do it anyway, and this is one of the major reasons. I want to illustrate general truths about humans with particular examples, and the particular example I know best is myself. More importantly, as your post shows, I have got a lot of things wrong, and I want to illustrate that. I know other people who I think have thought and felt wrongly, but I would feel even more arrogant posting about their stories as object lessons.Amod Lelehttp://loveofallwisdom.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-75658813511230560112009-09-21T23:17:00.386-07:002009-09-21T23:17:00.386-07:00Nice.
"colods" That is what "...Nice.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />"colods" That is what "they" made me type to make this post - by the way.Michael Metzlerhttp://www.poohsthink.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-10239214647632675402009-09-21T11:48:30.061-07:002009-09-21T11:48:30.061-07:00In certain moods, I'm with you and Menken, Mic...In certain moods, I'm with you and Menken, Michael (though Menken was himself a classic ass). No doubt Hume found the conclusion of Book I as loathesome as the rest of it, after a rousing game of backgammon. And need I mention Wittgenstein?Eric Schwitzgebelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11541402189204286449noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-21395084747281256232009-09-19T11:33:49.489-07:002009-09-19T11:33:49.489-07:00"I dislike persons who change there basic ide..."I dislike persons who change there basic ideas, and I dislike them when they change them for good reasons quite as much as when they change them for bad ones. A convert to a good idea is simply a man who confesses that he was formerly an ass - and is probably one still." - H.L. Menken, Baltimore Evening Sun, 1927<br /><br />I can't help but place Augustine's 'confessions' within the context of his 'conversion'. Augustine was still an ass, although better than most, philosophically speaking. And I speak as one who was formerly a bigger ass than Augustine, though now without a grand vision provoked by rhetorical wowsers and mind manipulators . . . I hope. Descartes was at least just posing for the sake of math and science. <br /><br />I am reading through George Lakoff's The Political Mind today. I like it much, but I cannot help but think Lakoff is trying to convert me to wowsing about unconscious mechanisms that we have not even located yet (see Bechtel, in press a, b, c, d. . . .)Michael Metzlerhttp://www.poohsthink.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-22159519529979563262009-09-17T09:19:51.665-07:002009-09-17T09:19:51.665-07:00I'm curious what you mean by "confession&...I'm curious what you mean by "confession", PhilGeek. It seems clear to me that by the characterization of "confession" I offer, those two works have confessional aspects. Or do you disagree with that?Eric Schwitzgebelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11541402189204286449noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-77245240819681477842009-09-16T18:44:32.707-07:002009-09-16T18:44:32.707-07:00Augustine's Confession is not a confession and...Augustine's Confession is not a confession and neither is Descartes Meditations. People like to think of the Augustine's Confession as a piece of autobiography but in so doing one considers only one part of the book---there's the end with the biblical commentary which wouldn't make sense if it were an autobiography as modernly conceived. Similarly, Descartes' Meditations is not a confession but belongs rather to the theological genre of a meditation that pre-existed Descartes book and informs it even while that genre is subverted for Descartes' philosophical and theological ends. So I am not sure I get the initial analogy.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15740400274008576262noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-22635021351688461822009-09-16T13:33:15.739-07:002009-09-16T13:33:15.739-07:00Thanks, Nick. I agree about Rousseau, Nietzsche, ...Thanks, Nick. I agree about Rousseau, Nietzsche, and Kierkegaard, though Nietzsche is a bit of a weird case since his "confessions" seem mostly to be self-congratulatory.<br /><br />I also accept what you say in your second paragraph, if you'll give me (as I think those authors would want) that philosophers are not being *intentionally* confessional. Since "confessional" as I defined it here really has to do with the author's intent to display himself as a possibly flawed model, little philosophy is confessional in my narrow sense; and the philosophy that is confessional in my narrow sense does, I think, stand out in a certain way.<br /><br />If you haven't already, you might be interested to see some of my other posts on the psychology of philosophy, which develop these ideas a bit more.Eric Schwitzgebelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11541402189204286449noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-60067507132635817252009-09-16T12:17:48.172-07:002009-09-16T12:17:48.172-07:00Dead on. I think you can add Rousseau, Nietzsche ...Dead on. I think you can add Rousseau, Nietzsche and Kierkegaard to that list.<br /><br />An interesting question is whether it is possible to do non-confessional philosophy. Nietzsche, Fichte, William James and Paul Feyerabend all thought that this was not possible.<br /><br />I think this idea would not receive assent amongst most philosophers today. Most of us think self-transcendence is possible, at least in thought. I'm not exactly sure how to go about defending this intuition, though.Vanitashttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03190524739107446297noreply@blogger.com