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Tag Archives: Philosophy
Big (Con)Science
Tom Regan talks about moral philosophy and mass culture. Robert Smith discusses the history, the importance, and the perils and rewards of big science in American society.
Finding a Place
Anthony Appiah discusses his most recent book, In My Father’s House: Africa in the Philosophy of Culture. Charlayne Hunter-Gault discusses her new book, In My Place.
Chinese Women & Wisdom
Zhu Hong discusses contemporary literature by and about Chinese women. Victor Mair talks about his translation of the Tao Te Ching, the classic book of Chinese philosophy and religion.
Public Philosophy
Thomas Flynn discusses the life and work of the modern French historian and philosopher Michel Foucault. Richard Rorty discusses philosophy and the politics of the American left.
Sino-Soviet Studies
Nikita Pokrovsky discusses American philosophy and literature. Yang Zhouhan discusses the baroque in English literature. Both scholars reflect on intellectual crosscurrents between their countries and the United States.
Old Money and New
Roy Weintraub and Neil de Marchi discuss theory in the history and philosophy of economics.
Willem Jongman discusses the political economy of the Roman Empire.
Judging History
Sir Geoffrey Elton discusses theory and the uses of history. Quentin Skinner discusses the foundations of modern political philosophy.
Physics and Philosophy
David Albert and Barry Loewer discuss the philosophical implications of quantum mechanics. During his fellowship year at the Center, Professor Loewer worked on An Investigation of Naturalistic Theories of Intentional Content and Causation.
Farmer Philosopher; Ancient Childhoods
Marjorie Grene is the author of books about existentialism, Aristotle, and philosophy and science.; Mark Golden is at work on a study of childhood in ancient Greece.
Science and Ethics, Ancient to Modern
In what ways do ancient Greek philosophers such as Socrates provide models for the study of ethics? How has the philosophy of ethics evolved into the modern world?
Thinking Machines
Can machines think? Contrasting answers to that question from John Searle and Herbert Simon. John Searle is the author of Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language (Cambridge University Press). Herbert Simon was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in economics in 1978, and the National Medal of Science in 1986.
Bloomsbury’s Prophet
During a recent fellowship year at the National Humanities Center, Tom Regan completed Bloomsbury’s Prophet: The Moral Philosophy of G. E. Moore. Professor Regan is also the editor of G. E. Moore: The Early Essays. Both books are published by Temple University Press.
Philosophy, Ancient and Modern
Montgomery Furth discusses his forthcoming study of the pre-Socratics, whose philosophies helped give rise to the thinking of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. Edward McClennen discusses his forthcoming book about rational self-interest, or the concept of human reason in the service of the emotions.
Literature, Philosophy, and Feminism
According to Martha Vicinus and Alison Jagger, contemporary feminism addresses not only the methods and content of literary and philosophical inquiry, but also seeks a restructuring of literature and philosophy as primarily influenced by masculine interests and values.
Afro-American Literature and African Philosophy
bell hooks is the author of Ain’t I a Woman and Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center, in which she argues that the struggle to end racism and the struggle to end sexism are naturally intertwined. In both works, bell hooks also stresses the importance of the ties that bind the study of literature to the practical concerns of everyday life.
According to Kwasi Wiredu, African philosophy is best understood in the light of several overarching philosophical tensions, including those among the spiritual and the material, the mystical and the empirical, the natural and the supernatural. The focus of Wiredu’s work is his native tribe of the Akans, which comprises two-thirds of Ghana’s population of 14 million people.