Archive for the ‘Aesthetics’ Category

Does an author’s declaration a character’s sexuality make?

Wednesday, October 24th, 2007

For those who do not know, recently J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter books revealed that Dumbledore (the school headmaster) was gay. Here’s a quote from Time, the details of which will be relevant later:

The big revelation of the night came when she was asked if Dumbledore had ever found love. With a sigh, she seemed on the verge of saying no, but then revealed, “my truthful answer to you… I always thought of Dumbledore as gay.” After a collective gasp, the audience roared with applause. Rowling was clearly astonished by the positive reaction and exclaimed, “if I’d known it would make you so happy, I would have announced it years ago!”

Justin brought this up at lunch on Tuesday, and the question came up as to whether Rowling’s revelation changed the truth of the matter or the text stood alone as a sole authority. For those who accept textual authority, something like the following conditional is affirmed:

(TA) A proposition p about a story S (revealed by a text T) is true only if (1) p is explicitly stated in T or (2) p is entailed by other propositions explicitly stated in T.

(I say “something like” TA because, as presented, TA may not be a precise formulation of the view. But I think the general point is made.)

Those who would affirm TA deny that Rowling has any more authority on the matter than your average reader. I was persuaded by this initially; now I don’t think so. My argument is below the fold. (more…)

Posted in Aesthetics, Frivolity | 228 Comments »

Philosophers’ Carnival #42

Monday, January 29th, 2007

THE PHILOSOPHERS’ CARNIVAL, VOLUME 42: INTRODUCTION TO PHILOSOPHY

NOW FULLY COLLECTED,
WITH SELECTIONS FROM ACROSS THE WEB

EDITED BY

JUSTIN MCBRAYER AND GARRETT PENDERGRAFT

ON BEHALF OF

SHOW-ME THE ARGUMENT

Preface
Philosophy is the search for reasoned answers to important, non-empirical questions. These questions include, but are not limited to, the following: Is there a God? What might God be like? If there isn’t a God, what implications does this have for human life? What does it mean to be me? Am I free? Am I responsible? Are there moral facts? What makes an action right or wrong? How ought I to live? Can we know anything? What does it mean to know something or to have a justified belief in something? What makes something beautiful? What makes something art? What is the meaning of life?

In this introductory anthology we present selections from real philosophers wrestling with real problems. With few exceptions, each of these entries was written in the last month or so and published on blogs in philosophy. In keeping with the purposes of the Philosophers’ Carnival, we have included only pieces that were nominated for publication in this issue of the Carnival. In keeping with the purposes of Show-Me the Argument (the philosophy graduate student blog of the University of Missouri), we have included only pieces that make rigorous and clear arguments concerning important philosophical questions. Political drivel and autobiographical musings didn’t make the cut.

Table of Contents

I. WHAT IS PHILOSOPHY? … 1

II. METAPHYSICS
1. Cognitive Biases and Free Will Part Two … 4
The Garden of Forking Paths

2. Presentism, Actualism, and the Triviality Objection … 8
The Alanyzer

3. A Trouble for Possible Worlds as Maximally Consistent Sets of Propositions … 11
Florida Student Philosophy Blog

4. Chalmers on Ontological Anti-realism … 22
Lemmings

III. EPISTEMOLOGY
1. May we say what we don’t know? … 26
Think Tonk

2. Disagreeing about Disagreement … 28
Thoughts, Arguments, and Rants

3. Justification, Inconsistencies, Contradictions, and Contradictories … 42
Certain Doubts

4. Epistemic ‘Ought’ Does Not Imply ‘Can’ … 73
Long Words Bother Me

6. Contradictions Rational and Justified? … 77
Knowability

IV. ETHICS
1. Desire Satisfaction Accounts of the Concept of Welfare and The Scope Problem … 80
Reflective Equilibrium

2. Philosophical Utilitarianism … 84
PEA Soup

3. Beliefs and Moral Judgments (see also Oughts and Desires on Show-Me the Argument) … 89
Atheist Ethicist

4. Infant Euthanasia and Utilitarianism … 92
Show-Me the Argument

5. Moral Intuitions and the Darwinist Dilemma (see also Moral Intuitions and Evolution on Atopian) … 105
Siris

6. Posthumous Procreation … 110
Philosophy, et cetera

V. PHILOSOPHY OF MIND
1. Consciousness and the Brainstem … 116
Brains

2. Content Internalism … 120
Brain Pains

3. Human Echolocation … 155
The Splintered Mind

VI. PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION
1. Uniform Experience Against Miracles … 158
Fides Quaerens Intellectum

2. Prophecy Argument Against Open Theism … 163
Show-Me the Argument

VII. PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE
1. Language and Color … 174
Language Hat

2. Talking to the Future … 177
Semantics etc.

VIII. AESTHETICS
1. Aesthetics and the Problem of Evil … 200
Prosblogion

2. The story of your life, or life as a work of art … 205
Philosophy Blog

IX. SPECIAL TOPICS
1. Thoughts about True Temp … 217
Experimental Philosophy

2. Why Truth is the Norm of Credibility … 221
Opiniatrety

3. Philosophical Failure: Peter van Inwagen and John Martin Fischer … 227
Garden of Forking Paths

4. A book review of John Searle’s Freedom and Neurobiology … 231
Show-Me the Argument

Posted in Action Theory, Aesthetics, Applied Ethics, Epistemology, Ethical Theory, History of Philosophy, Metaphysics, Philosophy of Language, Philosophy of Mind, Philosophy of Religion, Social/Political | 5,324 Comments »

Naturalism, Antirealism, Beauty

Thursday, September 28th, 2006

You watch the sun setting and form the belief this is beautiful.  Along with this belief is an accompanying deep sense of pleasure and wonder.  Being the reflective philosopher you are, you wonder if the scenery you are looking at does actually exemplify the property being beautiful.  You then reflect a bit further: blind natural forces resulted in my having the faculties I have by way of random genetic mutation and natural selection.  (more…)

Posted in Aesthetics, Epistemology, Philosophy of Religion | 3,615 Comments »

Art as Device

Saturday, July 22nd, 2006

Literary critic Vladimir Shklovsky’s essay “Art as Device” lays out, even before you’ve gotten past the title, the claim to fame that eventually came to define the Russian Formalist movement. On Shklovsky’s view all art is the employment of device. (more…)

Posted in Aesthetics | 343 Comments »

Institutional Theory of Art

Sunday, April 24th, 2005

According to the institutional theory of art, much or even all of what makes something an artwork lies outside of the work itself and has more to do with it being embedded within an institution, namely, the artworld. To support this theory, George Dickie and Arthur Danto make this argument:

  1. X is a work of art.
  2. Y is not a work of art.
  3. X and Y do not differ in their descriptive or physical characteristics.
  4. Thus X’s being a work of art has nothing to do with its descriptive and physical characteristics.
  5. Thus X’s being a work of art is due to its position in the artworld.

A common illustration (more…)

Posted in Aesthetics | 3,612 Comments »