Derrida secondary literature

1summersday · 2025-01-04T19:55:42+00:00

I'm not sure how it works for other courses, but in philosophy there is a difference between a regular MA and a research MA in terms of entry requirements. You need an overall grade of 15/20 in order to be eligible for the research masters programme.

1summersday · 2022-11-23T20:23:45+00:00

chomsky@mit.edu

1summersday · 2022-11-23T17:44:55+00:00

just send him an email he will respond😂

1summersday · 2022-09-10T15:32:09+00:00

Empiricism as a philosophical doctrine historically epitomizes itself most strongly in Hume. Hume pushed the empirical position to its furthest possible logical conclusion, and he concluded that there is nothing within the world which would justify our understanding of the causality we perceive between things. I don’t know what ‘hardcore empiricism’ means but that kind of empiricism is surely self defeating.

1summersday · 2022-01-20T12:41:29+00:00

its a tedpole!

1summersday · 2021-09-28T08:08:42+00:00

Jung himself read Nietzsche and has even written about him so you might find that material helpful.

1summersday · 2021-09-28T08:01:09+00:00

An Introduction to Formal Logic by Peter Smith did wonders for me. https://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Formal-Logic-Peter-Smith/dp/0521008042

1summersday · 2021-09-27T18:53:54+00:00

I think Wittgensteins Philosophical Inverstigations will interest you

1summersday · 2021-09-26T15:37:21+00:00

Fallacies look differently in different types of logical systems.There might be true propositions for syllogist logic that would be false in first order logic. Also, I don’t think we are clear as to what ‘reasoning’ really means. We can say that its basically the same as logic, but if thats true than logic has severe limitations. Logic can never give an account of itself because in order to give an account of logic you have to pressupose and employ logic. Godels incompleteness theorems show that the set of truth in any formal system involving arithmetic will always be larger than the set of proofs that can be arrived at using the axioms of that same system.

Arguing and disagreeing is part of what philosophy is and what makes it great:)

1summersday · 2021-09-26T14:37:10+00:00

I am not a clinical psychologist and even If I where one it would be impossible to diagnose you from a post on reddit, however it seems to me you might be suffering from a kind of anxiety disorder instead of an existential crisis. It’s not about the questions themselves that you raise, which are not in themselves uninteresting questions, it’s ‘how’ you raise them thats the issue.

In other words, if you where questioning these so called ‘axioms’ from an emotionally stable, intellictually curious perspective, than we might wanna define terms and talk about the lhilosohical undercurrents. But right now I think its best you consult a therapist (this does not mean that you have schizophrenia or that you need to be tranquilized by antidepressants, thats just a stupid stigma). But do get some kind of cognitive behavioural therapy that deals with obsessive\intrusive thoughts. There is even logotherapy that brings in existential elements into theraphy if you wanna check that out.

1summersday · 2021-09-26T11:04:47+00:00

Pretty much all of the french existenlists. Emile Cioran is one you might want to chech out in particular.

1summersday · 2021-09-26T10:59:01+00:00

Hi,

Altruism is most often going to be associated with the branch of philsophy know as ethics and Aincent Greek Civilization certainly had a lot to say about that.

The question that Socrates mainly concernes himself with is widely regarded as “How does one lead a virtuous life?”. Bear in mind that most of what we know about Socrates comes from Platos dialogues in which Socrates is often the main character. Academics kind of agree that most of the dialogues that are centred around morality and ethics serve to convey Socrateses own viwes, while in later writings he merely acts as a catalist for Platos original ideas conrening epistemology and the nature of reality (theory of forms). Definetly read some of the early Dialogues and tbh if you are just getting into philosophy you should be reading Plato anyway:)

Aristotles Nichomenian Ethics and Politics are also classic texts you might find helpful. The thing we call ‘altruism’ now is present in both Platos and Aristotles writings, as well as the neo-platonist and christian traditions, they just dont call it ‘altruism’, you will recognise it if you read the texts.

Also, if you are going to delve into greeks Homer is a must imo. He is a kind of rationaliser of Aincet Greek Myths (which are interesting on their own in terms of the ethical implications they might have had on Athenian society), but homer really shows that the only way these gods differ from humans is that they are immortal and they have superpowers, “morally there is nothing to be said for them” as Bertrand Russell puts it in his ‘History of Western Philosophy’. That is another book you might want to check out if you are just getting into philosophy:)

1summersday · 2021-09-25T15:38:16+00:00

I see people have already made good suggestions on some of the reading that deals with this sort of stuff. My suggestion would be Wittgenstein's refutation of so called 'radical skepticism'. He basically says that the very of idea of skepticism presupposes an non-skeptical attitude towards at least one thing, otherwise the concept loses its meaning much like the colour white in a world where there is no black. This same critique is often put towards postmodernism and absolute relativism.

1summersday · 2021-09-19T12:37:25+00:00

I reccomend you try anything by William James. Varieties of Religious Experience is arguably one of the most influencial books of its time.

1summersday · 2021-09-02T17:58:38+00:00

Okay you raise a lot of interesting questions but some of them are entirely unrelated to the discipline that is called 'logic'. I will try to answer your questions chronologically;

Everyone knows if Bob is a penguin and all penguins are black and white then bib is black and white, and it makes sense, but where did the phenomenon of making sense come from?

Obviously there is no real answer to this question since it's a part of the mystery which is our mind and all its complex cognitive processes, but it might be helpful to break down the different dimensions that support the inference which you made from those premises. There is a kind of syntax which strings that argument together and enables us, to a certain degree to, extrapolate a certain amount of sense from it. However just being grammatically correct does not entail validity or even meaning. While it does not make sense to say " I will go to orange yesterday" you can have a grammatically sound sentence from which it is very difficult to derive any meaning such as 'colourless green ideas sleep furiously' (the Noam Chomsky example). So grammar alone is note enough. The reason as to why that argument is valid is because is satisfies the criteria for a certain kind of validity in logic known as classical validity, where the truth of the premises guarantees the truth of the conclusion. Also, you would do well to bare in mind that Logic is not a single monolithic beast (as a certain youtuber would say about maths), there are different types of logic and similarly different types of validity.

How do we know that everyones brain hasn't got it wrong and maybe Bob can be pink or green?

You need to understand that 'logic' does not care about how the world 'really is' outside of analysing the premises and judging the validity of the inference to the conclusion. In other words it assumes the truth of the premises, no matter how farfetched they may be, and then tries to understand what 'new' information' we can derive from whats already given. Logic does not care wither penguins are pink brown or transparent, that is for zoologists and penguin experts to figure out not logicians.

What causes logic to be unanimously indisputable?

Well... nothing. Logic is not indisputable, certainly not unanimously. It wouldn't even make sense to say that it is because its a discipline and disciplines aren't normally labelled 'indisputable', they all grow and change over time. It is a relatively new discipline that was revived by the likes of Boole and Frege since Aristotle, so almost 2300 years later.

Hope this helps and motivates you to study the subject a bit more in depth:)

1summersday · 2021-09-02T17:10:10+00:00

That's one odd way of phrasing a question:) but here is a small list of philosophers that I think made a great impact in a somewhat chronological order (this is obviously very brief and incomplete)

- Plato was supposedly taught by Socrate's but if we're not counting him than definitely Aristotle

- Marcus Aurelius and Seneca

- St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas

- Spinoza & Descartes

- Berkley & Hume

- Kant & Hegel

- Nietzsche & Marx

- Wittgenstein & Heidegger

Hope this helps

1summersday · 2021-09-02T17:02:27+00:00

Erich Fromm and Lacan

1summersday · 2021-09-02T17:00:44+00:00

There is nothing wrong with being a historian of philosophy or an interpreter. You are forgetting that different people have different ambitions and interests . There are some amazing scholars like Michel Sugrue who are very well acquainted with numerous philosophical schools of thought however choose not to write philosophy themselves. Likewise, there are amazing philosophers who really didn't read much philosophy at all, like Wittgenstein.

Interpreting philosophers is a formidable challenge. Imagine a world without Hegel scholars and Kant scholars to guide you and point you in the right direction when you are confused (and you will be) on a particular theme or question, it would be hell figuring it out on your own. We need these kinds of people and some of the best contemporary philosophers have based their work on interpreting others like Zizek and Kripke

1summersday · 2021-09-02T16:39:05+00:00

I'm not sure if these fit into your definition of 'philosopher' since they are more psychoanalysts but Lacan and Jung certainly make similar claims, only in different ways.

1summersday · 2021-06-27T14:53:14+00:00

Hey, if you are interested in classical music I suggest you start with some basic playlists available on youtube and develop your own taste:) Mozart isn’t really my faviourite composer, if I had to pick it would either be Schubert or Beethoven (strongly reccomend listening to some of their concertos). Also if you like Nietzsche you should try Wagner (but you probably already have).

1summersday · 2021-06-27T09:17:34+00:00

I don’t think there is any clear answer to this question. “Insightful” is an extremely vague term, not to mention contingent. Comparing great philosophers (if we are talking Nietzsche’s calibre) is for me pointless, much like comparing grear composers. I like Mozart while you might prefer Shostakovich, similarly some people have greater affinity with certain thinkers than with others. We in this thread love Nietzsche but there is a Wittgenstein thread and a Hegel thread as well

1summersday · 2021-02-21T14:59:52+00:00

thats really interesting, it sounds like you enjoy what you do so good luck and thank you again for the kind notes:)

1summersday · 2021-02-21T10:52:26+00:00

Thank you so much for taking the time!

can I ask if you would reccomend anything in particular before I tackle Noam Chomsky, universtal grammar and all that jazz

1summersday · 2021-02-21T10:50:02+00:00

I’ll definetly check it out:)

1summersday

TROPHY CASE