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550The philosopher and builder Ludwig Wittgenstein remarks that architecture is more difficult than philosophy. He suggests an exhaustion criterion for how difficult a discipline is: a field is more difficult the more exhausting it is. I make a case against this claim. There was once a demand to prevent the Greek myths from establishing themselves in the curriculum by means of “our own rival myths.” It is difficult to compete with a renowned Greek myth, but if one does produce a rival, it may well …Read more
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494Parts of the Victorian middle class were troubled by how Victorian society was both highly evolved and contained savage parts. I propose a solution to the paradox they faced.
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461This brief paper raises a puzzle, or half-puzzle, about Flora Nwapa’s ethnic identity in light of sentences in her novel Women are Different and presents two solutions.
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524This paper responds to Thomas Kelly and Sarah McGrath’s worry that there can be evil reflective equilibrium. I propose that some of John Rawls’s restrictions on moral judgments we can enter into the procedure serve to protect against evil reflective equilibrium.
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489This paper presents a Davidsonian perspective on Derek Parfit’s disagreements with Nietzsche. I have actually gone further, too far perhaps, and tried to imitate Davidson’s attractive essayistic style.
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471This paper raises a worry that it is difficult to reconcile Adam Smith’s claims about the relationship of specialization to talent and character with his account of the origins of money. Specialization makes one stupid outside of one’s specialism yet money arises by specialists also providing what everyone wants.
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576I interpret George Eliot as objecting to John Locke in Middlemarch – more specifically, his theory of ideas – by means of her account of Dorothea’s experiences of Edward Casaubon at dinner.
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388The all-or-nothing problem, formulated by Joe Horton, presents us with a situation in which you can do nothing or save one child or save two. It is dangerous to save any, making doing nothing morally permissible, but there is no extra danger in saving two, so it seems wrong to just save one. But then doing nothing is morally better than saving one. I present a solution in response to this problematic result, which is that doing nothing is not an accurate description of a permissible option.
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439This paper examines what is said about a craze for essay writing in Rose Macauley’s 1923 essayistic novel Told by an Idiot, comparing the material with Milan Kundera on graphomania. In the appendix, I note a passage on crowds which is reminiscent of the widely read European author.
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760Are John Rawls’s most noticeable methodological contributions, reflective equilibrium and the original position, consistent with each other? I draw attention to a worry that they stand in inconsistent relationships to the claim that ought implies can: it can only be the case that we ought to do something if we can do it.
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636This is a one page handout presenting some objections A.R. Radcliffe-Brown makes to Frazer on rites and Frazer's evolutionism.
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672This is a one page handout, which specifies four uses of the social organism analogy in British structural-functionalist anthropology and contrasts these uses with uses in analytic political philosophy.
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470Joseph Raz claims that the fundamental principles of morality and politics are satiable: there is a point at which one has fulfilled them. I argue that Raz cannot consistently endorse this claim, given his approach to saving lives.
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377Milan Kundera is now perhaps the greatest living philosopher, but he suffers from logical problems. One might propose that since he is a person who works primarily in the medium of fiction, one should not be too harsh on him, rather find ways to make him more logical. The result may be rather chaste.
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507This paper considers a paradox which the historian of anthropology George Stocking draws attention to: from the point of view of parts of the Victorian middle class, Victorian society was highly evolved yet also contained savage components. I clarify the paradox and propose a solution.
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423I compare Rosamond’s relationship with her husband in Middlemarch with Rosamond’s marital relationship in L.A.G. Strong’s short story “The Seal.” I interpret the latter fiction as addressing the unpleasant question: what sort of decent man can suppress Rosamond?
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347Propositions, the paradox of analysis, and Milan Kundera's author's noteIjrdo-Journal of Educational Research 11 (1): 1. 2025.I present a literary solution to the paradox of analysis in light of The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, and also raise a question of whether sentences across languages are expressing the same proposition, owing to differences in informativeness.
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509Regarding the argument by Marilyn Strathern which Victoria Loblay focuses on, I present two differences between my response and Loblay’s response. Also I raise a concern about Loblay’s response.
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534Which moral judgments should one pay attention to in building a moral philosophy? Thomas Kelly and Sarah McGrath object to John Rawls’s suggestion to not rely on judgments heavily bound up with one’s own interests. I propose a solution in response to the objection.
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426This paper presents a puzzle that occurred to me while reading Milan Kundera defining graphomania: a mania for writing books for an unknown public. I also present a solution.
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475Max Gluckman introduces us to if-I-were-a-horse arguments, but what is wrong with them? In this paper, I draw attention to an objection built-in to the terminology.
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713This is a one-page handout presenting some objections nationalists might or do make to John Rawls's original position method.
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466Why is there a norm of reciprocity in certain societies – the recipient of a gift should give a gift in return? Or what is its function? Sir James Frazer provides an unobvious answer to the function of such a norm in one society: it serves to establish who is alive.
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583This paper considers the debate between teams of skilled contributors versus a genius by focusing on a specific case: a team project to overturn some remarks by Wittgenstein on Frazer’s The Golden Bough. In theory, there can be a team which does this, but in actual practice, such a team seems unlikely to arise.
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317This paper begins with Adam Smith’s advice to specialize and draws attention to an advantage from a misleading appearance of fixed specialization, identified in Flora Nwapa’s novel Efuru.
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466This paper responds to Theron Pummer’s distinction between Sorites arguments and repugnant conclusion arguments by presenting a Sorites overpopulation argument. Also I present a Sorites argument in favour of myths of genius.
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599I present anthropologist Max Gluckman’s explanation of what “if-I-were-a-horse” arguments are and introduce three questions. How do we define this kind of argument? Are earlier anthropologists “guilty” of them? And is it a bad idea to make them? I address the first two questions, proposing that Frazer is not much guilty of precisely these, though his project calls for them.
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737This paper presents two objections to Milan Kundera’s definition of graphomania.
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430Sir James Frazer’s The Golden Bough presents a puzzle regarding how primitive peoples believe they can control something which civilized people regard as beyond their control: the weather. I clarify the puzzle and consider Frazer’s solution to it, as well as other solutions.
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381This paper draws attention to a worry concerning what the book The econocracy says about multiple-choice questions versus essays. They face a problem reminiscent of the problems facing various kinds of relativism.
Manchester, England, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
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