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85Is Boring art just Boring?Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 53 (4): 425-426. 1995.Recent articles in this journal by Frances Colpitt and Richard Lind have attempted to defend some works of minimal and conceptual art against the charge of being boring. I am skeptical about both of these attempts
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115Fiction and NarrativeOxford University Press. 2014.Do fictions depend upon imagination? Derek Matravers argues against the mainstream view that they do, and offers an original account of what it is to read, listen to, or watch a narrative. He downgrades the divide between fiction and non-fiction, largely dispenses with the imagination, and in doing so illuminates a succession of related issues
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48Institutional definitions and reasonsBritish Journal of Aesthetics 47 (3): 251-257. 2007.The paper examines certain aspects of institutionalist definitions of art, in particular whether they are committed to ‘indexing’, whereby calling something art makes it art. It is argued that there is no such commitment and that institutionalist definitions need not abandon the idea that works of art become art for specific, and substantial, reasons. The question is how reasons can be accommodated. A proposal from defenders of ‘cluster theories’ is considered and rejected. Another proposal is a…Read more
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219Fictional assent and the (so-called) `puzzle of imaginative resistance'In Matthew Kieran & Dominic McIver Lopes (eds.), Imagination, Philosophy, and the Arts, Routledge. pp. 91-106. 2003.This article criticises existing solutions to the 'puzzle of imaginative resistance', reconstrues it, and offers a solution of its own. About the Book : Imagination, Philosophy and the Arts is the first comprehensive collection of papers by philosophers examining the nature of imagination and its role in understanding and making art. Imagination is a central concept in aesthetics with close ties to issues in the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of language, yet it has not received the kind …Read more
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33Imagination, Fiction, and DocumentaryIn Noel Carroll & John Gibson (eds.), Narrative, Emotion, and Insight, Penn State University. pp. 173. 2011.In this paper I argue against the current consensus that there is such a thing as 'the philosophy of fiction'. I argue instead that what are taken to be problems with fiction, are in fact problems with narrative more generally
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17Expression in the ArtsIn Peter Goldie (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Emotion, Oxford University Press. 2009.This is an overview of, and criticism of, theories on the role of the emotions in accounting for expression in the arts - both music and painting
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34Amy Coplan argues that recent work in the philosophy of the emotions suggests that film is more effective that literature in inducing non-cognitive affect. Derek Matravers replies to this, and suggests reasons for scepticism
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71Expression in MusicIn Kathleen Stock (ed.), Philosophers on Music: Experience, Meaning, and Work, Oxford University Press. 2007.This is a critical review of the current state of the debate in the philosophy of music, and defends the author's view as the phenomenology of the experience
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6Aesthetic PropertiesAristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 79 191-227. 2005.[Derek Matravers] Jerrold Levinson maintains that he is a realist about aesthetic properties. This paper considers his positive arguments for such a view. An argument from Roger Scruton, that aesthetic realism would entail the absurd claim that many aesthetic predicates were ambiguous, is also considered and it is argued that Levinson is in no worse position with respect to this argument than anyone else. However, Levinson cannot account for the phenomenon of aesthetic autonomy: namely, that we …Read more
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95Empathy as a Route to KnowledgeIn Amy Coplan & Peter Goldie (eds.), Empathy. Philosophical and Psychological Perspectives, Oxford University Pres. pp. 19. 2011.Is it epistemologically better to feel an emotion that someone is having, rather than just believing he or she is having the emotion? This is the question that Derek Matravers is raising.
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5Collected essays on philosophers (review)British Journal for the History of Philosophy 24 (6): 1227-1230. 2016.
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126Debates in Contemporary Political Philosophy: An Anthology (edited book)Routledge. 2002.This textbook reflects the buoyant state of contemporary political philosophy, and the development of the subject in the past two decades. It includes seminal papers on fundamental philosophical issues such as: the nature of social explanation distributive justice liberalism and communitarianism citizenship and multiculturalism nationalism democracy criminal justice. A range of views is represented, demonstrating the richness of the philosophical contribution to some of the most contested areas …Read more
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16Contemplating Art: Essays in Aesthetics: Book Reviews (review)British Journal of Aesthetics 47 (4): 441-442. 2007.
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124Beliefs and Fictional NarratorsAnalysis 55 (2). 1995.In his book _The Nature of Fiction_ Greg Currie makes the following proposal concerning the contents of works of fiction: 'Fs' is an abbreviation of 'P is true in fiction S', where P is some proposition and S is some work of fiction. 'Fs' is true iff it is reasonable for the informed reader to infer that the fictional author of S believes that P. In reading a fiction we engage in a make-believe, and the fictional author is that fictional character constructed within our make-believe whom we take…Read more
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15And emotionIn Berys Nigel Gaut & Dominic Lopes (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Aesthetics, Routledge. pp. 353. 2001.
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240This paper argues that the role of the negative emotions in the appreciation of art is misunderstood. Usually taken to generate the 'paradox of tragedy', in fact the negative emotions play an essential role in creativity, and hence in art appreciation
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118Jerrold Levinson maintains that he is a realist about aesthetic properties. This paper considers his positive arguments for such a view. An argument from Roger Scruton, that aesthetic realism would entail the absurd claim that many aesthetic predicates were ambiguous, is also considered and it is argued that Levinson is in no worse position with respect to this argument than anyone else. However, Levinson cannot account for the phenomenon of aesthetic autonomy: namely, that we cannot be put in a…Read more
Israel
Areas of Specialization
Aesthetics |
Social and Political Philosophy |
Value Theory, Miscellaneous |
Areas of Interest
Aesthetics |
Meta-Ethics |
Social and Political Philosophy |
Value Theory, Miscellaneous |