Kant’s Cave: Scott Biagi - On Wittgenstein’s “therapeutic” method in philosophy
Details
ATTEND IN PERSON OR ON ZOOM*
NB This talk will now take place on Sunday Nov 30 due to the venue availability situation. Apologies for any inconvenience.
Professional philosophers tend to speak of ordinary language philosophy (OLP) as a thing of the past. But there are still philosophers who practise versions of OLP and defend it in discussion of the aims and methods of philosophical inquiry. This talk focuses on a critique of the use of story-telling in the literature on the free will problem (see the article by Don Levi), which will serve as an example of Wittgenstein’s therapeutic approach to philosophical puzzlement.
Background reading
Ludwig Wittgenstein (1953) Philosophical Investigations. See especially §§65–6, §104, §115, §§121–23, §127, §133, §255
Harry Frankfurt (1969) Alternate Possibilities and Moral Responsibility. Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 66, No. 23
Don Levi (2014) The Trouble with Harry. Nordic Wittgenstein Review, Vol. 3, No. 1
For anyone interested in OLP:
Avner Baz, (2012) When Words Are Called For: A Defence of Ordinary Language Philosophy. Harvard University Press
Scott Biagi is a psychoanalytic psychotherapist with a background in philosophy. He has taught philosophy in further and higher education for about twenty years, and has a PhD in philosophy that explores the relationship between ordinary language philosophy and a field of sociological inquiry called ethnomethodology.
On the first Monday of every month the PFA meets at Kant's Cave at 7.30 pm for a lecture, debate and social evening. This usually takes place in the upstairs bar at the Two Chairmen, 39 Dartmouth Street, SW1H 9BP.
This event is sponsored by the Royal institute of Philosophy.
For the full programme of events see pfalondon.org
*Please, note that if you register to attend via Zoom the link might not automatically appear in your digital calendar, but will be available on the event Meetup page.