Anxiety: A Philosophical History (with a side order of Kant)

Welcome everyone to the next meetup series that Jen and Philip are presenting starting May 25!

This time around we will be presenting the book:

• Anxiety: A Philosophical History (Oxford University Press 2020) by Bettina Bergo (See link for further info about the book from the publisher)

This is a three hour meetup. For the first two hours we will stick very closely to the Bergo book. For THE FINAL HOUR we will be introducing a new way of doing things called "Filling in the Background". Bergo covers several philosophers. During the final hour we will read works by or about whatever philosopher she happens to be focussing on.

For example, Bergo starts with Kant and so for the first few sessions we will study Kant in an introductory way during the "Filling in the Background" final hour. When Bergo moves on to Schelling we will study some Schelling in the "Filling in the Background" final hour, and so on.

When we are covering Kant in the "Filling in the Background" section we will be referring to three books, one by Lucy Allais, one by Graham Bird and one by Kant himself. I (Philip) will do everything I can to make this clear and not confusing. But Kant is hard and the temptation to ignore real Kant and settle for a simplified cartoonish version of Kant's thought is too great. We need all three books to help us resist this temptation.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

A comment on what this meetup is and what it is not:

Bergo is looking at several European philosophers starting with Kant and is exploring the concept of Anxiety as a concept within philosophy. Obviously this will have some bearing on how anxiety as a word and as a concept functions within contemporary medicalized discourses. But in this meetup we will stick very closely to the philosophical aspects of the concept of anxiety. The occasional personal anecdote might be helpful, but only if it is given for the specific purpose of illuminating our understanding of Kant, Schelling, Schopenhauer and the other philosophers Bergo is writing about.

In a nutshell, this is not a support group about anxiety related mental health issues.

But hopefully it will be of interest to everyone, including those who are exploring the more medicalized versions of the concept of anxiety. Jen and Philip wish nothing but the very best to anyone suffering from a medical version of anxiety; but this meetup is about the philosophy version of this concept.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Even people who have not done the reading are welcome to attend this meetup. However if you want to talk during the meetup it is essential that you do the reading. We mean it! It is essential that the direction of the conversation be influenced only by people who have actually done the reading. The Bergo book is magnificent and we will be reading many of the all-time great philosophers, so do yourself a favour and do the reading. You will get so much more out of this meetup if you do. You may think you are so brilliant and wonderful that you can come up with great points even if you do not do the reading. You probably are brilliant and wonderful — no argument there! But you still have to do the reading if you want to talk in this meetup. Really.

To make it easier to do all the reading, please note also that the Bergo book is available as an audiobook. In an "Elbows Up" spirit, here is a place where you can buy the audiobook where the majority of the money you spend goes to a Canadian bookstore — message Philip to find out how to make that work.

Anxiety Audiobook | Libro.fm – https://libro.fm/audiobooks/9781705281406-anxiety

Incidentally, the very best translation of Kierkegaard's book – https://www.indigo.ca/en-ca/the-concept-of-anxiety/9781631490040.html

is also available as an audiobook too. Perhaps this will help people to keep up with the readings.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Jen and Philip have a very clear division of labour. If you have issues or concerns about the choice of texts or the pace of the reading or other "content" concerns, please contact Philip. If you have technology related questions please contact Jen. If you have complaints please direct them only to Philip.

Please note that this is a "raise hands" meetup and has a highly structured format, not an anarchy-based one. This is partly for philosophical reasons: We want to discourage a simple rapid fire "gotcha!" approach to philosophy. But our highly structured format is also for disability related reasons that Philip can explain if required.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

In both portions of the meetup, the format will be our usual "ACCELERATED LIVE READ". What this means is that each participant will be expected to read roughly 15-40 pages of text before each session. Each participant will have the option of picking a few paragraphs they especially want to focus on. We will then do a live read on the paragraphs that the participants found most interesting when they did the assigned reading. In general, shorter passages will be assigned in Bergo so we can go slowly through Bargo. But longer passages will be assigned in the "Filling in the background" section.

• For the first session (May 25) of the meetup, please read up to page 16 in Bergo. Please acquire a copy of the Guyer and Wood translation of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason and read pages 99 to 111. For this first gathering (and only for the first gathering) we will allow people to speak who have not done the reading. (A pdf of the Bergo and a pdf of the Guyer/Wood if you need access)
• For the second session (June 8), please read from page 16 to page 35 in Bergo. Please read from page 99 to page 124 in the Guyer/Wood translation (yes, we will be reviewing the Kant passages from the first session). Please also acquire Graham Bird's book The Revolutionary Kant (2006) and read pages 1 - 29. You may want to read the Graham Bird sections twice — Kant is worth it. (A pdf of the Bird if you need access)

Further reading assignments will be posted once we get a better sense of the pacing that will work best for the Bergo book and the Kant related books.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

A note on the Kant translation:

Many people in the meetup community prefer the Pluhar translations of Kant, perhaps in part because they are easier to follow. I agree that they are easier, but Pluhar achieved this by building in an interpretation. Guyer and Wood achieved something even better than ease of reading — they managed to give us a translation of Kant that genuinely reflects the German text with none of its difficulties politely whisked away. Even though I strongly disagree with Guyer's interpretation of Kant, he had the intellectual integrity to leave his interpretation at the door and give us real Kant in his translation.

Those of you who have heard me talk about how difficult (and occasionally impossible) it is to translate Heidegger will be happy to hear that I think that translating Kant is actually pretty easy. There are only two German words I will need to explain in depth and (fortunately) they are words that are often found together so they should be easy to remember. They are the German words for "mere" and "appearance":

• "bloß" (also spelled "bloss") and "Erscheinen".

When we do Heidegger I encourage people to refer to the German text if they can. But when we do Kant I request that anyone who has questions about the German text should message their questions to me on the meetup site. In the case of Heidegger it is worth it to interrupt the flow to pause and deal with translation issues. In the case of Kant, it generally is not — you really are not missing much if you cannot read Kant in German.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

A Note on the bewilderingly wide range of ways of interpreting Kant

The "Filling in the Background" portion of this meetup that deals with Kant will be informed by a simple guiding ethos: To engage seriously with Kant just IS to engage seriously with the bewilderingly wide range of ways there are of interpreting Kant. One interpretation (or more accurately one cluster of closely related interpretations) sometimes called "Oxford Kantianism" has acquired something of an iron grip on English language study of Kant. Amateur philosophers and Philosophy Profs who do not specialize in Kant often think "Oxford Kantianism" is the only (or only serious) way to interpret Kant. Yet, even in the English speaking world the majority of philosophers who specialize in Kant generally think "Oxford Kantianism" is utterly wrong. If you are mostly familiar only with "Oxford Kantianism" you might find Graham Bird's interpretation disorienting and eccentric. Yet Bird's approach is actually starting to look a little bit old fashioned to younger Kant specialists. Bird and the majority of Kant specialists (including me I suppose) are starting to look like we are a bit "stuck in the 80's... the 1980's that is".

So in the field of Kant scholarship in 2025 we are looking at a situation where amateurs and profs who do not specialize in Kant still treat "Oxford Kantianism" as the unquestioned right interpretation. Graham Bird (and me) might look outrageously avant-garde and eccentric to someone who assumes that "Oxford Kantianism" is the only option. But now Graham Bird (and me) are starting to look a bit old-fashioned to people like Lucy Allais. Confusing?! Yes! But in a fascinating and interesting way. Don't worry, I will make all of this very clear over the course of 5 or 6 sessions on Kant in the "Filling in the background" portion of the meetup.