What have you been reading?

[MentalEngineer]

3 hours ago, notorious_biv said:

I love it! So much of the philosophical literature on vision focuses on output states; it's nice to switch gears and discuss what actually goes on within vision. I also really appreciate how clear she is about what the notion of representation is, as well as its role in prominent theories of vision. Honestly, I find her arguments against cognitivism/for EV to be pretty compelling. When I'm done, I might return to Origins of Objectivity. I think I have a clearer understanding of what Burge is up to having read Orlandi. 

I'm going to have to read this too, then. Because Christ knows I have no idea what Burge thinks he's shown us by the end of that abominable tome.

[Schwarzwald]

Every semester I check out all the books I'm going to read in my spare time. I basically get whatever books I want, since no one uses our library. I'm almost done with this run, and would love to speak with anyone who has read any of these works, or would like to read one of these books with me. I'm probably going to read Fact, Fiction, and Forecast next.

[matchamatcha]

2 hours ago, Schwarzwald said:

Every semester I check out all the books I'm going to read in my spare time. I basically get whatever books I want, since no one uses our library. I'm almost done with this run, and would love to speak with anyone who has read any of these works, or would like to read one of these books with me. I'm probably going to read Fact, Fiction, and Forecast next.

Holy moly, that's an impressive pile to read in one semester on top of your course readings!  I recently picked up Worlds, Times and Selves from the "free books" pile in our department library - what were your thoughts on it?  I've also bumped Meaning and Necessity up on my reading list since becoming a Carnap expert is an odd little goal of mine.

[Schwarzwald]

13 minutes ago, matchamatcha said:

Holy moly, that's an impressive pile to read in one semester on top of your course readings!  I recently picked up Worlds, Times and Selves from the "free books" pile in our department library - what were your thoughts on it?  I've also bumped Meaning and Necessity up on my reading list since becoming a Carnap expert is an odd little goal of mine.

Lol, my poor grades this semester will reveal why I am able to read so many books. I recommend Meaning and Necessity, while I do not agree with some of its conclusions, I believe S2 typifies the standard understanding of the relations between the modalities. You should message me once you start reading it, I'd love to converse over Carnap. I haven't read Worlds, Times, and Selves yet, I had it for background to Richmond Thomason's "Indeterminist time and truth value gaps." Did you enjoy it?

[matchamatcha]

45 minutes ago, Schwarzwald said:

Lol, my poor grades this semester will reveal why I am able to read so many books. I recommend Meaning and Necessity, while I do not agree with some of its conclusions, I believe S2 typifies the standard understanding of the relations between the modalities. You should message me once you start reading it, I'd love to converse over Carnap. I haven't read Worlds, Times, and Selves yet, I had it for background to Richmond Thomason's "Indeterminist time and truth value gaps." Did you enjoy it?

I have only read one of the chapters (chapter 5 - I don't remember the tile) as some background for a class on possible worlds and modal semantics a little while ago, but I remember essentially agreeing with Prior's argument against a hard distinction between tensed and untensed propositions.  Prior's stance itself, which isn't really focused on in the chapter since the chapter is actually about rebuttals for the opposing argument, sort of reminds me of Russell's stance on rigid designators as mentioned by good ol' Kripke in Naming and Necessity.  Anyways, if you get around to it, let me know; I'd like to read the rest of it sometime and reread that chapter without the looming concern of a course.

Edited April 14, 2016 by matchamatcha
I kant spell.

[SamStone]

13 hours ago, MVSCZAR said:

The initial difficulty in reading Deleuze is incredibly frustrating, but it does dissipate after you start reading him as a sort of creative writer. That's to say, as dancing on the edge of the really real and pushing against the limit. I've never read A Thousand Plateaus, but I've read Nietzsche and Philosophy and What is Philosophy?. And I read some of Anti-Oedipus. It's the only book I've ever thrown out of a window, by the way, because it was so frustrating. But I suppose that goes to show that my strong opinions aren't meant to be held eternally. 

 

I'm planning on reading Hyperion this summer, too! Twins!

Yea, I totally agree with what you said about the initial difficulty. It took me a very long time before I took the time to make it past the frustrating stage with Deleuze. I've found reading his work really helpful though..I've always hoped to be a philosopher more capable of being creative than a philosopher who is "right" about something (not to imply that those things are exclude each other). So I've been really encouraged by his work—reading him has actually made me realize that there are not many philosophers that I know of that I feel encouraged by as a I read them. 

Anyway, why are you planning to read Hyperion?? It's not every day that you meet someone planning to read Hölderlin, haha. (I've recently gotten way into the Romantics [I'm also reading Dalia Nassar's Romantic Absolute, which I forgot to include in my original post], and I deal a little with Hölderlin in my thesis...which is why I'm planning to read Hyperion.)

 

7 hours ago, notorious_biv said:

I love it! So much of the philosophical literature on vision focuses on output states; it's nice to switch gears and discuss what actually goes on within vision. I also really appreciate how clear she is about what the notion of representation is, as well as its role in prominent theories of vision. Honestly, I find her arguments against cognitivism/for EV to be pretty compelling. When I'm done, I might return to Origins of Objectivity. I think I have a clearer understanding of what Burge is up to having read Orlandi. 

Yes! That is also why I really liked her book. I really enjoyed Burge's book, but I also found it really problematic. And Orlandi did a good job handling a lot of those problems--or at least helping me make sense of them.

[MVSCZAR]

33 minutes ago, SamStone said:

Yea, I totally agree with what you said about the initial difficulty. It took me a very long time before I took the time to make it past the frustrating stage with Deleuze. I've found reading his work really helpful though..I've always hoped to be a philosopher more capable of being creative than a philosopher who is "right" about something (not to imply that those things are exclude each other). So I've been really encouraged by his work—reading him has actually made me realize that there are not many philosophers that I know of that I feel encouraged by as a I read them. 

Anyway, why are you planning to read Hyperion?? It's not every day that you meet someone planning to read Hölderlin, haha. (I've recently gotten way into the Romantics [I'm also reading Dalia Nassar's Romantic Absolute, which I forgot to include in my original post], and I deal a little with Hölderlin in my thesis...which is why I'm planning to read Hyperion.)

Regarding creative philosophy... We would REALLY get along. I think I've been saying this to everyone who would listen, and perhaps people I've met at the grad visits could attest to this. 

 

I heard about Hölderlin through Heidegger. Actually, I think I heard about everything through Heidegger. And being interested in Greek and German thought, Hölderlin would be a natural interest. I'm not totally in love with him, though, but I want to be. I've been meaning to read Hyperion for a few years now after a friend told me it changed his life. I'm interested to see how it goes. Very exciting. 

[thehegeldialectic]

I work full time, so I can only study philosophy in the mornings, and this only on days where I don't work mornings or have the day off. 

I started working through Marx's Capital, Vol. I earlier this year. I got all the way through chapter 16 here.

Recently, I've started working on a paper on Plato. It focuses mainly on the Sophist, but builds on themes throughout his works. I stopped this because I really can't balance creative work with laboring full time, but it's still very much on my mind.

Last week, I switched back to working on Heidegger (my main area of interest) full time. I worked through his entire Introduction to Metaphysics, finishing last week. Over the last four days, I re-read "Origin of the Work of Art," reading parallel with the German. I plan to go back over some elements of this essay tomorrow.

My next project is Heidegger's Contributions to Philosophy, which will probably keep me busy until school starts. If I end up finishing this, giving up in frustration, or getting distracted, I'll read Difference and Repetition, since I haven't read any Deleuze yet, and have been meaning to.

Edited April 16, 2016 by iunoionnis