by E. John Winner ____ Coup d’état In April 1653, Oliver Cromwell led some twenty of his troops into the House of Commons. Berating the Parliamentarians with the strongest invective yet heard in that House, he had the soldiers boot them out without ceremony. The Rump Parliament had reached an inglorious end, and Cromwell had led what amounts to one […]
by Daniel A. Kaufman ____ On a number of occasions, I have defended what I’ve been calling “procedural liberalism” on the grounds that in large pluralistic societies (a) one cannot expect one’s fellow citizens to share a common, substantive conception of the good, and (b) one cannot expect that one’s “community,” in the sense of the word that implies a […]
by Mark English ___ My intention here is to recapitulate a couple of points arising from recent discussions with a view to clarifying my own position on the nature of the past, before briefly addressing some broader questions relating to realism and culture. Is it acceptable to distinguish between, on the one hand, an account of the past (whatever kind […]
by Daniel A. Kaufman ___ When one hears the expression “white paper,” one thinks of a document of great historic significance, typically issued by a government. Winston Churchill’s famous 1922 white paper clarifying the 1917 Balfour Declaration, which set in motion a series of events that changed the face of the Middle East, immediately comes to mind. What one doesn’t […]
by David L. Duffy _____ Raymond Ruyer (1902-1987), le Sage de Nancy, significantly influenced French philosophy (he is quoted by Merleau-Ponty, Canguilhem, Deleuze and the enactivists, e.g. Varela and Weber), but was little referenced in English until recently. [1] His thinking has roots in Bergson and Whitehead, with Deleuze calling him “the latest of Leibniz’s great disciples.” [2] His Néofinalisme […]
by Daniel A. Kaufman ____ Though I voted for Hilary Clinton in the last US presidential election, I knew that Donald Trump was going to win, months before voters went to the polling stations, and it seems that the same thing is likely to happen in 2020, regardless of who ends up being the Democratic nominee. Accordingly, I have made […]
by Daniel A. Kaufman ___ Come mothers and fathers Throughout the land And don’t criticize What you can’t understand Your sons and your daughters Are beyond your command Your old road is Rapidly agin’. Please get out of the new one If you can’t lend your hand For the times they are a-changin’. –Bob Dylan† According to one piece of […]
by Daniel A. Kaufman __ My title is derived from a comment made by our own Mark English, in a recent discussion on his excellent essay on history. The thought his comment expresses is mistaken, but in the best sort of way, for explaining where it goes wrong helps us to understand something essential – and difficult – about history. […]
by Mark English From time to time over the past couple of years, I have expressed reservations about certain forms of history as constituting knowledge. My view can, I think, be very simply stated and defended. It involves distinguishing different kinds of narrative from one another. The boundary lines in question are necessarily fuzzy. All the key concepts here – […]
by E. John Winner ____ This is first of two essays, concerning the events of the English Revolution of the 17th century. Why should these events concern an audience primarily interested in philosophy and philosophy’s concrete relations with contemporary culture and politics? The immediate answer to this is quite easily pronounced in two names: Hobbes and Locke. We should all […]
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