Hegel and Wittgenstein

Philosophy-haters, you probably want to skip this one; it’s the stuff of nightmares. Whoever says he acts in such and such a way from conscience, speaks the truth, for his conscience is the self that ...

Hegel’s Conservatism (and McGoohan’s Too)

Again on the subject of Hegel’s conservatism. I’m not really trying to convince anyone here, only to provide a verbal formulation for those who already suspect deep in their hearts that something about Hegel is ...

Fun with Consciousness

I love the philosophy of consciousness. Is there any other field of philosophy that proceeds with so few objective reference points, where people spend so much time fighting over pure first principles? Yes, probably, but ...

Note on Merleau-Ponty’s “Cogito”

Erich Auerbach: Mimesis 1

A la Fin Du Temps Perdu

I’ll try not to give away too much here, but the multiyear Proust reading has come to an end, even if the blog hasn’t. Since this isn’t an in-depth analysis but only my own reaction ...

Strawson on Consciousness

For those of us like me who can’t help wondering about the physical reality of subjective mental events, here’s a passage from the ever-excellent Galen Strawson, from a review of Antonio Damasio: The standard formulation ...