Maverick Philosopher

Footnotes to Plato from the foothills of the Superstition Mountains

Category: Blogging

  • In Praise of Blogosophy

    Philosophy is primarily an activity, not a body of doctrine. If you were to think of it as a body of doctrine, then you would have to say there is no philosophy, but only philosophies. For there is no one universally recognized body of doctrine called philosophy. The truth of course is one not many.…

  • Thomas Mann on Blogging

    Thomas Mann: Diaries 1918-1939 (Abrams, 1982, tr. R & C Winston), p. 194: I love this process by which each passing day is captured, not only in its impressions, but also, at least by suggestion, its intellectual direction and content as well, less for the purpose of rereading and remembering than for taking stock, reviewing,…

  • They Post Infrequently but Well

    Jim Ryan and Franklin Mason, the proprietors of Philosoblog and The Philosophical Midwife respectively, are both analytically trained philosophers outside of academe.  Their weblogs are well worth reading.  Explore their archives: the things they write rise above the ephemeral.  I have my differences with both, and they with each other.  But the commonalities run deeper.  On…

  • Maverick Philosopher Makes The Times Online 100 Best Blogs List

    A tip of the hat to Dave Lull for pointing me to A guide to the 100 best blogs – part I.  Maverick Philosopher makes the cut.  See page 5.  Excerpt: Two good philosophy blogs make the point that this is a subject made for bloggery. Philosophy is arguing, and arguing is what bloggers and…

  • Why Do I Delete Comments?

    Why do I delete comments? It is not because the commenter disagrees with what I say.  In Epistemic/Doxastic Possibility I floated a definition that commenter Andrew Bailey refuted. He blew it clean out of the water.  I acknowledged the refutation as soon as I became aware of it and proposed a different definition.  Bailey refuted…

  • Would Schopenhauer Allow Comments?

    If Schopenhauer were a blogger, would he allow comments on his weblog, The Scowl of Minerva? I say no, and adduce as evidence the following passage that concludes his Art of Controversy, a delightful essay found in his Nachlass, but left untitled by the master: As a sharpening of wits, controversy is often, indeed, of mutual…

  • Blogging as Exercitium Spirituale

    And you thought blogging could only be a shameless expression of vanity? But a quotidian assembling in this newfangled medium of reminders, admonitions, maxims and the like, performed in the right spirit, is no less a spiritual exercise than the daily jottings of a Marcus Aurelius.

  • Karl Kraus on Blogging

    Karl Kraus, Beim Wort Genommen, p. 124: Warum schreibt mancher? Weil er nicht genug Charakter hat, nicht zu schreiben. Why do many write? Because they don't have enough character not to write. (tr. BV)

  • A Reason to Blog

    Chary of embalming in printer’s ink ideas that may be unworthy of such preservation, due perhaps to underdevelopment, or lack of originality, or some more egregious defect, the blogger satisfies his urge to scribble and publish without burdening referees and editors and typesetters, and without contributing to the devastation of forests. He publishes all right,…

  • The Direction of This Weblog

    This from a reader: I have been following your blog for some time, from the move to PowerBlogs to the recent move to TypePad. I have two questions I’d like to ask: First, are you going to post your opinions on the election? I have particularly enjoyed reading the reactions of several conservatives . .…

  • The Presumptuousness of Blogging

    Immanuel Kant, The Conflict of the Faculties/Der Streit der Fakultäten, tr. Gregor (University of Nebraska Press, 1979), p. 177: To want to entertain others with the inner history of the play of my thoughts, which has subjective importance (for me) but no objective importance (valid for everyone), would be presumptuous, and I could justly be…