Slides for an Introduction to Philosophy course at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC, Canada. These give an introduction to Mill’s utilitarianism as well as to consequentialism generally. Then they discuss intellectual and sensual pleasures, the argument Mill gives for why the Greatest Happiness Principle should be how we…[Read more]

The Public Philosophy Journal’s 2018 New Engaged Scholars Digital Pilot Program, which officially kicks off on February 7th, is designed for doctoral students seeking guided, collaborative opportunities to develop early drafts into publishable content. This is the program agenda.

Slides for an Introduction to Philosophy course at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC, Canada. These are about Thomas Nagel’s text called “Death,” which is a chapter in his book called Mortal Questions. They connect Nagel’s view to Epicurus’ view of death, and discuss some of the main points about Nagel’s view.

A set of slides introducing the Chinese philosopher Mozi and his view of “impartial caring.” These are for an introduction to philosophy course at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC, Canada. They were created in January 2018.

These slides are for Introduction to Philosophy at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC, Canada.

There are also two videos that students watched, to accompany the class on this material:

Slides for an Introduction to Philosophy course at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver BC, Canada.

These slides are about Epicureanism, focusing on texts by Epicurus and Cicero.

It is commonly assumed that Aristotle thinks that his claim that being exhibits a category-based pros hen structure, which he introduces to obviate the problem of categorial heterogeneity, is sufficient to defend the possibility of a science of being qua being. We, on the contrary, argue that Aristotle thinks that the pros hen structure is…[Read more]

Introduction to The Late Voice: Time, Age and Experience in Popular Music.

Popular music artists, as performers in the public eye, offer a privileged site for the witnessing and analysis of ageing and its mediation. The Late Voice undertakes such an analysis by considering issues of time, age, memory, innocence and experience in modern popular…[Read more]

This extended review highlights an increasingly important aspect of the contemporary performance reception of the Odyssey in the UK, with growing numbers of practitioners and companies moving away from the straightforward dramatisation (or revisionist dramatic contestation) of Homer’s epic tale, and towards a deepening engagement with epic s…[Read more]

Our lack of reliable information concerning the physical and choreographic aspects of ancient tragic performance permits modern writers to construct their own imaginative re-creations of the ancient text/body relationship in a wide variety of modes. The range of ways in which texts translated or adapted from ancient tragedy are capable of…[Read more]

The translation of ancient tragedy is often considered at a linguistic level, as if the drama consisted simply of words being written, spoken and heard. This article contends that translation for the stage is a process in which literary decisions have physical, as well as verbal, outcomes. It traces existing formulations concerning the links…[Read more]

Alice Oswald’s recitation of her 2011 poem Memorial is an intensely modest, self-effacing performance. Yet it is also one which invites us to consider key questions about the ancient practice, and modern re-performance, of epic poetry. Oswald explicitly cites the antiphonal lament of Homeric funerary ritual as an influence upon her r…[Read more]

Ted Hughes’ version of Euripides’ Alcestis (1999) is a play which diverges significantly from its ancient source-text, most notably in an interpolated sequence during which the drunken Heracles re-enacts his own labours, before experiencing traumatic visions. This article identifies this un-Euripidean interlude as a characteristic instance of int…[Read more]

This review-essay discusses George Brant’s play Grounded (2013) in the context of its production at the Gate Theatre (London). It begins with a critical examination of my own “mis-seeing” of the play’s protagonist as a version of the tragic Heracles. The analysis which follows compares key aspects of The Pilot’s narrative with Euripides’ Heracles…[Read more]

In today’s academic philosophy, we have “philosophy of biology,” which deals with creatures’ biological phenomena, “philosophy of
death,” which concentrates on the concept of human death, and “philosophy of meaning of life,” which investigates difficult problems concerning the meaning of life and living, but we do not have “philosophy of…[Read more]

“Confessions of a Frigid Man: A Philosopher’s Journey into the Hidden Layers of Men’s Sexuality” is the translation of a Japanese 2005 bestseller. Soon after the publication, this book stirred controversy over the nature of male sexuality, male “frigidity,” and its connection to the “Lolita complex.” Today, this work is considered a classic in…[Read more]

This paper presents an introductory overview of Plato’s poetics, aesthetics, and literary theory, with particular reference to his notion of mimesis, and grounding the discussion on his Theory of Ideas. It is part of a lecture series on the history of literary criticism, partly available online as HYPERCRITICA: A HYPERTEXTUAL HISTORY OF LITERARY…[Read more]

This article considers the question ‘What makes hope rational?’ We take Adrienne
Martin’s recent incorporation analysis of hope as representative of a tradition that views the
rationality of hope as a matter of instrumental reasons. Against this tradition, we argue that
an important subset of hope, ‘fundamental hope’, is not governed by instru…[Read more]

This rubric is designed to facilitate a creative and lively philosophical dialogue online by encouraging strong writing in blog posts and comments. These criteria will be used for the qualitative evaluation of the blog posts and comments.

‘In The Inhumanist Manifesto, Gary Hall writes that “[i]f the inhuman equals the human intertwined with the nonhuman, then the inhumanities are the humanities.” Articulating the latest version of his radical theories on posthumanism, piracy, Marxism, open access and the commons, this bold remix of Hall’s self-proclaimed pirate philosophy detai…[Read more]