A close, critical reader is worth his weight in gold. I am reminded of this whenever I share a bit of writing with someone who proceeds to clear up confusions deftly and rapidly, and sometimes, represents my position better than I had managed. In part of a rough piece of writing tucked away somewhere, IContinue reading “Displacements of, Not Solutions to, Philosophical Problems: A Quick Primer”
Tag Archives: Wittgenstein
Movies on Philosophers: Rare, Hard to Make, Desirable
Having viewed the rather disappointing Chopin: Desire for Love over the weekend, I’m struck again by how difficult it seems to be to make movies about artists, writers, or perhaps creators of all kinds. My viewing also served to remind me that movies about philosophers’ lives are exceedingly rare, and the few that have been made–or rather, that I am awareContinue reading “Movies on Philosophers: Rare, Hard to Make, Desirable”
The Fallacious Knowing-How, Knowing-That Distinction
Over at the Stone, Jason Stanley offers some thoughtful remarks on the fallacious distinction between the practical and the theoretical, or rather, between practical and theoretical knowledge. Stanley examines the case to be made for the dichotomy between reflection–‘guided by our knowledge of truths about the world’–and action–‘guided by our knowledge of how to performContinue reading “The Fallacious Knowing-How, Knowing-That Distinction”
The Real Social Software: ‘Crowd Solutions’ To Co-ordination Problems
Consider a familiar, mundane, urban situation: You walk into an ATM vestibule in a bank. Your arrival has been preceded by other customers. No queue exists. But a ‘queue’ forms nevertheless and it deploys a simple algorithm: You simply wait till everyone that was there before you takes his or her turn. You don’t careContinue reading “The Real Social Software: ‘Crowd Solutions’ To Co-ordination Problems”
Samir Chopra 