Physicists Should Stop Saying Silly Things about Philosophy

Finally an interesting blog-post saying some basic things about the relation between philosophy and physics, explaining that “being useful” is not tantamount to “being useful to my current calculations” and that, accordingly, many physicists criticising philosophy are just misunderstanding their target.
I would have added something more regarding the epistemology of the issue, but for that have a look at the interesting comments (e.g., one says that philosophy is useful for asking questions, but lousy for answering them…).

Hayagrīva in Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta texts —UPDATED

In post-Vedānta Deśika (traditional dates 1269-1370) Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta texts Hayagrīva seems to have assumed the function Gaṇeśa has in all other texts, namely he is invoked at the beginning as the God of learning, protecting the intellectual enterprise one is about to undertake.

(Musée Guimet, Cambodia)

Veṅkaṭanātha’s Buddhist quotes

Veṅkaṭanātha (also known as Vedānta Deśika) quotes relatively often from Buddhist texts, especially from Pramāṇavāda ones (as was possibly customary within Indian philosophical circles. Does it mean that he could still directly access Pramāṇavāda texts? Or does he depend on second-hand quotations?

Is language misleading us?

Studio of Fedele Fischetti

Yes, with Michael Dummett’s death the “linguistic turn” in analytic philosophy has come to an end.
Yes, the new dominant trend is the move towards neurosciences, which are used to deal with issues in philosophy of mind, (cognitive) linguistics, (cognitive) semantics, morality, etc.

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Textual Reuse for Classicists

RETHINKING TEXT REUSE AS DIGITAL CLASSICISTS

DH 2014, Lausanne, 10 July 2014, 09:00-10:30

Amphimax, room 410

Text reuse – the meaningful reiteration of text, usually beyond the simple repetition of common language – is a broad concept that can naturally be understood at different levels and studied in a large variety of contexts. This panel will gather researchers from different projects focussing on text reuse in the field of Digital Classics with the aim of discussing the possible approaches to and understandings of the notion. It will also bring together current efforts and lay the ground for further research.

Conveners:

Aurélien Berra (Université Paris-Ouest & EHESS)

Matteo Romanello (German Archaeological Institute & King’s College London)

Alexandra Trachsel (University of Hamburg)

Invited participants:

Monica Berti (University of Leipzig)

Chris Forstall (University at Buffalo, SUNY)

Annette Geßner (University of Leipzig)

Charlotte Tupman (King’s College London)

For more information and the panel’s programme, please visit this site.

What is the difference between nouns and verbs (according to Mīmāṃsā authors)? Diaconescu vs. Clooney

What do nouns mean? And what is the difference between nouns and verbs? Pūrva Mīmāṃsā authors are rightly known as having conceived the first textual linguistics in South Asia. In this sense, their theory differs from the Vyākaraṇa one, as it does not start with basic forms having already underwent an analysis (vyākaraṇa), but rather with complex textual units, the sacrificial prescriptions of the Brāhmaṇas.