DPS meeting
Purushottama Bilimoria presents ‘Of Grief and Mourning: Thinking a Feeling, Back to Robert Solomon’
Wednesday 14 September from 5-6.30pm in ib3.307
This Wednesday from 5-6.30pm in ib3.307 the Deakin Philosophical Society Associate Professor Purushottama Bilimoria will present his essay ‘Of Grief and Mourning: Thinking a Feeling, Back to Robert Solomon’. Here’s the abstract
The paper considers various ruminations on the aftermath of the death of a close or loved one, and the processes of grieving and mourning. The conceptual examination of how grief impacts on its sufferers, from different cultural perspectives, is followed by an analytical survey of current thinking among psychologists, psychoanalysts and philosophers on the enigma of grief, and on the associated practice of mourning. Robert C. Solomon reflected deeply on the ‘extreme emotion’ of grief in his extensive theorizing on the emotions, particularly in his essay ‘On Grief and Gratitude’, commenting that grief is ‘often described as a very private, personal emotion, characterized by social withdrawal and shutting oneself off from the world’ (2004: 73). While dialoguing with the spirit of Solomon by way also of a tribute to his immense insights, the paper engages in critical reflections on recent thinking in this area elsewhere — notably, in Heidegger, Freud, Nussbaum, Casey, Gustafson, and Kristeva — and offers a refreshing critique toward an alternative to the received wisdom.
Find a copy of Purushottama’s paper attached to this email, and I hope to see you there.
Alfred Deakin Research Institute free public lecture
Greg Sheridan, Foreign Editor at The Australian, presents ‘What role can or should religion play in a modern nation?’
Thursday 22 September from 6pm at Deakin University’s Melbourne city centre conference theatre
On Thursday 22 September, Greg Sheridan will speak on the topic ‘What role can or should religion ploy in a modern nation?’. This event is a Deakin University public lecture.
Greg Sheridan is Foreign Editor for The Australian and arguably the most influential foreign affairs analyst in Australian journalism. He has also written actively and constructively on the question of religion in modern society. Mr Sheridan’s work has always been thought-provoking, and this event (sponsored by the Alfred Deakin Research Institute) provides a forum to address a topic of great national and international importance.
The lecture will be followed by a cocktail reception.
Date: Thursday 22 September 2011
Time: from 6pm
Venue: Conference Theatre, Deakin University Melbourne City Centre
Level 3, 550 Bourke Street
Melbourne (Melways Ref: 43 F8)
To register your attendance for this public lecture please email Dr Sam Koehne samuel.koehne@deakin.edu.au
DPS meeting
States may be like organised criminal gangs but they reduce rates of homicidal violence
Wednesday 7 September from 5-6.30pm in ib3.307
This week from 5-6.30pm in ib3.307 the Deakin Philosophical Society will continue discussing the relationship between government, organised crime and rates of homicidal violence.
Last week we discussed Charles Tilly’s (1985) article ‘War making and state making as organised crime’, in which he draws a comparison between the activities of successful modern states and the activities of organised criminal gangs.
This week we’ll look at a summary of recent research that shows that homicidal violence has declined significantly since the development of modern states. This research will ring a bell for those of you who were present when we discussed Steven Pinker’s TED lecture ‘The myth of violence’. Indeed, the summary we’ll look at this week is the 2007 article by Pinker that he published around the time of his TED lecture. Find a copy of ‘A history of violence: we’re getting nicer every day’ reproduced online at http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/pinker07/pinker07_index.html. Pinker’s original article appeared in The New Republic, vol. 236, no. 12.
So, here’s the dilemma that will guide this week’s discussion:
- Modern states are like organised criminal gangs ; but
- Homicidal violence has declined since the advent of modern states
So, if modern states are akin to organised criminal gangs but they protect us from violent death at the hands of our neighbours, are they good?
For those of you who are interested in chasing up Pinker’s sources, the principle source of his century-scale evidence is criminologist Manuel Eisner’s (2001) ‘Modernization, self-control and lethal violence: the long-term dynamics of European homicide rates in theoretical perspective’, The British Journal of Criminology, vol. 41, no. 4, pp. 618-638. You can access the article through Deakin library.
