Mind surfing and the clash of the Philosopher-Titans 


Yesterday, I had the extremely fortuitous experience of attending a talk by Dr Lucy Allais who was presenting a paper on Kant's transcendental idealism (a subject that I knew nothing about beforehand, but am now extremely interested in). In the first place, I was very pleased that I was actually able to follow most of what she was saying as the talk was not aimed at undergraduate students and was quite technical in places. The experience was much like surfing in that it involved continuously balancing and readjusting your mind in order to stay on top of a huge swell of thought and information that was coming towards you at great speed and sweeping you along. Go too fast and you would fall over the top and the whole argument would come crashing down around your ears. Too slow and you'd be left behind, treading water while everyone else was carried along on the crest of the wave. I have to say that I found the whole thing extremely exhilarating and thoroughly enjoyed both the talk and the ideas (that qualities in objects are a product of the conjunction of real objects and our minds) presented. 

However, the real fun began with the question and answer session. In the room were about eight students (myself plus mainly post-graduate students) and five academic staff from the philosophy department at York. Unfortunately, none of us students were brave enough to raise our hands to ask a question (I was dying to do so, but having no prior experience of Kant and never having been to such a talk before, I decided to hold my tongue and wait to see what other people said). When the staff questions began, it was clear that Dr Allais wasn't going to have such an easy ride of it...

As you might expect, the questions were incredibly detailed and subtle criticisms of the argument that had been presented, comparing the speaker's position with that of other published authors and commentators. There were clearly differences both of substance and interpretation (the whole talk was about the correct reading of Kant — a rather contentious matter, it would seem), and at one point, Dr Tom Stoneham clearly had Dr Allais on the run, resulting in a vigourous but still reasonable friendly exchange of views, which left the good Doctor lost for a decisive answer. She concluded that she would need some more time in order to formulate a proper defence, but felt the criticism did not represent a genuine flaw in her argument. Tom Baldwin was more sympathetic to her views, and in his characteristic jovial grandfatherly way, and formidable intelligence, proceeded to point out where he thought the real weakness in the argument lay (a technique that he later applied to me with considerable success).

All in all, it was an amazing spectacle to see great minds clash on a problem of philosophical interest, and there was something reminiscent of a scene from Greek mythology, or gladiatorial combat to the death. For each blow that was struck, there was a corresponding parry or counter-attack, and you could almost hear the intellectual foundations of the argument creaking and groaning under the strain... Unlike gladiatorial combat, however, the participants retired to the bar afterwards and for a friendly drink, and I later learned that this exchange had been comparatively mild compared to some of the more heated and on occasion finger-pointing debates that had arisen on the views of previous speakers (all in the name of philosophy, of course).

Apart from being a great opportunity to observe professional philosophers at large in their home territory (so to speak), it was also a good chance to talk to some of the staff on an informal level. I had a very interesting conversation with Tom Baldwin about some of my recent thoughts on time, which he gently pointed out were "quite mad", and then proceeded to reduce my arguments to incoherence with a few well placed words. I felt like one of the characters in the Platonic dialogues who is forced to admit that his views don't really make sense when placed under the relentless glare of Socrates' penetrating (but friendly) line of questioning. Even though he had taken apart something I had been working on for months in a matter of minutes, I couldn't help but like the guy as his attitude was one of care and encouragement, rather than attack or derision, even though I had made some fairly basic mistakes in my thinking. (Thankfully, I later realised where I had gone wrong, which has helped me to tighten up my argument and hopefully avoid being tripped up so easily in the future, so all was not lost!)

It's the first time I've managed to make it to the weekly Philosophy Colloquium at York and I found it a thoroughly enjoyable experience. Not quite as good as sex, perhaps, but certainly way out of the league of everyday pastimes such as drinking beer or watching television. Perhaps I can see myself going in for this philosophy lark as a serious career option. After all, when you're standing on the shoulders of giants, the view is so much better. 

Posted on Friday - February 25, 2005 at 12:39 PM            

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