The Manifesto is a tongue-in-cheek parody with a serious message. It is connected to work I am doing on the role of the hand in human evolution. This has been explored by paleoanthropologists but not by philosophers. Specifically, what is the role of the hand in the origin of language? Can we give a gradualist […]
The Prehensionist Manifesto (This document states the main tenets of the Cult of the Hand. All members of the cult are expected to conform to these principles. Formally, the cult is referred to as the Gripparian Order.) We seek to promote greater hand consciousness We advocate manual cultivation, arboreal therapy, and brachiation training We believe […]
I just finished a student textbook on philosophy of language, based on my regular lectures. It goes through the classic articles by Frege, Russell, Tarski, Davidson, Kaplan, etc, giving detailed expositions, with close attention to the text. I have found that other introductions to philosophy of language have not been satisfactory, either because they are […]
What can I say that is provocative enought to kickstart this blog? I know: Wimbledon! It is is going to be fascinating, no doubt about that. I think Sharapova will win the women’s. On the men’s side, I think Federer will either go out early or win. I’m predicting Djokovic vs. Murray in the final […]
I just heard (from Tom Hurka) that Bernard Suits’ brilliant book The Grasshopper was turned down by several academic publishes before being taken up by Toronto University Press. One wonders what level of blindness and mediocrity could lead p[eople to make such a decision. It seems that any degree of real originality will meet with rejection by […]
I wrote the novel Bad Patches back in the mid-eighties on a typewriter. I made some attempts to publish it but no takers. It sat around for almost 20 years. Meanwhile the internet came along and with it ebooks. Recently I had it put into electronic form and then I revised it. To my surprise I discovered […]
