Oxford Realism in Context

Until recently, the standard narrative of the emergence of analytic philosophy in the late 19th and early 20th century focused overwhelmingly on realist responses to British Idealism at Cambridge. But at around the same time, if not earlier, realism had already become a corner stone of philosophical practice at Oxford, in large part thanks to John Cook Wilson’s teaching. Partly due to their publication practices, Oxford realists did not come to dominate English-speaking philosophical venues in the way the Cambridge realists did. But their philosophical concerns, doctrines, and methods were nonetheless pivotal to the development of analytic philosophy. This conference will i) examine the philosophical context in which Oxford realism developed and thrived, ii) reconstruct in detail how Oxford realists and some of their key contemporaries understood perception, propositions, and universals, among other things, and iii) sketch the lasting influence Oxford realism had on the development of analytic philosophy in the 1930s to 70s.

PROGRAMME

* 10 November
09:30-10:30 Guy Longworth (Warwick) “Ryle’s Fidgetty Cook-Wilsonianism”
10:30-11:30 Michael Kremer (Chicago) “Gilbert Ryle and Oxford Realism”
11:45-12:45 Annemarie Kalis (Utrecht) “Ryle’s Epistemology of Perception”
13:45-14:45 Giulia Martina (Konstanz) “Prichard on Looks and Perception”
14:45:15:45 Roberta Locatelli (Tübingen) “Hinton’s Disjunctivism, Contemporary Disjunctivism, and their root in Oxford Realism”
16:15-17:15 Kurt Sylvan (Southampton) “Inferential Apprehension and Epistemic Immediacy in Statement and Inference”
17:15-18:15 Amirouche Moktefi (Tallinn) “Cook Wilson and the Shaping of Modern Logic”
19:00 Conference dinner at No More Rice

* 11 November
09:30-10:30 James Connelly (Hull) “Collingwood and Oxford Realism”
10:30-11:30 Giuseppina D’Oro (Keele) “Collingwood beyond the realism-idealism debate”
11:45-12:45 Junichi Kasuga (LEC, Tokyo) “Collingwood’s Philosophy of Perception in 1920-1930s Britain”
14:00-15:00 Anthony Fisher (Gonzaga) “Perception, Realism, and Method in Cook Wilson and Alexander”
15:00-16:00 Simon Wimmer (Dortmund) “Oxford Realism on the Objects of Belief”
16:15-17:15 Mathieu Marion (Montreal) “Cook Wilson on Plato and Universals”

VENUE

10 November: Internationales Begegnungszentrum, Emil-Figge-Str. 59, 44227 Dortmund

11 November: TU im U, Dortmunder U, Leonie-Reygers-Terrasse, 44137 Dortmund

Registration closes on 5 November.