Dear all, Please join us on Wednesday (Nov 25) for the second HPS workshop of the term. This time, we will have Rory Kent giving a presentation on: "Feyerabend's Critique of Scientific Ideology: A Marxist Interpretation." You may find an abstract of his talk below. We will meet at the usual time (5pm) in the designated channel (3.11) on Microsoft Teams. As most of you know, the format aims to provide a supportive atmosphere in which HPS graduate students can discuss their work in progress. Rory's talk might be of relevance for philosophy graduate students as well. If you are interested, please drop me a short message so I can make sure that you are able to access the Teams channel.
All best, Miguel Abstract It is no secret that Paul Feyerabend was a deeply critical commentator on science, philosophy and their respective roles in society. Indeed, it is precisely the critical content and incendiary tone of his work that has stoked controversy, contributing to his unfortunate (but by now waning) reputation as a professional provocateur and as 'the worst enemy of science.' Despite the radical overtones of Feyerabend's work, philosophers who are sympathetic to his project have provided reconstructions that leave it in a less controversial light, revealing moderate proposals to shift our attitudes to science and society that were hidden beneath a radical rhetoric. Such projects are doubtless valuable for expanding the appreciation for Feyerabend's work among academic philosophers; however, I offer an alternative interpretation of Feyerabend's (later) philosophy of science, one that places its radically critical character front and centre, while still remaining largely sympathetic. More specifically, I motivate and develop a Marxist interpretation of Feyerabend's later philosophy as a work in ideology critique. Though it would be unwise to characterise Feyerabend as 'a Marxist' in any substantial sense (not least given his repeated criticisms of contemporary Marxists), I maintain that we gain important insight when we interpret his arguments using the Marxist theoretical vocabularies of 'ideology', 'base-superstructure' and 'reification'. Establishing these conceptual parallels to Marx's critique of bourgeois ideology helps illuminate many of Feyerabend's (easily misrepresented) arguments about science and society and to unravel the irreducibly political nature of his work. _____________________________________________________ To unsubscribe from the CamPhilEvents mailing list, or change your membership options, please visit the list information page: http://bit.ly/CamPhilEvents List archive: https://lists.cam.ac.uk/pipermail/phil-events/ Please note that CamPhilEvents doesn't accept email attachments. See the list information page for further details and suggested alternatives.
