Thursday, July 30, 2026

Summer web surfing

Several new articles from David Oderberg: “Hylemorphism as a Generalized Research Programme”; “In Defence of Panmoralism”; and “Turning the Tables on the Table Deniers: Metaphysical Mythmaking About Ordinary Objects.”

Celebrated writer-artist John Byrne delivers an old school comics last hurrah in X-Men: Elsewhen.  Byrne is interviewed by The New York Times and at The Hollywood Reporter.  Meanwhile, after 90 years in NYC, Marvel Comics is moving its headquarters to Los Angeles.

The Chronicle of Higher Education interviews philosopher Alex Byrne about academic freedom, cancellation, and recent debates about sex and gender.

Matthew Schmitz writes an obituary for anti-wokeness at First Things.  At Skeptic, Scott Barry Kaufman on two types of anti-woke intellectuals.

At Boston Review, Michael Harris on the use of AI in mathematics.

Video of the 2026 Rolf Schock Prize Symposium on Bas van Fraassen’s philosophy of science, with van Fraassen, Kyle Stanford, Hans Halvorson, Michela Massimi, and James Ladyman.

At Thomistica, John Brungardt reviews two recent books on Thomism and evolution.

Jonathan Marks looks back at Saul Bellow’s Ravelstein, at The Bulwark.

Jobst Landgrebe and Barry Smith on why reality cannot be entirely captured by mathematics, at IAI.  Landgrebe and Smith’s book Why Machines Will Never Rule the World is in its second edition.

At The New Criterion, Harvey Mansfield on Locke and the American Revolution.

At YouTube, Eric Claussen and Mark Anderson discuss Plato and Nietzsche.

Roberto de Mattei comments on the SSPX consecrations, at Rorate Caeli.

3 comments:

  1. Before we invest time in reading Oderberg's article, can we get a summary of it? Is he arguing that hylomorphism serves as a "research programme" in the sense that premises about substantial form predict results that can be tested for empirically by scientists? Or is it a "research programme" for metaphysical speculation but not necessarily for experimental confirmation of an empirical claim? If the former, what research remains to be done on AT claims about formal vs material causes?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I clicked on the link and there is an abstract. The abstract gives a way better summary than I ever could.

      Delete
  2. I always loved these,

    I saw Prof shared Oderberg's work on twitter, and was wondering if he would share it with his blog audience as well.

    It always showed that Prof was very cultured, And someone you could sit down with and have a wide ranging conversation with apart from philosophy.

    I can imagine. Prof as a teenager visiting the comic book store.

    I wish we were back in 2014-18 when these were more common and Prof would respond to comments. It ocuured to me that Prof never really needed twitter to reach any kind of audiences.
    In fact people from twitter would have joined the conversation with the blog.

    The 2024 election discussion here at the blog , is still a highlight for me, Dr Janet Smith even praised the discourse.

    Anyways have, fun devouring the links everyone !

    ReplyDelete