Hart’s biography

by Micah on March 5, 2005

I haven’t had a chance yet to read Nicola Lacey’s “biography”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0199274975/qid=1110056861/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/102-3107565-2133731 of H.L.A. Hart, but it’s not every day you see this kind of exchange in the “London Review of Books”:http://www.lrb.co.uk/v27/n04/letters.html#1. Unfortunately, Nagel’s initial “review”:http://www.lrb.co.uk/v27/n03/nage01_.html is only available to subscribers. (Brian Leiter had a link “posted”:http://leiterreports.typepad.com/blog/2004/11/gardner_reviews.html to some comments from John Gardner on Lacey’s biography, but it doesn’t seem to be working now. Maybe Gardner has published his comments?)

{ 8 comments }

1

Jorn Barger 03.05.05 at 9:52 pm

Can it really be true that “every student of philosophy is puzzled by the point of Austin’s minute investigations of English usage”???

I’m an AI-and-literature guy, not a philosopher, but Wittgenstein bores me stiff, while I find Austin thrilling…

I read somewhere that he envisioned a sort of Manhattan project in ordinary-language analysis, where hundreds of Austin-trained introspectors would go thru the dictionary word by word, and untangle the Rest of Philosophy. Which is a little like what Lenat’s Cyc project is after (see url below).

2

John Quiggin 03.05.05 at 11:35 pm

There’s also an interesting review in Prospect. Subscribers only, but worth a click for the opening para.

3

Jonathan 03.05.05 at 11:37 pm

I apologize for being off-topic here, but Jorn, if you’re an ai-and-literature guy, I’d recommend trying blogging. It really enables you to share ideas, particularly ecletic ones, with a diverse audience; and many folks are trying it out nowadays.

4

Jorn Barger 03.06.05 at 12:35 am

I’ve been blogging for some good while (see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weblogs#Blogging_begins)

and I started for that very reason– to build an audience for my obscure ideas. I did manage to build an audience, but if you Google for links to my obscure pages, it’ll break your heart (or mine, anyway).

5

Jonathan 03.06.05 at 1:42 am

I know–joke.

6

dave heasman 03.06.05 at 9:47 pm

Wow, Jorn’s back! This is fantastic. Hooray. Unconfined joy etc.

7

Jorn Barger 03.07.05 at 5:39 pm

(Nobody has an opinion on JL Austin?)

8

jessica mclaughlin 03.11.05 at 12:52 pm

i have heard that brett hart died in a car accident is it true please email me at jessicamclghln@yahoo.com i would appreciate it

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