text-only version

Philosophy

The University of Sussex

 

TO PHILOSOPHY FACULTY LIST

Prof Michael Morris
Professor of Philosophy

Office: Arts B233
Office hour (Autumn Term 2008): Tues 11.00-12.00 and Thurs 12.00-13.00
Department of Philosophy
University of Sussex, Falmer, Brighton, BN1 9QN, UK
Tel.: +44 (0)1273 67 8247
Fax.: +44 (0)1273 625972
Email: m.r.morris@sussex.ac.uk

 

Courses I am teaching in 2008-9

For the BA

Introduction to Philosophy (Lectures)

Plato

Philosophy of Language

 

For the MA

Philosophical Topics

 

I have one term’s research leave, worked out as a reduced teaching load for the whole year in 2008-9.

Research interests

Philosophy of Language, Metaphysics, Aesthetics, Ethics, Plato, Wittgenstein.

Selected publications

·       Routledge Philosophy GuideBook to Wittgenstein and the Tractatus (London: Routledge, 2008)

·       Introduction to Philosophy of Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006)

·       The Good and the True (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992)

 

·       ‘The Question of Idealism in McDowell’, Philosophical Topics (forthcoming 2009)

·       ‘Mysticism and Nonsense in the Tractatus’, with J. Dodd, European Journal of Philosophy (forthcoming 2008)

·       ‘Doing Justice to Musical Works’, in K. Stock, ed., Experience, Meaning, and Work: Philosophers on Music (Oxford:    Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2007)

·       ‘Akrasia in the Protagoras and the Republic’, Phronesis 51 (2006), pp. 195-229

·        ‘Realism beyond Correspondence’, in H. Beebee and J. Dodd, eds., Truthmakers: the Contemporary Debate (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), pp. 49-65.

·       'Metaphor and Philosophy: an Encounter with Derrida', Philosophy 75 (2000), pp. 225-244.

·       'Mind, World, and Value', in A. O'Hear, ed., Current Issues in Philosophy of Mind (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), pp. 303-320.

·       'The Place of Language', Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 67 (1993), pp. 153-72.

·       'Why There are No Mental Representations', Minds and Machines 1 (1991).

·       'The Varieties of Sense', Philosophical Quarterly 38 (1988), pp. 385-400.

·       'Socrates' Last Argument', Phronesis 30 (1985), pp. 223-48.


More on Publications and Research

About me

I read Greats (Philosophy and Greek and Latin Literature) at Exeter College, Oxford. I was convinced at the time that I ought to be a school-teacher, so I did a year's teacher training, before teaching English for two years in a comprehensive school. I changed my mind about my future career half-way through this period (by the Athenian treasury at Delphi, on a holiday in Greece), and returned to Oxford to do the BPhil in Philosophy. At the end of that I was appointed Rank Xerox Senior Scholar at Oriel (I think the company's representative had always been interested in the mind-body problem), where I began work on my DPhil. After two years, in 1985, I was appointed to a job in Philosophy at Sussex.

Research

The principal focus of my work is on the philosophy of language. I am working on a book whose aim is to question the almost universal assumption that words are signs. Most contemporary philosophy of language is shaped by this assumption: it lies behind Gricean accounts of meaning and referential theories of meaning, for example. My chief worry is that it is inconsistent with a proper realism about the world, one which holds that the world as it is in itself is not in any way determined by the character of any way of representing it. I aim to present arguments against the view that words are signs, and develop an alternative account of language.

I have recently completed an introductory book on the philosophy of language for Cambridge University Press, which aims to guide students through the principal texts in the analytic tradition. Despite the fact that I am doubtful about the central assumptions of these texts, I think these are great works which need to be brought within the reach of ordinary undergraduates.  Because the book’s focus is on the great texts of the tradition, it amounts to  a critical history of analytic philosophy of language, as well as giving students what I think they need: I hope it will provoke thought among the experts without being too partisan.  This book came out in December 2006.

Still under the general heading of ‘philosophy of language’, I have just finished a book on Wittgenstein's Tractatus for Routledge’s ‘Guidebook’ series.  Although this is meant to be accessible to students, it aims to resolve many of the central problems in the interpretation of the work.  It is to be published in November 2008.

During the preparation for this book I worked with Julian Dodd (at Manchester) on a paper on the central paradox of the Tractatus (the fact that it seems to declare, with reason, that all of its sentences are nonsense).  This paper, ‘Mysticism and Nonsense in the Tractatus’, presents a view which is clearly distinct from both the ‘traditional’ interpretation and the currently fashionable ‘resolute’ reading.  This is forthcoming in print in the European Journal of Philosophy, and is currently available online through the journal’s website.

My concerns in the philosophy of language have raised questions for me about the nature of works of art and of artistic 'media' (for want of a better word).  ‘Doing Justice to Musical Works’ is a development of this line of thinking: its aim is to raise doubts about standard approaches to the ontology of musical works in a way which brings the medium of musical works more firmly into the foreground.  The question of artistic representation (and representation in general) is addressed in ‘Rembrandt’s Hat’, which I presented at the British Society of Aesthetics conference in September 2006.

A precise connection between the philosophy of language and the philosophy of art is raised by consideration of the nature of the objects of our attention when we look at pictures, or read works of fiction (similar points arise in connection with plays and operas, but the media involved are more complicated in these cases).  I have written a draft paper on this topic entitled ‘Objects of Art’: I aim to do justice to the temptation (which in my case is very strong) to think that the objects of our attention in these cases are things which do not really exist, and which have what seem to be contradictory properties.  This paper was presented to the British Society of Aesthetics conference in September 2007.

In the same area, I have recently completed a paper called ‘How Can There Be Works of Art?’, which is concerned with the kind of meaning works of art have, and how it is possible for them to have such a meaning.  The central claim is that the meaning of works of art is not a matter of what anyone means by them, or what anyone takes them to mean.  I take similar points to have application in the philosophy of language.  This paper was presented at the British Society of Aesthetics conference in September 2008.

I have a long-standing interest in Plato, and have recently published a paper on Plato on akrasia (weakness of will).  This re-examines two of the most discussed passages in Plato: the argument in the Protagoras against the possibility of doing what one knows to be wrong, and the argument in the Republic for the division of the soul.  The paper claims that the logic of each argument is different from what it has generally been supposed to be, and that, although the arguments presented depend on different (indeed, incompatible) assumptions, Plato himself seems to hold the same view at both places.

I am also working with a former colleague, Rickie Dammann, on a paper on Plato’s philosophy of art—on the notion of ‘imitation’ as it appears in the Republic, in particular.  This has strong links with the problems considered in the ‘Objects of Art’ paper.

 

 

Text-Only   Feedback   Disclaimer

Page maintained by: Michael Morris   Last updated: 4th May 2007