Some reflections on Simone Weil’s Mystical Response to Beckett’s Absurdism
International Journal of English and Literature, vol. 4, no. 10, pp. 549-559
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‘In the beginning was the deed’
Winch’s readings of Wittgenstein and Weil call for a significant rethinking of the relation between ‘metaphysics’ and ‘ethics’. But there are confusions, perhaps to be found in all three of these writers, that we may slip into here. These are linked with the tendency to see idealist tendencies in Wittgenstein, and with his remark that giving grounds comes to an end, not in a kind of seeing on our part, but in our acting. The sense that we think we see in this suggestion is dependent on a distorted conception of ‘justification’. Getting clear about this involves coming to appreciate just how much of our nature as ethical beings is engaged when we do philosophy.
— David Cockburn, Emeritus Professor, University of Wales.
Recalling the Apostle of Nonpartisanship
New York Times
The Sacred Object: Anne Carson and Simone Weil
From ScienceDirect by Elsevier, Acta Poética, Vol. 34, no.1, January–June 2013, pps.127-154.
“Simone Weil and the Traps of Intellectual Engagement”
in William Sweet, ed.,Ideas Under Fire: Historical Studies of Philosophy and Science in Adversity, Madison, UK: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, pp. 217-230
On the Ethics of Weakness: Simone Weil and Nihilism
This essay appears in Gianni Vattimo, ed., Weak Thought, State University of New York Press, 2013, pp. 111-137.
Simone Weil and Eric Voegelin: Two Paths to the Same Truth
With Eric Voegelin (1901-1985) and Simone Weil (1909-1943), we are confronted with two philosophers who examine events, understand their present, and consider the “disorder” of their time caused by Marxism, Fascism, and National Socialism. Their respective works constitute acts of resistance against ideology. Wondering about the “dark times” (Bertolt Brecht), they diagnose a Europe that suffers from a disease that is not without precedent, a disease that affects the spirit, the soul, and a disease that can be grasped by its several symptoms. In order to cure this disease, it is necessary to find remedies, and they both believe two countries in particular offer some hope.
VoegelinView.com, The Eric Voegelin Society publishes VoegelinView in partnership with Louisiana State University’s Eric Voegelin Institute, the University of Wisconsin’s Center for the Study of Liberal Democracy, and Nichollas State University’s Nicholls Foundation.
“Simone Weil’s Phenomenology of the Body, Comparative and Continental Philosophy”
Comparative and Continental Philosophy, vol. 4, # 2
Theory and Praxis: Simone Weil and Marx on the Dignity of Labor
Simone Weil had an ambivalent attitude toward Marx. While she thought that the young Marx’s celebration of labor had “lyrical accents,” she ultimately believed that Marx had neglected his own insights, embracing a blind worship of mechanization and a theory of history and revolution that was insufficiently attentive to the material conditions of workers. Marx, in her view, was insufficiently materialist and excessively wedded to a hierarchical model of science that maintained the domination of management. Weil and Marx’s attitudes toward the dignity of labor and the necessary conditions for socialism are analyzed. The most significant cleavage between them is ultimately due to the differing manner in which they conceive of the relationship between thought and action. Through this comparison, the philosophical underpinnings of the two radically different conceptions of labor and its dignity as a human activity are explained.
The Review of Politics, vol. 74, no. 1, pp. 87-107
Mathematics and Religion: on a Remark by Simone Weil
Logic in Theology, pp. 219-236
