Bonus Discussion of Anscombe’s “Intention” Now Posted for Citizens

As I read the whole of Intention for our Anscombe episode and didn’t want to promptly forget the whole thing, I ran a small Not School group last month that just had its discussion this last weekend; you can hear it on the Free Stuff for Citizens page (provided that you go become a Citizen, of course).

I was joined by Stanley Martin and Shira Coffee. All of us had some trouble with the overall drift of the book: every page has some bit of interesting analysis, e.g. what is the difference between an intention and a prediction? Between an intention and a command? Do Aristotelian practical syllogisms actually work according to modern logic? And you’ve already heard us talk on the PEL episode, I hope, about the guy pumping poison water. But what do all these individual insights add up to? She more often tries out a theory and then shows why it doesn’t work than puts forth anything positive, and the positive data doesn’t coalesce neatly into a theory. Nonetheless, it’s a fun read, and we had a good time going through it a bit, so if you liked the Anscombe episode and wanted to hear the other side of her story, I hope this bonus recording helps.

-Mark Linsenmayer