MULLING AT THE PANTHEON-SORBONNE AND THE TUILLERIE

The teaching methods at 'Paris I' are a bit different from Dartington and Falmouth. Admittedly, my recent pedagogic experience has been with a mere five tutors, one of whom has been particularly influential in my recent academic life. Also, the number of students per lecture was considerably smaller at the English Institutions. This allowed for much more discussion and argument during the course of a lecture. In addition, there were occasional one to one sessions with a tutor, some of which were scheduled but tutors were more or less available at any time on request. In the course of study one felt there was always a close guiding hand of a person willing to listen and give progressive feedback, despite the overall demands on their time, to the work one was doing. At least that was my experience. Here, in Paris, although only an 'auditeur libre', one is pretty much on one's own. I believe there is some access to the teaching staff, but they seem to come in and out of the lectures pretty swiftly. Not many of the students seems to engage directly with the teachers outside the lecture room, save for discussing schedules and such. I may be wrong about that, but it is the impression I have. During the course of a lecture there can be a number of 'exposé' by students. This is a presentation by a student doing a close reading of a particular text. The class is then invited to ask questions of the presenter after which the lecturer then elaborates on the subject, presumably tying it all together. I am no longer used to the speed at which the French speak and, in a crowded room, what with rustlings, other surrounding noises and the irritating habit the French have of shortening words by oral abbreviations, it is difficult to catch everything.

This is just an early impression of things at the moment, the content of the lectures is new to me and I am beginning to appreciate the material. I have not read Hume or Smith in any detail before, and it is exciting stuff. At least I think so. As to Thoreau, well, in the sixties he seemed extremely relevant. Not to say that some of his stuff has lost its edge, but, in my present circumstance, it is not as attractive as the Scottish Enlightenment.  It is still very much a worthwhile subject of study and one cannot help but admire Thoreau's tenacity in trying to make a reality of the words proffered by the first two sentences of the Declaration of Independence and the preamble to the Constitution of the United States. He was very much a man of his time. But that is another story. At least he was around for the camera. 

David Hume 1711-1776

Adam Smith 1723-1790

Henry Thoreau 1817-1862

It is interesting to note that Hume died the year of the Declaration of Independence, Smith died in the infancy of the French Revolution just one year old, and Thoreau died at the beginnings of the American Civil War.

The present study of Hume is from  Volume Two of the Treatise on Human Nature, Book Three - Of Morals, Part II  Of Justice and Injustice, Of the Origin of Justice and Property, Of the Rules which determine property, Of the Obligations of promises; Part III Of other virtues and vices, Of the Origins of the Natural Virtues and Vices.

As to Smith, we are dealing with The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Part I Of the Property of Actions, Section I Of the Sense of Propriety, Chapter I Of Sympathy, Chapter III Of the Manner in Which we Judge of the propriety or impropriety of the affections of other Men, by their concord and dissonance with our own.

We have just been for a walk in the Tuilleries Gardens where there is at present an exhibition of various pieces of sculpture.

     

       

A bit nippy, the weather, but lovely and warm in the sun. There is also on display a series of photographs accompanied by displayed text by way of explanation. A bit of performance writing. The pictures are not in the correct order, The texts are in English and French are are meant to be read from one panel to the next as they are incomplete on each panel. The panels are some distance apart and it is not easy, unless one walks quite some distance between them all, to follow the text in some grammatical order. One assumes, as the text concerns instructions for photographing plants and other feature in gardens, that it is meant to be read in some sort of cohesive sequence. Of course I am probably wrong about that, as I am about so many things.

As to sympathy, according to Smith, I cannot say that I was in any kind of sympathetic state in respect of these panels and the absent artist. The photographs, in Celia's opinion, were not very good. I was, according to Smith, in sympathy with her. It is, of course, more difficult to feel or express sympathy in the absence of a subject, nor do I suppose it is possible to be sympathetic to an inanimate object. Does sympathy require, as object, a living creature, and in particular, a creature with which we have some familiarity, or can one feel sympathy towards an object, particularly in respect of a work of art, or piece of craftsmanship, or what some would class as an 'objet trouvé', or indeed any object that takes our fancy.

If we have sympathy as signifier what is the signified? As a representamen, what can the object and interpretant be? With this stuff it is all dependent naturally on context, as with everything.

I am coming to grips with Hume's views on justice and property, whether natural of artifice. Sympathy plays a great role in the emergence of justice and it is no wonder that Hume and Smith were such great friends and in great sympathy with each other. I am still mulling but there will be more of this anon.