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Articles

The Sound of Philosophy

James Tartaglia asks whether philosophy and music should intersect.

I magine you are seated in a lecture theatre, patiently waiting to hear some philosophy. The philosopher you have come to see then takes the stage and starts to sing: a song about the very topic you were expecting them to talk about.

What you were expecting from your next sixty minutes was the usual presentation: namely a long build-up to situate you within the philosophical debate in question; the occasional (more or less) humorous aside to punctuate proceedings; lots of tentative reports of what the philosopher ‘wants to say’ (the nervous tic of the profession); and then some original claims, more often than not saved up until near the end. Then would come the round of questions –which some members of the audience will have been mentally rehearsing throughout the talk, designed as much to demonstrate the questioner’s own philosophical prowess as to elicit an illuminating answer, perhaps by catching the speaker out. This particular philosopher, however, has defied all these expectations by singing.

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