- East Boston, Massachusetts, United States
Phillip Deen
University of New Hampshire, Philosophy, Faculty Member
- Pragmatism, Democratic Theory, Liberalism, Virtue Ethics, Epistemic Justification, Logic of Inquiry, and 10 moreSatire & Irony, John Dewey, Climate Change, Unmodern Philosophy and Modern Philosophy, Critical Theory, Inequality (Economics), Humor, Moral and Political Philosophy, Democracy, and Jokesedit
- Phillip Deen is Senior Lecturer of Philosophy and Humanities at the University of New Hampshire. After years spent wo... morePhillip Deen is Senior Lecturer of Philosophy and Humanities at the University of New Hampshire. After years spent working on political philosophy and the history of American philosophy, specifically the thought of John Dewey, he shifted to humor studies and is currently writing a book on the ethics of humor.edit
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Research Interests: Philosophy and Pragmatism
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Contemporary comedy audiences are accused by some comedians of being too morally sensitive to appreciate humor. To get closer to an answer, I will first briefly present the argument over audience sensitivity as found in the... more
Contemporary comedy audiences are accused by some comedians of being too morally sensitive to appreciate humor. To get closer to an answer, I will first briefly present the argument over audience sensitivity as found in the nonphilosophical literature. Second, I then turn to the philosophical literature and begin from the idea that “funny” is a response-dependent property. I present a criticism of this response-dependence account of “funny” based in the claim that funniness is not determined by what normal audiences actually laugh at, but by what merits laughter. Third, I argue that excessive or deficient moral sensitivity distorts audience receptivity to humor. Fourth, I turn to candidates for ideally sensitive audiences. I conclude by returning to the particular cases of supposed oversensitivity or undersensitivity to jokes to see how we might judge them.
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John Dewey's political thought, particularly his best known The Public and Its Problems, is better understood in the context of his lecture notes on social and political theory from the 1920s. This article sketches his unpublished... more
John Dewey's political thought, particularly his best known The Public and Its Problems, is better understood in the context of his lecture notes on social and political theory from the 1920s. This article sketches his unpublished triad of economic processes, political-legal structures and social-moral functions. Particular emphasis is given to the priority of basic social groups as mediators of our transaction with nature and the function of the state to harmonize these groups, and to the slippage between economic processes and political-legal structures. The former deepens Dewey's connection to early twentieth-century political pluralism while the latter connects his thought to cultural lag theory.
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Dave Chappelle took an extended leave from comedy for moral reasons. I argue that, while he had every right to leave comedy because of his moral concerns, he was not obliged to do so. To make this case, I present Chappelle’s argument that... more
Dave Chappelle took an extended leave from comedy for moral reasons. I argue that, while he had every right to leave comedy because of his moral concerns, he was not obliged to do so. To make this case, I present Chappelle’s argument that the potential negative consequences of his racial humor obliged him to leave. Next, I argue against Chappelle’s argument about avoidable harms as the harms are not his responsibility, he was not being negligent, and the benefits of his humor outweigh the harms. I also argue in support of the intuition that another’s failure of comprehension or moral character, even if that failure will predictably result in harms to others, should not convert moral acts into immoral ones.
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John Dewey’s Unmodern Philosophy and Modern Philosophy aspires to overcome the antiquated philosophical baggage of so-called “modern” philosophy and replace it with a philosophy that is truly modern, having incorporated the... more
John Dewey’s Unmodern Philosophy and Modern Philosophy aspires to overcome the antiquated philosophical baggage of so-called “modern” philosophy and replace it with a philosophy that is truly modern, having incorporated the technoscientific revolution. As the philosophical revolution is incomplete, so is Dewey’s own text. In an attempt to flesh out a Deweyan conception of modernity, this chapter turns to another philosopher who has argued that modernity is still an unfinished project: Jürgen Habermas. This chapter compares their accounts of the meaning of modernity, its pathologies, and their proposed cures through a turn from subjective reason to intersubjective action and concludes that their essential difference lies in the emancipatory potential of scientific-technological reason itself.
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Research Interests: Philosophy, Applied Ethics, Humor, Virtue Ethics, Satire & Irony, and 3 moreCharity, Irony, and Eutrapelia
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This introduction contextualizes and evalu-ates Herbert Marcuse’s the accompanying, previously untranslated review of John
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Contemporary comedy audiences are accused by some comedians of being too morally sensitive to appreciate humor. To get a better sense of what this might mean, I will first briefly present the argument over audience sensitivity as found in... more
Contemporary comedy audiences are accused by some comedians of being too morally sensitive to appreciate humor. To get a better sense of what this might mean, I will first briefly present the argument over audience sensitivity as found in the nonphilosophical literature. Second, I then turn to the philosophical literature and begin from the idea that “funny” is a response-dependent property. I present a criticism of this response-dependence account of “funny” based in the claim that funniness is not de- termined by what normal audiences actually laugh at, but by what merits laughter. Third, I argue that excessive or deficient moral sensitivity distorts audience receptivity to humor. Fourth, I turn to candidates for ideally sensitive audiences. I conclude by returning to the particular cases of supposed oversensitivity or undersensitivity to jokes to see how we might judge them.
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Dave Chappelle took an extended leave from comedy for moral reasons. I argue that, while he had every right to leave comedy because of his moral concerns, he was not obliged to do so. To make this case, I present Chappelle’s argument that... more
Dave Chappelle took an extended leave from comedy for moral reasons. I argue that, while he had every right to leave comedy because of his moral concerns, he was not obliged to do so. To make this case, I present Chappelle’s argument that the potential negative consequences of his racial humor obliged him to leave. Next, I argue against Chappelle’s argument about avoidable harms as the harms are not his responsibility, he was not being negligent, and the benefits of his humor outweigh the harms. I also argue in support of the intuition that another’s failure of comprehension or moral character, even if that failure will predictably result in harms to others, should not convert moral acts into immoral ones.
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Bill Cosby's immorality has raised intriguing aesthetic and ethical issues. Should the crimes that he has been convicted of lessen the aesthetic value of his standup and, even if we can enjoy it, should we? I first discuss the intimacy... more
Bill Cosby's immorality has raised intriguing aesthetic and ethical issues. Should the crimes that he has been convicted of lessen the aesthetic value of his standup and, even if we can enjoy it, should we? I first discuss the intimacy between the comedian and audience. The artform is both structurally intimate and the comedian claims to express an authentic self on stage. After drawing an analogy to the debate over the ethical criticism of art, I argue that it is reasonable to find a comedian's performance less funny because standup's artistic success relies on this intimacy. I contrast the comedy of Bill Cosby with that of Louis CK. CK's moral flaws are much more present in his comedy, and it is therefore more difficult to find him funny. Last, it is ethically permissible to enjoy their comedy, if no harm to others results, both because it does not corrupt the audience's character and because amusement is valuable.
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This article discusses whether a sense of humor is a political virtue. It argues that a sense of humor is conducive to the central political virtues. We must first, however, delineate different types of humor (benevolent or malicious) and... more
This article discusses whether a sense of humor is a political virtue. It argues that a sense of humor is conducive to the central political virtues. We must first, however, delineate different types of humor (benevolent or malicious) and the different political virtues (sociability, prudence, and justice) to which they correspond. Generally speaking, a sense of humor is politically virtuous when it encourages good will toward fellow citizens, an awareness of the limits of power, and a tendency not to take oneself too seriously or when it condemns moral or intellectual vice. An analysis of President Donald Trumps deeply flawed sense of humor is used to ground this account.
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Irony is frequently misunderstood. Seemingly offensive statements are taken to be literally deceitful or malicious when their intended meaning was neither. This is, in part, because the audience lacks the moral virtues required to... more
Irony is frequently misunderstood. Seemingly offensive statements are taken to be literally deceitful or malicious when their intended meaning was neither. This is, in part, because the audience lacks the moral virtues required to recognize irony. I identify the typical case when irony is misunderstood and discriminate between the cognitive and moral requirements for appreciating irony. After defending irony from the charges that it is both sincerely offensive and offensively insincere, I propose that appreciating irony requires the complementary virtues of charity to the speaker and moderation of one’s self-seriousness. I then argue that these requisite qualities of character are in fact virtuous, but that does not entail that be should attribute irony to everyone. Rather, virtue requires the practical wisdom to know when it is appropriate to extend charitable interpretation of others’ moral character and to hold our own moral outrage at abeyance.
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John Dewey’s Unmodern Philosophy and Modern Philosophy aspires to overcome the antiquated philosophical baggage of so-called “modern” philosophy and replace it with a philosophy that is truly modern, having incorporated the... more
John Dewey’s Unmodern Philosophy and Modern Philosophy aspires to overcome the antiquated philosophical baggage of so-called “modern” philosophy and replace it with a philosophy that is truly modern, having incorporated the technoscientific revolution. As the philosophical revolution is incomplete, so is Dewey’s own text. In an attempt to flesh out a Deweyan conception of modernity, I have turned to another philosopher who has argued that modernity is still an unfinished project: Jürgen Habermas. I compare their accounts of the meaning of modernity, its pathologies, and their proposed cures through a turn from subjective reason to intersubjective action.
Research Interests:
John Dewey’s political thought, particularly his best known The Public and Its Problems, is better understood in the context of his lecture notes on social and political theory from the 1920s. This article sketches his unpublished triad... more
John Dewey’s political thought, particularly his best known The Public and Its Problems, is better understood in the context of his lecture notes on social and political theory from the 1920s. This article sketches his unpublished triad of economic processes, political-legal structures, and social-moral functions. Particular emphasis is given to the priority of basic social groups as mediators of our transaction with nature and the function of the state to harmonize these groups, and to the slippage between economic processes and political-legal structures. The former deepens Dewey’s connection to early 20th century political pluralism while the latter connects his thought to cultural lag theory.
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Recent attempts to legislate climate science out of existence raises the question of whether citizens are obliged to obey such laws. The authority of democratic law is rooted in both truth and popular consent, but neither is sufficient... more
Recent attempts to legislate climate science out of existence raises the question of whether citizens are obliged to obey such laws. The authority of democratic law is rooted in both truth and popular consent, but neither is sufficient and they may conflict. These are reconciled in theory and, more importantly, in practice once we incorporate insights from the pragmatist theory of inquiry.
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American pragmatist John Dewey's economic thought has remained relatively unknown by both philosophers and economists. This article addresses this lack of interest and replies to criticism of pragmatism as the philosophy of ‘corporate... more
American pragmatist John Dewey's economic thought has remained relatively unknown by both philosophers and economists. This article addresses this lack of interest and replies to criticism of pragmatism as the philosophy of ‘corporate liberalism’ by tracing one source of Dewey's economic thought to British New Liberal John Atkinson Hobson. General similarities are discussed first, followed by a presentation of Dewey's use of Hobson's theory of underconsumption during the Great Depression. It concludes by presenting Dewey's understanding of a liberalism that had truly become corporate.
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This introduction contextualizes and evaluates Herbert Marcuse’s the accompanying, previously untranslated review of John Dewey’s Logic: The Theory of Inquiry. Marcuse’s critique of pragmatism is indebted to Max Horkheimer’s claim that... more
This introduction contextualizes and evaluates Herbert Marcuse’s the accompanying, previously untranslated review of John Dewey’s Logic: The Theory of Inquiry. Marcuse’s critique of pragmatism is indebted to Max Horkheimer’s claim that pragmatism is an example of “traditional” theory and reduces thought to mere instrument in service of external ends. Unlike Horkheimer, Marcuse concedes that Dewey, unlike the logical positivists, attempted to develop a material logic of ends. However, he concludes that the attempt was ultimately unsuccessful. I place this conclusion in the context of Marcuse’s critique of technological reason. Lastly, I defend Dewey from the charge of crude instrumentalism and delineate Marcuse’s and Dewey’s critical disagreement on science’s capacity for self-reflection.
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... Brittany, or Franche-Comté; fraternité, brotherhood: all Frenchmen are brothers, so please behave as brothers do, love each other ... 16 DOES ETHICS HAVE A CHANCE? ... Jorge Luis Borges famously suggested in one of his short stories... more
... Brittany, or Franche-Comté; fraternité, brotherhood: all Frenchmen are brothers, so please behave as brothers do, love each other ... 16 DOES ETHICS HAVE A CHANCE? ... Jorge Luis Borges famously suggested in one of his short stories that, given the randomness of good or bad ...