Diversity Reading List

Autism has typically been framed as inherently harmful and at odds with both subjective happiness and objective flourishing. In recent decades, however, the view of autism as inherently harmful has been challenged by neurodiversity proponents, who draw on social and relational models of disability to reframe the harm autistic people face as arising out of the interaction between being autistic and disabling environments. Here we build on the neurodiversity perspective by arguing that autistic thriving has been rendered both invisible and unthinkable by interlocking forms of testimonial and hermeneutical injustice. On the view we propose, rather than autism being at odds with the possibility of living a good life as such, We argue that our mainstream conceptions of the good life have excluded autistic manifestations of happiness and flourishing. This leads to an epistemic catch-22-like paradoxical situation whereby one can be recognised as autistic or as thriving, but not both. We then propose four ameliorative strategies that support moving towards broader conceptions of the good human life which will allow us to recognise not just autistic, but also other neurodivergent ways, of living a good human life.

A source of tension between Philosophers of Mathematics and Mathematicians is the fact that each group feels ignored by the other; daily mathematical practice seems barely affected by the questions the Philosophers are considering. In this talk I will describe an issue that does have an impact on mathematical practice, and a philosophical stance on mathematics that is detectable in the work of practising mathematicians. No doubt controversially, I will call this issue ‘morality’, but the term is not of my coining: there are mathematicians across the world who use the word ‘morally’ to great effect in private, and I propose that there should be a public theory of what they mean by this. The issue arises because proofs, despite being revered as the backbone of mathematical truth, often contribute very little to a mathematician’s understanding. ‘Moral’ considerations, however, contribute a great deal. I will first describe what these ‘moral’ considerations might be, and why mathematicians have appropriated the word ‘morality’ for this notion. However, not all mathematicians are concerned with such notions, and I will give a characterisation of ‘moralist’ mathematics and ‘moralist’ mathematicians, and discuss the development of ‘morality’ in individuals and in mathematics as a whole. Finally, I will propose a theory for standardising or universalising a system of mathematical morality, and discuss how this might help in the development of good mathematics.

A French Jew born in Algeria, philosopher and novelist Cixous blends and bends the categories of theory. Originally written for a journal issue on Beauvoir, this essay tries to map out a strategy against the alienation of women through the re-apropriation of their own identity, via written work. A literary interpretation of feminism, it articulates the idea of écriture féminine (feminine writing), a type of writing particular to women. This is Cixous' strategic essentialism: according to her, the difference in women's expression should be underlined, and thus women should write in a specific style allowing for a reclamation and a reinvention of their identities, against the patriarchal system. This literary strategy is heavily embodied, and relies on representations as much as lived, practical experiences to criticize a male-centered system. However, Cixous remains a structuralist: identity is not given, but built within discourse in complex relation with other poles, and feminine writing can be found in men through sexual subversion (Genet is one example). This essay marks a specific period in both French feminism and post-structuralism, providing a perfect example of the philosophical, political and artistic questions of the period.