In a message dated 8/25/2004 2:53:05 AM Eastern Standard Time, atlas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx writes: Thank you, JL. When philosophers start talking about 'form' or 'substance' or 'accidents', etc. I get squirrelly. I'm never sure just what they're talking about. Richard Rorty seems to make the claim that fiction is the only real philosophy being done today. I wonder if he doesn't mean that philosophizing from fiction is the only philosophy being done today. ---- Thanks for the comments. My quotes on hylomorphism were meant to show that for some reason, Anglo-Saxon authors tend to regard the form/content distinction ('form'/'matter' to be more precise) to be _dogmatic_ -- the fact that there's a grand name for the doctrine may help there -- hylomorphism. I don't think 'fiction' is _essential_ for philosophical analysis, but others disagree. Gregory Currie has interesting stuff on that, based on Borges, etc. -- basically an analysis of the difficult idea of a 'logic of fiction'. Philosophers in the analytic tradition have been mainly concerned with whether the current King of France wears a wig -- or visited an exhibition. But there must be more to it than that. Cheers, JL ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html