Literature, Film, and Philosophy with Dr. Robert Pippin

PJ and Dr. Robert Pippin discuss how art can uniquely understand significant truths.

Show Notes

In this episode of the Chasing Leviathan podcast, PJ and Dr. Robert Pippin discuss the ways in which art, particularly film and literature, can help us uncover and internalize truth in ways that discursive philosophy often cannot achieve.

For a deep dive into Dr. Robert Pippin's work, check out his book: 
Philosophy by Other Means: The Arts in Philosophy and Philosophy in the Arts 👉 https://www.amazon.com/dp/022677077X

Check out our blog on www.candidgoatproductions.com 

Who thinks that they can subdue Leviathan? Strength resides in its neck; dismay goes before it. When it rises up, the mighty are terrified. Nothing on earth is its equal. It is without fear. It looks down on all who are haughty; it is king over all who are proud. 

These words inspired PJ Wehry to create Chasing Leviathan. Chasing Leviathan was born out of two ideals: that truth is worth pursuing but will never be subjugated, and the discipline of listening is one of the most important habits anyone can develop. 

Every episode is a dialogue, a journey into the depths of a meaningful question explored through the lens of personal experience or professional expertise.

What is Chasing Leviathan?

Who thinks that they can subdue Leviathan? Strength resides in its neck; dismay goes before it. It is without fear. It looks down on all who are haughty; it is king over all who are proud. These words inspired PJ Wehry to create Chasing Leviathan. Chasing Leviathan was born out of two ideals: that truth is worth pursuing but will never be subjugated, and the discipline of listening is one of the most important habits anyone can develop. Every episode is a dialogue, a journey into the depths of a meaningful question explored through the lens of personal experience or professional expertise.

[pj_wehry]: oh and welcome to chasing leviathan i'm
here with dr robert pippin robert pippin is

[pj_wehry]: distinguished service professor at the university of
chicago and we're

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: talking about his book philosophy by other
men

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: dr pippin wonderful

[robert_pippin]: my

[pj_wehry]: to have you here today

[robert_pippin]: thank you thank you for having me

[pj_wehry]: uh so just before we get into
the book which for those on youtube you

[pj_wehry]: can see it there we'll have a
link down below

[robert_pippin]: a

[pj_wehry]: tell me a little bit about your
journey how did you get into philosophy and

[pj_wehry]: what led you i know you've ritten
several books that's kind of apparent

[robert_pippin]: ah

[pj_wehry]: at the beginning like this has been
a lifelong project for you why this project

[pj_wehry]: why

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: philosophy r and that intersection

[robert_pippin]: well i started out in college as
an english major quite seriously interested in literature

[robert_pippin]: especially international literature um and i was
preparing i thought i was going to be

[robert_pippin]: a writer short story novel writer poet
but by my senior or in college i

[robert_pippin]: had taken a lot of philosophy courses
and you know i sort of had to

[robert_pippin]: face the fact that while i was
okay i wasn't good enough to be

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: a serious professional writer

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: so you know rather than spend ten
years waiting on tables in new york and

[robert_pippin]: staying up late writing stories that would
get rejected um i had

[pj_wehry]: ah

[robert_pippin]: formed especially in the end of my
junior year a deep attachment to philosophy especially

[robert_pippin]: the history of philosophy greek and german
philosophy in particular

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: at the very last minute in sort
of october my senior year i applied to

[pj_wehry]: ye

[robert_pippin]: graduate school and i had a teacher
i respected great deal who i said i

[robert_pippin]: wanted to study basically the history of
philosophy and especially the european tradition m content

[robert_pippin]: german idealism post kantian post idealist philosophy
in europe like nice and hidiger and at

[robert_pippin]: that time this was fifty years ago
at that time american philosophy departments were not

[robert_pippin]: terribly interested in either the history philosophy
or european philosophy so i went to kind

[robert_pippin]: of second to your graduate program by
the standards of the profession um at penn

[robert_pippin]: state working there with a man named
stanley rose and i mean i kept a

[robert_pippin]: very strong interest in literature in the
intersection between literature and philosophy but you know

[robert_pippin]: once you once you go to graduate
choo and you get a credential and you

[robert_pippin]: get a job and you have to
teach your specialty i wasn't able to pursue

[robert_pippin]: what i thought i was various ways
of osphyand reflective high culture literature intersecting with

[robert_pippin]: each other but in nineteen ninety two
i was teaching then at the university of

[robert_pippin]: california in san diego and in nineteen
ninety two i got an offer from the

[robert_pippin]: committee on social thought at the university
of chicago which is your your listeners can

[robert_pippin]: sort of google it and see what
kind of a program it is it's a

[robert_pippin]: ph d granting program that is explicitly
inter disciplinary

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: we don't have the usual kind of
program of a graduate school students come and

[robert_pippin]: take whatever courses they want they don't
have to take a series of field requirements

[robert_pippin]: or something like that and they're encouraged
to right patients that don't fit into the

[robert_pippin]: standard academic departments to the intersection between
greek literature and greek philosophy you are the

[robert_pippin]: history of stoicism and its relevant to
cant or the bearing of of philosophy on

[robert_pippin]: literature for example um so that gave
me kind of permission to teach and write

[robert_pippin]: about whatever i wanted to which was

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: like the mount olympus of philosophy i
mean i sort of arrived in academic heaven

[robert_pippin]: no

[pj_wehry]: uh

[robert_pippin]: no assigned courses

[pj_wehry]: h

[robert_pippin]: no repetitive courses i could teach something
different each year and it was a collection

[robert_pippin]: of especially when i first came there
were people like sal bellow and less call

[robert_pippin]: co ki and france fur and all
kinds of very luminous incredibly famous people and

[robert_pippin]: i was just tremendously stimulated to start
doing what i want so the first for

[robert_pippin]: into this was a book in two
thousand called henry james in modern moral life

[robert_pippin]: which was an attempt to show how
james in his novels was raising questions about

[robert_pippin]: the status of moral life in a
late modern world in which the conventional assumptions

[robert_pippin]: about the basis of morality had collapsed
there wasn't a consensus of so i tried

[robert_pippin]: to explore how the novels could show
us a way to think about it moral

[robert_pippin]: life in a way that contemporary philosophy
wasn't doing i continued to write about german

[robert_pippin]: philosophy wrote a lot of books about
con hagel a german german idealism in general

[robert_pippin]: but i started drifting more and more
towards this question of how to do philosophy

[robert_pippin]: you know without without conforming to the
convention standards of the discipline since i didn't

[robert_pippin]: have to i had permission

[pj_wehry]: ah

[robert_pippin]: not to really the most fortunate event
in my life was coming here to chicago

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: being able to do that so a
little later on i got invited to give

[robert_pippin]: a series of lectures called castle lectures
at you know i could have done standard

[robert_pippin]: a standard kind of account of hegel's
olitical thought for example but you know for

[robert_pippin]: for a general audience which is what
this was hegel is not a very friendly

[robert_pippin]: topic i mean is extremely difficult the
language is difficult and so forth so i

[robert_pippin]: decided really to again given permission to
do these sorts of things by the committee

[robert_pippin]: i decided to write a book on
hollywood westerns and the way in which hollywood

[robert_pippin]: westerns offered a mode of reflection about
things like legal authority the transition from a

[robert_pippin]: pre legal to a legal system emergence
of is what a lot of great westerns

[robert_pippin]: are about

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: bushi civilization in a hostile environment railroads
banks schools family security how does the ideal

[robert_pippin]: of that kind of life get a
grip in a situation of complete lawlessness what

[robert_pippin]: what prompts people to give up that
situation and cultivate the virtues necessary not not

[robert_pippin]: for a kind of honor society which
was what the pre legal situation of the

[robert_pippin]: of the west was in in the
post civil war era but but the virtues

[robert_pippin]: necessary for a comfortable bougeite life so
forth anyway i thought they would say no

[robert_pippin]: we don't want that we we want
to

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: donor of the series is going to
be there and we want to but they

[pj_wehry]: uh

[robert_pippin]: did

[pj_wehry]: uh eh

[robert_pippin]: they didn't they just they just said
okay fine if you want to write you

[robert_pippin]: know so the series is published as
a book

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: so i did i did these lectures
at yale on hollywood western in then i

[robert_pippin]: began to think well this is really
fun

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: this this allows one to illuminate um
issues in philosophy that we can't get a

[robert_pippin]: grip on especially issues that i called
political psychology that is to say what is

[robert_pippin]: necessary in the world

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: or a certain kind of claim of
normative authority to get a grip on people

[robert_pippin]: does that happen it doesn't happen political
life philosophers tend to have the illusion that

[robert_pippin]: reason people obey the state because there's
a very good argument for why they should

[robert_pippin]: nobody

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: experience is allegiance to a regime having
been

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: convinced of an argument suitable for an
academic philosophy journal so actually the way in

[robert_pippin]: which normative life moral life political life

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: the way in which it works you
know somewhat surprisingly is not really accessible to

[robert_pippin]: conventional discursive analysis that is the

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: read and butter of philosophy so i
thought well this this might be true of

[robert_pippin]: a variety of things i got another
series electro series invitation from the university of

[robert_pippin]: virginia and i was at that time
working in higgeleon problem of agency and responsibility

[robert_pippin]: i mean how do we know what
differentiates an action that i perform from a

[robert_pippin]: mere event that happens to me so
i thought well you know that's what really

[robert_pippin]: the classic nineteen forty film noir is
all about so i said you know would

[robert_pippin]: you would you let me give lectures
on

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: agency and fate you know the experience
of not being able to pick one's own

[robert_pippin]: future feeling in a way consigned to
a future so they the world of let

[robert_pippin]: me know if i'm just running on
too much or if you'd

[pj_wehry]: no

[robert_pippin]: like

[pj_wehry]: the only thing i want to say
is i've had a lot of people on

[pj_wehry]: here talk about how exciting philosophy is
and how important it is and how inspiring

[pj_wehry]: it is you might be the first
person who like the word

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: fun keeps coming up and i love
it i love that your journey is like

[pj_wehry]: philosophy as fun also

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: a huge fan of you know i
enjoy westerns especially like near i grew up

[pj_wehry]: with a lot of old time radio
detectives

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: i read a lot of raymond chandler
and so this is a lot of fun

[pj_wehry]: it's really

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: it's over fun approach and i'm enjoying
this

[robert_pippin]: actually very amusing there was a very
famous literary scholar in virginia after the first

[robert_pippin]: lecture i was on jack tenors film
out of the past first question i got

[robert_pippin]: was what are you doing

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: what is this

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: is not philosophy this is not film
studies this is not literally annalise what are

[robert_pippin]: you doing so

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: you know i tried to give an
answer

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: and you know

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: continued and the university of virginia also
publishes these lectures as a book so then

[robert_pippin]: i had a book come out on
show more so then you know i got

[robert_pippin]: increasingly more interest still writing about philosophy
but i got particularly more interested in writing

[robert_pippin]: about philosophy and film so i wrote
a book on hitchcock called a philosophical hitchcock

[robert_pippin]: i wrote a book i put together
a collection of a lot of essays i

[robert_pippin]: had written on film called filmed thought
cinema has reflective

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: form and then i got really interested
in melodrama an american melodrama and way in

[robert_pippin]: which i thought the great melodramas were
actually not not sentimental stories of love and

[robert_pippin]: despair but intensely critical of the form
of life emerging in the late modern west

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: i wrote a book about douglas sir
i think it's the greatest melodramatist in the

[robert_pippin]: nineteen nineteen fifties

[pj_wehry]: forgive me actually i don't know what
is he written

[robert_pippin]: well now this is a filmmaker who
wrote

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: great melo dramas who directed great melodramas
in the nineteen fifties like all that heaven

[robert_pippin]: allows written on the wind imitation of
life

[pj_wehry]: okay

[robert_pippin]: the as

[pj_wehry]: got

[robert_pippin]: these are these are these are films
that you know were immensely popular at the

[robert_pippin]: time i mean this was extremely provocative
as a philosophical enterprise because these are films

[robert_pippin]: that start hudson jane why man they
were just written off as was then called

[robert_pippin]: women's films or of sentimental love stories
with an enormous overwrought emotionality to them i

[robert_pippin]: thought they were incredibly subversive critical

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: doctors about the aridity and sterility of
late modern bourgeui life especially sort of suburban

[robert_pippin]: life that kind of thing the corrupting
effects of consumerism and consumer capitalism so uh

[robert_pippin]: that's basically the story of how i
drifted from being an english major to being

[robert_pippin]: a philos the professor being

[pj_wehry]: yea

[robert_pippin]: in the committee on social thought released
into

[pj_wehry]: yes

[robert_pippin]: this realm of what is now become
a kind of sub discipline of philosophy film

[robert_pippin]: philosophy film

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: as hilossophy not philosophy of film what
is it what kind of esthetic object is

[robert_pippin]: it but that film is a mode
of reflective thought and literature

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: is a mode of reflective thought that
philosophy by attempting to understand can actually illuminate

[robert_pippin]: areas of human life i what it
is like to be a human being that

[robert_pippin]: discursive analysis of concepts can't give us
and you know what is philosophy except an

[robert_pippin]: attempt to understand ourselves if we really
wanted to understand ourselves we have these documents

[robert_pippin]: i sense portray ourselves to ourselves in
a very thoughtful reflective way illuminates part of

[robert_pippin]: human experience that can't be illuminated otherwise
which gets to your remarked before about the

[robert_pippin]: problem of truth literature which is a
problem i'm working on now

[pj_wehry]: really that's awesome um well i would
hope you'd come back for that book as

[pj_wehry]: well but the one of the first
things that kind of comes to mind you're

[pj_wehry]: in chicago i'm sure you this name
how does your work interact with dr martha

[pj_wehry]: nuts mom

[robert_pippin]: well you know mars has been a
colncere for thirty years or so and she

[robert_pippin]: has her own approach to literature as
as contributing to philosophy her book loves knowledge

[robert_pippin]: or in her book on greek literature
the fragility goodness so i consider myself a

[robert_pippin]: kind of fellow traveller that field the
difference between us is that she she tends

[robert_pippin]: to think that the primary function of
literature it's philosophical dimensions is kind of educative

[robert_pippin]: you think that it kind of can
make us better persons at it's a kind

[robert_pippin]: of form

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: of moral education contributing to a certain
kind of humility about our practices and the

[robert_pippin]: confidence we have in them that's that's
fine but i don't i myself don't think

[robert_pippin]: that literature makes us better people um

[pj_wehry]: uh

[robert_pippin]: think care

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: it can illuminate something that isn't illuminated
otherwise but i have a much more ambitious

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: sense that if we

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: think about this seriously it changes it
should change our conception of philosophy itself

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: i don't think martha thinks that

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: but she's over in the were both
members of the philosophy department but she's like

[robert_pippin]: i'm also in the commitee on social
thought she's also in the law school the

[robert_pippin]: law school keeps her s are pretty
busy so we've been on some panels together

[robert_pippin]: years ago but we don't have kind
of continuous

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: interaction she she does her thing i
do my then

[pj_wehry]: yeah for sure i was just curious
because there's definite cross over i've read some

[pj_wehry]: of her work as well um

[robert_pippin]: hm oh

[pj_wehry]: so i was just curious like artly
because of the location now that you're at

[pj_wehry]: the same spot

[robert_pippin]: m

[pj_wehry]: so what does film give us that
discursive philosophy or literature for that matter give

[pj_wehry]: us that discursive philosophy doesn't

[robert_pippin]: well to go back to that question
of truth it gives us a kind of

[robert_pippin]: nother another access to truth philosophy

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: raditionally has been very skeptical of claims
going al the way back to plato

[pj_wehry]: right

[robert_pippin]: whose argument was that though poets convince
us by stirring up our emotions by creating

[robert_pippin]: a kind of passionate response say greek
tragedy or epic greek literature that is very

[robert_pippin]: very untrustworthy according to plato the poets
are just one step away from sophist that

[robert_pippin]: they can manipulate people's emotions to get
them to believe things that aren't true um

[robert_pippin]: but i don't myself i don't think
that's that's the right way to look at

[robert_pippin]: but it's just way too simple to
think that great literature for example or film

[robert_pippin]: works on us merely at the affective
or emotional level it inspires as you watch

[robert_pippin]: a great film or read a great
work of art literature poetry inspires a form

[robert_pippin]: of reflection why why is human life
being portrayed this way what's the point what

[robert_pippin]: is the work of art attempting to
show us now as i said philosophers are

[robert_pippin]: very skeptical about that because they think
you know truth is a matter of propositions

[robert_pippin]: is we claim in assertoric judgments to
be true and that there must be truth

[robert_pippin]: conditions ways of knowing whether it's true
or not for it to have the status

[robert_pippin]: of a truth bearer and the

[robert_pippin]: he so the problem with that is
it limits possible truth say a notion of

[robert_pippin]: correctness or correspondence that if i say
um m you know the yeah the melting

[robert_pippin]: temperature of copper is a thousand seven
hundred degrees i understand that before i know

[robert_pippin]: whether it's true or not by understanding
what it would be if it were true

[robert_pippin]: and the problem with say let's just
stick with literature or novels they don't assert

[robert_pippin]: anything don't claim anything to be true
their imaginative fictions about imagined fictional characters how

[robert_pippin]: can that be true i mean in
a literal sense it's false he never was

[robert_pippin]: a hamlet never was a charles foster
kane the stories are false that's quite symplistic

[robert_pippin]: because of course literature doesn't pretend to
be about real things in the strict literal

[robert_pippin]: sense sometimes real characters show up in
fiction but they're fictionalized they're not meant to

[robert_pippin]: be asserted and the truth of literature
is not that the story is true it's

[robert_pippin]: something else so the question is what
is something else what what is it that

[robert_pippin]: literature provides us that can't be done
by philosophy as in your in your question

[robert_pippin]: i mean the simplest thing is what
it is like to be a human being

[robert_pippin]: facing

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: dilemmas and situations that are typical of
the kinds of things human beings face especially

[robert_pippin]: in different historical worlds but worlds that
overlap because of the kind of commonality of

[robert_pippin]: experience of the human qua human so
the notion of a form of illumination or

[robert_pippin]: revelation or disclosure there's a wonderful phrase
by the philosopher bernard williams said that said

[robert_pippin]: we ought to distinguish between what we
think we think and what we really think

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: one

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: one function of literature is to show
us that what we really think might not

[robert_pippin]: be what we think we think and
then it raises a kind of critical question

[robert_pippin]: of whether we ought to think that
way so as i say philosophers are skeptical

[robert_pippin]: of this because how do you know
that what a literature literary object purports to

[robert_pippin]: disclose it's true h just pushes the
question back to shouldn't it be formulated in

[robert_pippin]: a proposition we can then investigate another
way i mean in up in simclaire's famous

[robert_pippin]: novel the jungle we could say well
that depiction of factory conditions under under capitalism

[robert_pippin]: it's true that's that's the way it
was but then we've translated the novel into

[robert_pippin]: a discursive proposition the conditions are these
and these and these and these and then

[robert_pippin]: we know how to figure out whether
that's true in one way figuring out whether

[robert_pippin]: it's true it's not by reading the
novel again we have to go somewhere else

[robert_pippin]: so the novel isn't say anything true
it just provokes us wonder if the depiction

[robert_pippin]: is true and then we switch to
the mode of truth bearers propositions assertions judgments

[robert_pippin]: evidence correspondent but that doesn't tell us
what it was like to live under those

[robert_pippin]: conditions there's no way to translate that
into discursive prose if we try to do

[robert_pippin]: it we get something incredibly clumsy if
you there's a famous shakespear sonet sonnet one

[robert_pippin]: thirty called whose first line is my
mistresses eyes are nothing like the sun son

[robert_pippin]: to say her lips not anywhere near
as red as beautiful coral and i said

[robert_pippin]: well what's what's shakespear trying to say
nd somebody says well you know what a

[robert_pippin]: saying is my love is not very
pretty but she's okay with me you

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: know you can sort of see the
problem right way or even more general thing

[robert_pippin]: like love is not a function of
physical

[pj_wehry]: ah

[robert_pippin]: beauty

[pj_wehry]: right

[robert_pippin]: that just misses the whole tonality and
ora of meaningfulness communicated in the poem deep

[robert_pippin]: love communicated in the poem not

[pj_wehry]: what

[robert_pippin]: a concession or anything go ahead

[pj_wehry]: i mean that makes total sense like
i mean the function of the poem like

[pj_wehry]: if you if i say if i
said that to my wife you know and

[pj_wehry]: i said the version

[robert_pippin]: right

[pj_wehry]: of like hey um if

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: i gave her a poem and then
i said by the way what this means

[pj_wehry]: is you're very beautiful i would literally
kill the function of the poem right like

[pj_wehry]: i mean unless the poem

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: was just as bad that explanation um

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: and so there's something else there are
you familiar with the rule of metaphor by

[pj_wehry]: paul record so he has he has
a lot to

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: say about this in terms of um
he uses the the metaphor as kind of

[pj_wehry]: this discussion of these kinds of things
it still didn't give me a full answer

[pj_wehry]: but it helped me i helped i
think put me on the right path the

[pj_wehry]: idea that when you talk about he's
as he's like a lion and so it's

[pj_wehry]: like oh he means he's really brave
and it's like if i if you can

[pj_wehry]: fully paraphrase something then the metaphor is
debt what that extra something is is the

[pj_wehry]: is the hard part and it's precisely
the fact that we can't always explain what

[pj_wehry]: extra something is is that what may
makes literature valuable in and of itself

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: um so i don't

[robert_pippin]: that's

[pj_wehry]: know

[robert_pippin]: it

[pj_wehry]: go head

[robert_pippin]: yeah that's a famous old problem is
called the paradox of paraphrase and there are

[robert_pippin]: many writers who move written about it
but the challenge that philosopher s then sam

[robert_pippin]: is well how is it that we're
on to something that we can't paraphrase what

[robert_pippin]: what would it mean to be on
to it

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: to be to be if we can't
formulate it determinately discursively not only how do

[robert_pippin]: we know what it is because we
know we haven't really distinguished it from what

[robert_pippin]: it is not we can't give it
determinant boundaries say in a very general sense

[robert_pippin]: of the meaning meaningfulness the significance of
the general experience of reading the poem how

[robert_pippin]: are we on to it and how
do we get anywhere near the question of

[robert_pippin]: its being true if

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: it can't be re formulated so in
this regard i've been working lately on the

[robert_pippin]: way in which the philosopher martin hediger
tries to express this kind of problem we're

[robert_pippin]: not

[pj_wehry]: ah

[robert_pippin]: on to meaningfulness by any kind of
cognitive grasp of it it's not nothing either

[robert_pippin]: in hydregar's word for how we're on
to it is a tune met even one

[robert_pippin]: stem and it has that same kind
of musical residence be in tune with something

[robert_pippin]: that that's that's a very unusual kind
of experiential relation to work of art or

[robert_pippin]: to meaningfulness in it human life if
we ask somebody what did it mean to

[robert_pippin]: you to go through that war we
don't

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: expect the list of propositions very often
we expect to kind of narrative well let

[robert_pippin]: me tell you a story and we
hope by telling the story someone can get

[robert_pippin]: a sense of what it meant to
us without being able to give a determinate

[robert_pippin]: paraphrase of what the sense of it
sense of it is there's these these sort

[robert_pippin]: of co ordinated notions of illumination disclosure
attunement truthfulness the credibility and genuineness the disclosure

[robert_pippin]: of a kind of deep meaningfulness that
also we tend to think of is not

[robert_pippin]: just the meaningfulness of what happens to
one character and what it's like for that

[robert_pippin]: character we tend to think of it
as typical as having a universal or more

[robert_pippin]: general significance and just what it meant
for this character and what it means for

[robert_pippin]: me personally to read it we tend
to think something is illuminated of a very

[robert_pippin]: general nature about the human experience so
meaningfulness is not the kind of thing that's

[robert_pippin]: subject to strict by vail and sinpropositional
assertions and so forth but nevertheless it would

[robert_pippin]: it would be a very crude thing
to say therefore it doesn't exist there isn't

[robert_pippin]: anything there other than what could be
paraphrased and especially if the question is truth

[robert_pippin]: if

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: you can't if you can't say it
you can't show it either show and saying

[robert_pippin]: distinction is crucial to this kind of
kind of discussion but i think that's a

[robert_pippin]: very impoverished way of looking at it
it doesn't it doesn't explain for example the

[robert_pippin]: unbelievable hold that sophocles or shakespeare hamlet
to or war and peace for example have

[robert_pippin]: on the human imagination and the way
in which we're gripped by it revealing something

[robert_pippin]: to us couldn't be revealed any other
way

[pj_wehry]: yuh and one i want to make
sure we do talk about your book but

[pj_wehry]: forgive me i

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: can't avoid this

[robert_pippin]: yah

[pj_wehry]: this question what do you think about
the fact that

[robert_pippin]: oh oh

[pj_wehry]: is part of this discussion

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: yeah the fact that while we are
acted

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: upon and we deal with the

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: truth as it's presented to us we
also act upon the world and we create

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: and we create truth in the world

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: with with the

[robert_pippin]: yes

[pj_wehry]: power like when we act upon the
world we make things true right

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: and so is there something about fiction
and about these kinds of things that help

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: us in that creative ass etive truth

[robert_pippin]: well not quite sure you mean but
it is certainly true that that literature can

[robert_pippin]: have a powerful effect on

[robert_pippin]: not just for individual

[robert_pippin]: individual orientation let's say to the world
put it that where the literature can both

[robert_pippin]: reveal create an orientation way being pointed
in life in a certain direction rather than

[robert_pippin]: another that we wouldn't have been able
to do uh we wouldn't have been able

[robert_pippin]: to achieve otherwise it can be transformative
not not in the going back to what

[robert_pippin]: you were saying about martha nisbumit it
doesn't necessarily make us any better but there

[robert_pippin]: is we can

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: be changed maybe this is what you're
getting at we

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: can be changed by the experience of
great great great art for example i come

[robert_pippin]: from the south and when i read
in college just about everything by falkner my

[robert_pippin]: my sense of what it was to
live in the south to be haunted by

[robert_pippin]: the sins the shells oh

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: sins that have never been expiated we've
been acknowledged properly in south just the opposite

[pj_wehry]: m yeah

[robert_pippin]: that that sort of gave me much
different sense of he what it was to

[robert_pippin]: live in an areo haunted by so
many ghosts who were still quite in the

[robert_pippin]: ghostly sense alive and and permeating the
experience of living in the south maybe maybe

[robert_pippin]: that kind of thing one could say
but literature that it can reorneent this in

[robert_pippin]: various ways so

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: take the issue of film melodramas we
it's true a lot of films there's a

[robert_pippin]: kind of first view it in what
you just follow the plot and get emotionally

[robert_pippin]: involved in the then you finished the
film but then you think well wait a

[robert_pippin]: minute there's something weird about this aspect
or that aspect of it then you go

[robert_pippin]: back and watch it again and you
find going back to you think you're thinking

[robert_pippin]: what you think you find well what
i was taking to be just a kind

[robert_pippin]: of straight forward information a certain romantic
form of life in late bourgeois modernity is

[robert_pippin]: actually wait a minute quite ironic about
it quite critical of it quite quite seriously

[robert_pippin]: subversive and you know it's funny in
this regard because the reception of many melodramas

[robert_pippin]: like circs the perception of them it
is only a first viewing reception the people

[robert_pippin]: don't people don't often have same thing
with western same thing with filmar same thing

[robert_pippin]: with many holly was genres like the
thriller something like an hitch coke i don't

[robert_pippin]: really realize that there's kind of a
trap door in the bottom there there's another

[robert_pippin]: film another novel

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: inside the novel people read flobear's man
bovary and they just they

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: read it for the plot then they
don't they don't quite realize the tremendously subversive

[robert_pippin]: nature of it or the uh the
enormous literary experimentation of the novel that sort

[robert_pippin]: of trying to change our view what
art is which is a kind of crucial

[robert_pippin]: problem modern art it was called modernist
art in which the value and function of

[robert_pippin]: art is now not taken for granted
and is up for grabs there's a whole

[robert_pippin]: series of artistic works after the eighteen
fifties or so in which we get re

[robert_pippin]: oriented with respect to the question of
art and its function in the world

[pj_wehry]: and what's interesting is that when you

[robert_pippin]: ah

[pj_wehry]: have like this

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: these well made novels and well made

[robert_pippin]: m

[pj_wehry]: movies

[robert_pippin]: my

[pj_wehry]: that people often internalize the trap door
without knowing it's there

[robert_pippin]: right

[pj_wehry]: is

[robert_pippin]: right

[pj_wehry]: the power

[robert_pippin]: true

[pj_wehry]: which is the power

[robert_pippin]: ye

[pj_wehry]: of one criticism

[robert_pippin]: eh

[pj_wehry]: to reveal like this

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: is what's actually happening to you but
also

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: just the power of the medium itself
which is probably more to

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: plato's point that it's sneaky but

[robert_pippin]: yeah well

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: you raise also the interesting question of
if you if you take this you of

[robert_pippin]: literature and this truth inimaor even you
know painting si what is criticism supposed to

[robert_pippin]: be like if it's not paraphrase

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: how if what's this one of the
chapters the first chapter in the book

[pj_wehry]: i was

[robert_pippin]: what is

[pj_wehry]: just about to ask you about it
so this is perfect yeah

[robert_pippin]: what is philosophical criticism of the arts
right as we were saying before it can

[robert_pippin]: just be a kind of discursive paraphrase
what truth claims are implicit in the the

[robert_pippin]: work of art so what do you
write about well it's very very difficult actually

[robert_pippin]: to do it at all well or
authentically because you have to both pay attention

[robert_pippin]: to the details very close attention to
the details how they illuminate something like the

[robert_pippin]: form of self reflection any literary object
embodies i mean by that that it's kind

[robert_pippin]: of a funny way of anthropomorifhizing works
but

[pj_wehry]: ah

[robert_pippin]: they're they're actually quite self conscious that

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: they set out to portray things in
a certain way for a certain point to

[robert_pippin]: make a certain reason and it's you
know to illuminate that without botlarizing it simplifying

[robert_pippin]: it or all the rest of that
stuff

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: you have to try to re create
in your attentiveness to the details something like

[robert_pippin]: the experience of coming to attend to
those details have to try to embody in

[robert_pippin]: a critical account which is sometimes can
be quite detailed you still have to try

[robert_pippin]: to illuminate what it was like to
be brought to attend to these details what

[robert_pippin]: it was like to experience them suddenly
salient in the second or third viewing of

[robert_pippin]: the film or reading of the novel
so criticism has this task of not only

[robert_pippin]: okay trying to show you what you
already know as you say without knowing it

[robert_pippin]: but to

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: do so in a way that attends
to the dimension of experience one has notion

[robert_pippin]: of attunement again being on to the
meaningfulness of the work which isn't a function

[robert_pippin]: of you know kind of cognitive self
reflection it's a much more deeply experiential odality

[robert_pippin]: of attentiveness and that requires the critic
to try to bring that out in the

[robert_pippin]: reader of the criticism so that's that's
quite a large topic what

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: is philosophical point of literary criticism i
mean until until the dominance of theory and

[robert_pippin]: literary criticism in the sixties and seventies
the old idea was just sort of philological

[robert_pippin]: you know to whom is this author
indebted what was the context historically at the

[robert_pippin]: time of the production of the work
what do we know about the various drafts

[robert_pippin]: of the work and the changes that
were made what are the literary sources that

[robert_pippin]: the author used or the synematic resaroyou
now really just

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: kind of logical explication but once we
asked him more radically what literature was doing

[robert_pippin]: in this in this case philosophically we
have to have a different mode of criticism

[robert_pippin]: as well

[pj_wehry]: m and then so you have philosophical

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: criticism in that first chapter and then
you have philosophical fiction and what makes fiction

[pj_wehry]: philosophical

[robert_pippin]: m well it has to do with
this notion of literary form m you know

[robert_pippin]: the this is a function both of
the structure of the plot and the nature

[robert_pippin]: of the characters but also the decision
an author makes about how to present the

[robert_pippin]: material how to actually eh organize and
show us the various elements that say make

[robert_pippin]: up a realist fictional novel and then
try to present them in a way in

[robert_pippin]: which the implicit reflectiveness of the work
is it's always also being about itself being

[robert_pippin]: about why it is presenting the material
this way rather than that way this this

[robert_pippin]: dimension of of literary orsytematic form is
that key to now i should say i

[robert_pippin]: mean sometimes if you if you raise
the question i well you know it's one

[robert_pippin]: thing for the follow the plot and
understand what's going on it's another thing to

[robert_pippin]: ask why is it being presented this
way rather than that way the answer can

[robert_pippin]: sometimes be to entertain us to

[pj_wehry]: right

[robert_pippin]: thrill us to scare us because you
know literature and film are also commercial products

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: they're made for audiences and even in
the

[pj_wehry]: very

[robert_pippin]: cast

[pj_wehry]: much so

[robert_pippin]: even in the case of hir like
henry williams he wanted the books to be

[robert_pippin]: sold to be read so sometimes you
can say well that's that's the main point

[robert_pippin]: and there's nothing wrong with it means
sometimes the point is to make something beautiful

[robert_pippin]: sometimes the point is to experiment with
literary form sometimes the point is to comment

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: on other literature intertextuality at great works
many of them not all we certainly admire

[robert_pippin]: great great works of art without any
interest in whether they have a philosophical dimension

[robert_pippin]: or not some of them don't many
of them don't but

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: in the case of works that that
seem quite philosophically ambitious we get a sense

[robert_pippin]: that we're being shown something in order
to reveal something we might not have attended

[robert_pippin]: to that is a truth about human
experience is of course raises the question well

[robert_pippin]: if they're not universally qualified propositions what's
the nature of generality in this illumination by

[robert_pippin]: a fictional object i mean you've got
a story about a man who goes to

[robert_pippin]: europe to rescue boy who's been trapped
or whose relatives think he's being manipulated by

[robert_pippin]: a married woman who's with whom he's
living with an affair and then the man

[robert_pippin]: stays long enough to real so that
actually the guy is better off than he

[robert_pippin]: would be going back to this boring
town

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: that he came from we when you
know well that's just a really interesting story

[robert_pippin]: or you could say well isn't james
in his novel the ambassadors isn't isn't he

[robert_pippin]: kind of trying to make a point
about the the experience of a kind of

[robert_pippin]: european culture whose value system is fading
lapsing and unattractive american context

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: which the kind of self consciousness and
moral self righteousness the american experience of itself

[robert_pippin]: is actually not a suitable counterpoint the
the decadence and collapsing value system of the

[robert_pippin]: europeans and you realize what were something
very quite typical of being said about emerging

[robert_pippin]: form of moral life in modern capitalism
um and so you know you realize as

[robert_pippin]: you read the ambassador this is not
meant just to entertain us or it's trying

[robert_pippin]: to say something general about the state
of our sense of how we ought to

[robert_pippin]: be living in a world in which
many of the common assumptions about that have

[robert_pippin]: collapsed and we don't we don't really
find incredible anymore we don't really we don't

[robert_pippin]: really have our parents yet in this
world that's emerging and pre world right right

[robert_pippin]: before the where one sort of exploded
the illusion that we did have a kind

[robert_pippin]: of common solid moral foundation

[pj_wehry]: uh

[robert_pippin]: but that raises

[pj_wehry]: would that

[robert_pippin]: the question of of generality of how
how a singular work about a singular character

[robert_pippin]: can have general significance

[pj_wehry]: ah is there something almost phenomenal logical
about about that generality and that kind of

[robert_pippin]: a

[pj_wehry]: in the great works of art this
is why you have certain works of art

[pj_wehry]: that seem to go beyond

[robert_pippin]: what's

[pj_wehry]: time

[robert_pippin]: at

[pj_wehry]: you know look at people recognize themselves
in hamlet and king lear these sorts of

[pj_wehry]: things and i think that there's a
the generality

[robert_pippin]: a

[pj_wehry]: comes from recognition right that people continually
over and over again recognize their own selves

[pj_wehry]: and specifically their own subjective consciousness is
as represented is that a fair way

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: to think about it

[robert_pippin]: sure yeah yeah sure i mean i
would put the problem this way as well

[robert_pippin]: since plato and aristotle there have been
two general ways of thinking and philosophy about

[robert_pippin]: universality or generality one is abstractive you
try to leave out particular elements and keep

[robert_pippin]: abstracting to a commonality that gives you
something shared by all of the particulars so

[robert_pippin]: questions like human nature you tried it
exclude things that are particular to various cultures

[robert_pippin]: and experience s until you get something
that's shared by all of them a very

[robert_pippin]: abstract notion of generality least common

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: denominator or most common denominator that kind
of thing but

[pj_wehry]: the essence

[robert_pippin]: yeah but but plato clearly is interested
in that's more an aristotelian conception of generality

[pj_wehry]: hm

[robert_pippin]: of inductive generality but plato clearly thought
with his theory of ideas that there's another

[robert_pippin]: kind of generality which has more to
do with a kind of concrete typicality something

[robert_pippin]: influenced haglquite a lot i mean the
idea is very simple i i might say

[robert_pippin]: to you for example now take michael
jordan that's

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: basketball player

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: that's what a basketball player is

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: embodies by being the particular he is
more perfectly any other player i play basketball

[robert_pippin]: but i'm not typical of basket book
i'm a

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: shadow faint

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: faint shadow michael jordan who is the
idea of a basketball player but in a

[robert_pippin]: concrete particular so that's not abstractive universality
that's not inductive universality

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: that's a way in which a singular
instance can be it's perfection representative of a

[robert_pippin]: kind of

[pj_wehry]: uh

[robert_pippin]: typicality

[pj_wehry]: uh

[robert_pippin]: and that is

[pj_wehry]: okay

[robert_pippin]: what i think yeah go ahead

[pj_wehry]: i was gonna say first of all
all chicago wins are very proud of you

[pj_wehry]: for

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: referencing michael jordan and not another player
of

[robert_pippin]: my name my name my name is
pippin

[pj_wehry]: yes you have to m would this
be similar is this kind of where you

[pj_wehry]: think can is going with his idea
of exemplars

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: the

[robert_pippin]: i mean

[pj_wehry]: the

[robert_pippin]: it

[pj_wehry]: creation

[robert_pippin]: is

[pj_wehry]: of judgment of categories i'm sorry go
ahead

[robert_pippin]: yeah i mean it is esthetic theory
i mean cat was really interested mostly in

[robert_pippin]: the beauty of nature but he does
have a theory of the role of beauty

[robert_pippin]: and art but he thinks he has
a much more restricted view

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: he thinks that the greatest achievement of
a kind of typicality and hart works is

[robert_pippin]: the the capacity of an art work
um to interest us create a kind of

[robert_pippin]: passionate involvement with it that isn't self
interested or a

[pj_wehry]: ah

[robert_pippin]: mere matter of pleasure that this is
this is his famous claim that beauty works

[robert_pippin]: of art for example is a symbol
of morality to say

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: the experience of art works or especially
the beautiful in nature compells us in a

[robert_pippin]: way that and help us understand that
our vocation in life it's not just pleasure

[robert_pippin]: seeking because where we're not interested in
the esthetic object as a means or enjoyment

[robert_pippin]: i mean if the work is genuinely
artistic it's quite an interesting point kamak its

[robert_pippin]: effect on us is not to think
of it like a good glass of wine

[robert_pippin]: or a good meal or whatever kind
of pleasant experience where an object is a

[robert_pippin]: mere means we feel the object has
a certain kind of authority over us and

[robert_pippin]: demands a mode of attentiveness that is
pleasant but not self interested pleasure it's a

[robert_pippin]: way of what kant calls our super
sensible nature we have to get into the

[robert_pippin]: metaphysics of that but just to say
are or we get a sense that we

[robert_pippin]: this is in general and what what
you thought about the kind of most awe

[robert_pippin]: inspiring feature of human beings sensual animals
though they are they are capable of acting

[robert_pippin]: for the sense of a moral ideal
in a way that would injure or destroy

[robert_pippin]: all of their sensible self interest even
their love for their family

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: could be sacrificed for the sake of
what's right we have this capacity and i

[robert_pippin]: thought well that's one of the things
i stand in awe of second

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: film with all the starry heavens above
and the moral law within and art can

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: play into that by showing us that
we have a capacity or an involvement in

[robert_pippin]: comportment with objects in the world that
create a kind of pleasure that's well beyond

[robert_pippin]: particular self interested pleasure but has a
kind of intellectual

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: or you know a dimension of purity
that connects with our moral moral vocation to

[robert_pippin]: art works can

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: exemplify that in a way that and
convince us reassure us that our general vocation

[robert_pippin]: in life is not a self interested
pleasure seeking beings but we have the capacity

[robert_pippin]: of actually suspending all of that the
sake of something it isn't merely self interested

[robert_pippin]: pleasure and in art works say it
can be a kind of pleasure that distinctive

[robert_pippin]: in the fact that it's not it's
ennobling pleasure kind of self elevation and convincing

[robert_pippin]: us that we can attend to things
in a way that doesn't doesn't actually have

[robert_pippin]: anything to do with our purely sensible
natures

[pj_wehry]: m yeah um so i want to
be conscious of your time uh

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: do you mind kind of as we
wrap things up just talking a little bit

[pj_wehry]: for

[robert_pippin]: oh

[pj_wehry]: a concrete example of what you're talking
about with phil ophical criticism and philosophical fiction

[pj_wehry]: your chapter on prose a shadow of
love or is it the

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: shadow of love

[robert_pippin]: yeah

[pj_wehry]: they said that

[robert_pippin]: it's about jealousy so

[pj_wehry]: shadow of love excuse me

[robert_pippin]: yeah the first great novel involves basically
for

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: crucial love affairs over the course of
its three three thousand pages m and uh

[robert_pippin]: and all of them what plays an
enormously powerful role is jealousy

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: a character a lover beloved mostly lovers
anxiety that the person they love doesn't share

[robert_pippin]: the same dimension of love that they
do and so actually that typifies is the

[robert_pippin]: tremendous uncertainty all human relationships we want
to be taken by others be the way

[robert_pippin]: we take ourselves but if we if
we actually work trying to sure the other

[robert_pippin]: takes ourselves so it's the way we
take ourselves we end up kind of creating

[robert_pippin]: a fictional self we a kind of
persona we present

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: to the world which then creates the
anxiety that we're not being loved or attended

[robert_pippin]: to for ourselves but for the the
character we've created in order to be attended

[robert_pippin]: to as ourselves

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: so jealousy typifies a great deal of
general unknowingness and in human

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: social relations and just trying to i
mean people find it sometimes when they first

[robert_pippin]: read the novel kind of strange that
price thinks that love is really always a

[robert_pippin]: matter of jealousy i mean we tend
to think of jealousy as a kind of

[robert_pippin]: character flaw you don't trust me i
mean i've given you no reason to think

[robert_pippin]: i'm betraying you but actually a much
more deep level in proof that i try

[robert_pippin]: to bring out in that chapter in
which the problem of jealousy is unavoidab it's

[robert_pippin]: not because people are pathological and they're
possessive they don't want the person to be

[robert_pippin]: with anybody else it's that they don't
know if they play a role in the

[robert_pippin]: person's imagination they think they do that
they would like to

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: play so they're constantly searching for reassurances
in a way that can be actually quite

[robert_pippin]: destructive of the relationship it's very hard
to avoid this problem people say well these

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: people are just pathological or not they're
not really interestin characters because they're all neurotic

[robert_pippin]: they just can't but you know this
is again a first reading second reading kind

[robert_pippin]: of thing you know you you the
first way through you think you got these

[robert_pippin]: corrupt decadent people that just

[pj_wehry]: ye

[robert_pippin]: can't relax and enjoy each other

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: but second or third time through you
realize something else is going on here there's

[robert_pippin]: a really big huge philosophical problem in
the relation between self knowledge and knowledge of

[robert_pippin]: others that the dynamic involved in being
taken to be who won wants to be

[robert_pippin]: taken to be actually however unavoidable complicates
things a great deal and prose also you

[robert_pippin]: know shows us there is something about
this that's that's not just destructive but quite

[robert_pippin]: important it accounts for this uncertainty in
romantic relationships accounts for a kind of constant

[robert_pippin]: tension it actually makes the relationship much
more important does it take it for granted

[robert_pippin]: actually way of enhancing the and making
the relationship more honest by acknowledging to one's

[robert_pippin]: self one's own uncertainty about this and
how limited the ways are you know asking

[robert_pippin]: asking the person do you do you
really love me do you do you think

[robert_pippin]: you really understand me well that's not
going to get you anywhere the general

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: problems we've been talking about you can't

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: discursively convince somebody by an argument they
don't have anything to worry about we always

[robert_pippin]: have

[pj_wehry]: therefore

[robert_pippin]: something to worry

[pj_wehry]: i love you yeah sorry

[robert_pippin]: they're kind of saying yeah right exactly

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: we always have something to worry

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: about but that's not unexpected because human
interaction these self knowledge and knowledge of others

[robert_pippin]: of us and our knowledge of them
has a kind of dynamic i mean henry

[robert_pippin]: james is good at this as well

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: he's always her trying scenes in which
the question is does she know that i

[robert_pippin]: know she knows that i know kind
of thing

[pj_wehry]: yeah

[robert_pippin]: um

[pj_wehry]: oh

[robert_pippin]: and we don't really notice that in
every day life it's much too complicating a

[robert_pippin]: relationship but when we sort step back
have a literary expression of it our own

[robert_pippin]: sense of what we've taken for granted
in our relationship since our lack of self

[robert_pippin]: knowledge about the sort of underlying anxiety
involved in all close relationships gets illuminated and

[robert_pippin]: we learn something we learned something

[pj_wehry]: m

[robert_pippin]: true

[pj_wehry]: m well i think that's great place
to wrap up dr pippin thank you so

[pj_wehry]: much if he is there one last
take away you'd leave for our listeners

[robert_pippin]: the book

[pj_wehry]: there you go h appreciate it thank
you so much for coming on today it's

[pj_wehry]: been a real pleasure

[robert_pippin]: my pleasure take care of