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Articles, Essays, and Book Chapters by Pamela Zinn
in G. Kazantzidis (ed.) Lucretian Receptions in Prose, 2024
Plutarch’s Gryllus is a serious, though unconventional, work of philosophy. Employing Lucretius a... more Plutarch’s Gryllus is a serious, though unconventional, work of philosophy.
Employing Lucretius as an ally, the dialogue targets especially the Stoic conception of animals as lesser beings than humans — sugaring that pill with its Aesopic and Homeric qualities. The case that the dialogue makes for animals’ rationality, and, by extension, for treating animals kindly and justly, is a version of Plutarch’s own view. Plutarch thus saw Lucretius as part of the theriophilic intellectual tradition with which he himself affiliated, and perhaps rightly so.
Classica et Mediaevalia, 2021
This article treats the sense of taste in Epicurean thought through the evidence in Lucretius’ De... more This article treats the sense of taste in Epicurean thought through the evidence in Lucretius’ De rerum natura. It reconstructs Lucretius’ account of what taste is and how it works, with a view to explaining instances like the taste of salt by the seaside, where we seem to taste at a distance. I argue that such instances are not exceptions, but examples that reveal more about the processes behind them. When analyzed in conjunction with the physiology of taste and the water cycle, the salty taste of sea air confirms the traditional view that the perception of flavor consistently occurs through direct contact with the object of perception, not through indirect contact with an intermediary. Moreover, it advances the understanding of what comes into contact, what the perceiver contributes to taste, and taste’s sensory threshold.
Kriterion, 2016
This paper analyzes the ontology and epistemology of time in Lucretius' De rerum natura. It uses ... more This paper analyzes the ontology and epistemology of time in Lucretius' De rerum natura. It uses the physiology of perception as well as epistemology to shed new light on the metaphysics. It presents an exegesis-based interpretation of the nature of time and of its perception, both arguing for and refining this interpretation by showing its explanatory power. The paper shows that Lucretius represents the perception of time or sensus temporis as a distinct sensory faculty, reconstructs how it emerges and operates, and relates it to his account of perception more generally. The sense of time in turn is seen to explain aspects of related faculties, including thought and sight, and cases of apparent simultaneity. The paper thus contributes to, among other things, our understanding of the speed of perception and Lucretius' account of the nature of time itself-arguing that Lucretius represents time as both continuous (not atomic) and real, as well as something perceived.
Conferences by Pamela Zinn
The boundaries and complementarities relating animals and language have always captured the human... more The boundaries and complementarities relating animals and language have always captured the human imagination. Animal/Language: An Interdisciplinary Conference engages with a central feature of what is becoming known as the "animal turn" in the humanities: the recognition that animals and language have a complicated relationship with one another in human understanding. What it means to be "human" has often been thought through and against the figure of the "animal", with "language" traditionally seen as constitutive of human identity. However, the desire for-and the realities of-communication between animals and humans and among animals themselves put pressure on these mechanisms of distinction in ways that can be both exciting and unsettling.
The "Animal" in the Humanities Research Group was founded in 2017 with the support of the Humanities Center at Texas Tech in order to foster interdisciplinary, collaborative inquiry into the role played by both "the animal" and real animals in human intellectual landscapes, historical and contemporary. To that end, this international conference brings together scholars from a range of disciplines, including literature, history, anthropology, philosophy, religious studies, the visual arts, the psychological sciences, and companion animal science in order to share their research, investigate the networks of relationships connecting animals, humans, and language in diverse historical, cultural, social, and philosophical contexts, and explore what particular perspectives on these questions reveal about the groups that hold them.
Books by Pamela Zinn
The idea to make this special issue was born during the Tensed vs Tense- less Theory symposium (h... more The idea to make this special issue was born during the Tensed vs Tense- less Theory symposium (http://tense-less.weebly.com) at the SOPhiA conference in Salzburg 2014. There, also, the Society for Philosophy of Time (SPoT - http://s-p-o-t.weebly.com) was founded. During the subsequent SPoT discussion groups and workshops (http://s-p-o- t.weebly.com/events.html) some of the papers of this volume have been presented, in one form or other. As this special issue corporealised the SPoT was growing. I’m grateful to everybody who was part of this exiting journey, but especially I want to thank Christian J. Feldbacher- Escamilla and Alexander Gebharter from KRITERION — Journal of Philosophy to make this special issue possible.
As the SPoT is set up very broadly, this special issue aims at depicting philosophy of time in all of its varieties. After ‘A Slightly Opinionated Introduction’ into philosophy of time, Jesse Mulder questions the set up of the eternalism/presentism debate in his ‘Defining Original Presentism’. His paper reflects the cutting edge of contemporary debate about the nature of time. Then, my paper touches upon the intersection of philosophy of time and philosophy of science, investigating the rela- tion between ‘Carnap’s Logic of Science and Reference to the Present Moment’. Cord Friebe’s ‘Time Order, Time Direction, and the Presentist’s View on Spacetime’ covers the intersection between philosophy of physics and philosophy of time. The last part of the special issue has a more historical twist – albeit still being systematic. Sonja Deppe’s ‘The Mind-Dependence of the Relational Structure of Time’ is concerned with more recent history (Henri Bergson), while Pamela Zinn’s ‘Lucretius On Time and Its Perception’ examines more ancient history.
in G. Kazantzidis (ed.) Lucretian Receptions in Prose, 2024
Plutarch’s Gryllus is a serious, though unconventional, work of philosophy. Employing Lucretius a... more Plutarch’s Gryllus is a serious, though unconventional, work of philosophy.
Employing Lucretius as an ally, the dialogue targets especially the Stoic conception of animals as lesser beings than humans — sugaring that pill with its Aesopic and Homeric qualities. The case that the dialogue makes for animals’ rationality, and, by extension, for treating animals kindly and justly, is a version of Plutarch’s own view. Plutarch thus saw Lucretius as part of the theriophilic intellectual tradition with which he himself affiliated, and perhaps rightly so.
Classica et Mediaevalia, 2021
This article treats the sense of taste in Epicurean thought through the evidence in Lucretius’ De... more This article treats the sense of taste in Epicurean thought through the evidence in Lucretius’ De rerum natura. It reconstructs Lucretius’ account of what taste is and how it works, with a view to explaining instances like the taste of salt by the seaside, where we seem to taste at a distance. I argue that such instances are not exceptions, but examples that reveal more about the processes behind them. When analyzed in conjunction with the physiology of taste and the water cycle, the salty taste of sea air confirms the traditional view that the perception of flavor consistently occurs through direct contact with the object of perception, not through indirect contact with an intermediary. Moreover, it advances the understanding of what comes into contact, what the perceiver contributes to taste, and taste’s sensory threshold.
Kriterion, 2016
This paper analyzes the ontology and epistemology of time in Lucretius' De rerum natura. It uses ... more This paper analyzes the ontology and epistemology of time in Lucretius' De rerum natura. It uses the physiology of perception as well as epistemology to shed new light on the metaphysics. It presents an exegesis-based interpretation of the nature of time and of its perception, both arguing for and refining this interpretation by showing its explanatory power. The paper shows that Lucretius represents the perception of time or sensus temporis as a distinct sensory faculty, reconstructs how it emerges and operates, and relates it to his account of perception more generally. The sense of time in turn is seen to explain aspects of related faculties, including thought and sight, and cases of apparent simultaneity. The paper thus contributes to, among other things, our understanding of the speed of perception and Lucretius' account of the nature of time itself-arguing that Lucretius represents time as both continuous (not atomic) and real, as well as something perceived.
The boundaries and complementarities relating animals and language have always captured the human... more The boundaries and complementarities relating animals and language have always captured the human imagination. Animal/Language: An Interdisciplinary Conference engages with a central feature of what is becoming known as the "animal turn" in the humanities: the recognition that animals and language have a complicated relationship with one another in human understanding. What it means to be "human" has often been thought through and against the figure of the "animal", with "language" traditionally seen as constitutive of human identity. However, the desire for-and the realities of-communication between animals and humans and among animals themselves put pressure on these mechanisms of distinction in ways that can be both exciting and unsettling.
The "Animal" in the Humanities Research Group was founded in 2017 with the support of the Humanities Center at Texas Tech in order to foster interdisciplinary, collaborative inquiry into the role played by both "the animal" and real animals in human intellectual landscapes, historical and contemporary. To that end, this international conference brings together scholars from a range of disciplines, including literature, history, anthropology, philosophy, religious studies, the visual arts, the psychological sciences, and companion animal science in order to share their research, investigate the networks of relationships connecting animals, humans, and language in diverse historical, cultural, social, and philosophical contexts, and explore what particular perspectives on these questions reveal about the groups that hold them.
The idea to make this special issue was born during the Tensed vs Tense- less Theory symposium (h... more The idea to make this special issue was born during the Tensed vs Tense- less Theory symposium (http://tense-less.weebly.com) at the SOPhiA conference in Salzburg 2014. There, also, the Society for Philosophy of Time (SPoT - http://s-p-o-t.weebly.com) was founded. During the subsequent SPoT discussion groups and workshops (http://s-p-o- t.weebly.com/events.html) some of the papers of this volume have been presented, in one form or other. As this special issue corporealised the SPoT was growing. I’m grateful to everybody who was part of this exiting journey, but especially I want to thank Christian J. Feldbacher- Escamilla and Alexander Gebharter from KRITERION — Journal of Philosophy to make this special issue possible.
As the SPoT is set up very broadly, this special issue aims at depicting philosophy of time in all of its varieties. After ‘A Slightly Opinionated Introduction’ into philosophy of time, Jesse Mulder questions the set up of the eternalism/presentism debate in his ‘Defining Original Presentism’. His paper reflects the cutting edge of contemporary debate about the nature of time. Then, my paper touches upon the intersection of philosophy of time and philosophy of science, investigating the rela- tion between ‘Carnap’s Logic of Science and Reference to the Present Moment’. Cord Friebe’s ‘Time Order, Time Direction, and the Presentist’s View on Spacetime’ covers the intersection between philosophy of physics and philosophy of time. The last part of the special issue has a more historical twist – albeit still being systematic. Sonja Deppe’s ‘The Mind-Dependence of the Relational Structure of Time’ is concerned with more recent history (Henri Bergson), while Pamela Zinn’s ‘Lucretius On Time and Its Perception’ examines more ancient history.