Research Seminar in Post-Kantian European Philosophy, 2019/2020
Unless otherwise stated, Post-Kantian European Philosophy Research Group seminars take place on Tuesdays, 5:30–7:30pm in Room S0.11 (ground floor of Social Studies). All welcome. For further information, please contact tbc
Postgraduate Work in Progress Seminar
This week, the seminar will discuss Giulia Lorenzi's paper How to Make Sense of Different Musical Perceptual Experiences: a New Philosophical Proposal. Guilia will be interviewed by Johannes Roessler
Abstract:
The common-sense intuitive idea that a musician with extended musical knowledge can perceive music in a different way than a naïve listener seems both appealing and problematic. Indeed, given the standard understanding of perception in the philosophical realm as the theory-neutral apprehension of information, it is not clear how musical knowledge can inform and enhance perception of music. In this paper, I suggest that we need to rethink how we characterise auditory perception to make sense of different musical perceptual experiences. Following O’Shaughnessy (2000) and Crowther (2009), I introduce the distinction between listening and hearing. I then show how considering listening as an action makes possible to explain two different components at play in musical training and music perception: a mere perceptual one and a theoretic-perceptual other. I finally show, how the attempts previously made in philosophy to characterise this experience fails to explain some crucial aspects of this case.