Seminar Series

The Scottish Centre for Continental Philosophy is pleased to announce its research seminar series for semester 1, 2026-27.

Wed October 21st Andrew Haas, 3.00-5.00pm

Presence—Event—Implication

The question of the meaning of being, has been asked and answered. The Greeks think being qua presence: ‘to be’ means ‘to be present.’ For Heidegger, however, presence cannot be being—for absence is not nothing; rather, both presence and absence are equiprimordial modes of being, and the unity of being must be sought elsewhere, namely, in being qua event: ‘to be’ means ‘to happen.’ And yet, both happening and unhappening, Ereignis and Enteignis, are equiprimordial modes of being—and again, the unity of being must be sought elsewhere. Fortunately, however, the Greeks provide a clue: in Greek, being is implied. For example, Heraclitus says: ἦθος ἀνθρώπῳ δαίμων—that is, not ‘human character is divine’; but rather, ‘human character divine.’ The ‘is’, being, is neither ‘there’ nor ‘not there’; it neither happens nor unhappens—for it is just implied, which is why it can be called an implication. The task then, is to think being qua implication and all that implies.

This event is online only.

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Thursday November 12th, Anupama Ranawana (Durham University) – 3.30-5.00pm

The Therigatha and other considerations: A Buddhist feminist riposte to muscular nationalism.

Across countries like Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Myanmar, Buddhist nationalism has been a key feature of majoritarian violence. These nationalisms have long and complex histories connected to the afterlives of the European colonial project, economic tensions,  and the intertwined relationship between the military, the state and Buddhist institutions in these contexts. It is a muscular nationalism. 

This paper draws from key case studies and specific texts connected to discuss how Buddhist feminist thought provides a riposte to such muscular nationalism. Case studies referenced will be the Sakyaditha (daughters of the Buddha) and the Alliance of Bhikkunis who- amongst other activities- draw on notions of shared sisterhood, non-violence and universal responsibility to create digital interfaith peacebuilding networks (Tomalin 2021, Tsai 2025).  A key text that will be referenced is the  Therīgāthā (Poems/Songs of the Elder Nuns) from the Theravada Buddhist literary tradition. Alternatively translated as ‘Poems of the First Buddhist Women’, it is often referred to as the oldest anthology of women’s literature in the world. It also offers us modern readers a powerful critique of notions such as ‘freedom’ and ‘liberation,’ as they may have been conceptualised and imagined different ways by women often silenced by hegemonic histories of religion (Baines 2024). As a foundational text of the Buddhist female experience is the freedom or the right to self-actualize, not only of access to rights but also the ability to be loving, compassionate beings, to flourish (Day 2016, Ranawana 2021).  

Dalhousie –

And online: SCCP Philosophy Seminar | Meeting-Join | Microsoft Teams

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Wednesday November 18th, Alexander Douglas University of St. Andrews 3.00pm-5.00pm

The Logic of Togetherness

Abstract: My title is drawn from a 1998 book by the philosopher and Daoism scholar, Kuang-Ming Wu. I use it in reference to a theme of my book Against Identity, which is that our attachment to a fixed identity distorts our thinking. If we become inflexibly attached to a fixed identity then our whole way of thinking is contaminated with this inflexibility. An analysis of this phenomenon is given by Spinoza. Standard methods of reasoning and argument won’t help, since these can easily be coopted to entrench a narrative that protects our own self-conception (Wu calls this “egological”). We can only become properly open to the thoughts and perspectives of others by relaxing our attachment to our idea of self, opening out to transformative encounters with other things.  Wu’s suggestion is that this cannot come from any individual effort but only from integration into a diverse community of others who all think differently. He proposes a model of “playing with arguments” to replace the traditional argumentative model of philosophy, which often serves to close off rather than open up alternative perspectives. I believe that the idea of “mind-fasting”, as outlined in Ch.4 of Zhuangzi, can be understood in light of this idea.