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Disgust and Death
Friday, April 09, 2010
4:00 pm
Knight Auditorium, Spurlock Museum
600 South Gregory Street
Urbana (View Map)
Colin McGinn
Department of Philosophy, University of Miami
What triggers disgust? Paradoxically, disgust is both primitive and yet
infused with civilization and its objects seem heterogeneous and
without unifying principle (from corpses to feces to rats to body
parts). McGinn suggests that death figures in objects we find
disgusting, directly or indirectly, so that symbolism is at work in
this most visceral of emotions. But the way death figures is subtle.
Skeletons are not disgusting while rotting flesh is. McGinn argues that
ultimately it is our incongruous nature as “embodied souls” that lies
behind disgust.
The Philosophy Annual Public Lecture
Hosted by: Department of Philosophy
In
conjunction with: Beckman Institute, College of Medicine, Department of
Anthropology, Department of the Classics, Department of Educational
Psychology, Department of English, Department of Entomology, Department
of French, Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures, Department
of Media and Cinema Studies, Department of Political Science,
Department of Psychology, Department of Religion, Department of Slavic
Languages and Literatures, Department of Sociology, Department of
Theatre, Gender and Women's Studies, Institute for Genomic Biology,
Medical Scholars Program, Neuroscience Program, Program in Comparative
and World Literature, Program in Jewish Culture and Society, Program in
Science and Technology Studies, School of Literatures, Cultures and
Linguistics, Spurlock Museum, Unit for Criticism and Interpretive
Theory, Insect Fear Film Festival, That's Rentertainment
WILL-AM580 FOCUS interview with Colin McGinn
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