Jonathan Wolff isn’t the very first particular person to be puzzled about why, although 5 very well-known female philosophers emerged from Oxford quickly right after the war, number of new ones are carrying out so right now (How can we finish the male domination of philosophy?, 26 November).
As a survivor from the wartime group, I can only say: sorry, but the cause was without a doubt that there had been fewer males about then. The trouble is not, of course, guys as such – guys have accomplished excellent ample philosophy in the previous. What is wrong is a specific fashion of philosophising that benefits from encouraging a whole lot of clever youthful men to compete in winning arguments. These people then quickly develop up a set of games out of easy oppositions and elaborate them until, in the end, nobody else can see what they are talking about. All this can go on right up until someone from outside the circle finally explodes it by moving the conversation on to a quite distinct subject, following which the games are forgotten. Hobbes did this in the 1640s. Moore and Russell did it in the 1890s. And in fact I think the time is about ripe for someone to do it right now. By contrast, in these wartime lessons – which had been little – males (conscientious objectors and so forth) had been current as well as girls, but they weren’t keen on arguing.
It was clear that we were all more interested in understanding this deeply puzzling world than in putting each other down. That was how Elizabeth Anscombe, Philippa Foot, Iris Murdoch, Mary Warnock and I, in our numerous techniques, all came to consider out alternatives to the brash, unreal fashion of philosophising – based mostly primarily on logical positivism – that was current at the time. And these have been the concepts that we later expressed in our own writings. Ultimately, I can verify that I’m still alive and doing philosophy. Next spring, Acumen will bring out my little book Are You an Illusion?
Mary Midgley
Newcastle on Tyne
The golden age of female philosophy | @guardianletters
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