His paper was on Augustine, examining some paradoxes in the Confessions. Augustine states several paradoxes and then proceeds to answer them. The paradoxes are interesting, though one wonders if they are really that problematic or paradoxical. As for the presentation itself, I found it a bit dry, and somewhat boring--reading the text and examining the paradoxes could have been done on one's own, and it wouldn't have taken an hour (or more?) to do so...
Not enough controversy to keep me awake...
James O'Donnell (U. Penn) came up in conversation afterwards--apparently he's a good philologist, but not so sharp with respect to the philosophy of the texts. (Charlotte Allen's review of his biography of St. Augustine.)
Which reminds me, I still need to get a copy of Peter Brown's biography of St. Augustine. Interview. A lecture by him at Stanford.
"A Life of Learning"
"Augustine the Bishop in the Light of New Documents"
John von Heyking
Mark Vessey
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