The 12th International Conference of

 

ISSEI

 

In cooperation

With

International Society for the Study of European Ideas

 

 

Section IV: Art, Theatre, Literature, Music, Culture

 

Workshop:     The Truth of Myth and the Myth of Truth

 

Chairs:              Brayton Polka and Edna Rosenthal

 

The idea at play in this workshop is that science presupposes the nonscientific discourse/world of myth, i.e. that it is fiction that allows us to have a scientific conception of the world that is not mythical. But what are the criteria for determining scientific truth and fictional truth, and what is the relationship between these forms of truth?  Is it the case that we can distinguish between truth and falsehood solely on the basis of the story of the eating of the fruit of knowledge of good and evil by original man and woman as found in Genesis?  Is the very origin of truth itself a myth, a fiction?  Is all knowledge, including our very distinction between science and fiction, mythical?  Is science itself a fiction?  A venerable way of addressing these issues is to ask, to paraphrase Tertullian: What does Greek myth have to do with biblical myth?

It is hoped that those working in literature, religion, and philosophy (including the philosophy of science, ethics, and metaphysics) and related fields, like Jungian psychology, will be interested in engaging their colleagues in the exciting issues raised by examining the relationship between science and fiction.

Co-chairs
Brayton Polka, York University (Toronto)     bpolka@rogers.com
Edna Rosenthal, Kibbutzim College of Education (Tel-Aviv), edna@macam.ac.il

 

 

 

 

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