Registration is open for the workshop 'Suffering and Attention'!
The event is free but registering is required for catering and venue planning purposes.
To register, please email [email protected]
(It is possible to register for both the student conference and the workshop at the same time)
-> See below for regularly updated information about the programme and how to get here.
The event is free but registering is required for catering and venue planning purposes.
To register, please email [email protected]
(It is possible to register for both the student conference and the workshop at the same time)
-> See below for regularly updated information about the programme and how to get here.
Workshop description
Suffering has always been topical. Where there is life, there is the capacity to suffer. But what precisely is suffering? It is more than pain, and it is more than things going badly. But what? And what, if anything, should we do about it?
The nature of suffering has recently become a topic of lively debate in analytic philosophy. In Suffering and Virtue (2018), Micheal Brady thinks of suffering as ‘displeasures that we mind’, while the volume The Philosophy of Suffering (2020), co-edited by Brady, David Bain and Jennifer Corns, collects a wide array of different views: suffering is conceived e.g. as negatively construing one’s situation, as a severe mental disruption, or as an emotion directed at pain. Different as these views are, they all agree that suffering is essentially experiential. But not even this seems to be a given. Corns (2022) has recently argued that suffering is significantly disrupted agency, hence not essentially marked by any experience at all – a view shared by some virtue ethical stances on suffering who take suffering to consist in prevention of flourishing, experienced or not.
The account of suffering we accept has a bearing on the way we will answer the ethical questions that suffering gives rise to: How do we engage with suffering, in ourselves and others? Do we have a duty always to alleviate or minimise it? Should we ever welcome it? Is it acceptable to look away, or do we have a responsibility to pay attention to it? And how do we attend to it without being crushed?
Interestingly, suffering is not thought of as only negative. Brady (2018) suggests that some forms of suffering, e.g. remorse, are virtuous reactions to wrong-doing and therefore praiseworthy. In The Philosophy of Suffering (2020) we find descriptions of suffering as an appropriate reaction to pain or a process to regain mental equilibrium. Twentieth century philosopher and mystic Simone Weil goes even one step further and sees suffering as an experience which, if met with love and attention, enables transformation and insight into the nature of reality and of oneself.
And yet, it is generally agreed that suffering is something negative: displeasure, pain, mental and agential disruption can be very hard to cope with and possess a destructive potential. Weil describes in disconcerting words the way in which suffering crushes the soul and makes us social outcasts, and how nearly psychologically impossible it is to attend to a sufferer.
But perhaps suffering is neither something to be embraced, nor something to be dealt with, but rather something to be dispelled. Suffering was the reason Siddhartha Gautama, according to tradition, started his wanderings and arrived at the main ideas of what is now known as Buddhism. In Buddhist philosophy, suffering arises from ignorance about our existence. Ideally, removing this ignorance will mean the end of suffering.
In this workshop, we will raise questions about the nature and ethics of suffering by putting in conversation contemporary analytic approaches with historical and continental views, and by broadening the scope to include reflections on the suffering of both human and non-human animals, environmental perspectives, and questions of suffering in the philosophy of medicine and mental health.
The nature of suffering has recently become a topic of lively debate in analytic philosophy. In Suffering and Virtue (2018), Micheal Brady thinks of suffering as ‘displeasures that we mind’, while the volume The Philosophy of Suffering (2020), co-edited by Brady, David Bain and Jennifer Corns, collects a wide array of different views: suffering is conceived e.g. as negatively construing one’s situation, as a severe mental disruption, or as an emotion directed at pain. Different as these views are, they all agree that suffering is essentially experiential. But not even this seems to be a given. Corns (2022) has recently argued that suffering is significantly disrupted agency, hence not essentially marked by any experience at all – a view shared by some virtue ethical stances on suffering who take suffering to consist in prevention of flourishing, experienced or not.
The account of suffering we accept has a bearing on the way we will answer the ethical questions that suffering gives rise to: How do we engage with suffering, in ourselves and others? Do we have a duty always to alleviate or minimise it? Should we ever welcome it? Is it acceptable to look away, or do we have a responsibility to pay attention to it? And how do we attend to it without being crushed?
Interestingly, suffering is not thought of as only negative. Brady (2018) suggests that some forms of suffering, e.g. remorse, are virtuous reactions to wrong-doing and therefore praiseworthy. In The Philosophy of Suffering (2020) we find descriptions of suffering as an appropriate reaction to pain or a process to regain mental equilibrium. Twentieth century philosopher and mystic Simone Weil goes even one step further and sees suffering as an experience which, if met with love and attention, enables transformation and insight into the nature of reality and of oneself.
And yet, it is generally agreed that suffering is something negative: displeasure, pain, mental and agential disruption can be very hard to cope with and possess a destructive potential. Weil describes in disconcerting words the way in which suffering crushes the soul and makes us social outcasts, and how nearly psychologically impossible it is to attend to a sufferer.
But perhaps suffering is neither something to be embraced, nor something to be dealt with, but rather something to be dispelled. Suffering was the reason Siddhartha Gautama, according to tradition, started his wanderings and arrived at the main ideas of what is now known as Buddhism. In Buddhist philosophy, suffering arises from ignorance about our existence. Ideally, removing this ignorance will mean the end of suffering.
In this workshop, we will raise questions about the nature and ethics of suffering by putting in conversation contemporary analytic approaches with historical and continental views, and by broadening the scope to include reflections on the suffering of both human and non-human animals, environmental perspectives, and questions of suffering in the philosophy of medicine and mental health.
Speakers
- Elisa Aaltola (University of Turku)
- Michael Brady (University of Glasgow)
- Silvia Caprioglio Panizza (University of Tübingen)
- Dorothea Debus (University of Konstanz)
- Eva-Maria Düringer (University of Tübingen)
- Ian James Kidd (University of Nottingham)
- Christopher Thomas (Manchester Metropolitan University)
- Mariëtte Willemsen (Amsterdam University College)
Programme
Day 1 16 April 2025
8:30 - 9:15
Registration and welcome
9:15 - 10:30
Dorothea Debus (Erlangen) ‘Attending to Pain as a Way of Dissolving Suffering: Some Philosophical Considerations’
Coffee
11:00 - 12:15
Elisa Aaltola (Turku) ‘Attention and Strategic Ignorance: The Psychology of Turning Away from Nonhuman Suffering’ [online]
12:15 - 13:15
Lunch
13:15 – 14:15
Hölderlin tower tour and poetry reading
14:30 - 15:45
Mariëtte Willemsen (Amsterdam) ‘Compassion and Imagination. In conversation with Nietzsche, Nussbaum, and Weil’
Coffee
16:15 - 17:30
Ian James Kidd (Nottingham) ‘Suffering and Pessimism’
Short break
17:45 - 19:15
Michael Brady (Glasgow) ‘Trauma, Attention, and Growth’ [Philosophy Colloquium]
19:30
Dinner at Sultan
Day 2 17 April 2025
9:00 - 10:15
Eva-Maria Düringer (Tübingen) ‘Suffering as being forced to bear the unbearable’
Short break
10:25 - 11:40
Christopher Thomas (Manchester) ‘“All the Horrors of the World are like Waves on the Sea”: Simone Weil on Beauty and Affliction’
Coffee
12:00 - 13:15
Silvia Caprioglio Panizza (Tübingen) ‘Truth in Suffering and the Imperative to Help’
8:30 - 9:15
Registration and welcome
9:15 - 10:30
Dorothea Debus (Erlangen) ‘Attending to Pain as a Way of Dissolving Suffering: Some Philosophical Considerations’
Coffee
11:00 - 12:15
Elisa Aaltola (Turku) ‘Attention and Strategic Ignorance: The Psychology of Turning Away from Nonhuman Suffering’ [online]
12:15 - 13:15
Lunch
13:15 – 14:15
Hölderlin tower tour and poetry reading
14:30 - 15:45
Mariëtte Willemsen (Amsterdam) ‘Compassion and Imagination. In conversation with Nietzsche, Nussbaum, and Weil’
Coffee
16:15 - 17:30
Ian James Kidd (Nottingham) ‘Suffering and Pessimism’
Short break
17:45 - 19:15
Michael Brady (Glasgow) ‘Trauma, Attention, and Growth’ [Philosophy Colloquium]
19:30
Dinner at Sultan
Day 2 17 April 2025
9:00 - 10:15
Eva-Maria Düringer (Tübingen) ‘Suffering as being forced to bear the unbearable’
Short break
10:25 - 11:40
Christopher Thomas (Manchester) ‘“All the Horrors of the World are like Waves on the Sea”: Simone Weil on Beauty and Affliction’
Coffee
12:00 - 13:15
Silvia Caprioglio Panizza (Tübingen) ‘Truth in Suffering and the Imperative to Help’
Transport information
Arriving by train
Within Germany and parts of Europe it is recommended to travel by train via Stuttgart. Stuttgart's main station is connected to the European high-speed rail network and is served by both ICE trains of Deutsche Bahn and French TGV. The onward journey from Stuttgart to Tübingen takes place with local train of Deutsche Bahn. The journey takes about one hour. You can buy tickets online here: https://int.bahn.de/en
From the Tübingen Main Train Station, it's a 15 minute walk to Alte Aula, or you can take buses 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 9, 11, 12, 13, 18, 19 from Tübingen Hautbanhof to Neckarbrücke, then walk for 5 minutes (go straight for 1 min and then left on Neckargasse).
Arriving by car
Tübingen is easily accessible by car via various freeways. The four-lane Bundesstraße 27 leads directly from the Autobahn 8 at Stuttgart Messe to Tübingen. Road users on the Autobahn 81 take the Herrenberg exit coming from the north and the Rottenburg exit coming from the south. From Herrenberg the Bundesstraße 296 leads to Tübingen. From the Rottenburg exit, take the Bundesstraße 28 a as well as state roads.
Tübingen has several car parks close to the university:
Arriving by plane
International guests are recommended to arrive via Stuttgart Airport (STR). The airport is about 30 kilometres from the city centre of Tübingen. The journey by car takes about half an hour under normal traffic conditions. In addition, there is a direct bus line 828 (Airport Sprinter) between the airport and the university's Campus Tal. The journey by bus takes about one hour.
Other nearby airports are Frankfurt and Munich (both approximately 3 hours from Tübingen by train or bus)
(Transport information adapted from the Tübingen University website)
Within Germany and parts of Europe it is recommended to travel by train via Stuttgart. Stuttgart's main station is connected to the European high-speed rail network and is served by both ICE trains of Deutsche Bahn and French TGV. The onward journey from Stuttgart to Tübingen takes place with local train of Deutsche Bahn. The journey takes about one hour. You can buy tickets online here: https://int.bahn.de/en
From the Tübingen Main Train Station, it's a 15 minute walk to Alte Aula, or you can take buses 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 9, 11, 12, 13, 18, 19 from Tübingen Hautbanhof to Neckarbrücke, then walk for 5 minutes (go straight for 1 min and then left on Neckargasse).
Arriving by car
Tübingen is easily accessible by car via various freeways. The four-lane Bundesstraße 27 leads directly from the Autobahn 8 at Stuttgart Messe to Tübingen. Road users on the Autobahn 81 take the Herrenberg exit coming from the north and the Rottenburg exit coming from the south. From Herrenberg the Bundesstraße 296 leads to Tübingen. From the Rottenburg exit, take the Bundesstraße 28 a as well as state roads.
Tübingen has several car parks close to the university:
- Car park Brunnenstraße 29 (Campus Tal)
- Car park Altstadt König, Herrenberger Str. 2 (historical center, university hospital Tal)
- Car park P4 Crona, Hoppe-Seyler-Straße 2 (university hospital Berg)
- Car park Ebenhalde, Schnarrenbergstraße 158 (Campus Morgenstelle)
Arriving by plane
International guests are recommended to arrive via Stuttgart Airport (STR). The airport is about 30 kilometres from the city centre of Tübingen. The journey by car takes about half an hour under normal traffic conditions. In addition, there is a direct bus line 828 (Airport Sprinter) between the airport and the university's Campus Tal. The journey by bus takes about one hour.
Other nearby airports are Frankfurt and Munich (both approximately 3 hours from Tübingen by train or bus)
(Transport information adapted from the Tübingen University website)
