Philosopher's Lexicon (Otago Supplement)

baier, n. An injudicious purchaser of dubious psychological claims. "Only a baier would pay out good money for Gilligan's stuff about the feminine disregard for abstract justice."

currie, n. the experience of an imaginary meal, consisting of what you feel if simulating somebody consuming something hot. "I've had several curries today, but somehow they fail to satisfy."

causal cheyne, n. A sequence of causes connecting an empirical phenomenon with a theoretical entity. "Numbers don't exist, since there is no causal cheyne connecting them with the real world."

dyke, n.   A flexible (i.e. not tense) rampart against the flow of time. "Thanks to our dyke, Christmas will never come/never end." [delete according to preference]

gillett, n. Kitchen implement used in preparing continental recipes.
"Put on the gillet, Slip on the led
Papa's gonna bake us some postmodern bread
That ain't all Papa's gonna do
Papa's gonna make some existentialist stew "

griffiths, n. A small, articulate and exceedingly voluble Welsh griffin, noted for its emotional nature. A harbinger of either sex or death. "When I saw the griffiths, I did not know which affect-program to run - lust or fear."

mack, v. To hack away at a non-empirical item with a blunt Occam's razor.   Hence mackie, adj. something that has been macked up. "Once John got to work on them moral values began to look a bit mackie."

Mackie the Knife. Fictional gangster with no respect for moral values.
"On the sidewalk, Sunday morning
Lies a moral realist oozing life
Someone's sneaking round the corner
Is the someone Mackie the knife?"

Maclaurin, n. (Archaic also Maclion) Mythical researcher with the head of a philosopher, the body of a lion and the tail of a biologist.  

moore, n. Unit of excessive bureaucratic exertion. "We thought Andrew was on too many committees already but he kept asking for moore."

musgrave, n. contraction of mass and grave: an area for the indiscriminate burial of the body parts of slaughtered anti-realists. "After Alan had finished with Rorty and van Fraasen, they had to be consigned to a musgrave."

musgravy, n. A Northern English sauce, commonly employed to render mushy p s and qs more palatable.

mulganize, v. to soften up excessively demanding moral theories. "I foolishly bought a brand of consequentialism from a wandering petersinger and it looked as though it would force me to sell all I had to give to the poor. But now I've had it mulganized it allows me to eat out at expensive restaurants and to make frequent trips to the opera."

net-baier, n. Someone who purchases books about Hume off the internet.

oddie, adj. Applied to theories - bizarre and apparently indefensible: "He argued for a real oddie theory of value, according to which values are robustly mind independent and causally efficacious."

pigden, n.   A den or rumpus room consecrated to boisterous contradiction. "The seminar degenerated into a real pigden, with frequent cries of 'Not-p!', 'That's nuts!', and 'That's just false!'."

pigdenite, n. Logical substance used in the construction of inference-barriers, as between "is" and "ought". "A reason should be given for what seems altogether inconceivable - how I got by for so long without the aid of pigdenite [D. Hume, satisfied customer]"

tichy, n. A unit of likeness to truth. "He messed around with the theory endlessly but he did not improve it one tichy."

waldron,n. A strut or flying buttress designed to reinforce nonsense upon stilts.

ward, v. To guard, so to speak, against any misinterpretation, as it were, of Kant (e.g. "He warded off Cassirer").

ward, n. A protected area (often designated by a personal name) where a dead philosopher can rest in peace. "We consigned Kant to the David ward."

© Philosophy, University of Otago.
Feedback | Disclaimer | Contacts | ^ Top of page