As part of the 2nd Week of Italian Cuisine, held from November 20 to November 26 2017, promoted by MAECI (Ministero degli Affari Esteri e della Cooperazione Internazionale) MIUR (Ministero dell’Istruzione dell’Università e della Ricerca) and MIPAAF (Ministero delle politiche agricole alimentari e forestali), the Italian Cultural Institute of Montreal present the conference: “Mad About Food: A Defense of Gastronomic Realism” by Martina Orlandi.
The conference is part of the series of encounters entitled “The travelling Genius : Italians Art, humanities, science … in the world“, is a space for discussion and cultural dialogue that the Italian Cultural Institute has developed especially for young Italians in world. Italians who, beyond any orientation, are the bearers of knowledge accumulated in Italy and diffuse the following, even without their knowledge, a provision or a vocation of ancient origin: the generous exchange of culture, comforted by a keen sense of human comprehension.
November 24, 2017, 6pm – Free Admission
Istituto Italiano di Cultura di Montreal
1200 Av. du Dr Penfield
Conference in English
Latin people used to say de gustibus non est disputandum, implying that our own tastes are inherently subjective and thus cannot be objects of criticism. Despite this claim being accepted by most people, some seem to consistently ignore it when making gastronomic judgments. When it comes to food we might, for example, blame people for eating meals that we consider disgusting or for purposely preferring to drink what is, all things considered, an inferior beer. Such strong reactions don’t seem to fit with the claim that tastes are subjective, rather they seem to presuppose an underlying gastronomic realism –the view according to which there are foods or drinks that are objectively good or bad. The aim of my paper is twofold. First, I defend the plausibility of gastronomic realism and in particular, I suggest that within certain respects it seems to be even more plausible than moral realism. Second, I show that a proper account of gastronomic realism warrants strong gastronomic reactions as appropriately fitting with the meta-gastronomical view.
Martina Orlandi is a PhD candidate in Philosophy at McGill University, working under the supervision of Profs. Sarah Stroud and Ian Gold. Her research interests include philosophy of mind and action, particularly phenomena of motivated irrationality. She is a member of the Interuniversity Research Group on Normativity (GRIN) and is working on a research project funded by FRQSC on validity in psychometrics with Prof. Eran Tal. She is currently writing her dissertation on the phenomenon of self-undeception (i.e. the phenomenon of coming out of self-deception).
Reservation no longer available