Pragmatism’s heartening recent revival (spearheaded by Richard Rorty’s bold intervention into analytic philosophy Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature) has coalesced into a distinctive philosophical movement frequently referred to as ‘neopragmatism’. This movement interprets the very meaning of pragmatism as rejection of metaphysical commitments: our words do not primarily serve to represent non-linguistic entities, but are tools to achieve a range of human purposes. A particularly thorough and consistent version of this position is Huw Price’s global expressivism. We here critically (...) appraise Price’s understanding of a commitment to pragmatism as a rejection of metaphysics, and argue that such rejection is not as easy or desirable as Price claims. First we argue that Price’s global expressivism itself draws on significant metaphysical assumptions (a ‘word-world’ dualism, and a nominalism concerning the meaning of general terms). Then we seek to resolve neopragmatist anxieties about metaphysics by arguing that metaphysics is indispensable for pragmatist philosophizing insofar as it seeks ways for human beings to realise themselves through practices of understanding reality and their place in it. If, as we argue, metaphysics consists in a maximally general inquiry into the nature and structure of reality, to try to block it seems a puzzling exercise in epistemic self-harm. (shrink)

The notions of ‘growth’ and ‘inquiry’ are central in the Philosophy for Children movement. Phil Cam’s writings on these concepts clearly map their close connection and, in the process, raise further questions for teachers of philosophy on curriculum content and the management of inquiry itself. With reference to the senior secondary context, I show how Cam’s exposition points to the teacher’s significant role, not only in the management of inquiry, but also in his or her participation as a learner in (...) the process. Furthermore, this learning goes beyond academic and pedagogical dimensions to ones involving personal development and character. In conclusion, I suggest that recognition of this deeper dimension of teacher quality is particularly needful today. (shrink)

An anti-representationalist view of language and a deflationary view of truth, key themes in contemporary pragmatism and especially Richard Rorty, do not undermine the notion, in critical theory, of ideology as 'false consciousness'. Both Foucault and Marx were opposed to what Marxists call historical idealism and so they should be seen as objecting to forms of ideology-critique that do not sufficiently avoid such an 'Hegelian' perspective. Foucault's general views on the relations between truth and power can plausibly be construed in (...) a way that makes them compatible with a Marxian critical theory. (shrink)

This essay first traces change in, roughly, the epistemology of the humanities from the 1950s to the 21st century. The second section looks at how the meaning and options in moral philosophy altered in more or less the same period. The last and easily most speculative section examines how these changes permeated American culture, and how professional philosophers responded to the challenges of the new political world they inhabited.

The paper is aimed at discussing two interpretations of pragmatism in a broader framework of general rules of philosophical interpretation. J. Habermas' and R. Rorty's uses of pragmatism are considered in detail and confronted with general assumptions of pragmatic philosophy. It is shown that in both cases the original ideas of pragmatism are changed in order to fit the philosophies of interpreters. The paper ends with discussion of a possibility of applying the rule of interpretative charity and dialogue to philosophical (...) analyses. Key Words: communication • dialogue • interpretation • postmodernism • pragmatism • tradition • transcendentalism. (shrink)

This paper motivates and defends “Rortian realism,” a position that is Rortian in respect of its underlying philosophical theses but non-Rortian in terms of the lessons it draws from these for cultural politics. The philosophical theses amount to what the paper calls Rorty's “anti-representationalism”, arguing that AR is robust to critique as being anti-realist, relativist, or sceptical, invoking Rorty's historicism/ethnocentrism as part of the defence. The latter, however, creates problems for Rorty in so far as his reformative views on the (...) nature of philosophical and academic activity are meant to be foisted on an academy that ex hypothesi holds views different from these. The paper suggests we can motivate a different conception of the consequences of AR more amenable to the academy: Rortian realism, a view that makes greater concessions to realism and a kind of scientific naturalism than Rorty would like, but that for those very reasons is more likely to allow AR to prevail. (shrink)

Through the critical examination of Baudrillard's concept of hyperreality, this article seeks to make a wider contribution to contempor ary debates about postmodernism. It draws on a post-Cartesian, Heideg gerian philosophy to demonstrate the weakness of the concept of hyperreality and reveal its foundation in a Cartesian epistemology. The article goes on to claim that this same Heideggerian tradition suggests a way in which the concept of hyperreality and nihilistic postmodern sociologies more generally might be dialectically superseded. Instead of these (...) theories being seen as saying anything insightful about recent social transformations, the epistemological void in which they position themselves should be inter preted as the intellectual expression of the wider cultural and postmodern trend of transgression. Key Words: Baudrillard • Cartesianism • Heidegger • hyperreality • postmodernism. (shrink)

Although the later Wittgenstein appears as one of the most influential figures in Davidson’s later works on meaning, it is not, for the most part, clear how Davidson interprets and employs Wittgenstein’s ideas. In this paper, I will argue that Davidson’s later works on meaning can be seen as mainly a manifestation of his attempt to accommodate the later Wittgenstein’s basic ideas about meaning and understanding, especially the requirement of drawing the seems right/is right distinction and the way this requirement (...) must be met. These ideas, however, are interpreted by Davidson in his own way. I will then argue that Davidson even attempts to respect Wittgenstein’s quietism, provided that we understand this view in the way Davidson does. Having argued for that, I will finally investigate whether, for Davidson at least, his more theoretical and supposedly explanatory projects, such as that of constructing a formal theory of meaning and his use of the notion of triangulation, are in conflict with this Wittgensteinian quietist view. (shrink)

Richard Rorty is one of the principal architects of a new way of thinking about liberalism. He calls his way “liberal ironism”: it is a postmodern liberalism, without Enlightenment rationalism, without the hopeless and finally enervating aspiration to discover an a historical philosophical foundation for liberal principles and practices. The postmodern liberal ironist, unlike the classical liberal rationalist, “faces up to the contingency of his or her own most central beliefs and desires,” says Rorty, including the characteristic liberal belief that (...) “cruelty is the worst thing we do.” Such postmodern liberals frankly admit the apparently unhappy consequence of that essential “contingency,” that “there is no neutral, noncircular way to defend” liberal ways, no good argument to deploy against “Nazi and Marxist enemies of liberalism”; but no such argument is needed, says Rorty, since loyalty to one's own community is morality enough, even where that loyalty is without foundation. Here, I begin with a few words about Rorty's postmodern liberalism, as preface to a discussion of the effects of postmodern doctrines on liberal moral psychology. (shrink)

Rorty's neopragmatism is an attempt to retrofit Dewey's experimentalism for the post-modern situation. Specifically, he substitutes "language" for "experience" and "culture" for "science", to arrive at a philosophy "no closer to science than to art". I argue that the first move results from misunderstanding of the role experience plays in the context of verification in Dewey's experimental logic. The second move leaves Rorty without any alternative method even for approaching the very problems which Dewey proposed to solve with his experimentalism.

Abstract: In this article I contest a reading of Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations —a reading of it as debunking philosophy. I concede that such a reading is not groundless, but I show why it is nonetheless mistaken. To do so, I distinguish two different ways of viewing Philosophical Investigations and its concern with philosophical problems, an External View and an Internal View. On the External View, readers of the book are taken to know ahead of time what philosophical problems are. On (...) the Internal View, readers are not taken to know this ahead of time: the task of the book is to disclose what philosophical problems are, to show them coming into being. One thing disclosed is our participatory role in philosophical problems coming to be. Learning about the nature of philosophical problems is thus learning about our own nature; metaphilosophical knowledge is in part self-knowledge. If the Internal View is correct (as I believe it is), then Philosophical Investigations does not debunk philosophy but provides a different conception of philosophy and the philosopher's task. (shrink)

This article identifies a common intellectual project of the disciplines that constitute the Humanities. It does not define the humanities but characterizes some of the main features of the distinctive and essential kind of learning uniquely attainable by their study. The humanities enable us to attain an understanding of normativity in the broadest sense; humanistic study leads to a textured, penetrating comprehension of diverse valuative matters and concerns. Moreover, study in the humanities enables us to recognize and appreciate valuative realism (...) . This is the view that valuative matters are appropriate objects of comprehension and that values are not simply projected in an expressivist or subjectivist manner. Valuative realism does not depend upon, and should not be assimilated into, knowledge that emulates the methods of the sciences. Humane studies develop a genuine understanding of diverse kinds of significance and educate people in the concepts and discourse to articulate it. (shrink)

The objective to which this manuscript is oriented to is focused on the analysis of interpersonal communication in sport. The multimodal essence of human nature adopts special characteristics in individual and team sports, given the roles that athletes adopt in different circumstances, depending on the contingencies that characterize each competition or each training session. Themixed methodsframework allows us to advance in the ways of integration between qualitative and quantitative elements, taking advantage of the proven possibilities of systematic observation, which we (...) can considermixed methodin itself, and which provides rigor and flexibility in the study of the communicative flow in sport. In any sport, the procedure followed by systematic observation may require direct observation, which is characterized by its high perceptiveness, or indirect observation, when it comes to verbal behavior or documentary material. In all cases, the procedure is structured in three macro-stages: QUAL-QUAN-QUAL. In this work we start from a conceptual positioning about interpersonal communication, to later show the sequential gear in sports about obtaining qualitative data, its transformation into other types of data that are still qualitative but have been structured, analyze them quantitatively, and return to a qualitative stage where the interpretation of the results is possible. This process ofquantitizingconstitutes the cornerstone that gives shape and structure to any research on interpersonal communication in sport that combines the fine nuances of qualitative data (a motor action, a gesture, an exclamation,…) with the power of robust quantitative data analysis suitable for the treatment of organized qualitative data, which will provide qualitativefeed-back. (shrink)

In today’s pluralistic society, clinical ethics consultation cannot count on a pre-given set of rules and principles to be applied to a specific situation, because such an approach would deny the existence of different and divergent backgrounds by imposing a dogmatic and transcultural morality. Clinical ethics support (CES) needs to overcome this lack of foundations and conjugate the respect for the difference at stake with the necessity to find shared and workable solutions for ethical issues encountered in clinical practice. We (...) argue that a pragmatist approach to CES, based on the philosophical theories of William James, John Dewey, and Charles Sanders Peirce, can help to achieve the goal of reaching practical solutions for moral problems in the context of today’s clinical environment, characterized by ethical pluralism. In this article, we outline a pragmatist theoretical framework for CES. Furthermore, we will show that moral case deliberation, making use of the dilemma method, can be regarded an example of a pragmatist approach to CES. (shrink)

This introduction to the special issue of Human Studies on postphenomenology outlines specific developments which have led to this style of phenomenology. Postphenomenology adapts aspects of pragmatism, including its anti-Cartesian program against early modern subject/object epistemology. Postphenomenology retains and emphasizes the use of phenomenological variations as an analytic tool, and in practice postphenomenology takes what is commonly now called “an empirical turn,” which deeply analyzes case studies or concrete issues under its purview.

As a regular reader of Science, Scientific American, Nature and The Eonomist, I could not miss how so many articles in these science-technology journals refer to micro-processing, which today dominates so much science-praxis. I have become aware that how science happens, changes primarily with a wide context of instrument changes. That is what this paper is about. Heidegger’s technologies were largely Industrial-Big, Machinic, and Mechanical. Science, today often a leader, is now operating by using micro-nano processes and has often shifted (...) to biological and medical sciences, marking a change in how science operates. This has significant consequences for how we should think about the “transcendental” and the “empirical” in philosophy of technology. (shrink)

International Relations's intellectual history is almost always treated as a history of ideas in isolation from both those discursive and political economies which provide its disciplinary and wider context. This paper contributes to this wider analysis by focusing on the impact of the field's discursive economy. Specifically, using Foucaultian archaeologico-genealogical strategy of problematization to analyse the emergence and disciplinary trajectories of Constructivism in IR, this paper argues that Constructivism has been brought gradually closer to its mainstream Neo-utilitarian counterpart through a (...) process of normalization, and investigates how it was possible for Constructivism to be purged of its early critical potential, both theoretical and practical. The first part of the paper shows how the intellectual configuration of Constructivism and its disciplinary fortunes are inseparable from far-from-unproblematic readings of the Philosophy of Social Science: the choices made at this level are neither as intellectually neutral nor as disciplinarily inconsequential as they are presented. The second and third parts chart the genealogies of Constructivism, showing how its overall normalization occurred in two stages, each revolving around particular practices and events. The second part concentrates on older genealogies, analysing the politics of early classificatory practices regarding Constructivism, and showing how these permitted the distillation and immunization of Constructivism – and thus of the rest of the mainstream scholarship which it was depicted as compatible with – against more radical Postmodernist/Post-structuralist critiques. Finally, the third part focuses attention on recent genealogies, revealing new attempts to reconstruct and reformulate Constructivism: here, indirect neutralization practices such as the elaboration of ‘Pragmatist’ Constructivism, as well as the direct neutralization such as the formulation of ‘Realist’ Constructivism, are key events in Constructivism's normalization. These apparently ‘critical’ alternatives that aim to ‘provide the identity variable’ in fact remain close to Neo-utilitarianism, but their successful representation as ‘critical’ help neutralize calls for greater openness in mainstream IR. Rather than a simple intellectual history, it is this complex process of reading and producing that counts as ‘Constructivism’, which explains both the normalization of Constructivism and the continued marginalization of Postmodernist/Post-structuralist approaches in mainstream IR's infra-disciplinary balance of intellectual power. (shrink)

International Relations's intellectual history is almost always treated as a history of ideas in isolation from both those discursive and political economies which provide its disciplinary and wider context. This paper contributes to this wider analysis by focusing on the impact of the field's discursive economy. Specifically, using Foucaultian archaeologico-genealogical strategy of problematization to analyse the emergence and disciplinary trajectories of Constructivism in IR, this paper argues that Constructivism has been brought gradually closer to its mainstream Neo-utilitarian counterpart through a (...) process of normalization, and investigates how it was possible for Constructivism to be purged of its early critical potential, both theoretical and practical. The first part of the paper shows how the intellectual configuration of Constructivism and its disciplinary fortunes are inseparable from far-from-unproblematic readings of the Philosophy of Social Science: the choices made at this level are neither as intellectually neutral nor as disciplinarily inconsequential as they are presented. The second and third parts chart the genealogies of Constructivism, showing how its overall normalization occurred in two stages, each revolving around particular practices and events. The second part concentrates on older genealogies, analysing the politics of early classificatory practices regarding Constructivism, and showing how these permitted the distillation and immunization of Constructivism – and thus of the rest of the mainstream scholarship which it was depicted as compatible with – against more radical Postmodernist/Post-structuralist critiques. Finally, the third part focuses attention on recent genealogies, revealing new attempts to reconstruct and reformulate Constructivism: here, indirect neutralization practices such as the elaboration of ‘Pragmatist’ Constructivism, as well as the direct neutralization such as the formulation of ‘Realist’ Constructivism, are key events in Constructivism's normalization. These apparently ‘critical’ alternatives that aim to ‘provide the identity variable’ in fact remain close to Neo-utilitarianism, but their successful representation as ‘critical’ help neutralize calls for greater openness in mainstream IR. Rather than a simple intellectual history, it is this complex process of reading and producing that counts as ‘Constructivism’, which explains both the normalization of Constructivism and the continued marginalization of Postmodernist/Post-structuralist approaches in mainstream IR's infra-disciplinary balance of intellectual power. (shrink)

This collection maintains a dialogue between the analytic and continental traditions, while aspiring to situate itself beyond the analytic-continental divide. It divides into four parts, Methodologies, Truth and Meaning, Metaphysics and Ontology, and Values, Personhood and Agency, though there is considerable overlap among the categories. History and temporality are recurrent themes, but there is a lot of metaphysics generally, with some philosophy of language, philosophy of social science, ethics, political philosophy and epistemology. Less prominent is a pragmatic, deflationary attitude, and (...) at a number of points I argue for the virtues of such an approach. (shrink)

It is a commonplace among certain recent philosophers that there is no such thing as the essence of anything. Nietzsche, for example, asserts that things have no essence of their own, because they are nothing but ceaselessly changing ways of acting on, and reacting to, other things. Wittgenstein, famously, rejects the idea that there is an essence to language and thought – at least if we mean by that some a priori logical structure underlying our everyday utterances. Finally, Richard Rorty (...) urges that we ‘abandon … the notion of “essence” altogether’, along with ‘the notion that man's essence is to be a knower of essences’. (shrink)

It is a commonplace among certain recent philosophers that there is no such thing as theessenceof anything. Nietzsche, for example, asserts that things have no essence of their own, because they are nothing but ceaselessly changing ways of acting on, and reacting to, other things. Wittgenstein, famously, rejects the idea that there is an essence to language and thought — at least if we mean by that somea priorilogical structure underlying our everyday utterances. Finally, Richard Rorty urges that we “abandon (...) […] the notion of ‘essence’ altogether”, along with “the notion that man's essence is to be a knower of essences”.It would be wrong to maintain that these writers understand the concept of essence in precisely the same way, or that they are all working towards the same philosophical goal. Nevertheless, they do share one aim in common: to undermine the idea that there is some deeper reality or identityunderlyingandgroundingwhat we encounter in the world, what we say and what we do. That is to say, they may all be described asanti-foundationalistthinkers — thinkers who want us to attend to the specific processes and practices of nature and humanity without understanding them to be the product of some fundamental essence or “absolute”. (shrink)

I argue for three principle claims. First, philosophers who seek to integrate the semantic and the intentional into a naturalistic metaphysical worldview need to address a task that they have thus far largely failed even to notice: explaining into- level connections between the physical and the intentional in a naturalistically acceptable way. Second, there are serious reasons to think that this task cannot be carried out in a way that would vindicate realism about intentionality. Third, there is much to be (...) said for an irrealist, non-eliminativist, naturalistic approach to intentionality that I call "preservative irrealism". (shrink)

I propose a metaphysical position I call 'limited metaphysical realism', and I link it to a position in the philosophy of language I call 'psychologistic semantics'. Limited metaphysical realism asserts that there is a mind-independent, discourse-independent world, but posits a sparse ontology. Psychologistic semantics construes truth not as direct word/world correspondence, and not as warranted assertibility (or Putnam's "ideal" warranted assertibility), but rather as 'correct assertibility'. I argue that virtues of this package deal over each of the two broad positions (...) that have recently dominated metaphysics and philosophy of language--positions I call package deal metaphysical realism, and package deal anti-realism. (shrink)

Epistemology has traditionally sought to discover the foundations of knowledge. Recently, anti‐foundational philosophers have construed epistemo‐logy's failure to discover an ultimate ground to indicate the bankruptcy of foundational theory. On closer examination, however, the history of epistemology reveals the aim of foundational theory to be different both from the reductive ideal of its traditional defenders and from the unsystematic relativism that its recent critics offer instead. An alternative history of foundational theory reveals a progress toward multiple necessary foundations which is (...) the task of epistemology to articulate. (shrink)

Reason, objectivity, and human nature are now suspect ideas. Among postmodern thinkers, Richard Rorty has advanced an especially forceful critique of these notions. Drawing partly on Wittgenstein's philosophy of language, Rorty contends that objectivity is no more than a metaphysical name for intersubjective agreement, and that “human nature” is an empty category, there being nothing beneath history and culture. Wittgenstein himself, however, recognized within the world's many civilizations “the common behavior of mankind,” without which Rorty's ethnocentric “solidarity” would be inconceivable. (...) This common form of life—the life of those who speak—encompasses countless human activities that presuppose and are interwoven with the concepts of reason and objectivity. (shrink)

In this article an attempt is made to provide a re-vision of philosophy of education that will redress the legacy of the past in South Africa, and contribute to laying the foundations of a critical civil society with a culture of tolerance, public debate and accommodation of differences and competing interests. This re-vision of philosophy of education, which finds its roots in developments in philosophy in the twentieth century, and especially in the discourse of postmodernism, directs attention to a pluralistic (...) problem-centred approach to philosophy of education. (shrink)

How can philosophy exert its critical function in society and in education if any appeal to independent and even relatively ‘certain’ criteria seems problematic? The epistemological doubts that foundationalist models of justification encounter unavoidably seem to raise this question. In particular, the relativist implications that seem to result from rejecting such models seem to paralyse the critical potential of philosophy of education. In order to explore the possibilities of a conception of educational critique that avoids the pitfalls of foundationalism, I (...) analyse the epistemological dimensions of this much-feared relativism, illustrating this with some characteristic examples. Solving the problems raised will require an interpretation of critique that leaves our daily sense of critique intact, without literally adopting its—foundationalist—basic assumptions. After systematically developing such an alternative interpretation of critical usage, a non-relativist but still non-foundationalist and powerful conception of philosophical critique seems possible. I illustrate results with some examples from philosophy of education. (shrink)

I argue that desire sometimes amounts to knowledge, in the same sense that belief sometimes amounts to knowledge. The argument rests on two assumptions: that goodness is the correctness condition for desire and that knowledge is apt mental representation. Desire that amounts to knowledge—or ‘conative knowledge’—is illustrated by cases in which someone knows the goodness of something despite not believing that it is good.

While contemporary feminist philosophical discussions focus on the oppressiveness of universality which obliterates “difference,” the complete demise of universality might hamper feminist philosophy in its political project of furthering the well-being of all women. Dewey's thoroughly functionalized, relativized, and fallibilized understanding of universality may help us cut universality down to size while also appreciating its limited contribution. Deweyan universality may signify the ongoing search for a genuinely common language in the midst of difference.

While contemporary feminist philosophical discussions focus on the oppressiveness of universality which obliterates "difference," the complete demise of universality might hamper feminist philosophy in its political project of furthering the well-being of all women. Dewey's thoroughly functionalized, relativized, and fallibilized understanding of universality may help us cut universality down to size while also appreciating its limited contribution. Deweyan universality may signify the ongoing search for a genuinely common language in the midst of difference.

Truth, the pragmatist claims, is something we make, not something which corresponds to reality. If this view of truth is accepted, Rorty notes, two problems arise: the pragmatist will have little to say to those who abuse others, because he or she will not be able to point to some universal standards that the abusers are vio lating ; and the torturers may be able to quote pragmatic principles in their own defence. Rorty argues that the pragmatist can reduce cruelty (...) by splitting himself or herself into public and private parts. I examine this problem and Rorty's solution. I argue that his solution fails for two reasons: first, keeping our public and private selves apart is unlikely to reduce cruelty; and, second, he cannot maintain the public/private split. Consequently, Rorty is unable to deal with the anti-pragmatic criticism that his theory of truth could lead to an increase in cruelty. Key Words: democracy • liberalism • political theory • pragmatism • Richard Rorty. (shrink)

After a brief sketch of the history of philosophical pragmatism generally, and of legal pragmatism specifically (section 1), this paper develops a new, neo-classical legal pragmatism: a theory of law drawing in part on Holmes, but also on ideas from the classical pragmatist tradition in philosophy. Main themes are the "pluralistic universe" of law (section 2); the evolution of legal systems (section 3); the place of logic in the law (section 4); and the relation of law and morality (section 5).

What I have to offer here are some thoughts about the “research ethic,” and the ethics of research, in philosophy. There won't be any exciting stuff about the political wisdom or otherwise of research into racial differences in intelligence, or the ethics of scientists' treatment of laboratory animals, or moral issues concerning genetic engineering or nuclear technology, or anything of that kind. There will be only, besides some rather dry analysis of what constitutes genuine inquiry and how the real thing (...) can come to be corrupted, some rather uncomfortable reflections about the present condition of philosophy, its causes and its consequences. (shrink)

Nobody seriously doubts the possibility, or the usefulness, of finding things out; that is something we all take for granted when we inquire about our plane schedule, the state of our bank account, the best treatment for our child's illness, and so forth – a presupposition of the most ordinary, everyday looking into things as well as of the most sophisticated scientific research, not to mention of the legal system. Of course, nobody seriously doubts, either, that sometimes, instead of really (...) looking into things, people fake, fudge, and obfuscate to avoid discovering unpalatable truths or having to give up comfortable tenets; that is something we all take for granted when we ask who paid for a reassuring study, who stands to gain from an Official Inquiry, which party an expert witness works for, and so on.Of late, however, radical feminists, multiculturalists, sociologists and rhetoricians of science, and a good many philosophers as well – though they look into questions about their plane schedules, bank accounts, medical treatments, etc., just like everyone else – profess to have seen through what the rest of us take for granted. (shrink)

In this reply, I take up the challenges the five respondents raised. In particular, I deal with the issues of truth, bivalence, tolerance, and justification.

The passing of Richard Rorty is an event to mark in the annals of American philosophy - the passing of a spirit-guide to some, and of a dark shadow to others, but certainly that of an original, iconoclastic thinker who brought classical American pragmatism back into the contemporary philosophical conversation, and who got philosophers telling stories of achieving a long-loved dream of democracy. I outline a twelve-point agenda for productive future philosophical wrangles with Rorty, highlighting his metaphysical nominalism, antireligious ironism, (...) and "Western bourgeois liberal democracy.". (shrink)

The topic of this paper is an examination of the practical dimension of contemporary philosophical culture, both in relation to the idea of wisdom in traditional philosophy and in relation to psychoanalytical practice. In the first part of the paper, we determine what philosophical culture is, primarily by emphasizing the differences between that culture and the scientific-technological culture. In the second part of the paper, we show that such a philosophical culture has fallen into a crisis. In the third part (...) of paper, we offer a way out of that crisis, in the form of psychoanalysis, which criticizes the primacy that philosophical culture accords to consciousness, logic, diachronic and linear ways of thinking. In the fourth and last part of the paper, we present the shortcomings of this psychoanalytical model. As a solution, we offer a new model of philosophical culture, created by the synthesis of philosophy, psychoanalysis, but also other discipline of human thought, which has similarities with Nietzsche?s anticipation of Gay Science, as well as with Jasper?s idea of transcendence. (shrink)

An interpretation is given of John Dewey's views about “realism” in metaphysics, and of how these views relate to contemporary debates. Dewey rejected standard formulations of realism as a general metaphysical position, and interpreters have often been taken him to be sympathetic to some form of verificationism or constructivism. I argue that these interpretations are mistaken, as Dewey's unease with standard formulations of realism comes from his philosophical emphasis on intelligent control of events, by means of ordinary action. Because of (...) his views about relations, Dewey's views in this area do risk collapsing into an overly holistic position. I discuss how these problems might be avoided, and consider also how Dewey's views about naturalism and realism might usefully inform ongoing work. (shrink)