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.

In texts such as “Richard Rorty’s Pragmatic Turn” Jürgen Habermas defends a theory that associates, on the one hand, the truth-claim raised by a speaker for a proposition p with, on the other hand, the requirement that p be “defendable on the basis of good reasons […] at any time and against anybody”. This, as is known, has been the target of criticisms by Rorty, who−in spite of agreeing with Habermas on the central tenet that the way of evaluating our (...) beliefs must be argumentative practice−declares that the only “ideal presupposed by discourse” is “that of being able to justify your beliefs to a competent audience”. We will consider two texts from 1971, -surprisingly neglected in most approaches to the debate-, in which Habermas did include such a “competence condition” to elucidate the notion of truth. We will discuss whether there are good reasons to relinquish such a condition and to refer, instead, only to the formal or procedural properties of argumentative exchanges, as Habermas does in presenting the notion of “ideal speech situation”. As we will try to argue, there are no such good reasons. (shrink)

In this article the author tries to give an answer - from the point of view of the transcendental pragmatic foundation of discourse ethics - to the title question, which was raised by the Unesco conferences entitled `Universal Ethics' in Paris (27 March 1997) and Naples (December 1997). The article should be understood as a supplement to the empiristic-comparative responses of S. Bok and H. Küng, and especially to the communitarian approach of M. Walzer, proposed at the first conference. Unlike (...) traditional rationalism, this approach does not try to deduce concrete moral norms from axiomatic first principles; it begins with transcendental reflection on the undeniable moral presuppositions of argumentative discourse (which is not circumventable in philosophy). The approach first deduces from these presuppositions only the ideal procedures for the moral discourses through which all concrete moral problems ought to be solved, if possible. The second step provides a strategic-counter-strategic supplementation principle for those cases where undistorted moral discourses are not possible. (shrink)

The so-called debate between Jürgen Habermas and John Rawls concentrated mainly on the latter’s political liberalism. It dealt with the many aspects of Rawls’s philosophical project. In this article, I focus only on one of them, namely the epistemic or cognitivistic nature of principles of justice. The first part provides an overview of the debate, while the second part aims to show that Habermas has not misinterpreted Rawls’s position. I argue that Habermas rightly considers Rawls’s conception of justice as a (...) moral one. In the last part, I discuss two key questions raised by Habermas. The first concerns the relation between justification and acceptance of the principles of justice. The second concerns the relation between two validity terms: truth and reasonableness. (shrink)

As understood today, political correctness aims at preventing social discrimination by curtailing offensive speech and behaviour towards underprivileged groups of individuals. The core proponents of political correctness often draw on post-modernism and critical theory and are notorious for their scepticism about objective truth and scientific rationality. Conversely, the critics of post-modern political correctness uphold Enlightenment liberal principles of scientific reasoning, rational truth-seeking and open discourse against claims of relativism and oppression. Yet, both the post-modern proponents and their Enlightenment liberal critics (...) make up two sides of the same phenomenon of political correctness. Both sides intend to protect a liberal value system from illiberal truth-claims, which is the function of politically correct regulation. While post-modern advocates attempt to promote liberating tolerance, Enlightenment liberals place liberal values above the open-ended search for truth. Despite appearances to the contrary, this socio-academic debate is not about two sides favouring and opposing political correctness. In fact, it is a debate about the type of politically correct regulation that can better guard liberal values. (shrink)

An overview of a philosophical movement originating in the United States of America in the 19th century.

Does the wide distribution of political power in democracies, relative to other modes of government, result in better decisions? Specifically, do we have any reason to believe that they are better qualitatively – more reasoned, better supported by the available evidence, more deserving of support – than those which have been made by other means? In order to answer this question we examine the recent effort by Talisse and Misak to show that democracy is epistemically justified. Highlighting the strengths and (...) weaknesses of their arguments, we conclude that the differences between an epistemic conception of democracy and an epistemic justification of democracy are fundamental to determining the relative attractions of different arguments for democracy, and their implications for actual forms of government. -/- . (shrink)

Conceptions of acceptability-based moral or political justification take it that authoritative acceptability constitutes, or contributes to, validity, or justification. There is no agreement as to what bar for authoritativeness such justification may employ. The paper engages the issue in relation to (i) the level of idealization that a bar for authoritativeness, ψ, imparts to a standard of acceptability-based justification, S, and (ii) the degree of discursive purchase of the discursive standing that S accords to people when it builds ψ. I (...) argue that (i) and (ii) are interdependent: high idealization values entail low discursive purchase, while high degrees of purchase require low idealization values. I then distinguish between alethic conceptions of justification that prioritize ends that commit to high idealization values, and recognitive conceptions that favour high discursive purchase. On this basis, I argue for a moderately recognitivist constraint on idealization. To render the recognitive discursive minimum available to relevant people at the site of justification, S should set ψ low enough so that it is a genuine option for actual people to reject relevant views in ways that S recognizes as authoritative. (shrink)

We critically assess integrative social contracts theory (ISCT) and show that the concept particularly lacks of moral justification of substantive hypernorms. By drawing on Habermasian philosophy, in particular discourse ethics and its recent application in the theory of deliberative democracy , we further advance ISCT and show that social contracting in business ethics requires a well-justified procedural rather than a substantive focus for managing stakeholder relations. We also replace the monological concept of hypothetical thought experiments in ISCT by a concept (...) of practical discourse to better govern business activities on the macro-level of organizational actors such as firms, governments, and NGOs. (shrink)

A lengthy reply to 13 critical discussions of _Meaning in Life: An Analytic Study_ collected in an e-book and reprinted from the _Journal of Philosophy of Life_. The contributors are from a variety of philosophical traditions, including the Anglo-American, Continental and East Asian (especially Buddhist and Japanese) ones.

Drawing from a variety of Hegel’s writings, Shannon Hoff articulates a theory of justice that requires answering simultaneously to three irreducibly different demands: those of community, universality, and individuality. The domains of “ethicality,” “legality,” and “morality” correspond to these essential dimensions of human experience, and a political system that fails to give adequate recognition to any one of these will become oppressive. The commitment to legality emphasized in modern and contemporary political life, Hoff argues, systematically precludes adequate recognition of the (...) formative cultural contexts that Hegel identifies under the name of “ethical life” and of singular experiences of moral duty, or conscience. Countering the perception of Hegel as a conservative political thinker and engaging broadly with contemporary work in liberalism, critical theory, and feminism, Hoff focuses on these themes of ethicality and conscience to consider how modern liberal politics must be transformed if it is to accommodate these essential dimensions of human life. (shrink)

This article examines Gianni Vattimo’s contribution to the recent ontological turn in political theory. Drawing on Nietzsche and Heidegger, Vattimo offers a ‘philosophy of history’ in which strong metaphysical claims are presented as gradually being weakened, but in which the irrationalism he thinks characteristic of many anti-foundationalist theorists is also avoided. This philosophy is said to provide for new understandings of ethical and political life which have the acceptance of pluralism as their aim. The article argues that Vattimo’s attempt to (...) identify a position beyond metaphysics on the one hand and relativism on the other is unsuccessful, and that he ought to join in with the thoroughgoing anti-foundationalism that marks the work of writers such as Rorty and Derrida. It suggests further that awareness of our historical situation need not weaken the confidence with which our beliefs are held, and does not support any particular political programme. (shrink)

The controversy over the old ideal of “value-free science” has cooled significantly over the past decade. Many philosophers of science now agree that even ethical and political values may play a substantial role in all aspects of scientific inquiry. Consequently, in the last few years, work in science and values has become more specific: Which values may influence science, and in which ways? Or, how do we distinguish illegitimate from illegitimate kinds of influence? In this paper, I argue that this (...) problem requires philosophers of science to take a new direction. I present two case studies in the influence of values on scientific inquiry: feminist values in archaeology and commercial values in pharmaceutical research. I offer a preliminary assessment of these cases, that the influence of values was legitimate in the feminist case, but not in the pharmaceutical case. I then turn to three major approaches to distinguish legitimate from illegitimate influences of values, including the distinction between epistemic and non-epistemic values and Heather Douglas’ distinction between direct and indirect roles for values. I argue that none of these three approaches gives an adequate analysis of the two cases. In the concluding section, I briefly sketch my own approach, which draws more heavily on ethics than the others, and is more promising as a solution to the current problem. This is the new direction in which I think science and values should move. (shrink)

Este ensayo analiza la conjunción libertad/autoridad defendida por el republicanismo clásico. Como pensador moderno, Maquiavelo recupera esta síntesis clásica y define la autoridad como la condición de posibilidad de la libertad. Pero, como muestra Eric Nelson, el republicanismo de Maquiavelo es más ateniense que romano. El republicanismo de Michael Sandel tiene una orientación similar. Basado en la ontología social desarrollada por Arendt y Taylor, Sandel postula el valor intrínseco de las nociones de participación y soberanía popular. De este modo, él (...) puede refutar la objeción de Rorty y su interpretación idiosincrática de Dewey. Según Sandel, Dewey critica el rechazo liberal de la autoridad y es capaz de articular orgánicamente la autoridad democrática y la libertad. This essay analyzes the conjunction freedom/authority defended by classical republicanism. As a modern thinker, Machiavelli retrieves this classical synthesis and defines the authority of law as the condition of possibility for freedom. But, as Eric Neson shows, Machiavelli's republicanism is more Athenian than Roman. Michael Sandel's democratic republicanism has a similar orientation. Besed on the social ontology developed by Arendt and Taylor, Sandel postulates the intrinsic value of the notions of participation and popular sovereignty. In this way he can refute Rorty's objections and his idiosyncratic interpretation of Dewey. According to Sandel, Dewey criticizes liberalism's rejection of authority and is able organically to articulate democratic authority and freedom. (shrink)

Liberalism sanctions both democracy and capitalism, but incorporating the two into a coherent intellectual system presents difficulties. The anti-foundational pragmatism of Richard Rorty offers a way to describe and defend a meaningful democratic capitalism while avoiding the problems that come from the more traditional liberal justification. Additionally, Rorty's rejection of the search for extra-human grounding of social and political arrangements suggests that democracy is entitled to a philosophical support that capitalism is not. A viable democratic capitalism therefore justifies its use (...) of markets on the consent of the governed, rather than appeals to liberal notions of individualism, liberty, and property. (shrink)

This paper interprets the relation between justice and legitimacy found in John Rawls's Political Liberalism and then applies it to the field of transitional justice. The author argues that transitional mechanisms can be better defended in terms of “legitimacy” than in “justice,” because the circumstances of transitional justice admit of reasonable disagreement over “just” public policy. In such circumstances, policy recommendations can always be construed as falling short of justice, thus raising plausible concerns over their normative justification. This paper attempts (...) to answer such concerns by justifying transitional mechanisms as morally appropriate yet less than fully just. The author explains how the concept of legitimacy facilitates such a justification and how such a justification can secure the normative grounds that are ironically threatened by investigations relying on a concept of justice. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine how a manifest disagreement between Richard Rorty and Alasdair MacIntyre concerning the history of philosophy is but one of a series of deep and interrelated disagreements concerning, in addition, the history of science, the good life for human beings, and, ultimately, the character of and prospects for humankind as well. I shall argue that at the heart of this series of disagreements rests a dispute with regard to the nature of rationality. And this disagreement concerning (...) the norms of rationality, despite its theoretical and practical importance, is one which is, or so I argue, irresolvable. Moreover, the series of disagreements which I examine in the context of the debate between Rorty and MacIntyre is not peculiar or idiosyncratic to them. Their dispute reflects presumptions common to contemporary analytical philosophy. And while analytical philosophers have not made discussions of human nature one of their characteristic concerns, I indicate that such concerns do play a central role in the controversy which I examine. Differences of opinion concerning the political and social nature of human beings are reflected up and down the philosophical line. My argument is in no way concerned with issues of psychological priority or causality (e.g. whether having certain views disposes one psychologically to accepting other views). What I establish are the logical relations, and the points of philosophical contention, among certain epistemo logical and political theses. In Part I, I rehearse Rorty's epistemological views and examine how these views are connected to his views on morality and human nature. In Part II, I begin with MacIntyre's position concerning the virtues and modern moral philosophy and then reconstruct, ex pede Herculem, his views on rationality. Part III examines the prospects of reconciling the perspectives discussed in the first two sections. (shrink)

The linguistic turn is a central aspect of Richard Rorty’s philosophy, informing his early critiques of foundationalism in Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature and subsequent critiques of authoritarianism in Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity. It is argued that we should interpret the linguistic turn as a methodological suggestion for how philosophy can take a non-foundational perspective on normativity. It is then argued that although Rorty did not succeed in explicating normativity without foundations (or authority without authoritarianism), we should take seriously (...) the ambition motivating his project. But taking that ambition seriously may require reconsidering the linguistic turn. (shrink)

This article provides a new interpretation of Richard Rorty’s notion of the private-public distinction. The first section of the article provides a short theoretical overview of the origins of the public-private distinction in Rorty’s political thought and clarifies the Rortian terminology. The main portion of the article is dedicated to the critique of Rorty’s private-public distinction, divided into two thematic sections: (i) the private-public distinction as undesirable and (ii) the private-public distinction as unattainable. I argue that Rorty’s formulation provides plausible (...) answers to the first kind of criticism, but not to the second. Finally, a reformulation of the private-public distinction will be suggested, which both mitigates the second line of criticism and better coheres with Rorty’s general theory. (shrink)

Many models of (un)ethical decision making assume that people decide rationally and are in principle able to evaluate their decisions from a moral point of view. However, people might behave unethically without being aware of it. They are ethically blind. Adopting a sensemaking approach, we argue that ethical blindness results from a complex interplay between individual sensemaking activities and context factors.

My dissertation combines philosophy of science and political philosophy. Drawing directly on the work of Alasdair MacIntyre and inspired by John Dewey, I develop two rival conceptions of scientific practice. I show that these rivals are closely linked to the two basic sides in the science and values debate -- the debate over the extent to which ethical and political values may legitimately influence scientific inquiry. Finally, I start to develop an account of justice that is sensitive to these legitimate (...) and illegitimate influences. (shrink)

The notion of human rights is highly controversial and contested in modern scholarship. However, human rights have been defined as ‘the rational basis… for a justified demand.’ What constitutes demand should be understood as that which is different from favor or privilege but one's due, free from racial, religious, gender, political inclinations. But since rights are basic due to the fact that they are necessary for the enjoyment of something else, we are poised to examine it from the pre-figurative, configurative (...) and post-figurative stages of development in Africa. This enterprise anchors on the belief in cosmotheandrisation of human rights in Africa: cosmos ‘earth’, theos ‘God’ and anthropos ‘human’. These three levels of horizontal and vertical relationship guarantee the respect for human rights in traditional Africa. Through this approach, this enterprise shows that the positive approach to human rights is majorly declarative without corresponding pragmatic manifestation. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine the question of the scope of justice, in a not unusual distributive, egalitarian, and universalistic framework. Part I outlines some central features of the egalitarian theory of justice I am proposing. According to such a conception, justice is – at least prima facie – immediately universal, and therefore global. It does not morally recognize any judicial boundaries or limits. Part II examines whether, even from a universalistic perspective, there are moral or pragmatic grounds for rejecting (...) or limiting the global scope of justice. In particular, I scrutinize five universalistic objections: (1) the principle of “moral division of labor”; (2) the connection between cooperation and distributive justice; (3) the primacy of democracy; (4) the dangers of a world state; and (5) political‐pragmatic reasons. I intend to show that these objections cannot undermine the strong normative claims of global justice. At the most, political‐pragmatic reasons speak in favor of initially striving for somewhat less, in order to receive more general backing. (shrink)

This paper considers the relation between philosophical discussions of, and social-scientific research into popular beliefs about, distributive justice. The first part sets out the differences and tensions between the two perspectives, identifying considerations which tend to lead adherents of each discipline to regard the other as irrelevant to its concerns. The second discusses four reasons why social scientists might benefit from philosophy: problems in identifying inconsistency, the fact that non-justice considerations might underlie distributive judgments, the way in which different principles (...) of justice can yield the same concrete distributive judgments, and the ambiguity of key terms. The third part distinguishes and evaluates three versions of the claim that normative theorising about justice can profit from empirical research into public opinion: that its findings are food for thought, that they amount to feasibility constraints, and that they are constitutive of normatively justified principles of justice. The view that popular opinion about justice has a strongly constitutive role to play in justifying principles of distributive justice stricto sensu is rejected, but it is argued that what the people think (and what they can reasonably be expected to come to think) on distributive matters can be an important factor for the political theorist to take into account, for reasons of legitimacy, or feasibility, or both. (shrink)

Derrida's early reluctance to spell out political implications of deconstruction gave way during the course of the 1980s to a series of analyses of political concepts and issues. This article identifies the principal intellectual strategies of Derrida's political engagements and provides a detailed account of his concept of ‘democracy to come’. Finally, it suggests several points of contact between Derrida and recent liberal political philosophy, as well as some areas in which deconstructive analyses require further refinement if fruitful exchange is (...) to occur. (shrink)

The problem of the status of metaphysics -- what it is and what it is for, what use it is - has been with us for millennia, at least since Plato took issue with the Sophists, and continues to the present day. Here I attempt an intervention in this perennial dispute, with the aim of providing some kind of rapprochement between the factions. This intervention is based on how Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914) understood metaphysics and the position presented here is (...) thus called `Peircean realism'. The basic idea is that everyone has a metaphysics and has to have one, just to get by in everyday life, and this is no different for scientific inquirers in their professional work. The subject matter of metaphysics is thus presuppositions, whether it is what we rely on to go shopping or to discover the Higgs boson. We rely on these in our activities and expect them to have an effect on outcomes, so when our expectations are frustrated, doubt may be thrown on our presuppositions. We would thus like the ability to inquire into our presuppositions so as not to repeat mistakes, but our instinctive, evolved capacity for reasoning may not be up the job, since it is entwined with what we take for granted. Instead, Peirce develops a science of good reasoning that includes a theory of inquiry, which would allow us to scrutinise our presuppositions, to perform metaphysical inquiry. The starting point for this science of good reasoning is basic principles of combination and organisation, because these are involved in all activity, and these are Peirce's categories of Firstness, Secondness and Thirdness. This is also where I start in the exposition of and argument for Peircean realism as a scientific -- that is, truth-directed -- metaphysics that provides the best possible general presuppositions to the natural and human sciences, the special sciences that deal with matters in their particularity; that Peircean realism is a viable metaphysics for those sciences. This exposition and argument comprises the first part of this thesis. In the second part, the case for Peircean realism is further bolstered by turning a critical eye on positions that are deficient from the Peircean point of view, in that they lack one or other category and thus starve the special sciences of the resources they need, or that they try to ignore metaphysics entirely. All this is meant to demonstrate that metaphysics is unavoidable, that we need all three of Peirce's categories for a viable metaphysics for the special sciences, and that Peircean realism is just such a metaphysics. (shrink)

La democracia en el texto es vista desde una perspectiva integral u onmicomprensiva que complementa la parte instrumental (procedimiento electoral) con la sustancial (goce efectivo de derechos humanos) basado en la concienciación de una real dignidad humana que permita que la persona realice su proyecto de vida, disfrute de sus derechos y funcione efectivamente en la sociedad dentro del Estado democrático constitucional: la interrelación e interdependencia entre democracia, dignidad humana y Estado constitucional de derecho resulta para el autor un norte (...) el cual hay que seguir a cada instante. El libro muestra la importancia de la dogmática actual de la Corte Constitucional colombiana sobre derechos fundamentales, lo cual es un aporte latinoamericano a la estructuración de un constitucionalismo que contribuya con soluciones a favor de la libertad y la justicia en función de la persona humana en un escenario de tensiones evidentes entre la globalización y nacionalismos populistas y patrioteros. En el sentido expresado en el punto anterior la obra del profesor Caldera corrobora la relevancia que dicha dogmática le atribuye a la funcionalidad de los DerechosFundamentales con el logro del contenido normativo de la dignidad humana. Así, para Caldera Ynfante y desde su especial interpretación de la democracia cumple con los requisitos dogmáticos entronizados por la Corte Constitucional para ser considerado como un derecho fundamental generador de todos los efectos instrumentales y sustanciales que le son señalados. El texto nos lleva a establecer conceptualmente con un propósito práctico que la democracia integral, es decir, entendida como derecho fundamental es posible asumirla desde la perspectiva de la denominada teoría de la integralidad de los DDHH a partir de la Declaración y Plan de Acción de Viena sobreDDHH de 1993, instrumento del derecho internacional que resulta apical a partir del cual considera como fundamentales todos los Derechos Humanos. En consecuencia para el autor la democracia integral, como derecho fundamental, es posible asumirla desde la perspectiva del Enfoque Basado enDDHH y así puede ser defendida ante cualquier sistema de protección, ora universal o regional. Por otra parte es necesario para el lector reflexionar en torno al sentido de una democracia integral que para el autor es asumida como una meta garantía de losDDHH; es decir, como el derecho fundamental de los derechos fundamentales. (shrink)

Richard Rorty’s project of discarding philosophy as a whole suffers a contradictory, self-defeating problem that I call philosophical exorcism. Since Rorty’s understanding of radicality is misleading, when he criticizes philosophy in its entirety, his criticism returns to itself so that his project itself is to be discarded. As a remedy for the exorcism, a different radicality, found in Dewey’s concept of quality, is examined through two films directed by John Cassavetes and David Lynch. The radicality at stake contains a paradox (...) of sharing the unsharable, which distances philosophy from Rorty’s self-defeating pragmatism. (shrink)

This article explores the question of the role of religion in the public square through the lens of Richard Rorty’s more general public–private distinction. When we note his various positions over the years on the role of religion in the public square we observe a shift that yields a more favorable public role for religion so long as it limits itself to social action and refrains from making knowledge-claims that serve as tools of the powerful. But if, according to Rorty, (...) religion per se is no longer the problem, then what becomes of his efforts to endorse a more general public–private distinction? The argument set forth assesses the inadequacies and limitations of Rorty’s assumptions about the public–private split and suggests another way of framing the issue that will prove productive in debates concerning the role of religion in the public square. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:Partnerships between companies and NGOs have received considerable attention in CSR in the past years. However, the role of NGO legitimacy in such partnerships has thus far been neglected. We argue that NGOs assume a status as special stakeholders of corporations which act on behalf of the common good. This role requires a particular focus on their moral legitimacy. We introduce a conceptual framework for analysing the moral legitimacy of NGOs along three dimensions, building on the theory of deliberative democracy. (...) Against this background we outline three procedural characteristics which are essential for judging the legitimacy of NGOs as potential or actual partners of corporations. (shrink)

Resumen: La presente contribución gira en torno al significado del atentado terrorista del 11 de septiembre de 2001 para la hermenéutica filosófica, en particular la de Gianni Vattimo. El turinés gestó en sus textos de entre 2006 y 2014 una versión nueva de la hermenéutica que se basa en la experiencia de este acontecimiento. Esta nueva hermenéutica estaría atenta al conflicto y a las transformaciones sociales y tendría por núcleo la noción de “evento”, Sin embargo, Vattimo mismo no ofrece una (...) definición operativa adecuada del término. Ante esto, propongo incorporar a la tradición hermenéutica conceptos como “evento” y “milagro”, acuñados por Joseph de Maistre. Se trata de una propuesta de “maistrianización” de la hermenéutica para hacer de ella un discurso viable y fructífero en un mundo violento e inestable. (shrink)

In Habits of the Heart and The Good Society, Bellah et al. diagnose our loss of public life in areas such as education and relate this loss both to flaws in moral ecology and to our institutions. Their opposition to the Lockean metaphysic of self and community and to objectivist epistemology as a way of understanding schools is helpful in that it naturally suggests the kind of piecemeal, contextualized change that we locate within Dewey's viewpoint. But, I argue, Bellah et (...) al.'s penchant for “first philosophy” ultimately taints their work. While I applaud their turn to Dewey, I find their choice of a “metaphysical”, rather than a Rortyan reading of Dewey misguided. The proper alternative to a Lockean metaphysics is not a communitarian/Aristotelian one; the proper corrective to objectivist epistemology is not “Deweyan epistemology” or “critical theory”. We need to see, as in Rorty, that democracy exists prior to normative philosophy just as it has priority over substantive religion. To think otherwise would lead to a loss of contact with the ordinary, specific, ever-changing realms where our lives, and our democratic institutions — including the university — must either thrive or flounder. Finally, there is no epistemology or metaphysics that will adequately “ground” the university's workings. Instead, there is only, as Dewey put it, growth or failure to grow, guided by hints and resonances that arise in evolving circumstances. (shrink)

Richard Rorty's philosophy has two basic commitments: one to postmodernism and the other to liberalism. However, these commitments generate tension. As a postmodernist, he sharply criticizes the Enlightenment; as a liberal, he forcefully defends it. His postmodernist liberalism actually explains liberalism using irrationalism. /// 罗蒂哲学有两个基本承诺，一个是对后现代主义的承诺，一个是对自由主义 的承诺。但是这两种承诺之间存在着紧张关系: 作为后现代主义者，罗蒂对启蒙提 出了强烈的批评; 作为自由主义者，他又在极力地维护启蒙。罗蒂的后现代自由主 义实质上是以非理性主义来解释自由主义。.

This paper examines the relationship between truth and liberal politics via the work of Bernard Williams and Richard Rorty. I argue that Williams is right to think that there are positive relations between truth, specifically a realist understanding of truth, and liberal politics that Rorty's abandonment of the realist vocabulary of truth undermines. At the heart of this concern is the worry that abandoning the realist vocabulary opens up the possibility that the standards of justification for our true beliefs can (...) be manipulated by those with the power to do so in order to further their own political ends. The political benefit of realism is that it fixes the standards of justification and makes them immune to manipulation by the use of power. However, I suggest that there is a form of realism available that Rorty can accept which would deliver the political benefits of the realist vocabulary without requiring him to accept the thick realist metaphysics that he wants to avoid. My conclusion is that there is a positive and important relationship between truth and liberal politics, a relationship that can be sustained without any necessary commitment to realist metaphysics. (shrink)

An interview with the philosopher Howard Caygill, primarily concerning his book 'Resistance', conducted in December 2013.

Summary Justifications of the humanities often employ a mythos that exceeds their historical dispositions and reach. This applies to justifications that appeal to an ?idea? of the humanities grounded in the cultivation of reason for its own sake. But the same problem affects more recent accounts that seek to shatter this idea by admitting an ?event? capable of dissolving and refounding the humanities in ?being?. In offering a sketch of the emergence of the modern humanities from early modern humanism, the (...) paper argues that these twin philosophical justifications fail to capture both the array of intellectual arts that have informed the humanities disciplines and the variety of uses to which these arts have been put. Nonetheless, the two philosophical constructions have had a concrete impact on the disposition of the modern humanities, seen in the respective structuralist and poststructuralist reconfigurations of the disciplines that began to take place under the banner of ?theory? during the 1960s. In discussing the effects of theory on the humanities in Australia, the paper focuses on the unforeseeable consequences of attempts to provide arts-based disciplines with a foundation either in cognitive structures or in an ?event? that shatters them. (shrink)

This essay presents a new way of conceptualizing the problem of political obligation. On the traditional ‘normativist’ framing of the issue, the primary task for theory is to secure the content and justification of political obligations, providing practically applicable moral knowledge. This paper develops an alternative, ‘pragmatist’ framing of the issue, by rehabilitating a frequently misunderstood essay by Hanna Pitkin and by recasting her argument in terms of the ‘pragmatic turn’ in recent philosophy, as articulated by Robert Brandom. From this (...) perspective, the content and justification of political obligations cannot be determined in a way that is in principle separable from their application. This casts ‘political obligation’ not as a problem to be philosophically resolved, but as a political predicament that calls for a kind of practical engagement. The merit of this perspective is to draw our attention toward the conditions under which the problem appears as a lived predicament. (shrink)

The paper outlines a critique and reconstruction of Richard Rorty’s version of pragmatism. While sympathetic to many elements in Rorty’s philosophy, his recent creation of a dichotomy between state-level (read credible) and global-level (read utopian) politics is criticised. Patterns of governance in the global polity simply do not match. Decision-making prowes s within institutional and agent networks transcends exclusively state-centric cartographies and proffers the need to theorise global politics in a non-dichotomised, multi-level fashion. This is not to dispense with pragmatism. (...) Rather, it is to extend it. By drawing on Rorty’s concept of sentimental education, a global pragmatic praxis is elaborated via a narrative of the Tobin Tax and its place in a burgeoning global civil society. In this way, Rorty’s oft-repeated claim that “we should start from where we are” is applied to the plurality of ‘we-groups’ and their multiple activities within an emerging global polity. (shrink)

In Two Faces of Liberalism, John Gray pursues the dual agenda of condemning familiar liberal theories for perpetuating the failed “Enlightenment project,” and promoting his own version of anti‐Enlightenment liberalism, which he calls “modus vivendi.” However, Gray's critical apparatus is insufficient to capture accurately the highly influential “political” liberalism of John Rawls. Moreover, Gray's modus vivendi faces serious challenges raised by Rawls concerning stability. In order to respond to the Rawlsian objections, Gray would have to reinstate the aspirations and principles (...) characteristic of Enlightenment theories of liberalism. (shrink)

A problem arises, both for philosophy and for argumentation theory, in a pluralist world where people hold widely different beliefs about what to do. Some responses to this problem, including relativism, might settle but do not provide any criteria for resolving such differences. Alternative responses seek a means of resolution in universalist, culture-neutral criteria which must be invoked in assessing all human action. A philosophically adequate account of universalism would contribute to an ideal of critical rationality, as well as to (...) the ideas of field-invariance and of convincing, as opposed to persuasive, argumentation. The account's adequacy would require universality both in form and in content. Universality in form is secured by seeking universal preconditions for practical reasoning in general, rather than specifically for morality. Universality in content is harder, and candidates such as freedom, autonomy and health are problematic. An alternative content is provided by the proposition that the satisfaction of material preconditions is necessary for the performance of any action whatever. Neglect of these preconditions may constitute a fallacy in the extended sense found in argumentation theory, and assumptions about them should form part of the point of departure for any practical deliberation. (shrink)

This is a story of the development of a community service for business education project in Florida International University's Business Environment Program. The Project, as it is called, had its practical origins in student involvement in community activism-type projects. Its theoretical foundation is found in the concept of increasing community discourse — following Dewey (1954) — as a vehicle for strengthening the business and society bond. Student community service projects are described including the largest group to evolve, a group dedicated (...) to feeding Miami's homeless and taking the name the FIU Foodrunners. The Project is now in its third year with approximately five-hundred students per year working twenty-five hours per semester on community service projects. The community service requirement directly as a result of experiences with the Project has expanded beyond the Business Environment courses to offerings in other departments and is now part of a University-wide recently institutionalized structure designed to stimulate student community service efforts.Today was our third run, the third Sunday of waking up early. Now that I have been reading Aram and putting the pieces together, I can see how this concept of business and society comes together. (shrink)

How does public discussion contribute to the reasonableness with which power is exercised in a democracy? Contemporary answers to this question (such as formulated by Rawls or Habermas), are often based upon two interconnected preconceptions. These are, 1. the idea that the value of public discussion lies primarily in the fact that citizens can reach a reasonable consensus through argumentation and discussion and, 2. the belief that the exercise of power is legitimate only if it is determined by a reasonable (...) consensus among citizens. In this sense, 'reasonable consensus among citizens' eliminates, under ideal conditions, the 'autonomy' of the exercise of power. However, these ideals of democracy appear to conflict with certain aspects of democratic society; aspects, moreover, which we tend to value quite highly. I therefore advance an alternative account of the reasonableness of power in democratic societies; one which acknowledges both the characteristically unlimited scope of public discussion in democratic society and the fact that such discussion rarely or perhaps even never ends in a general consensus. In order to elucidate the democratic character of society we must explain the relationship between discussion and power in such a way that we understand both the need for discussion and the necessity of an autonomous exercise of power. (shrink)

Faith in the universal moral equality of people enjoys close to unanimous consensus in present moral and political philosophy. Yet its philosophical justification remains precarious. The search for the basis of equality encounters insurmountable difficulties. Nothing short of a miracle seems required to stabilize universal equality in moral status amidst a vast space of distinctions sprawling between people. The difficulties of stabilizing equality against differentiation are not specific to any particular choice regarding the basis of equality. To show this, I (...) will provide a general diagnosis of the difficulty together with its application to the arguably best attempt at a solution, namely to ground moral equality in a form of subjectivity. In his recent book Equality for Nonegalitarians, George Sher advances the view that “we are moral equals because we are equally centers of consciousness. …The fact that we are equals in this respect—that each is a world unto himself—…explains why each person’s interests are of equal moral importance”. Yet the worlds we are unto ourselves can no more withstand the force of differentiation than previous candidates suggested in the literature, and the reasons why run deeper than even some critics have recognized. The prospects for vindicating universal moral equality remain bleak. (shrink)