Setting Sail: The Development and Reception of Quine’s Naturalism

Philosophers' Imprint 18:1-24 (2018)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Contemporary analytic philosophy is dominated by metaphilosophical naturalism, the view that philosophy ought to be continuous with science. This naturalistic turn is for a significant part due to the work of W. V. Quine. Yet, the development and the reception of Quine’s naturalism have never been systematically studied. In this paper, I examine Quine’s evolving naturalism as well as the reception of his views. Scrutinizing a large set of unpublished notes, correspondence, drafts, papers, and lectures as well as published responses to Quine’s work, I show how both internal tensions and external criticisms forced him to continuously develop, rebrand, and refine his metaphilosophy before he explicitly decided to label his view ‘naturalism’ in the late 1960s.

Author's Profile

Sander Verhaegh
Tilburg University

Analytics

Added to PP
2018-03-17

Downloads
433 (#35,517)

6 months
53 (#69,045)

Historical graph of downloads since first upload
This graph includes both downloads from PhilArchive and clicks on external links on PhilPapers.
How can I increase my downloads?