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Search Results for: rorty

Episode 157: Richard Rorty on Politics for the Left (Part Two)

February 6, 2017 by Mark Linsenmayer 74 Comments

Continuing on Achieving Our Country: Leftist Thought in 20th Century America (1998). We talk more about Rorty’s description of the conflict between the “reformist left” and the “cultural left.” Do political-comedy shows serve a a positive political purpose? Can an enlightened political viewpoint really be a mass movement at all? Is it better to pursue specific political campaigns or be part of a “movement?” Can Rorty’s diagnosis cure Seth’s malaise?

End song: “Wake Up, Sleepyhead,” by Jill Sobule, as interviewed on Nakedly Examined Music #11.

Episode 157: Richard Rorty on Politics for the Left (Part One)

January 30, 2017 by Mark Linsenmayer 54 Comments

On Achieving Our Country: Leftist Thought in 20th Century America (1998). What makes for efficacious progressivism? Rorty argues that reformism went out of fashion in the ’60s in favor of a “cultural left” that merely critiques and spectates, leaving a void that a right-wing demagogue could exploit to sweep in, claiming to be a champion of regular working people. Sound familiar?

Episode 155: Richard Rorty Against Epistemology

January 2, 2017 by Mark Linsenmayer 14 Comments

On Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (1979), Part II: “Mirroring.”

Is a “theory of knowledge” possible? Rorty thinks that any such account will be a fruitless search for foundations. Knowledge is really just a matter of social agreement, and beliefs must be justified from other beliefs, not from any alleged relationship to reality.

End song: “The Ghosts Are Alright” from The Bye-Bye Blackbirds (Houses and Homes, 2008), as discussed on Nakedly Examined Music #32.

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Richard Rorty and the Origins of Post-Truth

December 30, 2016 by Ana Sandoiu 34 Comments

Some have traced the origins of our “post-truth” era back to post-modernism and relativism. Could a look at Richard Rorty’s philosophy help us understand the “post-truth” phenomenon?

Episode 153: Richard Rorty: There Is No Mind-Body Problem

December 5, 2016 by Mark Linsenmayer 11 Comments

On Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (1979), Part I: “Our Glassy Essence.”

“The mind” seems to be an unavoidable part of our basic conceptual vocabulary, but Rorty thinks not, and he wants to use the history of philosophy as a kind of therapy to show that many of our seemingly insoluble problems like the relation between mind and body are a result philosophical mistakes by Descartes, Locke, and Kant. With guest Stephen Metcalf of Slate’s Culture Gabfest podcast.

End song: “Wall of Nothingness” from Sky Cries Mary from This Timeless Turning (1994). Listen to Mark’s interview with the band’s frontman, Roderick Romero, in Nakedly Examined Music ep. 9.

Lawrence Cahoone on Rorty: Bridging Analytic and Continental Philosophy

April 12, 2011 by Tom McDonald 4 Comments

Richard Rorty: A friend of Dan Dennett (and his dreaded scientism : ). A neo-pragmatist. An analytic philosopher who began teaching around the mid-20th-century, he eventually turned against its scientism. Rorty felt that 20th-century analytic thought was going down the wrong track by taking up the same sort of epistemological foundationalist project as Descartes. Rorty saw the narrow sense-data and Continue Reading …

Later Pragmatists: Rorty on truth

July 22, 2010 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

Maybe the most famous current pragmatist is Richard Rorty. He doesn’t like William James’s redefinition of the word “truth,” but he thinks that virtually everything James said about it could be better applied to the word “justification.” Plus, you get to see subtitles in (I think) Dutch!

Ep. 227: What Is Social Construction? (Hacking, Berger) (Part Two)

October 14, 2019 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

Continuing Ian Hacking’s The Social Construction of What (1999) and Peter Berger’s “Religion and World Construction” (1967).

We break down Hacking’s typology of construction arguments: Are they exploring where our ideas came from or trying to change things? Are they trying to state facts about nature vs. nurture or essentially political solicitations for us to reconceptualize in healthier ways? Plus, more about the supposed divide between science wars and the culture wars and Berger’s picture of the nomos (custom) defining what it is for us to live a meaningful life.

Start with part one, or get the full, ad free Citizen Edition. Please support PEL!

End song: “The ConstruKction of Light, Part 1” by King Crimson; listen to Mark with Trey Gunn on Nakedly Examined Music #21.

Sponsors: Visit thegreatcoursesplus.com/PEL for a free month of learning and hempfusion.com w/ promo code PEL for 20% off your first order & free shipping.

Episode 196: Guest Simon Blackburn on Truth (Part Two)

August 13, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 5 Comments

Continuing with Simon on his book On Truth (2018).

We move to part two of the book, where we get down to the procedures used to obtain truth in art, ethics, and science. Yes, truth is objective, but it’s not best described as correspondence, and in fact this elaboration of how truth is actually obtained is more enlightening than any abstract definition meant to cover all the different types of truth-seeking.

Listen to part one first, or get the unbroken, ad-free Citizen Edition, and also Wes’s bonus conversation on Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five. Please support PEL!

End song: “with you/for you” from the new cold/mess EP by Prateek Kuhad, interviewed on Nakedly Examined Music #79.

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PREVIEWS-Eps 192-193 Allan Bloom & Liberal Education Follow-Ups

July 6, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

Hear highlights from two supporter-only discussions: Allan Bloom on Nietzsche/Freud/etc. and Leo Strauss vs. Richard Rorty on liberal education and democracy.

Episode 193: The Theory and Practice of Liberal Education w/ Pano Kanelos (Part Two)

July 2, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

Continuing with the current St. John’s College president on articles on liberal education by Jacob Klein, Sidney Hook, and Martha Nussbaum.

What’s the practical application of a liberal education? Is it really liberating or indoctrinating? We continue discussion of the Great Books model.

Listen to part 1 first or get the ad-free Citizen Edition along with the follow-up discussion. Please support PEL!

End song: “Preservation Hill” by The Bevis Frond; Mark interviewed Nick Saloman on Nakedly Examined Music #75.

Sponsor: Listen to the Outside the Box podcast.

Episode 193: The Theory and Practice of Liberal Education w/ Pano Kanelos (Part One)

June 25, 2018 by Mark Linsenmayer 3 Comments

The president of St. John’s College, Annapolis joins us to discuss Jacob Klein’s “The Idea of a Liberal Education” (1960) and “On Liberal Education” (1965), plus Sidney Hook’s “A Critical Appraisal of the St. John’s College Curriculum” (1946) and Martha Nussbaum’s “Undemocratic Vistas” (1987).

What constitutes a liberal education? Should we all read the Western canon? Klein (and our guest) think that we need to wonder at the familiar, to explore the ancestry of our current concepts in order to avoid their sedimentation.

Don’t wait for part two; get the full, unbroken Citizen Edition now; you’ll also get (soon) a bonus discussion. Please support PEL!

Sponsored by Molekule, the only air purifier that actually destroys pollutants. Visit molekule.com and use offer code PEL for $75 off.

Science, Religion, and Secularism Part XV: A Fractured World: God, Humanity, and Nature

December 21, 2017 by Daniel Halverson Leave a Comment

We come to the end of our series within a series, on Michael Allen Gillespie’s Theological Origins of Modernity. We’ve spent a lot of time on this text because it’s such good, rich material, and because it’s a fairly recent book with a genuinely novel perspective. For my part, I’m persuaded that nominalism goes a long way toward explaining the Continue Reading …

Irony and Political Rhetoric (Philosophical Issues Related to the #thatasshole Campaign, Part 3)

November 2, 2017 by Mark Linsenmayer 3 Comments

Start with the South Parkesque absurdist beginning of this series, if that’s the kind of thing that you’re into. Satire and Irony as Political Tools I’ve already written on humor for this series; shouldn’t this topic have already been covered? Well, no. As Wikipedia tells us (citing Robert Corum writing about French satire), satire need not be actually funny. Animal Continue Reading …

Episode 163: Guest Stewart Umphrey on Natural Kinds (Part One)

May 1, 2017 by Mark Linsenmayer 14 Comments

On Natural Kinds and Genesis: The Classification of Material Entities (2016). Are general terms like “water” or “dog” just things that we made up to order the world? Aristotle thought that some universals constitute natural kinds, with a nature that explains their behavior. “Kinds” were replaced with “laws,” but Stewart wants us to reconsider, and bring back “natural philosophy” in the process.

Self-Contradiction: The Wisdom of Emerson Vs. Trump’s Whims

March 10, 2017 by Maura Jack Kelly 9 Comments

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “Speak what you think now in hard words and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day.” Does that mean the current POTUS is an Emersonian? Not quite!

Letter to the Editor: Identity Politics and Effective Action

February 12, 2017 by Wes Alwan 72 Comments

A listener takes on our politics and Rorty episodes.

Episode 154: Wilfrid Sellars on the Myth of the Given

December 19, 2016 by Mark Linsenmayer 4 Comments

On “Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind” (1956).

Is knowledge based on a “foundation,” as Descartes, Locke, et al. thought? Sellars says no: The allegedly basic elements upon which knowledge would be built either have to be propositions, in which case they involve a lot of prior knowledge involved in language use and so aren’t really basic, or they’re “raw feels,” in which case they can’t actually serve as reasons for anything; reasons have to be propositional. With guest Lawrence Dallman.

End song: “Senses on Fire” by Mercury Rev. Check out the interview with singer Jonathan Donahue in Nakedly Examined Music ep. 14.

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PEL 2017 Calendar w/ Art from Existential Comics

December 18, 2016 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

You like Existential Comics, right? Corey Mohler has drawn the philosopher pictures for our PEL wall calendar. Go buy it now. For an additional $2.50, we’ll throw in Mark’s Songs from the Partially Examined Life CD. Buy the calendar-CD combo.

Philosophy of History Part XXXII: Peter Novick—That Noble Dream (Part II)

April 21, 2016 by Daniel Halverson Leave a Comment

Part two of a two-part discussion of Peter Novick’s That Noble Dream: The Objectivity Question in the American Historical Profession.

Carl Becker: The Heavenly City of Eighteenth-Century Philosophers

February 24, 2016 by Daniel Halverson 5 Comments

“In a very real sense it may be said of the eighteenth century that it was an age of faith as well as of reason, and of the thirteenth century that it was an age of reason as well as of faith.” –Carl Becker

In Dreams

February 3, 2016 by Jay Jeffers 4 Comments

Exploration of the big idea that permeates Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Between the World and Me.

Topic for #128: Hilary Putnam on Linguistic Meaning

November 23, 2015 by Mark Linsenmayer 1 Comment

We were rejoined by Matt Teichman to continue our Kripke thread, discussing primarily Putnam’s essay “The Meaning of Meaning” (1971) about water here vs. water on “Twin Earth” where that stuff that runs in rivers and streams has a different chemical composition. Putnam puts forth a positive theory of meaning that involves holding a stereotype of a term (e.g., that water is wet) but also where your meaning is determined by extension, i.e., what your term in the real world actually refers to, so that we and the Twin Earthers mean something different even though we seem to have the same psychological state when talking about water.

Episode 126: Saul Kripke on Possibilities, Language & Science

November 2, 2015 by Mark Linsenmayer 14 Comments

On Naming and Necessity (1980). What’s the relationship between language and the world? Specifically, what makes a name or a class term pick out the person or things that it does? Saul Kripke wanted to correct the dominant view of his time (which involved a description in the speaker’s mind), and used talk of “possible worlds” to do it! With guest Matt Teichman.

End song: “Reason Enough” by Mark Lint.

Not School Groups In December

December 4, 2014 by Daniel David Leave a Comment

December’s Not School Groups are reading Houellebecq and Grotowski. Maybe some Rorty, Proudhon, and Heidegger too. Come check them out, or start your own group!

Google Scholar citations–a measure of academic importance:

July 15, 2014 by Wayne Schroeder 6 Comments

Which philosophers are most cited according to Google Scholar since 2009?

Zen and the Art of Martin Heidegger?

August 31, 2013 by David Buchanan 40 Comments

The partially examined podcasters raised a series of very difficult questions in their recent discussion of Heidegger, particularly during a ten-minute stretch beginning about one hour and ten minutes into the 80th episode. These questions all seemed to pivot around one central problem: what does it mean to get right with Being? Should we take this as a kind of Continue Reading …

Presidential Pragmatism

October 18, 2012 by Dylan Casey 13 Comments

In a recent column in The Stone, Harvey Cormier considers the political oomph of pragmatists through a nice presentation of some central thinking of William James. The occasion for the piece is a recent spate of writings characterizing Obama as “a pragmatist politician.” What I like best about Cormier’s article is his refutation, through James, of the lame but pervasive Continue Reading …

David Burrell on Nietzsche and “Trust”

August 30, 2012 by Mark Linsenmayer 3 Comments

Stony Brook University’s Templeton Research Lectures series features several lectures from early 2007 by David Burrell, an Emeritus Professor in philosophy and theology from Notre Dame University, as well as a Catholic Priest. His specialty appears to be Medieval Studies, focusing on the ties between the various Abrahamic religions, and the lectures on Maimonides and al-Ghazali are excellent. What may Continue Reading …

Nietzsche, Pragmatism and the Fact-Value Distinction

August 18, 2012 by David Buchanan 6 Comments

[From David Buchanan, frequent blog and Facebook contributor and participant in our ZAMM episode.  See if that doesn’t make sense after reading this.] Richard Rorty opened one of his talks by pointing out that as Europeans see it, Pragmatism is just what the Americans could get out of Nietzsche. This joke suggests that there are many similarities but American Pragmatism Continue Reading …

Philosophical Mavericks: Pirsig, MacIntyre, Solomon, Bergmann

July 17, 2012 by Mark Linsenmayer 8 Comments

I made the point both on the episode and in a recent post that I thought MacIntyre to be a better model of the outsider philosopher than Pirsig. This is not a point I really want to hammer, as I like Pirsig and I don’t relish dissing someone that many of our listeners have a great appreciation for. So let Continue Reading …

Living Ironically: The Upshot

June 30, 2012 by Mark Linsenmayer 21 Comments

With a few comments on my last post to spur me on, here are some hopefully final thoughts on the ironic life for the moment. Irony is one of the characteristic social modes for Americans of at least the Generation X (that would be mine, i.e. 40ish) and younger. I can’t speak for how pervasive it is demographically in terms Continue Reading …

Pirsig as an American Pragmatist

February 22, 2012 by David Buchanan 26 Comments

Philosophology is to philosophy as art history is to painting, Pirsig says. He uses that ridiculous-sounding word to draw a distinction between comparative analysis and original thought, between critical examination and creative production. In the tradition of Emerson’s famous 1837 speech, “The American Scholar”, Pirsig is calling for creativity and originality. This is not to say that the critics and Continue Reading …

Hannah Arendt on Scientism

November 26, 2011 by Tom McDonald 7 Comments

The question of the “pernicious influence” of scientism on modern life and philosophy gets raised fairly often here at PEL. I get the sense that Wes and Seth think the influence ‘quite pernicious’ while Mark thinks ‘not so pernicious’. (Correct me if I’m wrong guys). So I thought it would be helpful to clarify what is implied by the term, Continue Reading …

PEL Episodes by Topic

Updated 8/13/18 Given how many episodes we’ve done, even we lose track of where we’ve been. We aim (among other things) to present the equivalent of an introductory course in all the major areas of philosophy, and in some areas get you to an intermediate level. Here’s where I’ll periodically comment on our progress. Feel free to weigh in on Continue Reading …

Hegel and the Negativity of the Modern Spirit

April 4, 2011 by Tom McDonald 5 Comments

[Editor’s Note: Tom McDonald, guest podcaster on our Hegel episodes, has eagerly agreed to join us on the blog to share more of what he’s picked up about Hegel. You can read more by Tom at zuhanden.com -ML] It’s hard to overestimate how important for Hegel is Kant’s critical philosophy following the Enlightenment. Kant’s elaboration of ‘the critical turn’ in Continue Reading …

Borders Raid

March 5, 2011 by Seth Paskin 7 Comments

So the Borders bookstore chain filed for bankruptcy (it’s a US-based brick & mortar retailer that apparently had small forays into the UK, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore) and recently I went in to stock my shelves with what I was sure would be a bonanza of discounted philosophy books.  I am here to tell you of my disappointment. To Continue Reading …

Grappling with Heidegger’s Biography

February 11, 2011 by Seth Paskin 2 Comments

More than most other philosophers, Heidegger’s life is almost as much a subject of scrutiny as his writings.  Part of this comes with the territory of being a founding figure in Existentialism, but 99% has to do with his conduct during and immediately after the National Socialist era in Germany, particularly regarding his membership in the Nazi party, treatment of Continue Reading …

Kung Fu Pragmatism

December 13, 2010 by Dylan Casey 2 Comments

Editor’s Note: You may recall our new contributor Dylan Casey from our quantum physics and pragmatism episodes. He’s a physics Ph.D. who teaches philosophy, literature, and other things at St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland, and I’m married to his sister. -ML This article from “The Stone” (as in philosopher’s stone) in the NYTimes argues that, properly understood, kung fu Continue Reading …

Boghossian vs. Goodman on Fact Constructivism

November 15, 2010 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

One book we’d mentioned on the episode as a counter to Goodman’s epistemology was Paul Boghossian’s Fear of Knowledge: Against Relativism and Constructivism. Boghossian’s target is any theory of knowledge that says that facts are constructed, reflecting the contingent needs and interest of some society, and that consequently some different society with different needs could construct facts so as to Continue Reading …

Later Pragmatists: Robert Brandom on language

July 24, 2010 by Mark Linsenmayer 2 Comments

OK, at this point I’m just going on youtube searches for “pragmatism;” I was not previously familiar with Brandom, though he is apparently well known and studied under Rorty and Princeton and has a beard that looks stunning when backlit. He has some interesting comments here about the historical point at which pragmatism as we read about it arose and Continue Reading …

Historical note about the Pragmatist Revival

July 23, 2010 by Mark Linsenmayer Leave a Comment

This was news to me, that pragmatism was eclipsed by the 1940s until Richard Rorty and Hilary Putnam, though note that the video says they were eclipsed by positivism, i.e. the idea that philosophical statements need to be cashed out in terms of sense verifications, which is a species of a view we attributed on the podcast to William James, Continue Reading …

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