Electric Agora (archive)

Tag: Hilary Putnam

  • Why I am Not a Rortyan but Would Like to Be

    By Jay Jeffers ___ There is no rivalry like an intrastate rivalry. In the state of Pragmatism, the game of the week is always Richard Rorty vs. Hilary Putnam. Nothing ever gets settled, but the effort is there. This is the third and likely final entry in an ongoing attempt to settle a few things. […]

  • A Pragmatic Option

    by Jay Jeffers ____ American Pragmatism has been controversial from the start. It was accused of “cosmic impiety” by Bertrand Russell, a founding father of Anglophone analytic philosophy. Rifts developed quickly even within the young school of thought, with the original pragmatist Charles Sanders Peirce renaming his approach “pragmaticism,” which he thought was “ugly enough […]

  • Truth Rediscovered: A Humanistic View of Rationality

    By Jay Jeffers ___ The Buddha said, “Three things cannot long be hidden: the sun, the moon, and the truth.” Or maybe he didn’t. Scholars would have to chime in on the popular interpretation through the lens of history, linguistics, and the like. Either way it’s a vivid quote. The real problem isn’t whether or […]

  • Wittgenstein and Woke Philosophy

    by Bharath Vallabha ___ Since I was a philosophy undergrad 25 years ago, I wanted academic philosophy to be more diverse. Back then, at least in the departments I was in, most philosophy professors and students were white males, and the curriculum was almost entirely European. What most bugged me was this was so taken […]

  • philosophy as diplomacy

    by Daniel A. Kaufman ___ During a conversation with Megan Fritts of Utah State, I suggested that perhaps philosophical disputes should be conducted as negotiations rather than arguments. I’d like to develop this idea a bit more. That philosophy is a primarily argumentative business is, I trust, evident enough that I don’t need to expand […]

  • Prolegomena for a Pluralist Metaphysics: Explanatory Disunity

    by Daniel A. Kaufman ___ As readers know, I have been running a series of conversations with Crispin Sartwell, as an accompaniment to these prolegomena. I asked Crispin to do this with me for two reasons: First, he is the only person within my circle capable of addressing the many and diverse subject areas across […]

  • Meaning, Hummus Masabacha, and Def Leppard

    By Daniel A. Kaufman ___ Bernard Williams is one of the top 5 greatest post WWII philosophers.  Here is a new website devoted to collecting everything available by and about him. https://sites.google.com/site/bernardwilliamsphilosopher/home Rare and very high quality live footage of Def Leppard, from 1983, when they were still a hard-rocking NWOBHM band. (Concert split into […]

  • Bernard Williams, Blackadder, and Latkes

    by Daniel A. Kaufman Terrific piece on the philosophy of Bernard Williams https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/public/bernard-williams-ethics-human-point-view/ Bad Religion, Live in 1989 (Complete show) Talk Talk, “Life’s What You Make it” Live in 1986 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzUkRwmvbNQ Hilary Putnam on Naïve Realism and Qualia Comprehensive Documentary on the Incomparable Black Adder Chanukah May be Over but Here’s a Great Latkes Recipe […]

  • Shakshuka, Mental States, and Iron Maiden

    by Daniel A. Kaufman The flagship feminist philosophy journal, Hypatia, still reeling from the scandal involving its treatment of Rebecca Tuvel, finds itself humiliated once again, this time by a Sokal-style hoax. http://leiterreports.typepad.com/blog/2018/10/sokal-hoax-redux.html For those who need a refresher on the Tuvel affair: http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/05/transracialism-article-controversy.html Rare, amazing footage of Iron Maiden from their New Wave of […]