Electric Agora (archive)

Tag: Wilfrid Sellars

  • In Defense of Philosophy: Analytic, Pragmatist, and Transcendental

    by Preston Stovall ____ [1] In a recent essay that got some attention in online circles in philosophy, Liam Kofi Bright foretold the end of analytic philosophy – characterizing it as a degenerating research program – and the exhaustion of a Kripkean understanding of what analytic philosophy has been up to. While reading Liam’s essay, […]

  • Prolegomena for a Pluralist Metaphysics: One More Thing (Some Stuff about God and Intelligibility)

    by Daniel A. Kaufman ___ Of all things the measure is man, of the things that are, that they are, and of things that are not, that they are not.    –Protagoras 1. A common mistake that people (and philosophers, especially) make is to look for intelligibility in the wrong place. This is made worse by […]

  • Pure and Applied Chess

    by David L. Duffy. Personally, I have found some chess analogies, metaphors and thought experiments from philosophers a little unimpressive, speaking as someone who was once a middling club player. Some philosophers have been what I think of as serious players – at least one has been an International Master — but I don’t see […]

  • Joshua Rasmussen on the Prolegomena

    by Daniel A. Kaufman Joshua Rasmussen of Azusa Pacific University and I discuss my ongoing Prolegomena for a Pluralist Metaphysics. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3Aq4lb-v90  

  • Dialogues with Crispin on the Prolegomena: Vol. 3

    The third of my ongoing series of discussions with Crispin Sartwell on my Prolegomena for a Pluralist Metaphysics. https://youtu.be/Pmh39dGfgrM

  • Prolegomena for a Pluralist Metaphysics: Philosophy, Science, and “Common Sense”

    by Daniel A. Kaufman ___ As these prolegomena begin to wind down, I want to step back and speak a bit more generally about the conception of philosophy – and of inquiry more generally — from which they spring. Sellars, of course, in the opening paragraphs of “Philosophy and the Scientific Image of Man,” gave […]

  • Morality and the Social World: Objectivity, Realism, and Normativity

    by Jared Yarsevich ___ Moral realism occupies a precarious position in contemporary philosophy. It carries the notable distinction of drawing the opprobrium of both hard-nose naturalists and libertine relativists. Uniting erstwhile enemies such as these is quite the feat and is undoubtedly symptomatic of deep conceptual flaws. But then again, maybe the multi-front assaults indicate […]

  • Discussions with Crispin on the Prolegomena: Vol. 2

    The second of my ongoing series of discussions with Crispin Sartwell on my Prolegomena for a Pluralist Metaphysics. https://youtu.be/bv1Dsy00nN8

  • Prolegomena for a Pluralist Metaphysics: People

    by Daniel A. Kaufman ___ I shouldn’t need to tell anyone that there are people. You’re a person, as am I. There likely are others in your house. Certainly, there are more down on the street.  I understand from a not entirely reliable authority that Hell consists of them. Clearly, uncontroversially, obviously, people exist. They […]

  • Prolegomena for a Pluralist Metaphysics: Actions, Reasons, Causes … and Ends

    by Daniel A. Kaufman ____ I’ve been saying that I’d like a return to philosophical “normalcy,” meaning that I’d like us to stop indulging what I’ve been calling, alternatively, “crazy” and “desperate” philosophical positions: Panpsychism; Hard Determinism; Eliminative Materialism and “Illusionism”; Platonism; Mind/Body Dualism; and so on. I’m running an ongoing series of conversations with […]