Philosophy as Cultural Politics: Volume 4
Philosophical Papers

This book contains a rich selection of the philosophical papers which Rorty has written over the past decade.

Richard Rorty (Author)

9780521875448, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 1 January 2007

220 pages
23.3 x 15.8 x 2.2 cm, 0.47 kg

"...this important volume of his Philosophical Papers is to be recommended as a resource on familiar and unfamiliar topics in the Rortian philosophy." --Francesco Tampoia: Philosophy in Review

This volume presents a selection of the philosophical papers which Richard Rorty has written over the past decade, and complements three previous volumes of his papers: Objectivity, Relativism, and Truth, Essays on Heidegger and Others and Truth and Progress. Topics discussed include the changing role of philosophy in Western culture over the course of recent centuries, the role of the imagination in intellectual and moral progress, the notion of 'moral identity', the Wittgensteinian claim that the problems of philosophy are linguistic in nature, the irrelevance of cognitive science to philosophy, and the mistaken idea that philosophers should find the 'place' of such things as consciousness and moral value in a world of physical particles. The papers form a rich and distinctive collection which will appeal to anyone with a serious interest in philosophy and its relation to culture.

Part I. Religion and Morality from a Pragmatist Point of View: 1. Cultural politics and the question of the existence of God
2. Pragmatism as romantic polytheism
3. Justice as a larger loyalty
4. Honest mistakes
Part II. Philosophy's Place in Culture: 5. Grandeur, profundity and finitude
6. Philosophy as a transitional genre
7. Pragmatism and romanticism
8. Analytic and conversational philosophy
Part III. Current Issues within Analytic Philosophy: 9. A pragmatist view of contemporary analytic philosophy
10. Naturalism and quietism
11. Wittgenstein and the linguistic turn
12. Holism and historicism
13. Kant vs. Dewey: the current situation of moral philosophy.

Subject Areas: Political science & theory [JPA], Cultural studies [JFC], Social & political philosophy [HPS], Philosophy [HP]