About this topic
Summary Thinking about philosophical progress requires us to think about the very nature of philosophy, its aims, and whether philosophers are doing well or badly in meeting those aims. Does philosophy make intellectual progress? If it does, what does this progress consist in? Is progress all (and only) about truth or knowledge? What entity is the proper subject of philosophical progress? Is progress compatible with apparent widespread disagreement among philosophers? Is progress in philosophy like or unlike progress in other disciplines, such as the sciences? These are the sorts of questions addressed by those concerned with philosophical progress. 
Key works For a defence of a moderately pessimistic view based on (lack of) convergence, see Chalmers 2015. For a book-length defence of a moderately optimistic view based on acquiring knowledge of the answers to philosophical questions, see Stoljar 2017. Ross 2021 defends a multi-factor view of philosophical progress combining convergence, formulating new questions, and acquiring knowledge of the answers to these questions. For a diverse edited collection, see Blackford & Broderick 2017. Important work on progress and different approaches to theorising about it can also be found in the literature on scientific progress (https://philpapers.org/browse/scientific-progress). 
Introductions

Thinking about progress in philosophy presupposes some familiarity with philosophical debates. Many discussions also draw comparisons with progress in science. Dellsén et al 2022 provides a wide-ranging discussion of different views on philosophical progress, alongside discussion of scientific progress. Dellsén 2018 is an accessible introduction to different views on scientific progress. 

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  1. Towards a New Account of Progress in Metaphysics: The Tool Building Approach.Dylan Goldman - manuscript
    How does scientifically informed metaphysics make progress? One response is that scientifically informed metaphysics makes progress off the back of science. Some argue that there is a problem with this line of reasoning. Kerry McKenzie claims that metaphysics cannot make progress off the back of science because metaphysical theories cannot approximate the truth like science can. She concludes that metaphysics based on science cannot make progress, even in principle. In this paper, I use McKenzie’s argument as a jumping-off point from (...)
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  2. Viewpoint Convergence as a Philosophical Defect (work in progress, committed to volume Attitude in Philosophy, eds. Goldberg & Walker).Grace Helton - manuscript
    What can we know? How should we live? What is there? Philosophers famously diverge in the answers they give to these and other philosophical questions. It is widely presumed that a lack of convergence on these questions suggests that philosophy is not progressing at all, is not progressing fast enough, or is not progressing as fast as other disciplines, such as the natural sciences. Call the view that ideal philosophical progress is marked by at least some degree of convergence on (...)
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  3. Philosophical Progress, Skepticism, and Disagreement.Annalisa Coliva & Louis Doulas - forthcoming - In Maria Baghramian, J. Adam Carter & Richard Rowland (eds.), Routledge Handbook of Disagreement. Routledge.
    This chapter serves as an opinionated introduction to the problem of convergence (that there is no clear convergence to the truth in philosophy) and the problem of peer disagreement (that disagreement with a peer rationally demands suspending one’s beliefs), and some of the issues they give rise to, namely, philosophical skepticism and progress in philosophy. After introducing both topics and surveying the various positions in the literature we explore the prospects of an alternative, hinge-theoretic account.
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  4. Philosophy's Past: Cognitive Values and the History of Philosophy.Phil Corkum - forthcoming - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research:1-22.
    Recent authors hold that the role of historical scholarship within contemporary philosophical practice is to question current assumptions, to expose vestiges or to calibrate intuitions. On these views, historical scholarship is dispensable, since these roles can be achieved by nonhistorical methods. And the value of historical scholarship is contingent, since the need for the role depends on the presence of questionable assumptions, vestiges or comparable intuitions. In this paper I draw an analogy between scientific and philosophical practice, in order to (...)
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  5. The Unfortunate Consequences of Progress in Philosophy.Bryan Frances - forthcoming - In Maria Baghramian, J. Adam Carter & Richard Rowland (eds.), Routledge Handbook of Disagreement. Routledge.
    We tend to think that philosophical progress, to the extent that it exists, is a good thing. I agree. Even so, it has some surprising unfortunate consequences for the rationality of philosophical belief.
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  6. Making Philosophical Discoveries.Thaddeus Metz - forthcoming - In Jonathan Jansen (ed.), On the Question of Discovery: How New Knowledge Is Created in Academic Research.
    An autobiographical reflection on some kinds of intellectual moves that tend to be revealing in philosophy. Written for emerging researchers.
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  7. Philosophy is a Great Success, and We are Fooled into Thinking Otherwise.T. Parent - forthcoming - In Mitchell Green & Jan Michel (eds.), William Lycan on Mind, Meaning, and Method. Basingstoke: Palgrave.
    [For a planned Festschrift on William Lycan, edited by Mitch Green and Jan Michel.] Lycan (2022) sums up his (2019) _On Evidence in Philosophy_ as a “dolorous” book. This is primarily because the book claims that the field is infected with non-rational socio-psychological forces (fashion, bias, etc.) and that there is a persistent lack of consensus on philosophical questions. In this paper, I primarily rebut Lycan's second reason for dolorousness. For one, if we attend carefully to his text, his metaphilosophical (...)
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  8. Rationalizing our Way into Moral Progress.Jesse S. Summers - forthcoming - Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 19 (5):1-12.
    Research suggests that the explicit reasoning we offer to ourselves and to others is often rationalization, that we act instead on instincts, inclinations, stereotypes, emotions, neurobiology, habits, reactions, evolutionary pressures, unexamined principles, or justifications other than the ones we think we’re acting on, then we tell a post hoc story to justify our actions. This is troubling for views of moral progress according to which moral progress proceeds from our engagement with our own and others’ reasons. I consider an account (...)
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  9. Systematicity and Skepticism.Aaron Segal - 2024 - American Philosophical Quarterly 641 (1):1-18.
    The fact that philosophy is systematic—that philosophical issues are thoroughly interconnected—was a commonplace among nineteenth century idealists, then neglected by analytic philosophers throughout much of the twentieth century, and has now finally started to get some renewed attention. But other than calling attention to the fact, few philosophers have tried to say what it consists in, or what its implications are. -/- I argue that the systematicity of philosophy has disastrous epistemological implications. In particular, it implies philosophical skepticism: philosophers are (...)
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  10. Philosophical Agreement and Philosophical Progress.Julia Smith - 2024 - Episteme:1-19.
    In the literature on philosophical progress it is often assumed that agreement is a necessary condition for progress. This assumption is sensible only if agreement is a reliable sign of the truth, since agreement on false answers to philosophical questions would not constitute progress. This paper asks whether agreement among philosophers is (or would be) likely to be a reliable sign of truth. Insights from social choice theory are used to identify the conditions under which agreement among philosophers would be (...)
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  11. Philosophers Ought to Develop, Theorize About, and Use Philosophically Relevant AI.Graham Clay & Caleb Ontiveros - 2023 - Metaphilosophy 54 (4):463-479.
    The transformative power of artificial intelligence (AI) is coming to philosophy—the only question is the degree to which philosophers will harness it. In this paper, we argue that the application of AI tools to philosophy could have an impact on the field comparable to the advent of writing, and that it is likely that philosophical progress will significantly increase as a consequence of AI. The role of philosophers in this story is not merely to use AI but also to help (...)
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  12. Challenging the Pursuit of Novelty.Emmalon Davis - 2023 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 101 (4):773-792.
    Novelty—the value of saying something new—appears to be a good-making feature of a philosophical contribution. Beyond this, however, novelty functions as a metric of success. This paper challenges the presumption and expectation that a successful philosophical contribution will be a novel one. As I show, the pursuit of novelty is neither as desirable nor as feasible as it might initially seem.
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  13. Would Disagreement Undermine Progress?Finnur Dellsén, Insa Lawler & James Norton - 2023 - Journal of Philosophy 120 (3):139-172.
    In recent years, several philosophers have argued that their discipline makes no progress (or not enough in comparison to the “hard sciences”). A key argument for this pessimistic position appeals to the purported fact that philosophers widely and systematically disagree on most major philosophical issues. In this paper, we take a step back from the debate about progress in philosophy specifically and consider the general question: How (if at all) would disagreement within a discipline undermine that discipline’s progress? We reject (...)
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  14. Scientism and Sentiments about Progress in Science and Academic Philosophy.Moti Mizrahi - 2023 - Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective 12 (6):39-60.
    Mizrahi (2017a) advances an argument in support of Weak Scientism, which is the view that scientific knowledge is the best (but not the only) knowledge we have, according to which Weak Scientism follows from the premises that scientific knowledge is quantitatively and qualitatively better than non-scientific knowledge. In this paper, I develop a different argument for Weak Scientism. This latter argument for Weak Scientism proceeds from the premise that academic disciplines that make progress are superior to academic disciplines that do (...)
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  15. Why philosophy needs a concept of progress.James Norton - 2023 - Metaphilosophy 54 (1):3-16.
    This paper defends the usefulness of the concept of philosophical progress and the common assumption that philosophy and science aim to make the same, or a comparable, kind of progress. It does so by responding to Yafeng Shan's (2022) arguments that the wealth of research on scientific progress is not applicable or useful to philosophy, and that philosophy doesn't need a concept of progress at all. It is ultimately argued that while Shan's arguments are not successful, they reveal the way (...)
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  16. Problems with Publishing Philosophical Claims We Don't Believe.Işık Sarıhan - 2023 - Episteme 20 (2):449-458.
    Plakias has recently argued that there is nothing wrong with publishing defences of philosophical claims which we don't believe and also nothing wrong with concealing our lack of belief, because an author's lack of belief is irrelevant to the merit of a published work. Fleisher has refined this account by limiting the permissibility of publishing without belief to what he calls ‘advocacy role cases’. I argue that such lack of belief is irrelevant only if it is the result of an (...)
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  17. Examining Philosophy Itself.Yafeng Shan (ed.) - 2023 - Malden, MA, USA: Wiley.
    One of the most distinctive features of philosophy is self-reflection and by exploring novel philosophical methods, this book examines some of the most important metaphilosophical issues. Shows that philosophers are not only concerned with metaphysical, epistemological, conceptual, ethical, and aesthetic issues of things around us, but how they also pay serious attention to the nature, value, methods, and development of philosophy itself Explores some of the most important metaphilosophical issues: Is philosophy progressive? Are metaphysical claims meaningful? What is the aim (...)
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  18. How to Vindicate the Armchair.James Andow - 2022 - Analysis 82 (2):306-321.
    Strevens’s Thinking Off Your Feet promises to vindicate philosophical analysis. My comments take a narrow, critical focus. I argue that Strevens doesn’t deliver on this promise. Given my understanding of (i) what is required from a vindication of philosophical analysis and (ii) Strevens’s grounds for ‘optimism’ about philosophical analysis, Strevens hasn’t done enough to vindicate philosophical analysis. Indeed, Strevens’s supposed grounds for optimism about armchair philosophy in fact provide motivation for philosophical analysis to give up some ground to experimental philosophy. (...)
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  19. Novelty.Emmalon Davis - 2022 - The Philosopher 110 (4):39-44.
    Academic philosophy has a novelty problem. Novelty has become a litmus test for a contribution’s value. This results in a common undertaking for academic researchers. Read a bunch. Look for holes and gaps. Figure out what hasn’t been said. Try to insert yourself in a conversation by saying something new. On first glance, this approach might appear to make sense. If it’s not new, why do we need it? Yet a fixation on novelty sculpts a landscape of philosophical inquiry that (...)
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  20. The Epistemic Consequences of Paradox.Bryan Frances - 2022 - Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
    By pooling together exhaustive analyses of certain philosophical paradoxes, we can prove a series of fascinating results regarding philosophical progress, agreement on substantive philosophical claims, knockdown arguments in philosophy, the wisdom of philosophical belief, the epistemic status of metaphysics, and the power of philosophy to refute common sense. As examples, this Element examines the Sorites Paradox, the Liar Paradox, and the Problem of the Many – although many other paradoxes can do the trick too.
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  21. Your Appeals to Intuition Have No Power Here!Moti Mizrahi - 2022 - Axiomathes 32 (6):969-990.
    In this paper, I argue that appeals to intuition in Analytic Philosophy are not compelling arguments because intuitions are not the sort of thing that has the power to rationally persuade other professional analytic philosophers. This conclusion follows from reasonable premises about the goal of Analytic Philosophy, which is rational persuasion by means of arguments, and the requirement that evidence for and/or against philosophical theses used by professional analytic philosophers be public (or transparent) in order to have the power to (...)
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  22. Philosophy doesn't need a concept of progress.Yafeng Shan - 2022 - Metaphilosophy 53 (2-3):176-184.
    Philosophical progress is one of the most controversial topics in metaphilosophy. It has been widely debated whether philosophy makes any progress in history. This paper revisits the concept of philosophical progress. It first identifies two criteria of an ideal concept of philosophical progress. It then argues that our accounts of philosophical progress fail to provide such an ideal concept. Finally, it argues that not only do we not have a good concept of philosophical progress, we also do not need a (...)
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  23. The unexamined philosophy is not worth doing: An introduction to New Directions in Metaphilosophy.Yafeng Shan - 2022 - Metaphilosophy 53 (2-3):153-158.
    Recently there has been an increasing interest in metaphilosphy. The aim of philosophy has been examined. The development of philosophy has also been scrutinised. With the development of new approaches and methods, new problems arise. This collection revisits some of the metaphilosophical issues, including philosophical progress and the aim of philosophy. It sheds new light on some old approaches, such as naturalism and ordinary language philosophy. It also explores new philosophical methods (e.g., digital philosophy of science, conceptual engineering, and the (...)
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  24. Making Sense of Nonsense: Navigating Through the West's Current Quagmire.Scott D. G. Ventureyra (ed.) - 2022 - Ottawa, ON, Canada: True Freedom Press.
    In recent years, there has been a concerted attack on many of the precepts of Western civilization relating to the concept of God, truth, Christianity, morality, sex, the family, and even modern science, especially biology. The concern of this volume is to explore these and other attacks through the tools of philosophy, theology, science, and intuition. It seeks to bring clarity to the ongoing struggle of Western civilization to preserve its values and traditions. -/- The West is crumbling at an (...)
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  25. Against philosophical proofs against common sense.Louis Doulas & Evan Welchance - 2021 - Analysis 81 (2):207–215.
    Many philosophers think that common sense knowledge survives sophisticated philosophical proofs against it. Recently, however, Bryan Frances (forthcoming) has advanced a philosophical proof that he thinks common sense can’t survive. Exploiting philosophical paradoxes like the Sorites, Frances attempts to show how common sense leads to paradox and therefore that common sense methodology is unstable. In this paper, we show how Frances’s proof fails and then present Frances with a dilemma.
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  26. What's the point of knowledge?: A function‐first epistemology. Michael Hannon. Oxford University Press, 2019, ix+275 pp., ISBN: 9780190914721. $78.00. [REVIEW]Georgi Gardiner - 2021 - European Journal of Philosophy 29 (3):674-678.
  27. Attentional progress by conceptual engineering.Eve Kitsik - 2021 - Metaphilosophy 53 (2-3):254-266.
    Does conceptual engineering as a philosophical method deserve all the attention that it has been getting recently? The important philosophical questions, one might say, are about the world, not about what our concepts are or should be like. This paper fleshes out one way in which conceptual engineering can contribute to philosophical progress. The suspicion that conceptual engineering is getting too much attention presupposes that it is important to distribute our philosophical attention well (for example, conceptual engineering should not get (...)
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  28. How Intellectual Communities Progress.Lewis D. Ross - 2021 - Episteme (4):738-756.
    Recent work takes both philosophical and scientific progress to consist in acquiring factive epistemic states such as knowledge. However, much of this work leaves unclear what entity is the subject of these epistemic states. Furthermore, by focusing only on states like knowledge, we overlook progress in intermediate cases between ignorance and knowledge—for example, many now celebrated theories were initially so controversial that they were not known. -/- This paper develops an improved framework for thinking about intellectual progress. Firstly, I argue (...)
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  29. A debunking explanation for moral progress.Nathan Cofnas - 2020 - Philosophical Studies 177 (11):3171-3191.
    According to “debunking arguments,” our moral beliefs are explained by evolutionary and cultural processes that do not track objective, mind-independent moral truth. Therefore (the debunkers say) we ought to be skeptics about moral realism. Huemer counters that “moral progress”—the cross-cultural convergence on liberalism—cannot be explained by debunking arguments. According to him, the best explanation for this phenomenon is that people have come to recognize the objective correctness of liberalism. Although Huemer may be the first philosopher to make this explicit empirical (...)
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  30. Philosophy in the Age of Science? Inquiries into Philosophical Progess, Method, and Societal Relevance.Julia Hermann, Jeroen Hopster, Wouter Kalf & Michael Klenk (eds.) - 2020 - Fordham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
    Current academic philosophy is being challenged from several angles. Subdisciplinary specialisations often make it challenging to articulate philosophy’s relevance for the societal questions of our day. Additionally, the success of the ‘scientific method’ puts pressure on philosophers to articulate their methods and specify how these can be successful. How does philosophical progress come about? What can philosophy contribute to our understanding of today’s world? Moreover, can it also contribute to resolving urgent societal challenges, such as anthropogenic climate change? This edited (...)
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  31. Aristotle, Isocrates, and Philosophical Progress: Protrepticus 6, 40.15-20/B55.Matthew D. Walker - 2020 - History of Philosophy & Logical Analysis 23 (1):197-224.
    In fragments of the lost Protrepticus, preserved in Iamblichus, Aristotle responds to Isocrates’ worries about the excessive demandingness of theoretical philosophy. Contrary to Isocrates, Aristotle holds that such philosophy is generally feasible for human beings. In defense of this claim, Aristotle offers the progress argument, which appeals to early Greek philosophers’ rapid success in attaining exact understanding. In this paper, I explore and evaluate this argument. After making clarificatory exegetical points, I examine the argument’s premises in light of pressing worries (...)
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  32. Neutralism and Conceptual Engineering.Patrick Greenough - 2019 - In Alexis Burgess, Herman Cappelen & David Plunkett (eds.), Conceptual Engineering and Conceptual Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
    Conceptual Engineering alleges that philosophical problems are best treated via revising or replacing our concepts (or words). The goal here is not to defend Conceptual Engineering but rather show that it can (and should) invoke Neutralism—the broad view that philosophical progress can take place when (and sometimes only when) a thoroughly neutral, non-specific theory, treatment, or methodology is adopted. A neutralist treatment of one form of skepticism is used as a case study and is compared with various non-neutral rivals. Along (...)
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  33. Epistemic Progress Despite Systematic Disagreement.Dustin Olson - 2019 - Epistemology and Philosophy of Science 56 (2):77 - 94.
    A number of philosophers argue that because of its history of systematic disagreement, philosophy has made little to no epistemic progress – especially in comparison to the hard sciences. One argument for this conclusion contends that the best explanation for systematic disagreement in philosophy is that at least some, potentially all, philosophers are unreliable. Since we do not know who is reliable, we have reason to conclude that we ourselves are probably unreliable. Evidence of one’s potential unreliability in a domain (...)
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  34. Williamson on Laws and Progress in Philosophy.Daniel Stoljar - 2019 - Epistemology and Philosophy of Science 56 (2):37-42.
    Williamson rejects the stereotype that there is progress in science but none in philosophy on the grounds (a) that it assumes that in science progress consists in the discovery of universal laws and (b) that this assumption is false, since in both science and philosophy progress consists at least sometimes in the development of better models. I argue that the assumption is false for a more general reason as well: that progress in both science and philosophy consists in the provision (...)
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  35. Philosophical Insights Original vs Factual Derivative: (original, creative vs academic, factual ideas).Ulrich de Balbian - 2018 - Oxford: KDP.
    Both immanent and non-immanent (transcendent) factors related to philosophy, its nature, subject-matter, aims, objectives and methods are discussed from a meta-philosophical perspective, It will be noticed that original- and creative-thinkers in the socio-cultural practice of philosophy present us with their own, new and original ideas and patterns, sets or models of such ideas. Paradigms or models that are arrived at through the processes of theorizing. Processes that consist of a number of smaller steps or stages, stages that are multi-dimensional and (...)
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  36. Scientific progress: Four accounts.Finnur Dellsén - 2018 - Philosophy Compass 13 (11):e12525.
    Scientists are constantly making observations, carrying out experiments, and analyzing empirical data. Meanwhile, scientific theories are routinely being adopted, revised, discarded, and replaced. But when are such changes to the content of science improvements on what came before? This is the question of scientific progress. One answer is that progress occurs when scientific theories ‘get closer to the truth’, i.e. increase their degree of truthlikeness. A second answer is that progress consists in increasing theories’ effectiveness for solving scientific problems. A (...)
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  37. Philosophical Expertise.Bryan Frances - 2018 - In James Chase & David Cody (eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Applied Epistemology. Routledge. pp. 297-306.
    Philosophical expertise consists in knowledge, but it is controversial what this knowledge consists in. I focus on three issues: the extent and nature of knowledge of philosophical truths, how this philosophical knowledge is related to philosophical progress, and skeptical challenges to philosophical knowledge.
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  38. Scepticism and Disagreement.Bryan Frances - 2018 - In Diego Machuca & Baron Reed (eds.), Skepticism: From Antiquity to the Present. Bloomsbury Academic. pp. 581-591.
    There is a long history of using facts about disagreement to argue that many of our most precious beliefs are false in a way that can make a difference in our lives. In this essay I go over a series of such arguments, arguing that the best arguments target beliefs that meet two conditions: (i) they have been investigated and debated for a very long time by a great many very smart people who are your epistemic superiors on the matter (...)
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  39. The technological fix as social cure-all: origins and implications.Sean F. Johnston - 2018 - IEEE Technology and Society 37 (1):47-54.
    On the historical origins of technological fixes and their wider social and political implications.
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  40. Trust, Trade, and Moral Progress.Jonny Anomaly - 2017 - Social Philosophy and Policy 34 (2):89-107.
    Abstract:Trust is important for a variety of social relationships. Trust facilitates trade, which increases prosperity and induces us to interact with people of different backgrounds on terms that benefit all parties. Trade promotes trustworthiness, which enables us to form meaningful as well as mutually beneficial relationships. In what follows, I argue that when we erect institutions that enhance trust and reward people who are worthy of trust, we create the conditions for a certain kind of moral progress.
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  41. THE INSTITUTIONAL and PERSONAL NEED for PHILOSOPHY.Ulrich De Balbian - 2017 - Oxford: Academic Publishers.
    She has always existed and is more than a citizen of multiverses,‭ ‬most likely the ground of all.‭ ‬In the West she was introduced around C.570‭ ‬and since then many individuals have searched for her,‭ ‬tried to become familiar with her and created all sorts of,‭ ‬frequently ridiculous,‭ ‬things in her name. Once someone has a passion for her it cannot be extinguished but increases.‭ ‬Objectively this need for her is referred to as‭ ‘‬love of wisdom‭’‬,‭ ‬the need for wisdom,‭ (...)
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  42. Philosophical Criteria in Whitehead and Rorty.Russell J. Duvernoy - 2017 - Metaphilosophy 48 (5):762-779.
    Rorty's aversion to metaphysics is well known, so the extent of his early work on Whitehead might come as a surprise. This article examines the young Rorty's critical assessment of Whitehead to show how it demonstrates the consequences of diverging metaphilosophical orientations. It argues that Rorty's insistence on judging Whitehead's work through an exclusively epistemological frame causes him to miss its more radical existential and epistemic implications. After examining how Rorty and Whitehead operate with different cost-benefit analyses as to the (...)
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  43. Extensive Philosophical Agreement and Progress.Bryan Frances - 2017 - Metaphilosophy 48 (1-2):47-57.
    This article argues, first, that there is plenty of agreement among philosophers on philosophically substantive claims, which fall into three categories: reasons for or against certain views, elementary truths regarding fundamental notions, and highly conditionalized claims. This agreement suggests that there is important philosophical progress. It then argues that although it's easy to list several potential kinds of philosophical progress, it is much harder to determine whether the potential is actual. Then the article attempts to articulate the truth that the (...)
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  44. David Lewis and the Kangaroo: Graphing philosophical progress.Benj Hellie - 2017 - In Russell Blackford & Damien Broderick (eds.), Philosophy's Future: The Problem of Philosophical Progress. Oxford: Blackwell. pp. 213–225.
    Data-driven historiography of philosophy looks to objective modeling tools for illumination of the propagation of influence. While the system of David Lewis, the most influential philosopher of our time, raises historiographic puzzles to stymie conventional analytic methods, it proves amenable to data-driven analysis. A striking result is that Lewis only becomes the metaphysician of current legend following the midpoint of his career: his initial project is to frame a descriptive science of mind and meaning; the transition to metaphysics is a (...)
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  45. Scientific Progress: Why Getting Closer to Truth Is Not Enough.Moti Mizrahi - 2017 - International Studies in the Philosophy of Science 31 (4):415-419.
    ABSTRACTThis discussion note aims to contribute to the ongoing debate over the nature of scientific progress. I argue against the semantic view of scientific progress, according to which scientific progress consists in approximation to truth or increasing verisimilitude. If the semantic view of scientific progress were correct, then scientists would make scientific progress simply by arbitrarily adding true disjuncts to their hypotheses or theories. Given that it is not the case that scientists could make scientific progress simply by arbitrarily adding (...)
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  46. Does Scientific Progress Consist in Increasing Knowledge or Understanding?Seungbae Park - 2017 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 48 (4):569-579.
    Bird argues that scientific progress consists in increasing knowledge. Dellsén objects that increasing knowledge is neither necessary nor sufficient for scientific progress, and argues that scientific progress rather consists in increasing understanding. Dellsén also contends that unlike Bird’s view, his view can account for the scientific practices of using idealizations and of choosing simple theories over complex ones. I argue that Dellsén’s criticisms against Bird’s view fail, and that increasing understanding cannot account for scientific progress, if acceptance, as opposed to (...)
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  47. Is there Progress in Philosophy? A Brief Case for Optimism.Daniel Stoljar - 2017 - In Russell Blackford & Damien Broderick (eds.), Philosophy's Future: The Problem of Philosophical Progress. New Jersey, USA:
    This chapter sets out an optimistic view of philosophical progress.The key idea is that the historical record speaks in favor of there being progress at least if we are clear about what philosophical problems are, and what it takes to solve them. I end by asking why so many people tend toward a pessimistic view of philosophical progress.
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  48. Philosophical Progress: In Defence of a Reasonable Optimism.Daniel Stoljar - 2017 - Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
    Many people believe that philosophy makes no progress. Members of the general public often find it amazing that philosophers exist in universities at all, at least in research positions. Academics who are not philosophers often think of philosophy either as a scholarly or interpretative enterprise, or else as a sort of pre-scientific speculation. And many well-known philosophers argue that there is little genuine progress in philosophy. Daniel Stoljar argues that this is all a big mistake. When you think through exactly (...)
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  49. Three Barriers to Philosophical Progress.Jessica Wilson - 2017 - In Russell Blackford & Damien Broderick (eds.), Philosophy's Future: The Problem of Philosophical Progress. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Blackwell. pp. 91--104.
    I argue that the present (if not insuperable) lack of fixed standards in philosophy is associated with three barriers to philosophical progress, pertaining to intra-disciplinary siloing, sociological rather than philosophical determinants of philosophical attention, and the encouraging of bias.
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  50. The Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Methodology.Herman Cappelen, Tamar Gendler & John P. Hawthorne (eds.) - 2016 - Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.
    This is the most comprehensive book ever published on philosophical methodology. A team of thirty-eight of the world's leading philosophers present original essays on various aspects of how philosophy should be and is done. The first part is devoted to broad traditions and approaches to philosophical methodology. The entries in the second part address topics in philosophical methodology, such as intuitions, conceptual analysis, and transcendental arguments. The third part of the book is devoted to essays about the interconnections between philosophy (...)
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