Various conceptions of philosophy of education have been mooted over the last sixty years. The paper looks at five of these, associated particularly with R. S. Peters, D. W. Hamlyn, David Bakhurst, Philip Kitcher and Harvey Siegel. It shows differences and sometimes overlaps among these, to do with whether or not philosophy of education should be seen as a branch of philosophy, as central to philosophy as a whole, or as a form of applied philosophy. The paper puts most weight (...) on the last of these while recognizing the importance of work on the enculturation of young human beings as exemplified in Hamlyn’s and Bakhurst’s writings. (shrink)

(Bonus material: a critique of the genesis myth of Western philosophy as well as of the exclusions and policing practices of both analytic and continental traditions).

In this article I explore Mary Midgley's meta-philosophy: her view of the purpose of philosophy and its corresponding methodology. After some biographical information and historical context, I consider Midgley's answer to the question ‘why do we need philosophy?’.

Despite a recent surge of interest in philosophy as a way of life, it is not clear what it might mean for philosophy to guide one's life, or how a “philosophical” way of life might differ from a life guided by religion, tradition, or some other source. We argue against John Cooper that spiritual exercises figure crucially in the idea of philosophy as a way of life—not just in the ancient world but also today, at least if the idea (...) is to be viable. In order to make the case we attempt to clarify the nature of spiritual exercises, and to explore a number of fundamental questions, such as “What role does reason have in helping us to live well?” Here we distinguish between the discerning and motivational powers of reason, and argue that both elements have limitations as guides to living well. (shrink)

A work powerful and pervading in its implications not only for metaphysics but also for art, political science, and the philosophy of history.

The question “What is philosophy?” is difficult to answer because it seems to presuppose answers to long‐standing and controversial philosophical questions. As answers to these questions affect one’s metaphilosophy, apparently irresolvable philosophical disagreements are then converted into deadlock concerning the nature of the discipline. As this problem is unique to philosophy, however, this difficulty itself reveals something of philosophy’s essential nature. As, under analysis, it turns out to arise from a definite way of posing problems, philosophy can initially be (...) defined by a particular mode of problematisation. This essay establishes this argument and proposes a method for developing this insight into a fully realised, socio‐historical metaphilosophy. This involves stages of (a) hermeneutical analysis and (b) historical contextualisation, both of which increase the account’s empirical adequacy. A conclusion discusses the extent to which philosophy is on trial here and argues that questioning the future of philosophy is not inherently philistine. (shrink)

This paper is based on a literature review of articles discussing the teaching and learning of philosophy in primary and secondary schools. The purpose of this review was to address two research questions: What 'is 'philosophy? What does philosophy do? This paper addresses the first research question—What 'is' philosophy?—by gathering together the various understandings of the word ‘philosophy’ circulating in the literature. There are ten understandings of what philosophy 'is' that have arisen from the literature: philosophy (...) as a foundational concept; philosophy as thinking—a skill, a disposition, a practice; philosophy as method or process; philosophy as a tool or instrument; philosophy as a creative task; philosophy as inquiry; philosophy as search for truth; philosophy as non-dogmatic teaching and hence the emancipation of thought; philosophy as communal activity; philosophy as a way of life. These ten understandings have been consistent over time, from writing in the field in the 1970s through to the present day. Many commentators hold and work with multiple understandings of what philosophy 'is' in their writing. (shrink)

Deleuze and Guattari differentiate between philosophy, science, and the arts - seeing each as a means of confronting chaos - and challenge the common view that philosophy is an extension of logic. The authors also discuss the similarities and distinctions between creative and philosophical writing. Fresh anecdotes from the history of philosophy illuminate this book, along with engaging discussions of composers, painters, writers, and architects.

In attempting to answer the question posed by this book's title, Giorgio Agamben does not address the idea of philosophy itself. Rather, he turns to the apparently most insignificant of its components: the phonemes, letters, syllables, and words that come together to make up the phrases and ideas of philosophical discourse. A summa, of sorts, of Agamben's thought, the book consists of five essays on five emblematic topics: the Voice, the Sayable, the Demand, the Proem, and the Muse. In keeping (...) with the author's trademark methodology, each essay weaves together archaeological and theoretical investigations: to a patient reconstruction of how the concept of language was invented there corresponds an attempt to restore thought to its place within the voice; to an unusual interpretation of the Platonic Idea corresponds a lucid analysis of the relationship between philosophy and science, and of the crisis that both are undergoing today. In the end, there is no universal answer to what is an impossible or inexhaustible question, and philosophical writing—a problem Agamben has never ceased to grapple with—assumes the form of a prelude to a work that must remain unwritten. (shrink)

Introduction: State-Centered and Individual-Centered TheoriesWhat is philosophy of criminal law? The seventeen essays in this book, as a whole, provide an excellent place to start in answering that question. Editors John Deigh and David Dolinko state that they put together this volume of “seventeen original essays by leading thinkers in the philosophy of the criminal law” in order to create “an authoritative handbook” representing “the state of current research on the major topics in the field that arise from issues in (...) the substantive criminal law” (p. v).So what is the field, and what are its major topics? There are many ways to organize this field, but I would start by observing that we can divide the world of philosophy of criminal law into two different types of theorizing: state-centered and individual-centered. The state-centered theory focuses on the proper limits of the state’s power to criminalize and punish, while the individual-centered theory focuses on questions of innocen .. (shrink)

This edition of one of Heidegger's minor essays--Was ist das--die Philosophie?--contains the German text and a translation,, on facing pages.--L. S. F.

Why should anybody take an interest in philosophy? Is it just another detailed study like metallurgy? Or is it similar to history, literature and even religion: a study meant to do some personal good and influence our lives? In her last published work, Mary Midgley addresses provocative questions, interrogating the various forms of our current intellectual anxieties and confusions and how we might deal with them. In doing so, she provides a robust, yet not uncritical, defence of philosophy and the (...) life of the mind. This defence is expertly placed in the context of contemporary debates about science, religion, and philosophy. It asks whether, in light of rampant scientific and technological developments, we still need philosophy to help us think about the big questions of meaning, knowledge, and value. (shrink)

An anthology of meta-philosophical selections culled from the writings of Maritain, Russell, Carnap, Black, Cornforth, Dewey, Husserl, McKeon, Collingwood, and Heidegger. Johnstone's introductory essay attempts a brief historical survey, then discusses and relates the various selections, which are seen as representing a process from philosophy as wisdom back to philosophy as wisdom. The book is part of the "Sources in Philosophy" series.—A. E. J.

Art plays a significant role in Iris Murdoch’s moral philosophy, a major part of which may be interpreted as a proposal for the revision of religious belief. In this paper, I identify within Murdoch’s philosophical writings five distinct but related ways in which great art can assist moral/religious belief and practice: art can reveal to us “the world as we were never able so clearly to see it before”; this revelatory capacity provides us with evidence for the existence of the (...) Good, a metaphor for a transcendent reality of which God was also a symbol; art is a “hall of reflection” in which “everything under the sun can be examined and considered”; art provides us with an analogue for the way in which we should try to perceive our world; and art enables us to transcend our selfish concerns. I consider three possible objections: that Murdoch’s theory is not applicable to all forms of art; that the meaning of works of art is often ambiguous; and that there is disagreement about what constitutes a great work of art. I argue that none of these objections are decisive, and that all forms of art have at least the potential to furnish us with important tools for developing the insight required to live a moral/religious life. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:"What Is Philosophy?"The Status of World Philosophy in the ProfessionRobert C. SolomonThe question "What is philosophy?" is both one of the most virtuously self-effacing and one of the most obnoxious that philosophers today tend to ask. It is virtuously self-effacing insofar as it questions, with some misgivings, its own behavior, the worth of the questions it asks, and the significance of the enterprise itself. It is obnoxious (...) when it refuses to question its own behavior but instead takes that same behavior as the exclusive standard to delegitimize any other activity that dares to call itself "philosophy." Thus, for most of this century, Anglo-American and most European philosophers have simply ignored the rich philosophical traditions of Africa, Asia, Latin and Native America, and the rest of the world. Some leading African American and African European philosophers have dismissed "ethnophilosophy" as "not philosophy," presumably to protect their own analytic credentials. Universities as far flung as Singapore, Sierra Leone, and New Delhi have prided themselves on their fidelity to Oxbridge philosophy. It seems that the globalization of free market economics goes with the globalization of one brief moment in philosophy, with similarly devastating effects on local cultures and the rich varieties of human experience.Philosophy might be thought of as made up of two components: critical thinking and passionate vision. But "critical thinking" does not necessarily imply the hermeneutics of suspicion, skepticism, or intellectual paranoia—all too often the trademarks of the bright young professional philosopher. One can be "critical," that is, reflective, while at the same time be committed, even devoted, to an idea or a way of thinking. The emphasis on passionate vision, however, is just as essential, and any philosophy that doesn't include both components just isn't worthy of the name. Without passionate vision, we get that utterly eviscerated focus on forms of argumentation—philosophia minimalia—devoid of "empirical" content (that is to say, content) and, as far as most people are concerned, devoid of any interest. Without critical reflection, we get gullibility and the worst of New Age philosophy, accepting of any kind of nonsense, just because it stirs the passions. But simply to assume that philosophy must be as rigorously self-questioning as modern European and Anglo-American philosophy is a subtle form of ethnic chauvinism. It eliminates from the realm of philosophy not only African ethnophilosophy and Latin and Native American and South Pacific mythology but a good deal of the philosophy of religion, the basis (for better or worse) of the development of Western philosophy over much of the past two thousand years. [End Page 100]I have just withdrawn from a recent dispute, in a respectable and supposedly eclectic philosophy journal, in which my worst fears in this regard were rather bluntly confirmed. I had made the point mentioned above—rather matter-of-factly, I thought—that if (analytic) philosophy dismisses or ignores modes of thinking that are not obviously self-critical and are presented poetically instead of by way of positions to be argued for, then a good deal of the world's philosophy, including a good deal of Western philosophy, would be left out of the arena. The journal's board reacted indignantly, to put it mildly, to the suggestion that anything should count as "philosophy" that was not sufficiently self-critical in just this sense. But what about the millennium or so of religious philosophy in the West? Does anyone believe that thinkers like Anselm, or Alvin Plantiga for that matter, are seriously skeptical of the truth of Christianity, as they go through their admittedly brilliant argumentative routines? For that matter, to what extent is the emphasis on logical form and argument subjected to scrutiny in contemporary analytic philosophy? (As one of the foremost practitioners of that art commented, "Metaphilosophy makes me sick.")Some of the hostility to world philosophy, to be sure, turns on the conflict between philosophy and religion, which may have its origins in ancient and medieval philosophy but emerges full-blown with the Enlightenment and its campaign against "superstition." But many people and a good many cultures do not distinguish between philosophy and religion. If we consider the word "philosophy... (shrink)

‘What is philosophy?’ is a question that every professional philosopher must ask themself sometimes. In a sense, of course, they know: they spend much time doing it. But in another sense, the answer to the question is not at all obvious. In the same way, any person knows by acquaintance what breathing is; but this does not mean that they know the nature of breathing: its mechanism and function. The nature of breathing, in this sense, is now well (...) understood; the nature of philosophy, by contrast, is still very much an open question. One of the reasons this is so is that the nature of philosophy is itself a philosophical question, so uncontentious answers are not to be expected—if philosophers ever ceased disagreeing with one another our profession would be done for. Moreover, it is a hard philosophical question. Many great philosophers, including Plato, Hegel, and others, have suggested answers to it. But their answers would now be given little credence. In the thirty or so years that I have been doing philosophy there have been two views about the nature of philosophy which have had wide acceptance. These are the views of the later Wittgenstein and of Derrida. In the first two parts of this paper I will describe these views and explain why I find them unsatisfactory. I will then go on, in the final part of paper, to outline a view that inspires more confidence in me. (shrink)

The attractive format and readable style of this paperback might have proved useful to achieve the author's purpose of acquainting "the beginning student with the forest before he is hopelessly lost among the trees." But the material selected is restrictive, and Sprague prefers to be clever rather than just.--R. I.

In this stimulating book, six leading philosophers--Karl-Otto Apel, Robert Brandom, Karsten Harries, Martha Nussbaum, Barry Stroud, and Allen Wood--consider the nature of philosophy. Although each of them has a unique perspective, they all seem to agree that philosophy seeks to uncover hidden assumptions and concepts in order to expose them to critical scrutiny. It is thus entirely fitting that philosophers should examine their own assumptions about the nature of their discipline. As they delve into the nature of philosophy, the authors (...) address many fascinating subjects: what makes philosophy different from natural science, religion, and other branches of the humanities; whether philosophy can contribute to political transformation, and if so, how; whether there can ever be an "end of philosophy"; and more. The editors' introduction ties together the contributors' diverse perspectives by noting common themes, similarities, and differences. (shrink)

The paper provides a systematic overview of recent debates in epistemology and philosophy of science on the nature of understanding. We explain why philosophers have turned their attention to understanding and discuss conditions for “explanatory” understanding of why something is the case and for “objectual” understanding of a whole subject matter. The most debated conditions for these types of understanding roughly resemble the three traditional conditions for knowledge: truth, justification and belief. We discuss prominent views about how to construe these (...) conditions for understanding, whether understanding indeed requires conditions of all three types and whether additional conditions are needed. (shrink)

Called by many France's foremost philosopher, Gilles Deleuze is one of the leading thinkers in the Western World. His acclaimed works and celebrated collaborations with Félix Guattari have established him as a seminal figure in the fields of literary criticism and philosophy. The long-awaited publication of _What is Philosophy?_ in English marks the culmination of Deleuze's career. Deleuze and Guattari differentiate between philosophy, science, and the arts, seeing as means of confronting chaos, and challenge the common view that philosophy (...) is an extension of logic. The authors also discuss the similarities and distinctions between creative and philosophical writing. Fresh anecdotes from the history of philosophy illuminate the book, along with engaging discussions of composers, painters, writers, and architects. A milestone in Deleuze's collaboration with Guattari, _What is Philosophy?_ brings a new perspective to Deleuze's studies of cinema, painting, and music, while setting a brilliant capstone upon his work. (shrink)