This chapter contains sections titled: Introduction: The Span of Early American Philosophy The Context of Early American Thought The Trajectory of Early American Philosophy Seventeenth‐Century Puritanism Early Eighteenth Century Later Eighteenth Century Conclusion.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 42.2 (2004) 229-231 [Access article in PDF] James A. Good, editor. The Early American Reception of German Idealism. 5 vols. Bristol: Thoemmes, 2002. Pp. 2826. Cloth, $635.00. The five volumes of this set reprint an impressive collection of long unavailable texts by five largely forgotten nineteenth-century American authors, each of whom was familiar with at least some aspects of (...) the philosophical revolution that began in Germany with the appearance of Kant's Critiques and whose own writings were deeply influenced by German Idealism. Largely due to the efforts of these five authors, idealism began to rival empiricism and common-sense realism as a major philosophical movement in the United States by the end of the nineteenth century and was an important part of that intellectual context from which later movements, notably pragmatism, grew. But despite the obvious importance of these authors and texts for understanding both the American "reception" of German Idealism and the history of American philosophy, they are today virtually unknown and most of the volumes reprinted in this set are exceedingly rare. Every student of the history of American thought must therefore be grateful to Thoemmes Press and to James A. Good for making these important works once again available. Each volume is prefaced by an excellent introduction summarizing the essential biographical and historical facts, the relevant intellectual context, and the immediate and lasting influence of the work or author in question. Good's introductions also include insightful, albeit brief, comments on the philosophical contents and distinctive character of each volume. Indeed, one of the pleasures of perusing these volumes is the opportunity this affords to appreciate the originality and philosophical talent of some of these long neglected authors, particularly Marsh, Hickok, and Everett.Volume One reprints what would appear to be the first book on Hegelian "psychology" to be published in America: Psychology; or a View of the Human Soul, by Frederick Augustus Rauch (1841). Rauch (1806-41) was a German emigrant classicist who became enamored with Hegelian philosophy during his student years and was particularly influenced by the Heidelberg theologian Charles Daub. In America, Rauch became head of the Classics Department at Marshall College, where he also taught theology and philosophy. Described as "the first enthusiastic Hegelian in the United States," Rauch's Hegelianism was of the "Old" or "Right" variety. Despite its title, "psychology" is the topic of only the second half of this volume, the first part of which is devoted to "anthropology." These divisions correspond almost exactly to the similarly titled sections of Hegel's "philosophy of subjective spirit," which is the obvious model for Rauch's Psychology. The latter, however, displays none of the dialectical power of Hegel's work and is larded with empirical observations and sundry opinions on a variety of topics. It is perhaps illuminating to discover that American "Hegelianism" can trace its roots to such an eccentric and unrigorous work, which was widely read and even adopted as a textbook by several colleges in the mid-nineteenth century and thus can be described as the book that begin the process of "introducing Hegelianism to America."Volume Two contains The Remains of the Rev. James Marsh, D.D.: Late President and Professor of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy in the University of Vermont; with a Memoir of His Life, edited by Joseph Torrey (1843). Marsh (1794-42), who was reputedly "the first American to study Kant," was a polymath who trained at Dartmouth College and at Andover and Union Seminaries as a classicist, theologian, and philosopher and then served for many years as the President of the University of Vermont. In addition to translating Herder and others, Marsh published the first American edition of Coleridge's Aids to Reflection, with an [End Page 229] introductory essay of his own. This work, the first edition of which appeared in 1829, proved to be extremely popular and was instrumental in introducing Kantian and post-Kantian speculation to the New World. Though one of the founders of the Transcendentalist movement in America, Marsh's... (shrink)

The term “American Philosophy,” perhaps surprisingly, has been somewhat vague. While it has tended to primarily include philosophical work done by Americans within the geographical confines of the United States, this has not been exclusively the case. For example, Alfred North Whitehead came to the United States relatively late in life. On the other hand, George Santayana spent much of his life outside of the United States. Until only recently, the term was used to refer to philosophers of (...) European descent. Another focus for defining, or at least characterizing, American Philosophy has been on the types of philosophical concerns and problems addressed. While American philosophers have worked on traditional areas of philosophy, such as metaphysics, epistemology, and axiology, this is not unique to American Philosophy. Many scholars have highlighted American philosophers’ focus on the interconnections of theory and practice, on experience and community, though these, too, are not unique to American Philosophy. The people, movements, schools of thought and philosophical traditions that have constituted American Philosophy have been varied and often at odds with each other. Different concerns and themes have waxed or waned at different times. For instance, the analysis of language was important throughout much of the twentieth century, but of very little concern before then, while the relation between philosophy and religion, of great significance early in American Philosophy, paled in importance during much of the twentieth century. Despite having no core of defining features, American Philosophy can nevertheless be seen as both reflecting and shaping collective American identity over the history of the nation. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: The Question of Whether There Is a Latin American Philosophy Is There Philosophy in Latin America? References Further Reading.

Richard Popkin opened an early paper with the observation "No figure in the history of European philosophy has had a more direct and enduring influence on American thought than George Berkeley."2 Popkin's case for Berkeley's "enduring" influence well into classical pragmatism is compelling.3 But in what follows I will be concerned with his more "direct" influence on the Connecticut philosopher and theologian Samuel Johnson —not to be confused with the English stone-kicking confuter of Berkeley—during Berkeley's brief, abortive (...) Rhode Island sojourn of 1729–31. Johnson studied classics and history at the nascent Yale College, until, "accidentally lighting on Lord Bacon's Instauratio Magna or Advancement of... (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to offer a specific perspective on Puritan philosophy. Most of the early American philosophy of the Puritans dealt with theological issues, the main topics of philosophical speculation were the ideas of God, salvation, freedom, and others. However, there were some ideas, the presence of which is an important factor, which until now has been little taken into account. This factor is the genuine interest of the Puritans in the natural sciences. (...) Both in England and in America, there were favorable conditions for the new natural philosophy proclaimed by Francis Bacon, this natural philosophy offered a new type of thought. The English philosopher struggled with obstacles in the way of research, one of which was infallible authority, for example, the authority of Aristotle. One of the most curious facts about the colonial life of American settlers is the construction of Harvard College, which from the first days, preserved and increased knowledge. Among the sciences taught was astronomy, which indicates the interest of the Puritans in the study of space. The most important change in the scientific worldview of the times of the first colonies in North America was the adoption of the heliocentric system of Nicolaus Copernicus to replace the geocentric system of Ptolemy, which had existed for many centuries. Among the first books printed in the colonies were mainly religious texts, but there were also scientific ones, for example, astronomical almanacs and catalogs appeared. The information in these books helped in observing the heavenly bodies, for which the first optical instruments, telescopes, were used. Several decades after the first settlers in Plymouth, the first telescope appeared in America thanks to John Winthrop Jr. Taken together, these facts show that in addition to religious reflections, American Puritan thinkers were also interested in cosmological problems. (shrink)

In this article I argue that African-American philosophy emerges from a socio-existential context where persons of African descent have been faced with the absurd in the form of white racism. The concept of struggle, given the above, functions as both descriptive and heuristic vis-à-vis the meaning of African-American philosophy. Expanding upon Charles Mills’ concept of non-Cartesian sums, I demonstrate the inextricable link between Black lived experience, struggle, and the morphology of meta-philosophical assumptions and philosophical problems specific (...) to African-American philosophy. Then, I provide a sketch of two early African-American philosophers whose philosophical work is, though neglected, indispensable to African-American philosophical legitimating practices and whose work is informed by the defining motif of struggle. Lastly, I demonstrate the efforts of Africana philosophers at creating philosophical sites that nurture a sense of shared struggle and community. (shrink)

PERHAPS THE MOST STRIKING FEATURE of professional philosophy in North America at this historic juncture is its scope and scale. The historian Bruce Kuklick entitled his informative study of academic philosophy in the United States, The Rise of American Philosophy: 1860-1930, even though his book dealt only with the Department of Philosophy of Harvard University. This institution's prominence on the American philosophical scene in the early years of the century was such that this (...) parochial-seeming narrowing of focus to one single department--with its half-dozen or so philosophers--was not totally absurd for the period at issue. But today it would certainly be so. The American Philosophical Association, to which most United States academic practitioners of the discipline belong, presently has more than eight thousand members, and the comprehensive Directory of American Philosophers for 1992-1993 lists well over ten thousand philosophers affiliated to colleges and universities in the United States and Canada. Admittedly, this profession is small potatoes compared with other academic enterprises; the Scientific Research Society Sigma XI currently has a membership of more than one hundred thousand scientists, and the Modern Language Association has more than thirty-two thousand members. All the same, a small town of not inconsiderable size could be populated exclusively with contemporary North American academic philosophers. To be sure, its demographics would be rather unusual. Only just under twenty percent would be women; and blacks, Hispanics, and Asian-Americans would constitute just over one percent of the population. The social classes above and below the middle are underrepresented in this community, and a disproportionate fraction of its members comes from families of professional status. Moreover, for reasons that require a deeper sociological analysis than can be attempted here, the profession attracts a disproportionately larger fraction of Catholics, Jews, and immigrants. (shrink)

_American Philosophy: The Basics_ introduces the history of American thought from early Calvinists to the New England Transcendentalists and from contract theory to contemporary African American philosophy. The key question it asks is: what it is that makes American Philosophy unique? This lively and compelling book moves through key periods in the development of American thought from the founding fathers to the transcendentalists and pragmatists to contemporary social commentators. Readers are introduced to: (...) Some of the most important thinkers in American history including Jonathan Edwards, Thomas Paine, Charles Sanders Pierce, Thomas Kuhn, Cornel West and many more Developments in five key areas of thought: epistemology, metaphysics, religion and ethics, social philosophy, and political philosophy The contributions of American women, African-Americans and Native Americans. Featuring suggestions for further reading and assuming no prior knowledge of philosophy, this is an ideal first introduction for anyone studying or interested in the history of American thought. (shrink)

In Utilitarianism in the Early American Republic James E. Crimmins provides a fresh perspective on the history of antebellum American political thought. Based on a broad-ranging study of the dissemination and reception of utilitarian ideas in the areas of constitutional politics, law education, law reform, moral theory and political economy, Crimmins illustrates the complexities of the place of utilitarianism in the intellectual ferment of the times, in both its secular and religious forms, intersection with other doctrines, and (...) practical outcomes. The pragmatic character of American political thought revealed--culminating in the postbellum rise of Pragmatism--stands in marked contrast to the conventional interpretations of intellectual history in this period. Utilitarianism in the Early American Republic will be of interest to academic specialists, and graduate and senior undergraduate students engaged in the history of political thought, moral philosophy and legal philosophy, particularly scholars with interests in utilitarianism, the trans-Atlantic transfer of ideas, the American political tradition and modern American intellectual history. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:American Philosophy: The Basics by Nancy StanlickPeter [email protected] Stanlick. American Philosophy: The Basics. London: Routledge, 2013. 174 pp with index.In 174 pages American Philosophy: The Basics covers the American philosophical tradition from its European roots to some of its contemporary leanings. The stated goal of the book is to give an overview of American philosophy and “explain what makes (...) American philosophy a national or cultural philosophical tradition.” This is a particularly tall order for such a short book, and it might be understandable if Stan-lick necessarily omits numerous thinkers from the canon. Overall, the book succeeds at giving a quick overview of the history of American philosophy.The text covers a fairly diverse selection of philosophers. Starting from Jonathan Edwards’ Calvinist theology, the book moves through early American social and political thought, and the European enlightenment ideals that underwrite them, as found in revolutionary era thinkers such as Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, and Benjamin [End Page 578] Franklin. The rest of the chapters quickly address New England transcendentalism and classical pragmatism. The book ends with two quick summaries of “recent” developments in American philosophy split between metaphysics, epistemology, and the philosophy of science; and a second section on social, political, and ethical writings. The latter section includes summaries of recent writings on feminist ethics and African American social thought. Although these themes are particularly welcome, the book would have benefited by addressing feminist and African American contributions not just to ethics or social thought, but also to debates in epistemology or the philosophy of science.The author’s intended audience is undergraduates taking an American philosophy course or those wholly uninformed about the American philosophical tradition. Although the book serves as a helpful summary of various views in the American intellectual tradition, it would need to be supplemented by a substantial amount of primary texts to provide enough course material for a semester. The text does not contain enough critical commentary to function as a secondary resource by itself, but could function alongside additional secondary material.This last point is particularly telling about the book’s goals. Stanlick manages to introduce and explain numerous classic philosophical problems throughout the text (e.g., the mind-body problem, the problem of freewill, arguments for God’s existence, etc…) and provides a glossary at the end of the book, but does not do much to explore any of the issues in-depth. In part this is because of the overview nature of the text, but additional explanations, as well as a longer list of secondary sources, would have gone a long way in strengthening the author’s overall approach. This is an interesting, and I think helpful, approach for a lower-level philosophy text: it provides clear exposition of philosophical terminology while never straying from the overall goal of exploring the American philosophical tradition.One initial problem is the author’s narrative commitment to what makes American philosophy uniquely American. Stanlick argues that what is indicative of American philosophy is more of an emphasis on “what we can do with theories, principles, and arguments” than with theoretical or abstract problems. While we may be able to see this emphasis in some of the classical pragmatists and early American intellectuals, I think it’s difficult to claim that such an emphasis is indicative of all American philosophy.Additionally, seemingly major American philosophers are simply absent. Though discussions of Charles Sanders Peirce, William James, John Dewey, and Richard Rorty compose the pragmatism chapter, no mention is made of C.I. Lewis or Sidney Hook. Recent pragmatists, outside of W.V.O Quine and Rorty, are missing from both the pragmatism chapter and later chapters on contemporary developments in American philosophy. It seems reasonable to expect some mention of [End Page 579] Robert Brandom’s analytic pragmatism, the contemporary revival of Peirce’s philosophy, Cheryl Misak’s extensive work on American pragmatism (although one of her edited volumes is mentioned in a “further readings” sections), Susan Haack’s epistemology, or Richard Shusterman’s work on embodiment and pragmatism. Although not American in genesis, 19th Hegelianism (as especially seen in the St. Louis and Ohio Hegelians) does not appear... (shrink)

Part I Philosophic Traditions Introduction to Part I 3 1 Philosophy and the Afro-American Experience 7 CORNEL WEST 2 African-American Existential Philosophy 33 LEWIS R. GORDON 3 African-American Philosophy: A Caribbean Perspective 48 PAGET HENRY 4 Modernisms in Black 67 FRANK M. KIRKLAND 5 The Crisis of the Black Intellectual 87 HORTENSE J. SPILLERS Part II The Moral and Political Legacy of Slavery Introduction to Part II 107 6 Kant and Knowledge of Disappearing Expression (...) 110 RONALD A. T. JUDY 7 Social Contract Theory, Slavery, and the Antebellum Courts 125 ANITA L. ALLEN AND THADDEUS POPE 8 The Morality of Reparations II 134 BERNARD R. BOXILL Part III Africa and Diaspora Thought Introduction to Part III 151 9 “Afrocentricity‘: Critical Considerations 155 LUCIUS T. OUTLAW, JR. 10 African Retentions 168 TOMMY L. LOTT 11 African Philosophy at the Turn of the Century 190 ALBERT G. MOSLEY Part IV Gender, Race, and Racism Introduction to Part IV 199 12 Some Group Matters: Intersectionality, Situated Standpoints, and Black Feminist Thought 205 PATRICIA HILL COLLINS 13 Radicalizing Feminisms from “The Movement Era‘ 230 JOY A. JAMES 14 Philosophy and Racial Paradigms 239 NAOMI ZACK 15 Racial Classification and Public Policy 255 DAVID THEO GOLDBERG 16 White Supremacy 269 CHARLES W. MILLS Part V Legal and Social Philosophy Introduction to Part V 285 17 Self-Respect, Fairness, and Living Morally 293 LAURENCE M. THOMAS 18 The Legacy of Plessy v. Ferguson 306 MICHELE MOODY-ADAMS 19 Some Reflections on the Brown Decision and Its Aftermath 313 HOWARD McGARY 20 Contesting the Ambivalence and Hostility to Affirmative Action within the Black Community 324 LUKE C. HARRIS 21 Subsistence Welfare Benefits as Property Interests: Legal Theories and Moral Considerations 333 RUDOLPH V. VANTERPOOL 22 Racism and Health Care: A Medical Ethics Issue 349 ANNETTE DULA 23 Racialized Punishment and Prison Abolition 360 ANGELA Y. DAVIS Part VI Aesthetic and Cultural Values Introduction to Part VI 373 24 The Harlem Renaissance and Philosophy 381 LEONARD HARRIS 25 Critical Theory, Aesthetics, and Black Modernity 386 LORENZO C. SIMPSON 26 Black Cinema and Aesthetics 399 CLYDE R. TAYLOR 27 Thanatic Pornography, Interracial Rape, and the Ku Klux Klan 407 T. DENEAN SHARPLEY-WHITING 28 Lynching and Burning Rituals in African-American Literature 413 TRUDIER HARRIS-LOPEZ 29 Rap as Art and Philosophy 419 RICHARD SHUSTERMAN 30 Microphone Commandos: Rap Music and Political Ideology 429 BILL E. LAWSON 31 Sports, Political Philosophy, and the African American 436 GERALD EARLY. (shrink)

An update to the Dictionary of Modern American Philosophers, this version now includes the those minds dealing in the area of theology.

In this highly original work, Mathew A. Foust breaks new ground in comparative studies through his exploration of the connections between Confucianism and the American Transcendentalist and Pragmatist movements. In his examination of a broad range of philosophers, including Confucius, Mencius, Xunzi, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Charles Peirce, William James, and Josiah Royce, Foust traces direct lines of influence from early translations of Confucian texts and brings to light conceptual affinities that have been previously overlooked. Combining (...) resources from both traditions, Confucianism and American Philosophy offers fresh insights into contemporary problems and exemplifies the potential of cross-cultural dialogue in an increasingly pluralistic world. (shrink)

In this dissertation I uncover a logic of the development of atomism in early Greek philosophy that has not been previously recognized in the philosophical literature. This logic results from the nature of subjectivity and the attempt by reflective subjects to understand the world in which they live. Thus because of the nature of illusions built in to perception and reflection, reflective subjects who attempt to understand their world will develop more or less accurate accounts according to their (...) ability to see through these illusions. ;Physicalism, as it is understood by Professor Phillip Scribner of The American University and explained in currently unpublished manuscripts, provides the interpretative key that reveals the underlying logic in the development of early Greek philosophy. It is therefore necessary to explain this particular form of physicalism in some detail in order to understand the terminology and categories to be used in the historical analysis. To this end I explain the physicalist ontology and philosophy of science, the genesis of the problem of mind in Modern and Contemporary philosophy, the physicalist solution to the problem of mind, and the nature of the physicalist critique of the history of philosophy. ;In the historical sections the themes of materialism, reductionism, and realism are used to compare the views of Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, Parmenides, Empedocles, Anaxagoras, Leucippus, and Democritus and to show how their various positions on the themes follow from their assumptions about the nature of subjectivity. I argue that the predecessors of atomism were all naive realists and that this assumption about the nature of mind generates the problems of early Greek philosophy. The resolution of these problems follows from the development of critical realism by Leucippus and a form of proto-physicalism by Democritus. ;The main sources used are English translations of Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker by H. Diels, edited by W. Kranz, and a variety of secondary sources which provide the consensus of modern authorities. (shrink)

Analytic philosophy has traditionally been little concerned with the history of philosophy, including that of analytic philosophy itself. But in recent years the study of the early period of the analytic tradition has become an active and lively branch of Anglo-American philosophy. Early Analytic Philosophy, a collection of papers presented in honor of professor Leonard Linsky at the University of Chicago in April 1992, is an example of this. The contributors, many of (...) them leading scholars in the field of early analytic philosophy, approach the thought of the founders of the analytic tradition in its own right and with a keen eye to how it differs from much of contemporary analytic philosophy. Many of the papers challenge received interpretations and propose alternative readings. (shrink)

Analytic philosophy has traditionally been little concerned with the history of philosophy, including that of analytic philosophy itself. But in recent years the study of the early period of the analytic tradition has become an active and lively branch of Anglo-American philosophy. Early Analytic Philosophy, a collection of papers presented in honor of professor Leonard Linsky at the University of Chicago in April 1992, is an example of this. The contributors, many of (...) them leading scholars in the field of early analytic philosophy, approach the thought of the founders of the analytic tradition in its own right and with a keen eye to how it differs from much of contemporary analytic philosophy. Many of the papers challenge received interpretations and propose alternative readings. (shrink)

"Central Themes in Early Modern Philosophy is a selection of some of the best work being done in early modern philosophy by Anglo-American philosophers today.... The essays in this collection are historically informed and philosophically challenging. The book is a fitting tribute to Jonathan Bennett." -- Daniel Garber, University of Chicago.

In this paper, I would like to focus upon two things. The first concerns the intertwining of naturalism and religion, namely the fact that early American naturalism defined itself as a “secular religion”. This expression sounds like an oxymoron, but the analysis of a dazzling text by Francis Ellingwood Abbot will help us to clarify the concept of “godless religion”, which will be taken up in the following years by all the major naturalists of the time. The second (...) concerns the power of the symbolic dimension of naturalism, especially in the debates of the 1940s. In those years naturalism was engaged in a battle for the survival of democracy. “Science”, “democracy” and “freedom” were not only concepts debated on a theoretical level, but they outlined a system of archetypes by virtue of which post-war liberal and democratic America would build a relevant part of its self-image. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Early Modern Philosophy: Mind, Matter, and MetaphysicsMargaret J. OslerChristia Mercer and Eileen O’Neill, editors. Early Modern Philosophy: Mind, Matter, and Metaphysics. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Pp. xxi + 298. Cloth, $55.00.The editors of this collection of essays by the late Margaret Wilson's former students and colleagues present this book "as a snapshot of state-of-the-art history of early modern philosophy" (8). (...) Many of the usual suspects make an appearance in these pages: Descartes, Spinoza, Locke, Berkeley, Malebranche, and Kant. A couple of new faces also come on stage: Damaris Cudworth (Lady Masham), best known as Locke's companion but presented here as a philosopher in her own right, and the Cartesian Bernard le Bouvier de Fontenelle. As the title suggests, most of the papers deal with metaphysical topics, including the nature of matter, the nature of mind, and arguments for the existence of God. Notably absent from the stage are other figures who played key roles in seventeenth-century philosophy, such as Hobbes, Gassendi, and the Cambridge Platonists. The authors stay fairly close to the traditional canon of early modern philosophers and philosophical issues, but, then, so did Margaret Wilson.In their Introduction, Mercer and O'Neill briefly outline the recent historiography of early modern philosophy, at least as practiced in the Anglo-American tradition. These approaches range from the logical analysis of the arguments of historical figures to accounts that situate their subjects in the context of their times. Mercer and O'Neill identify two methodological principles that have emerged since the 1960s and that depart from the older analytic approach, which sought to use historical sources for new philosophical insights. The two principles, articulated by Janet Broughton in her paper in the volume, encourage a greater historical sensibility: (1) the history of philosophy should aim "to articulate how previous philosophers saw their projects"; and (2) the history of philosophy should accept "how remote the fundamental concerns of previous philosophers may be from our own (and how historically conditioned both their concerns and ours may be)" (4–5). The editors claim that all the authors in the volume accept principle (1), but disagree about whether they should abide strictly by the principle or go on to debate with their historical subjects about philosophical issues. Would that the essayists had been as historiographically aware as their editors.It is not surprising that a book honoring Margaret Wilson should contain four articles on Descartes. With a few noteworthy exceptions, the articles deal with very traditional problems growing out of the analytic tradition. Janet Broughton describes the results of a close reading of Descartes's skeptical arguments in the Meditations. Michael Ayers examines Descartes's dualism, demonstrating its relevance to modern discussions of personal identity and the mind-body problem. Edwin Curley considers Descartes's ontological argument for the existence of God, revisiting his own earlier analysis of this question. And Louis E. Loeb provides a critical analysis of Descartes's mind-body dualism. Although all these papers are based on close textual analysis, they largely ignore the historical and intellectual context within which Descartes was writing, focusing instead on the logic of his arguments. They give little acknowledgement to the fact that Descartes was working in intellectually turbulent times as philosophers wrestled with the relationships among the foundations of knowledge, natural philosophy, and theology, or that these factors might have been formative influences on the development of his thought.Most of the other papers take a similar approach. Catherine Wilson sets out to find contradictions between Spinoza's "severe ontology" and his ethical program, and proceeds to explain why his ethical theory has been less influential on modern ethical theory than the ideas of Hume or Kant. She ignores the influence of medieval Jewish philosophy on [End Page 478] Spinoza's thinking, suggesting instead a Platonic influence for which she provides no textual evidence. Roger S. Woolhouse and Jonathan Bennett provide close readings of Locke's theory of matter. Useful as explications, neither paper contains any discussion of the mechanical philosophy more generally or the theological implications of matter theory in seventeenth-century natural philosophy. Vere Chappell examines Locke... (shrink)

This anthology contains selections from the writings of early American thinkers, the pragmatists, and many later twentieth-century philosophers in America. Accordingly, the book is divided into three major parts: the first deals with Edwards, Franklin, Jefferson, Emerson, and Thoreau; the second includes Fiske, Wright, Peirce, James, Dewey, and Royce; and the long third section contains selections from the early realists, Thomists, process philosophers, systematic metaphysicians, phenomenologists, new empiricists, language philosophers, and moral philosophers. Each chapter in each of (...) the three parts begins with a brief introduction by the editor, and concludes with “study questions” and a bibliography. Finally, there is a brief epilogue, “Is There an American Philosophy?”, which reviews some of the literature concerning the defining characteristics, if any, of philosophical thought in America. (shrink)

This anthology contains selections from the writings of early American thinkers, the pragmatists, and many later twentieth-century philosophers in America. Accordingly, the book is divided into three major parts: the first deals with Edwards, Franklin, Jefferson, Emerson, and Thoreau; the second includes Fiske, Wright, Peirce, James, Dewey, and Royce; and the long third section contains selections from the early realists, Thomists, process philosophers, systematic metaphysicians, phenomenologists, new empiricists, language philosophers, and moral philosophers. Each chapter in each of (...) the three parts begins with a brief introduction by the editor, and concludes with “study questions” and a bibliography. Finally, there is a brief epilogue, “Is There an American Philosophy?”, which reviews some of the literature concerning the defining characteristics, if any, of philosophical thought in America. (shrink)

Manju Jain's innovative study of T. S. Eliot's Harvard years traces the genesis of his major literary, religious and intellectual preoccupations in his early work as a student of philosophy, and explores its influence on his poetic and critical practice. His concerns were located within the mainstream of Harvard philosophical debates, especially in relation to the controversy of science versus religion. These questions (and Eliot's work as he grappled with them) point forward to important debates in contemporary (...) class='Hi'>philosophy and hermeneutics. Drawing extensively on unpublished sources, Manju Jain offers answers to the questions of why Eliot failed to find satisfaction in an academic career devoted to philosophy, and why he abandoned the speculations of metaphysics for the dogmas of theology. (shrink)

Manju Jain's innovative study of T. S. Eliot 's Harvard years traces the genesis of his major literary, religious and intellectual preoccupations in his early work as a student of philosophy, and explores its influence on his poetic and critical practice. His concerns were located within the mainstream of Harvard philosophical debates, especially in relation to the controversy of science versus religion. These questions point forward to important debates in contemporary philosophy and hermeneutics. Drawing extensively on unpublished (...) sources, Manju Jain offers answers to the questions of why Eliot failed to find satisfaction in an academic career devoted to philosophy, and why he abandoned the speculations of metaphysics for the dogmas of theology. (shrink)

Though the title is a bit misleading, this is a splendid collection of essays, five of which are insightful philosophical commentaries on specific American philosophers and one an exercise in philosophical analysis by a distinguished living American philosopher. W. V. Quine maintains that philosophical inquiry should begin with "clear words" rather than "clear ideas" and it would seem that it also ends with words. In an essay remarkable for both its economy and clarity, Quine charts a path which (...) begins with "observation sentences" and the "primacy of bodies," passes through a "brave new ontology" in which bodies disappear and ends with a nonreductionist linguistic physicalism. Quine states that the "physicalist does not insist on an exclusively corporeal ontology. He is content to declare bodies to be fundamental to nature in somewhat this sense: There is no difference in the world without a difference in the position of states of bodies." The crucial question, as Quine readily acknowledges, is "what to count as states of bodies." Physics seems to point in the direction of a "field theory" in which "bodies themselves go by the board" leaving us with a "brave new ontology"—"the purely abstract ontology of set theory, pure mathematics." To which Quine’s response seems to be that this is so much the worse for ontology. Having earlier stressed that "all entities are theoretical," Quine now asserts that "sentences, in their truth and falsity, are what runs deep; ontology is by the way." While his physicalism is admittedly unfinished and incomplete, the direction is set—to reformulate physicalism "by reference not to physical objects but to physical vocabulary." Roland A. Delattre explores "the political implications and resonances" of Edwards’s metaphysics of beauty. Inasmuch as "beauty" is central to the Edwardean vision, Delattre contends that it must have a bearing upon politics. Admittedly going beyond "anything explicitly offered by Edwards," Delattre convincingly argues that "the logic of this vision of reality is to relativize the claim that the political order is to be understood religiously as the scene for a movement through history towards the kingdom of God." A. Robert Caponigri argues quite persuasively that transcendentalism, as expressed by Emerson and Thoreau, affirms an individualism which allows for the state only as a necessary evil. Brownson, however, rescues transcendentalism by distinguishing "civil society" from both the government and the abstract individual and showing how it serves to mediate "the claim and obligation" between state and citizen. In a delightful and informative essay, Max H. Fisch traces pragmatism backwards and forwards from James’s 1898 address to the Philosophical Union of the University of California. It was in this address that the word "pragmatism" was first used publicly but Fisch supplies compelling evidence that the structure of Peirce’s pragmatism was in print as early as 1868. In sketching the development of "pragmatism from Peirce to C. I. Lewis, Fisch gives us perceptive indications of the varieties of pragmatism. Santayana, according to Frederick A. Olafson makes some telling points against a rationalism which isolates reason from its natural conditions and continuities. But Olafson forcefully argues that Santayana jeopardizes the autonomy and significance of reason by reducing it to an esthetic epiphenomenon. Peter Fuss continues his incisive and controversial interpretation of Royce. Centering on Royce’s analysis of Hegel, Fuss maintains that while Royce occasionally flirts with the "correct" understanding of Hegel’s Absolute, he finally surrenders the view of the Absolute as an all-inclusive unity of a community of finite selves in favor of the outmoded view of the Absolute as a transcendent entity. In an unusually clear and focused introduction, the editors have provided useful mini-versions of each essay.—E.F. (shrink)

ISBN 978-1-4384-9027-4 Argues that Nietzsche’s idea of the Übermensch was a central concern of filmmakers in the 1920s and 1930s. -/- Nietzsche in Hollywood offers a compelling and startling history of Hollywood film in which the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche and his idea of the Übermensch looms large. Though Nietzsche’s philosophy was attacked as egoistic and a sociopathic version of Darwinism in films from the 1910s, it undergoes a series of cinematic and philosophical transformations in the 1920s and 1930s (...) under the eye and pen of some of the most significant names in early Hollywood, including Erich von Stroheim, Josef von Sternberg, Ben Hecht, Howard Hawks, and Ernst Lubitsch. In addition to establishing historical connections between Nietzsche’s philosophy and these filmmakers, the book provides philosophical readings of many Hollywood films through the lens of the Nietzschean ideas of “perspectivism” and the critique of morality. Offering a new history of classic Hollywood films as well as a new approach to film philosophy, Nietzsche in Hollywood reveals a reading of the philosopher in American culture that has largely been ignored. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Evolution of the Society for the Advancement of American PhilosophyJames Campbelldespite my increasingly decrepit appearance, I can lay no claim to being one of the founders of SAAP. When I joined the Society in the mid-1970s, it was already a well-functioning organization—if a much smaller one than today. After a few years of attending meetings, I began to submit papers, and I first appeared on the program (...) at our sixth annual meeting at John Carroll University in 1979. (See Fig. 1, the complete program, below.) While I was not one of the founders of SAAP, I did know them all. Presiding at the early meetings were, in the order of their presidencies, such elders as John Lachs, John J. McDermott, Darnell Rucker, James Gouinlock, Beth J. Singer, Peter H. Hare, Sandra B. Rosenthal, Thelma Z. Lavine, Joseph Betz, Charlene Haddock Seigfried, and Andrew J. Reck. Serving in the background at the same time were such patron saints as Justus Buchler, Douglas Greenlee, Abraham Edel, Max Harold Fisch, Elizabeth Flower, Edward H. Madden, David L. Miller, Frank M. Oppenheim, Evelyn Shirk, John E. Smith, and H. S. Thayer. It was a good time to be coming to American Philosophy, under the guidance of a Society that respected the fundamentals of pluralism and "fallibilism."1IThe brief discussion of the evolution of SAAP that I offer here initially emphasizes what the Society has meant to me over nearly five decades.2 As I was entering graduate school in 1974, I was drawn by the American philosophical tradition. It was, as William James writes, my "dumb conviction" that the best answers were to be found in this philosophical direction and not in the others, and that my job was to pursue these answers.3 What I found in this tradition was a refuge from both the analytic style of philosophy then dominant in America, with what I saw as its obsession with truth4 and its [End Page 1] confusion of cleverness with wisdom, and the alternatives of the various continental traditions that, although they pursued wisdom, seemed to me to rely too strongly on the mysterious or the untranslatable. My own sense of the American philosophical tradition at the time was an amalgam of Puritanism, Deism, Transcendentalism, Pragmatism in its various forms, and a large dose of Columbia Naturalism. Through further study and especially through my interactions at SAAP meetings, I became more grounded in these approaches and more open to other strands within the tradition.5 For me, cooperative interaction with others was essential to further understanding. Just as for Josiah Royce, the secret was "the community."6Among the lessons that I drew from the American philosophical tradition were the following. I knew that it was necessary to resist the human tendency to believe that what works for me will work for everyone else. As George Santayana reminds us, all philosophy is "personal."7 Thus, certain thinkers and certain thoughts will benefit from their initial plausibility to us, and other thoughts and thinkers will be initially suspect. To counter this personal prejudice, we need to partake in careful, long-term study. On a related point, Ralph Waldo Emerson urges us to seek insight from others, to accept what he calls "provocation" while not accepting their answers.8 At the same time, we live among these other individuals, marry them, teach their children, and benefit from their contributions to our social existence. In other words, American Philosophy teaches us that people are social creatures—a point which both Emerson and James were wary of, but not blind to—and that our thinking should focus on the world of shared experience. As Benjamin Franklin writes, our efforts in "Philosophy" make sense only when our pursuit of wisdom is related to human well-being.9 This point is so important that we need to wonder how our efforts were ever allowed to narrow and separate from a broad sense of human welfare to focus upon supposedly more important minutiae. With John Dewey, I saw the job of philosophers to be helping individuals to understand and deal with their philosophical "problems" of living.10 And, perhaps more... (shrink)