The History of Philosophy Reveals that ‘Great’ Philosophy is Disguised Moral Advocacy: A Nietzschean Case against the Socratic Canon in Philosophy

2018 ◽  
pp. 185-199 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Leiter
Keyword(s):  
History Of Physics ◽  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
The Real ◽  
Real Lesson ◽  
History Of

Instrumentalists think the history of philosophy is as relevant to philosophy as the history of physics is to physics: if past philosophical or physical theories are true, or help us get to the truth, then we should know about them, otherwise not. Sceptical instrumentalists (such as Carnap and Quine) think history fails on these counts, optimistic instrumentalists think it does not. By contrast ‘anti-philosophical’ instrumentalists—such as Marx, Nietzsche and Wittgenstein—are not simply sceptics, because the sceptics still believe there is something for philosophy to do, some knowledge it can produce, some truths it can reveal. The anti-philosophical philosophers think we should give up philosophy as traditionally conceived: the real lesson from the history of philosophy in the Socratic canon is that philosophy is ‘garbage’, or, as Nietzsche thought, disguised moral advocacy. For Nietzsche, this is the real lesson of the history of philosophy.

Continental Realism and Its Discontents

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Real World ◽  
Continental Philosophy ◽  
German Idealism ◽  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
Human Consciousness ◽  
The Real ◽  
New Realism ◽  
History Of

A new realist movement in continental philosophy has emerged to challenge philosophical approaches and traditions ranging from transcendental and speculative idealism to phenomenology and deconstruction for failing to do justice to the real world as it is ‘in itself’, that is, as independent of the structures of human consciousness, experience, and language. This volume presents a collection of essays that take up the challenge of realism from a variety of historical and contemporary philosophical perspectives. This volume includes essays that engage the fundamental presuppositions and conclusions of this new realism by turning to the writings of seminal figures in the history of philosophy, including Kant, Schelling, and others. Also included are essays that challenge anti-realist readings of Merleau-Ponty, Derrida, and Nancy. Finally, several essays in this volume propose alternative ways of understanding realism through careful readings of key figures in German idealism, pessimism, phenomenology, existentialism, feminism, and deconstruction.

scholarly journals Artificial intelligence and philosophical creativity: From analytics to crealectics

Human Affairs ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 597-607
Author(s):  
Luis de Miranda
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Data Analytics ◽  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
The Real ◽  
Analytic Process ◽  
History Of ◽  
Definition Of

AbstractThe tendency to idealise artificial intelligence as independent from human manipulators, combined with the growing ontological entanglement of humans and digital machines, has created an “anthrobotic” horizon, in which data analytics, statistics and probabilities throw our agential power into question. How can we avoid the consequences of a reified definition of intelligence as universal operation becoming imposed upon our destinies? It is here argued that the fantasised autonomy of automated intelligence presents a contradistinctive opportunity for philosophical consciousness to understand itself anew as holistic and co-creative, beyond the recent “analytic” moment of the history of philosophy. Here we introduce the concept of “crealectic intelligence”, a meta-analytic and meta-dialectic aspect of consciousness. Intelligent behaviour may consist in distinguishing discrete familiar parts or reproducible functions in the midst of noise via an analytic process of segmentation; intelligence may also manifest itself in the constitution of larger wholes and dynamic unities through a dialectic process of association or assemblage. But, by contrast, crealectic intelligence co-creates realities in the image of an ideal or truth, taking into account the desiring agent imbued with a sense of possibility, in a relationship not only with the Real but also with the creative sublime or “Creal”.

scholarly journals The Leibniz-Clarke Correspondence as a Case Study for the Historiography of Physics

2020 ◽  
pp. 59
Author(s):  
Matt Waldschlagel
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz ◽  
History Of Physics ◽  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
Absolute Space ◽  
Isaac Newton ◽  
Absolute Time ◽  
Modern Physics ◽  
History Of

This paper examines an important episode in the history of early modern physics – the Leibniz-Clarke correspondence of 1715-16, an exchange that occurred at the intersection of physics, metaphysics and theology – before turning to questions of interpretation in the historiography of physics.  Samuel Clarke, a disciple of Isaac Newton, engaged in a dispute over Newton’s commitment to absolute space and absolute time with Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, who criticized Newton’s views and advanced a rival account.  I clarify the positions at stake in the Leibniz-Clarke correspondence, define a variety of terms – absolute space, absolute time, substantivalism, and relationalism – endogenous to the exchange, and reconstruct key elements in the philosophical dimension of the dispute.  I then use the Leibniz-Clarke exchange as a springboard from which to examine interpretive considerations in the historiography of physics.  I argue that the history of physics can benefit from reassessing its historiographical commitments by borrowing or appropriating some of the intellectual resources used by philosophers working in the history of philosophy.  This historiographical reassessment, I contend, will not only shed new light on the Leibniz-Clarke exchange but may also reinvigorate the history of physics.

scholarly journals The Divine Processions and the Divine Energies

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 59-70
Author(s):  
David Bradshaw ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Fourth Century ◽  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
The Real ◽  
Dionysius The Areopagite ◽  
History Of ◽  
Real Importance ◽  
Cappadocian Fathers ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Maximus The Confessor

The concept of the divine energies (energeiai) is commonly associated with the late Byzantine theologian Gregory Palamas. In fact, however, it has biblical origins and figures prominently in Greek patristic theology from at least the fourth century. Here I briefly trace its history beginning with the Pauline usage of energeia and continuing through the Cappadocian Fathers, Dionysius the Areopagite, Maximus the Confessor, and Gregory Palamas. I argue that the divine processions in Dionysius function much as do the divine energies in the Cappadocians, although Dionysius enriches the concept by setting it within the context of a Neoplatonic pattern of procession and return. Dionysius’s own work was in need of a further synthesis in that he does not explain the relationship between the divine processions and the divine logoi, the “divine and good acts of will” by which God creates. Maximus the Confessor then introduced a further element into this complex tradition through his argument that certain “natural energies” must necessarily accompany any nature. I argue that the real importance of Palamas from the standpoint of the history of philosophy lies not in originating the concept of the divine energies, but in using it to synthesize these disparate elements from the Cappadocians, Dionysius, and Maximus.

Descartes' Debt to Augustine

1992 ◽  
Vol 32 ◽  
pp. 73-88
Author(s):  
Stephen R. L. Clark
Keyword(s):  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
Jonathan Edwards ◽  
The Real ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Right

Jonathan Edwards identified the central act of faith as ‘the cordial consent of beings to Being in general’, which is to say to God (see Holbrook, 1973, pp. 102ff). That equation, of Being, Truth and God, is rarely taken seriously in analytical circles. My argument will be that this is to neglect the real context of a great deal of past philosophy, particularly the very Cartesian arguments from which so many undergraduate courses begin. All too many students issue from such courses immunized against enthusiasm, in the conceit that they have answers to all the old conundrums, which were in any case no more than verbal trickery. ‘By uttering the right words but failing to use them in propria persona, philosophy induces a kind of soporific amnesia bewitching us into forgetting our God-given task. That task is, of course, to do what Socrates did and to live as he lived' (Burrell, 1972, p. 4). Burrell's words are not wholly fair to academic philosophers, nor to the Lady Philosophy. Plenty of philosophers really mind about the truth, and want to be Socratic in pursuit of it. But the danger is a real one. If all that matters is debunking past philosophers, how does that differ from the repeated refutation of the Chaldaean Oracles or the Prophecies of Nostradamus? A pretty enough pastime for the young, but hardly serious business for adults (as Callicles remarks: Plato, Gorgias 484 c 5ff). ‘If the history of philosophy is a process of ‘salvaging’ what you yourself have already thought, then why bother?’ (MacDonald Ross, 1985, p. 502).

scholarly journals Study of the Implementation of Socratic Dialogue at History of Physics Course

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-20
Author(s):  
Moch Yusuf Efendi ◽  
Tsung-Hui Cheng ◽  
Elok Halimah Sa'diyah ◽  
Desi Wulandari ◽  
Ahmad Qosyim ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Lesson Plan ◽  
Public University ◽  
History Of Physics ◽  
Socratic Dialogue ◽  
Learning Materials ◽  
Empirical Validity ◽  
The Real ◽  
Analysis Technique ◽  
History Of ◽  
Physics Course

Having the development of learning materials of the history of physics with Socratic learning dialogue, we implemented them to the two classes in a public university in Indonesia. The materials consisted of a lesson plan, student worksheets, evaluation sheets, and rubrics that fulfill the criteria of construct, content, and empirical validity. However, the discussion of this paper focused on the results of empirical validity. Learning materials were trialed and tested on a limited participant (10 university students from a public university in Surabaya - S), then the real classes included 40 students from a public university in Surabaya, Indonesia- S1 and S2 (20 students for each class). The data analysis technique used a descriptive statistical analysis with percentages and logical analysis. The research findings included: 1) the student's assessment of the learning materials (especially the handout and student worksheet) were categorized as good, 2) the feasibility of the learning materials during the real teaching activities obtained: the implementation of history of physics learning at S1 and S2 for each item was a quite good category, and 3) assessment of critical thinking students who are oriented Socratic dialogue showed that over 60% and 70% of S1 and S2 student answers lead to Socratic thinking, respectively. The implication of the study is the availability of physics history learning materials that are ready to be used in conducting lectures in the following semester.

Why We Need a Real History of Philosophy

2018 ◽  
pp. 36-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Marenbon
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual History ◽  
Small Area ◽  
Intrinsic Value ◽  
Division Of Labour ◽  
History Of Philosophy ◽  
Western Tradition ◽  
Short List ◽  
Analytical Philosophy ◽  
The Real ◽  
History Of

The main value of the history of philosophy is not in how philosophers can use it, but its intrinsic value as an independent discipline. A ‘real history of philosophy’ maximises this value. It must meet criteria with regard to method, breadth and comprehensiveness. The method of approach requires a rejection of the usual division of labour between history of philosophy and intellectual history. Although analytical historians rarely recommend such a method in theory, they often follow it in practice. But, as a field, analytic history of philosophy fails drastically in breadth and comprehensiveness. It is highly concentrated around a short list of names, historically on just two short periods, and geographically on a small area within the broad Western tradition. As a result, students of analytical philosophy are likely to finish their courses more ignorant of the real history of their subject than when they began.

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