At least some of the arguments offered by Richard Rorty in Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature are great. Understanding the arguments takes time because they are specific criticisms of a long tradition of philosophy. A neophyte might respond to his arguments by saying “Well, the position he’s attacking sounds ridiculous anyway, so I don’t see why I should care about his criticisms.” To really appreciate and understand the argument, the reader needs to have sense of why prior philosophers were driven to these seemingly ridiculous positions in the first place, and how their commitment to those positions stems from commitment to other very common-sensical positions (like the correspondence theory of truth). Only then can you appreciate how Rorty’s arguments are really an attack on those common-sensical positions rather than some outre philosophical ideas.
I meant great in the sense of voluminous and hard to pin down where they are wrong (apart from other philosophers skilled in wordplay). Take one of the arguments from an idealist that I think underpin postemodernism Berkely
(1) We perceive ordinary objects (houses, mountains, etc.).
(2) We perceive only ideas.
Therefore,
(3) Ordinary objects are ideas.
I’m not going to argue for this. I’m simply going to argue that for a non-philosopher this form of argument is very hard to distinguish from the stuff in Super-intelligence.
Which of the arguments do you consider to be great? Where do you think it takes a lot of time to understand the arguments well enough to reject them?
At least some of the arguments offered by Richard Rorty in Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature are great. Understanding the arguments takes time because they are specific criticisms of a long tradition of philosophy. A neophyte might respond to his arguments by saying “Well, the position he’s attacking sounds ridiculous anyway, so I don’t see why I should care about his criticisms.” To really appreciate and understand the argument, the reader needs to have sense of why prior philosophers were driven to these seemingly ridiculous positions in the first place, and how their commitment to those positions stems from commitment to other very common-sensical positions (like the correspondence theory of truth). Only then can you appreciate how Rorty’s arguments are really an attack on those common-sensical positions rather than some outre philosophical ideas.
Omg I love you, thanks for promoting Rorty’s work on this platform
I meant great in the sense of voluminous and hard to pin down where they are wrong (apart from other philosophers skilled in wordplay). Take one of the arguments from an idealist that I think underpin postemodernism Berkely
(1) We perceive ordinary objects (houses, mountains, etc.).
(2) We perceive only ideas.
Therefore,
(3) Ordinary objects are ideas.
I’m not going to argue for this. I’m simply going to argue that for a non-philosopher this form of argument is very hard to distinguish from the stuff in Super-intelligence.