This article assesses to what extent the future of democratic liberty depends upon its citizens employing a proper approach to the past, by analyzing Tocqueville’s views of three kinds of historical consciousness—aristocratic, revolutionary, and democratic. It is argued that democracies require certain aristocratic assumptions about historical dynamics to cultivate a historical consciousness that fosters liberty. Key to this is the belief in the human capacity to influence the trajectory of history. Tocqueville’s historical approach, which blends aristocratic and democratic elements, is (...) identified as the most effective method for tempering the fatalistic tendencies of the democratic point of view. Thus, for democracies to maintain liberty, citizens should recognize the dual role of general causes and human agency in directing the course of historical events. Tocqueville’s insights on the effects of historical consciousness on the future of democratic liberty remain particularly relevant today when Western democracies confront internal polarization and external anti-democratic challenges, whether neoliberal, illiberal, populist, or fascist. (shrink)

There is a bifurcation between philosophy and history, and in particular, between the interpretations in the writings of historians and in the conceptualizations of philosophers. Philosophers believe analysis to be a supremely rational activity, and they are right. But almost all interpretations are long, complex, and difficult to reduce to the manageable object of philosophical analysis, and philosophers sometimes conclude that what cannot be cut down to analytical size is not worthy of cognitive study, Historical interpretation, and therefore (...) history itseif, has suffered grievously from this inclination and from the attendant temptation to shnplify at the expense of the subject. (shrink)

The question, how is profound intellectual disagreement possible, even when addressed toward the paradigmatically reasonable activity of scientific communication, has generated a number of puzzling responses. On a response attributed to Thomas S. Kuhn, some episodes in the history of science don't allow for meaningful disagreement. In such situations, the adversaries talk at cross purposes until one side is either "converted" or dies off. ;This skeptical prospect has also been considered by those who study the differences between natural languages, and (...) the misunderstandings which punctuate a child's first language acquisition. I investigate theories of concepts in search of one capable of illuminating the apparent gaps in communication between scientists, between speakers of different languages, and between infants and adults. I begin by showing that the antipsychologist efforts of post-Fregean philosophers of language, in particular those built on a causal theory of reference, fail to explain either how communication is possible when it is, or why it isn't otherwise. Nor does recourse to a principle of charity or humanity help them in this regard. I conclude that such attempts can't ground an account of communication. ;I argue that an account of concept learning drawn in part from recent work in developmental psychology can explain both the possibility of serious disagreement, as well as the possibility of overcoming it reasonably. I urge that the revival of psychologism in the philosophy of language follows. Semantic psychologism is semantics informed by empirical psychology, not by the phenomenology Frege attacked. I explore the consequences of this doctrine for the philosophy and history of science. These include a rejection of the common philosophical assumption that all meaningful communication can be reduced to a form of translation, and renewed emphasis on the importance of analogy in communication. ;Finally, I apply this new semantic psychologism toward the historical interpretation of science. If the program is right, it should provide insight into the communicative dimensions of important episodes in the history of science. While a full exploration of this historical method lies beyond the scope of my thesis, two preliminary case studies indicate its fruitfulness. (shrink)

The philosophy of “presence” seeks to challenge current understandings of meaning and understanding. One can trace its origins back to Vico, Dilthey, and Heidegger, though its more immediate exponents include Jean-Luc Nancy, Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht, and such contemporary philosophers of history as Frank Ankersmit and Eelco Runia. The theoretical paradigm of presence conveys how the past is literally with us in the present in significant and material ways: Things we cannot touch nonetheless touch us. This makes presence a post-linguistic (...) or post-discursive theory that challenges current understandings of “meaning” and “interpretation.” Presence provides an overview of the concept and surveys both its weaknesses and its possible uses. In this book, Ethan Kleinberg and Ranjan Ghosh bring together an interdisciplinary group of contributors to explore the possibilities and limitations of presence from a variety of perspectives—history, sociology, literature, cultural theory, media studies, photography, memory, and political theory. The book features critical engagements with the presence paradigm within intellectual history, literary criticism, and the philosophy of history. In three original case studies, presence illuminates the relationships among photography, the past, memory, and the Other. What these diverse but overlapping essays have in common is a shared commitment to investigate the attempt to reconnect meaning with something “real” and to push the paradigm of presence beyond its current uses. The volume is thus an important intervention in the most fundamental debates within the humanities today. Contributors: Bill Ashcroft, University of New South Wales; Mark Bevir, University of California, Berkeley; Susan A. Crane, University of Arizona; Ranjan Ghosh, University of North Bengal; Suman Gupta, Open University Ethan Kleinberg, Wesleyan University; John Michael, University of Rochester; Vincent P. Pecora, University of Utah; Roger I. Simon. (shrink)

When considering a suitable topic for inclusion in this collection, it occurred to me that it might be worth discussing a writer whose interests were largely centred on themes directly related to those cited in the collection's title, and who throughout most of his philosophical career remained particularly insistent upon the need to define the boundaries separating humanistic modes of understanding from ones associated with the physical sciences. The writer in question was R. G. Collingwood. Although Collingwood has justly been (...) credited with perceptive insights into the metaphysical origins and presuppositions of natural science, as well as with raising pointed questions concerning the nature of conceptual change in scientific thought, he had in fact little first-hand knowledge of the subject and it is not in this sphere that his chief claims to importance and originality lie. Rather, they are to be found in an area with which he was certainly intimately acquainted and in which as a practitioner he helped to make significant discoveries on the ground. That was history, a discipline requiring in his view a type of thinking that had either been ignored by his philosophical contemporaries or else misconceived and distorted by those who had troubled to consider it. Thus, as a result of making a serious effort on his own account to come to terms with what it involved, he became—in his own words at the time—‘more and more conscious of being an outlaw’. (shrink)

This article argues that the relationship between analytical philosophy and the philosophy of intellectual history is conceptually uneasy and even antagonistic once the general philosophical viewpoints, and some particular topics, of the two perspectives are drawn out and compared. The article critically compares the philosophies of Quentin Skinner and Mark Bevir with the philosophies of Ludwig Wittgenstein, J.L. Austin, W.V.O. Quine and Donald Davidson. Section I compares the way in which these two perspectives view the task of (...) class='Hi'>philosophy. Section II points to a critical difficulty in Bevir and Skinner’s use of analytical philosophy in their discussions on objectivity. In section III, another such critical juncture is identified in the topic of explanation. Finally, section IV suggests an interpretation for the character of the comparison. (shrink)

Attempts to find an underlying consistency in Marx's complex vision of history without glossing over apparent contradiciton in the writings of Marx and in those of his interpreters.

_Analytic Philosophy: An Interpretive History_ explores the ways interpretation (of key figures, factions, texts, etc.) has shaped the analytic tradition, from Frege to Dummet. It offers 17 chapters, written especially for this volume by an international cast of leading scholars. Some chapters are devoted to large, thematic issues like the relationship between analytic philosophy and other philosophical traditions such as British Idealism and phenomenology, while other chapters are tied to more fine-grained topics or to individual philosophers, like (...) Moore and Russell on philosophical method or the history of interpretations of Wittgenstein’s _Tractatus_. Throughout, the focus is on interpretations that are crucial to the origin, development, and persistence of the analytic tradition. (shrink)

Introduction, by J.R. Strayer.--History, popular and unpopular, by Jacques Barzun.--The science of history, by Hajo Holborn.--The economic impact on history, by Herbert Heaton.--Biography and history, by Dumas Malone.--Theology of history, by George La Piana.

Historians, philosophers, and men of affairs frequently raise questions about the “meaning” of history, or of selected segments of history, and frequently disagree about the relative merits of competing interpretations of specific historical periods or of the historical process as a whole. Such discussions are anything but idle. They affect what historians and others say about the past, and, in doing so, they influence the construction of social policies in the present. Indeed, they affect the very quality of a culture. (...) For the view that a group of people hold towards their past is one of the controlling factors in their morals, religion, art, and intellectual pursuits, to say nothing of the sights, sounds, and actual feel of their daily experience. (shrink)

History and the writing of history.--The customary philosophy of history.--The anthropomorphic view of history.--Man and nature.--Society and the individual.--The psychological roots of religion.--The psychological premises of history.--The question of progress.--Eschatology.--The meaning of history.

This article argues that Vico’s theory of history should be construed as an ontological constructionist account as opposed to its usual realist interpretation. In support of this interpretation I draw upon two important concepts issuing from the body of the Scienza nuova: the notion of ‘‘storia’’ and the verum ipsum factum principle. Both concepts are not only consistent with an ontological constructionist interpretation of Vico’s theory of history but function as powerful explanatory devices in the context of (...) such an interpretation. I show the advantage this interpretation holds for overcoming one of the main charges brought against the Scienza nuova when it is interpreted as presenting a realist conception of history. In highlighting the possibility and, indeed, textual advantages of construing Vico’s theory of history as an ontological constructionist account I claim that Vico may have anticipated the constructionist tradition by some 200 years and may be considered as the founder of constructionism in the philosophy of history. (shrink)

François Renaud replies to the question of what principles one ought to employ in the study of Plato by arguing that, and demonstrating how, the argument and the drama operate together successfully in the Gorgias. In agreement with Renaud’s approach, I expose some historical roots with a review of Platonic interpretive strategies of the modern period in the context of history of philosophy more generally. I also try to show why argument and drama operate together, an insight I attribute (...) to Plato’s genius in relation to music. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis essay explores the different interpretations proposed by Ernst Cassirer and Hans Blumenberg of the relation between Platonic philosophy and myth as a means of bringing to light a fundamental divergence in their respective conceptions of what precisely myth is. It attempts to show that their conceptions of myth are closely related to their respective assumptions concerning the historical significance of myth and regarding the sense of history more generally. Their divergent conceptions of myth and of history, I argue, (...) are at the same time not simply matters of abstract speculation, but spring from fundamental presuppositions concerning myth's political significance. The present elucidation aims not only to set in relief one or another of the ways in which Cassirer or Blumenberg understood myth, nor even to present Blumenberg's critical reception of Cassirer's theories, but above all to contribute to the interpretation of the political implications of myth and of its historical potency in our contemporary epoch. (shrink)

The present study aims at giving factual support to the thesis that the Parmenides is serious in intention, rigorous in logical demonstration, and stylistically meticulous in its original composition. While this consideration may be tedious, still it is useful. Against a past history which has claimed to find the tone hilarious, the logic fallacious, the work inauthentic, the text in need of bracketing by divination, the whole incoherent— against these eccentricities a certain firm sobriety seems called for. I hope that (...) my conclusions find support and persist through fluctuations of philosophic and philological styles.The main difficulty with my thesis is that the text as we now have it (in Burnet's and Dies' editions) shows exceptions to every rule that might apply to style and even to logical structure. Thus it is almost but not quite uniformly true that each theorem opens with a theorem statement; that each is marked by a "questioning" response; that each deduction is valid when formalized in propositional calculus; and so on. Are the exceptions the result of careless composition; are they deliberate warnings not to take the proofs too seriously; or are they the result of errors in transmission? One way to test this is to reconstruct early versions of the text: if these show more logical rigor than the later versions the notion of a wholly valid original is supported; if they do not, the result may point toward the need for a less serious interpretation. A second thing to look for is the possibility that, here and there, parts of a coherent original text are uniquely conserved in sources other than the principal mss, B,T, and W. This assumes, of course, that the "original" text in question is the one with the best logical form, and that assumption seems justified. As a matter of fact, later copyings almost universally show deterioration, not improvement in style and logic.My textual findings are more compatible with some lines of interpretation than with others. Thus I offer some reasons for not accepting treatments of the work as a joke, mystical revelation, or abrupt metaphysical revision. The structure of the dialogue is best explained, I think, by reading it as an indirect proof that some non-Platonic interpretations of the theory of forms are unsatisfactory. In particular, these are the Megarian version (represented in the first part of the dialogue by Zeno, in the second by the First Hypothesis), and the Anaxagorean version put forward by Eudoxus (represented in the first part by Cephalus and his friends from Clazomenae, in the second by the Second Hypothesis). At the same time, the dialogue shows the need for a philosophic method other than the "hypothetical— deductive" way of dianoia; presumably this other method is the "dialectic" discussed in Republic VII. It also follows that any interpretation of the Phaedo which falls into either the Eudoxian or Megarian difficulties was not— at least at the date of the Parmenides—Plato's intended reading.Findings concerning the relations and reliability of the manuscripts of this dialogue also apply to the texts of the other Platonic dialogues which these mss contain.Further, the Parmenides is such an important work both historically and intrinsically that any insight which textual study can bring to its interpretation is a contribution to Western philosophy. (shrink)

A History of Modern Political Thought analyzes the ways of interpreting modern political thought and interpretations of particular modern political thinkers. It analyses prominent schemes of interpretation such as deconstruction, hermeneutics and contextualism and provides a critical reading of how particular thinkers including Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Hegel, Rousseau, Marx, Bentham, Mill, Nietzsche, and Beauvoir are interpreted in the light of these schemes. The book addresses the question of why there are so many reinterpretations of political thinkers and how we (...) can understand past thinkers. It concludes by developing an interpretive pluralism which recognises the merits of several schemes of interpretation, while furnishing a critical overview which maintains a dialectical perspective that provides an integral overview of the subject. (shrink)

Victorian scriptural hermeneutics : history, intention, and evolution -- Intertext 1 : Victorian legal interpretation -- Carlyle : between biblical exegesis and romantic hermeneutics -- Intertext 2 : Victorian science and hermeneutics : the interpretation of nature -- George Eliot's hermeneutics of sympathy -- Intertext 3 : Victorian literary criticism -- Subjectivism, intersubjectivity, and intention : Oscar Wilde and literary hermeneutics.

Owen Ware here develops and defends a novel interpretation of Fichte’s moral philosophy as an ethics of wholeness. While virtually forgotten for most of the twentieth century, Fichte’s System of Ethics is now recognized by scholars as a masterpiece in the history of post-Kantian thought and a key text for understanding the work of later German idealist thinkers. This book provides a careful examination of the intellectual context in which Fichte’s moral philosophy evolved and of the specific (...) arguments he offers in response to Kant and his immediate successors. A distinctive feature of this study is a focus on the foundational concepts of Fichte’s ethics—freedom, morality, feeling, conscience, community—and their connection to his innovative but largely misunderstood theory of drives. By way of conclusion, the book shows that what appears to be two conflicting commitments in Fichte’s ethics—a commitment to the feelings of one's conscience and a commitment to engage in open dialogue with others—are two aspects of his theory of moral perfection. The result is a sharp understanding of Fichte's System of Ethics as offering a compelling resolution to the personal and interpersonal dimensions of moral life. (shrink)

Drawing primarily upon Dante’s three major philosophical treatises (De vulgari eloquentia, Convivio, and Monarchia), this essay explores how Dante’s ethico-political philosophy operates within the crucial tension between the phenomenology of time as the condition for the possibility of human moral development and yet also as, metaphysically speaking, the privation and imitation of eternity. I begin by showing that, in the De vulgari eloquentia, Dante’s understanding of the poetic and rhetorical function of the illustrious vernacular is tied to his political (...) philosophy in a way that depends upon a rich but ultimately unresolved tension between (a) the demand that only an atemporal, unchanging vernacular would be suitable for the tasks of universal monarchy and (b) the recognition that only a temporal, localized, and changing illustrious vernacular could possibly bring about the existence of the universal monarchy. In the second half of the essay, I will turn to Dante’s treatment of the providential grounding for the independence of spiritual and temporal authority in Convivio and Monarchia. I will argue that Dante’s understanding of divine providence provides common justification for the temporal and spiritual authorities whose independence he otherwise insists upon. Finally, drawing on the letter to Cangrande della Scala (the authorship of which is disputed), I will discuss how, for Dante, the providential ground for the legitimacy of temporal authority can only be discerned through the allegorical interpretation of history itself. In light of my discussion of these themes in Dante’s political philosophy and its dependence on his understanding of divine providence, I will conclude with a brief reflection on how Dante’s understanding of divine providence might help us better appreciate important aspects of the neglected legacy of Renaissance humanism in the history of early modern philosophy. (shrink)

Jewish philosophy is often presented as an addendum to Jewish religion rather than as a rich and varied tradition in its own right, but the _History of Jewish Philosophy_ explores the entire scope and variety of Jewish philosophy from philosophical interpretations of the Bible right up to contemporary Jewish feminist and postmodernist thought. The links between Jewish philosophy and its wider cultural context are stressed, building up a comprehensive and historically sensitive view of Jewish philosophy and (...) its place in the development of philosophy as a whole. Includes: · Detailed discussions of the most important Jewish philosophers and philosophical movements · Descriptions of the social and cultural contexts in which Jewish philosophical thought developed throughout the centuries · Contributions by 35 leading scholars in the field, from Britain, Canada, Israel and the US · Detailed and extensive bibliographies. (shrink)

This is the first volume in the trilogy "Many Peaces" on transrational peace and elicitive conflict transformation. It proposes an innovative analysis of peace interpretations in global history and contemporary cultures of peace, the so-called five families of energetic, moral, modern, post-modern, and transrational.

Top scholars address Hegel’s History of Philosophy.