From: Matt the Enraged Endorphin (mpkundert@students.wisc.edu)
Date: Sun Feb 09 2003 - 23:38:33 GMT
DMB, Andy,
I think I'll enter a few comments:
DMB said:
Rorty does not use the word "Platonism" to denote the thoughts of Plato?
It means instead a "nest of dualisms"! Oh, Lord! No wonder I'm confused.
Matt:
In the essay, "Confessions," I say this:
"When Whitehead said that all of Western philosophy is a series of
footnotes to Plato, Rorty says that Whitehead’s point 'was that we do not
call an inquiry "philosophical" unless it revolves around some of the
distinctions which Plato drew.' [p. xviii, if you're keeping track Andy]
Pirsig agrees with this assessment when he says, 'Systematic philosophy is
Greek. The ancient Greeks invented it and, in so doing, put their
permanent stamp on it.' [ZMM, Ch. 28] Dewey called this stamp 'that whole
nest and brood of Greek dualisms.'"
DMB said:
It seems to me that Rorty is saying that the last 25 hundred years of
Western Philosophy ought to be ejected. This strikes me as just about the
most extraordinary claim I've ever heard and so to persuade me of its truth
would take extraordinary evidence.
Andy said:
Yes, this does seem an extraordinary claim, but it is only an extension of
the thoughts begun by many other philosophers over the past century [Dewey,
James, Wittgenstein, Kuhn, etc.) I think his analogy of throwing away the
ladder, not because we have reached a final conclusion, but because we are
faced with new problems is a good one here.
Matt:
[Sidenote to Andy's comment about whether Pirsig fit in the above list: in
qualified, simplistic terms, I follow Sam in including the Pirsig of ZMM in
the above list, but not the Pirsig of Lila. In other words, the pragmatist
Pirsig, not the metaphysical one.]
Yes, exactly Andy, particularly about the ladder. Here's Rorty on how to
decide whether or not to follow the pragmatist in discarding the Platonic
picture of philosophy:
"To decide whether [the pragmatist is right] is to decide whether Hegel or
Plato had the proper picture of the progress of thought. Pragmatists
follow Hegel in saying that 'philosophy is its time grasped in thought.'
Anti-pragmatists follow Plato in striving for an escape from conversation
to something atemporal which lies in the background of all possible
conversations. I do not think one can decide between Hegel and Plato save
by meditating on the past efforts of the philosophical tradition to escapte
from time and history. One can see these efforts as worthwhile, getting
better, worth continuing. Or one can see them as doomed and perverse. I
do not know what would count as a noncircular metaphysical or
epistemological or semantical argument for seeing them in either way. So I
think that the decision has to be made simply by reading the history of
philosophy and drawing a moral." (Consequences of Pragmatism, p. 174)
Rorty drew this moral in his Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature.
Andy said:
"didn't Campbell make the point that the key to enlightenment was
transcending these dualism also?"
DMB said:
"Yes, Campbell and many others discuss the transcendence of all dualities.
Its a very ancient idea symbolized in the caduceus...."
Matt:
I think comparing Campbell to Rorty is good because I think there is an
important difference: if my understanding of Campbell's project is right
(which is largely gleaned from DMB's exposition of him), then Campbell
believes in something like a "perennial philosophy." So when DMB says,
"Its not a mistake invented by any one person or mode of thought, it is the
plauge of all mankind," Rorty denies this. Platt argued roughly the same
position when he argued that SOM was built into our langauge and,
therefore, couldn't be overcome, simply coped with. Rorty makes a
distinction (though, Rick, I still deny that this is part of a "pragmatic
method" ;-) between binary thinking and hypostatized dualisms. We fall
into Platonism and metaphysics if we start to think that the binaries we
use to think and cope with our environment are _real_ in sense that what is
really real are these dualisms, rather then the everchanging environment.
Rorty does think we can rid ourselves of metaphysical dualisms, but he
can't conceive of thinking without binaries. The perennial philosopher
begs the question over the pragmatist by saying that these problems can
never be overcome (and vice versa for the pragmatist over the perennial
philosopher). Once again, the only way Rorty thinks we can solve this
dilemma in a noncircular way is to draw a moral from the history of philosophy.
Andy said to DMB about calling Rorty a "shallow and superficial thinker":
So, we should condemn Rorty
for neglecting to make any reference to the mystical one (actually I am not
sure that he has neglected it, I have barely scratched the surface of his
work, but for the sake of argument...) and not give him credit for pointing
out another instance of the strong hold these dualisms have on our
mindsets.
Matt:
I've now read 78 of Rorty's essays, and I have yet to see him endorse a
"mystical one" the way in which DMB or Scott R would want him to. However,
I don't think this affects the moral he's drawn from the history of philosophy.
Matt
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