metaphilosophy

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The Development of Experimental Philosophy

A recent survey of publications in experimental philosophy provides a picture of the field’s growth and range. (more…)

In Defense of Boring and Derivative Philosophy (guest post)

“Even if you prefer the sexiness of radicalism or the glory of revolution: you need boring, work-a-day normal conservative philosophy.” (more…)

36 Answers to “What Is the Value of Philosophy?” (updated)

Friction, a philosophy channel featuring interviews of professional philosophers, recently released a supercut of three dozen thinkers answering the question “What is the value of philosophy?” (more…)

Why the History of Philosophy Matters to Philosophy (guest post)

“Studying the history of philosophy can help us see ourselves from the outside and that can help us inhabit philosophy from the inside.” (more…)

Organizing for Answers

Suppose the main aim of the enterprise of academic philosophy is to generate philosophical knowledge, and that said knowledge is mainly answers to big philosophical questions. How should the discipline be organized so as to best achieve this aim? (more…)

A New Topography of Philosophy: Analytic, Continental, and Philosophy of Science

When it comes to mapping the territory of academic philosophy, “the timeworn analytic-continental divide should be replaced with a three-way split, between analytic, continental, and philosophy of science programs.” (more…)

Article Spotlight: “The End of History” by Hanno Sauer

Daily Nous is launching a new series, Article Spotlight, in which the authors of recent journal articles are invited to write brief posts here about them.

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Analytic Philosophy and the Big Questions of Life

At the start of each term, Helena de Bres (Wellesley) holds “get to know you” office hours with her students. “So what made you sign up for a philosophy class?” she asks. (more…)

To Be a Department of Philosophy (guest post)

“There are many reasons to expand the story we tell about philosophy. But a main reason is just that the best, most interesting, and even the correct answers to philosophical questions that interest us might be found anywhere.” (more…)

The Contingency of Philosophers’ Philosophies

In an interview, Josef Mitterer is asked about how approaches to philosophy may vary by whether they provide “an escape from contingency.” (more…)

Which Questions Can’t Philosophy Answer By Itself?

In an interview in The Undergraduate Philosophy Journal of Australasia, Thomas Spiteri asks Peter Godfrey-Smith (Sydney) about “how best to make epistemic progress” answering philosophical questions about minds and consciousness. (more…)

Increased Specialization & Competent Peer Review

Is increased specialization in philosophy a problem for high-quality peer review? (more…)

Philosophy that “Tries to Get You to See Something”

At the beginning of his interviews of philosophers, Richard Marshall asks his subjects, “What made you become a philosopher?” (more…)

“Very often, corralling is not an option in philosophy”

That’s philosopher Frank Jackson (ANU), in a recent interview published in The Undergraduate Philosophy Journal of Australasia. (more…)

In Defense of the Details (guest post)

Are today’s younger philosophers “focusing too much on detailed investigations of individual things and not enough on the big picture”? (more…)

World Philosophy Day & the Growth of Philosophy

Today is World Philosophy Day, a day designated by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to celebrate “the enduring value of philosophy for the development of human thought, for each culture and for each individual.” (more…)

An Empirical Approach to the Analytic-Continental Divide

What’s the difference between analytic philosophy and Continental philosophy? In a new paper, a pair of researchers use a computer analysis of the content of different journals to test one way the distinction is sometimes characterized. (more…)

Evidence for a Probabilistic Turn in Philosophy (guest post)

“If our data is representative of the philosophy literature, then the use of formal methods in philosophy changed starkly over the course of just a single decade.” (more…)

Shaping the AI Revolution In Philosophy (guest post)

“Despite the great promise of AI, we maintain that unless philosophers theorize about and help develop philosophy-specific AI, it is likely that AI will not be as philosophically useful.” (more…)

Optimism about Metaphysics (and Philosophy in General)

Is there reason to be optimistic about progress in metaphysics? Jessica Wilson (Toronto) thinks so. (more…)

Intuitive Expertise in Moral Judgments (guest post)

“People’s intuitive judgments about thought experiment cases are influenced by all kinds of irrelevant factors… the issue of intuitive expertise in moral philosophy is anything but settled.”

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Analytic Philosophy’s “Triple Failure of Confidence”

“Analytic philosophy suffers from a triple failure of confidence, especially among younger philosophers.” (more…)

“Hey Sophi”, or How Much Philosophy Will Computers Do?

While we have seen increased use of computing in philosophy over the past two decades, the continued development of computational sophistication and power, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and associated technologies, suggest that philosophers in the near future could do more philosophy through computers, or outsource various philosophical tasks to compute..

Philosophical Quality Now and Then

“I find no good reason to think that philosophers today do philosophy better than philosophers 600 or 2000 years ago.” (more…)

2020 PhilPapers Survey Begins

In 2009, the PhilPapers team—David Bourget of the University of Western Ontario and David Chalmers of New York University—conducted a survey of the views of professional philosophers in the English-speaking world. How have those views changed in the past 11 years? (more…)