methodology
TagPhilosopher Drops Some Bombs
There’s a fun interview with University of Waterloo’s John Turri at 3:AM Magazine in which he blithely drops a few philosophy bombs:
Quality Control, Methodological Bias, and Persistent Disagreement in Philosophy
Recently, mainstream philosophy journals have tended to implement more and more stringent forms of peer review (e.g., from double-anonymous to triple-anonymous), probably in an attempt to prevent editorial decisions that are based on factors other than quality. Against this trend, we propose that journals should relax their standards of acceptance, as well as be les..
What Are Philosophers Supposed To Do?
The summer issue of The Hedgehog Review is out and features a symposium, “On the Business of Philosophy.” The main element of the symposium is Richard Rorty’s Page-Barbour Lectures at the University of Virginia, with responses from Susan Haack (Miami), Robert Pippin (Chicago), and Matthew Crawford (Virginia). (more…)
Intuitive Bedrock and the Philosophical Enterprise (guest post by Dale Dorsey)
The following guest post* is by Dale Dorsey (Kansas) and appears here via a special arrangement with Oxford University Press and the OUP Blog, at which it is also posted.
Intuitive Bedrock and the Philosophical Enterprise
by Dale Dorsey
Imagine a person who spends their entire life sitting on the couch watching and rewatching Clive Barker’s Hellraiser. He..
Thought Experiments and Philosophical Method
In an interview at 3:am Magazine, Richard Marshall presses Philip Kitcher (Columbia) on his criticism of a priori, thought-experiment-driven approaches to philosophy. Marshall says that a criticism of Kitcher’s view is that it “would end much typical philosophical investigation.” Kitcher replies:
Thought experiments work when, and only when, they call into action..
Metaphysics as Intellectual Ergonomics (guest post by Elijah Millgram)
This is the fifth in a series of guest posts* by Elijah Millgram (Utah) based on themes from his new book, The Great Endarkenment: Philosophy for an Age of Hyperspecialization. (Here are the first, second, third, and fourth entries.) (more…)
Metaphysics by Forgetting (guest post by Elijah Millgram)
This is the fourth in a series of guest posts* by Elijah Millgram (Utah) based on themes from his new book, The Great Endarkenment: Philosophy for an Age of Hyperspecialization. (Here are the first, second, and third entries.) (more…)
Doing It All By Yourself (guest post by Elijah Millgram)
This is the third in a series of guest posts* by Elijah Millgram (Utah) based on themes from his new book, The Great Endarkenment: Philosophy for an Age of Hyperspecialization. Earlier posts are here and here. (more…)
Serial Hyperspecializers and How They Think (guest post by Elijah Millgram)
This is the second in a series of guest posts* by Elijah Millgram (Utah) based on themes from his new book, The Great Endarkenment: Philosophy for an Age of Hyperspecialization. The first post appeared here last week. (more…)
The Endarkenment at Home: Benchmarking Academics (guest post by Elijah Millgram)
The Great Endarkenment: Philosophy for an Age of Hyperspecialization is a new book by Elijah Millgram (Utah). In the book, Professor Millgram looks at the implications of our becoming, more and more, “a society of specialists” in which “communication across the barriers between the professions and disciplines is our own very pressing problem,” a problem that “threat..
Contrarian on Questions
Continuing with the recent theme of methodology, Robin Hanson, who holds an appointment in the Economics Department at George Mason University, writes often about rationality and decision theory, and is chief author at the Overcoming Bias site, has advice for contrarians. Observing that knowingly disagreeing is irrational or dishonest, he says contrarians should not..
Philosophy v. Common Sense
Speaking of philosophical methodologies (and there is of course a lot that falls under that heading), one longstanding issue is the extent to which philosophy must ultimately conform with common sense. Of course there have been countless counterintuitive theses defended in the history of philosophy, but the dominant view today seems to be that philosophy is indeed i..
What Are We Doing When What We’re Doing Is Philosophy?
A number of philosophers will take up that question at the Edinburgh Women in Philosophy Group’s Spring Workshop on Philosophical Methodologies this May. The workshop’s organizer, Richard Stöckle-Schobel, informs me that they are looking for postgraduates (i.e., graduate students) to comment on the papers, and have some travel funds available.
UPDATE: See the comme..