Since the rise of analytic philosophy, a virtual Berlin wall seems to be inserted with respect to continental philosophy. If we take into account the difference between both traditions concerning the respective subject-matters, the pivotal goals, the modes of inquiry and scholarship, the semantic idioms, the methodological approaches, the ongoing discussions, the conferences and publications etc., it is hardly an overstatement to say that both traditions evolve insulated and have a conflicting relation. From a meta-philosophical stance, the common and prima (...) facie reply to this split is the encouragement of merging inclinations. I argue for another strategy. Based on a discussion of the intrinsic differences and their importance, I’m inclined to conclude that unification coincides with a loss of authenticity, blurring the critical potential of both traditions. Hence, we are better of endorsing agonistic pluralism between analytic philosophy and contemporary continental philosophy. The plurality of points of view render several opportunities for productive critiques and fruitful cross-overs between both traditions. Alas, the susceptibility for these innovations is vastly counteracted due to a widespread attitude of antipathy, ignorance and occasional vulgarisation. (shrink)

Foucault and Sellars are representatives of conflicting philosophical traditions: whereas Foucault famously insisted that “power is everywhere,” Sellars proposed the well-known scientia mensura dic...

Foucault and Sellars are representatives of conflicting philosophical traditions: whereas Foucault famously insisted that “power is everywhere,” Sellars proposed the well-known scientia mensura dictum. The tension between the two perspectives seems to be so strong that each of them ends up reducing the other to an epiphenomenal illusion. In this article, I shall attempt to show that the works of Sellars and Foucault are not necessarily irreconcilable. The common ground for this dialogue is what I shall define as a historico-practical (...) conception of science. I will build this concept by tracing a connection between the Foucauldian notion of “conditions of possibility” of science and Sellars’s thesis about the “indispensability” of the manifest image. Finally, I will argue that this conception of science problematizes the clash between the scientific and manifest images of the world, paving the way for a different relationship between naturalism and critical theory. (shrink)

Philosophy & Social Criticism, Ahead of Print. Foucault and Sellars are representatives of conflicting philosophical traditions: whereas Foucault famously insisted that “power is everywhere,” Sellars proposed the well-known scientia mensura dictum. The tension between the two perspectives seems to be so strong that each of them ends up reducing the other to an epiphenomenal illusion. In this article, I shall attempt to show that the works of Sellars and Foucault are not necessarily irreconcilable. The common ground for this dialogue is (...) what I shall define as a historico-practical conception of science. I will build this concept by tracing a connection between the Foucauldian notion of “conditions of possibility” of science and Sellars’s thesis about the “indispensability” of the manifest image. Finally, I will argue that this conception of science problematizes the clash between the scientific and manifest images of the world, paving the way for a different relationship between naturalism and critical theory. (shrink)

The split between analytic philosophy and Continental philosophy has mainly preoccupied scholars of philosophy so far, but in fact, it has broader pedagogical implications. This article argues that conventions of argumentative writing, as taught in colleges today, have their roots in analytic philosophy and its assumptions regarding ways of disseminating knowledge. Behind writing instructors’ emphasis on the ‘thesis and evidence’ structure lie analytic tendencies such as verifiability and intersubjectivity. By contrast, Continental philosophy emphasises the subjective human experience, which leads to (...) a more experimental form of writing. This split and the embeddedness of argumentation in analytic philosophy is indispensable in comprehending the rationale behind the conventions of academic writing taught in colleges today. (shrink)

This thesis offers a naturalist revision of Alain Badiou’s philosophy. This goal is pursued through an encounter of Badiou’s mathematical ontology and theory of truth with contemporary trends in philosophy of mathematics and philosophy of science. I take issue with Badiou’s inability to elucidate the link between the empirical and the ontological, and his residual reliance on a Heideggerian project of fundamental ontology, which undermines his own immanentist principles. I will argue for both a bottom-up naturalisation of Badiou’s philosophical approach (...) to mathematics and a top-down naturalisation. Articulating my particular understanding of what realism and naturalism should commit us to, I propose a creative fusion of Badiou’s attention to metamathematical results with a structural-informational metaphysics, proposing a ‘matherialism’ uniting the more daring speculative insights of the former with the naturalist and empiricist commitments motivating the latter. (shrink)

This research project aims to accomplish two primary objectives: (1) propose an argument that a posthuman ethics in the design of technologies is sound and thus warranted and, (2) how can existent SBD approaches begin to envision principled and methodological ways of incorporating nonhuman values into design. In order to do this this MRP will provide a rudimentary outline of what constitutes SBD approaches. A particular design approach - Value Sensitive Design (VSD) - is taken up as an illustrative example (...) given that it, among the other SBD frameworks, most clearly illustrates a principled approach to the integration of values in design. -/- This explication will be followed by the strongest arguments for a posthumanist ethic, primarily drawing from the works of the Italian philosophers Leonardo Caffo and Roberto Marchesini and Francesa Ferrando. In doing so I will show how the human imperative to account for nonhuman values is a duty and as such must be continually ready-to-hand when making value-critical decision. (shrink)