Online research in philosophy

I certainly find it easier to recognize the deep continuities within Wittgenstein's thought, than the real nature of the contrasts: one only comes to recognize these for what they are after prolonged engagement with the two works.Heather Gert has offered a reading of Investigations §§ 46-50. Her attention devolves primarily on the notorious standard meter paragraph of § 50. Important to her reading is her conviction about what it is from the Tractatus that is being criticized and about how it (...) is being criticized.I believe Gert's reading of the passage is mistaken. Gert fails to get fully into focus what is happening in the distance, in the Tractatus, and she fails to get into focus what is happening nearby, in .. (shrink)

Abstract: In this article I contest a reading of Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations —a reading of it as debunking philosophy. I concede that such a reading is not groundless, but I show why it is nonetheless mistaken. To do so, I distinguish two different ways of viewing Philosophical Investigations and its concern with philosophical problems, an External View and an Internal View. On the External View, readers of the book are taken to know ahead of time what philosophical problems are. On (...) the Internal View, readers are not taken to know this ahead of time: the task of the book is to disclose what philosophical problems are, to show them coming into being. One thing disclosed is our participatory role in philosophical problems coming to be. Learning about the nature of philosophical problems is thus learning about our own nature; metaphilosophical knowledge is in part self-knowledge. If the Internal View is correct (as I believe it is), then Philosophical Investigations does not debunk philosophy but provides a different conception of philosophy and the philosopher's task. (shrink)

Peter Kivy investigates the unity of form and content in the arts, particularly in poetry. While Kivy says much with which I happily agree, I sadly disagree with him about the impossibility of form–content identities. Kivy's arguments fail to compel: there are other ways of understanding form–content identities and the need for them that has been felt by artists and critics. CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this?