There is an overt tension between Rorty’s pragmatist critique of philosophy and his apparent epistemological and metaphysical commitments, which it is instructive to examine in order to assess not only Rorty’s overall position, but also renewed contemporary interest in pragmatism and its metaphilosophical implications. After showing why Rorty’s attempts to limit the scope of his critique failed to resolve this tension, I try reading him as a constructive metaphysician who was attempting to balance a causal account of the language / (...) world relation with panrelationism. However, Rorty intended these commitments to be interpreted in light of his pragmatism about vocabularies, and relied upon a ‘social standpoint strategy’ to render his overall position consistent. I conclude that to the extent that this strategy succeeds, it removes almost all of the argumentative force from Rorty’s pragmatism. (shrink)

A much-needed consideration of methodology in comparative philosophy.

_A much-needed consideration of methodology in comparative philosophy._.

The western philosophy in general is regarded by Richard Rorty as the result of the fouitless and diferent theoretical dualisms in the history of philosophy. In the context of literary Salvaging Culture, he tries to deconstruct the diferent problems of philosophy and to remove those dualisms. In his view the classic philosophers were believing in extra-human and extra-historical realities and they were regarding human beings as servants and discovers of them. By separating the personal or private realm from the public (...) realm or society and politics, he shows that the realm of politics has no need to get its foundations from the individual criteria of private realm. Instead of using the classical concept of philosophy, that is truth, proposes the concept of solidarity. Solidarity, in his thought, means nogetiation on the diferent problems which is result of pragmatic view on things and being influenced by special norms of society and instrumentel usage of words. He believes that by creating new words which are instruments to be in consistency with envierment, human beings try to make more solidarity between individuals and to establish a free and justly society whitout any discrimination and offence. This article tries to show that the philosophical thought of Rorty, at the first and in the direction of a political thought and takeing a Shoanist attitude by himself, is an effort to provide situation for a libral democratic society. (shrink)

This paper explores themethodological consequences of AmericanPragmatism for the social sciences. It alsocriticises some rival perspectives onmethodology of social research, in particularfalsificationist, realist and someanti-naturalist views. It is argued thatAmerican Pragmatism shows striking affinitieswith the genealogical method of history and thereflexive turn in cultural anthropology. It isalso argued that Pragmatism forces us to thinkdifferently about the relationship betweentheory and empirical research.