Forthcoming In Journal Of The American Philosophical .

2y ago
24 Views
2 Downloads
242.37 KB
30 Pages
Last View : 1m ago
Last Download : 2m ago
Upload by : Aarya Seiber
Transcription

Forthcoming in Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Accepted August 30, 2016.Revisiting the Early Modern Philosophical CanonLisa Shapiro (Simon Fraser University)lshapiro@sfu.caAbstract: I reflect critically on the early modern philosophical canon in light of theentrenchment and homogeneity of the line up of seven core figures: Descartes, Spinoza,Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, Kant. After distinguishing three elements of aphilosophical canon -- a causal story, a set of core philosophical questions and a set ofdistinctively philosophical works -- I argue that recent efforts contextualizing the history ofphilosophy within the history of science subtly shift the central philosophical questions andallow for a greater range of figures to be philosophically central. However, the history ofscience is but one context in which to situate philosophical works. Looking at the historicalcontext of 17th century philosophy of mind, one that weaves together questions ofconsciousness, rationality, and education, does more than shift the central questions -- itbrings new ones to light. It also shows that a range of genres can to be properlyphilosophical, and seamlessly diversifies the central philosophers of the period.Keywords: early modern philosophy, feminism, metaphilosophy, philosophy of mind,education1. IntroductionWithin the history of early modern philosophy, philosophers in North America haveconsidered the central figures in the early modern period to be the seven of Descartes,Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume and, of course, Kant, since the early twentiethcentury. It was then that, Bruce Kuklick (1984) suggests, William James and Josiah Roycesettled on who were the people worth reading, the greatest philosophers of the period. Afterover one hundred years, it might be time to revisit both the story line and just what it mightmean to be a 'great philosopher'.Arguably, efforts over the last several decades to explore less canonical figures,beginning with the work of Popkin and Watson, and gaining traction with the more recentefforts turning attention to Malebranche (Nadler (1992), Schmaltz (1996)), Gassendi(Lolordo (2007), Fisher (2005)), Newton (Downing (2014), Janiak (2007)), or Reid(Copenhaver (2007, 2010, 2011), Lehrer (1989), Van Cleve (2002)), imply a recognition of aneed to refresh and so enliven the discussion. Nonetheless, there remains a gap between this1

Forthcoming in Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Accepted August 30, 2016.increased scholarly interest and pedagogical interest. Not many people teach these noncanonical figures in their undergraduate classes. If these figures do get a grip, both scholarlyand pedagogical, it is because they fit easily into the narrative that drives the canonization ofthe seven central figures. So the early modern canon as it stands effectively limits, if not thefigures that we take as important, then the storylines that we take to define the history ofphilosophy.There has been another trend over the past several decades. Led by Daniel Garber,historians of the philosophy of the early modern period have aimed to contextualize thephilosophy of the period, situating its metaphysics, and in particular the metaphysics of bodyand the nature of space, with respect to the history of science, thereby shifting the storylinesubtly. Quite recently, that contextualist program has been extended to include theepistemology at work in the experimental science of the period, as well as its metaphysics.1Here too the focus has been on scholarship, and if this new contextualist storyline isincorporated into the classroom, it tends to happen by preserving the canonical seven figureswhile focusing on the metaphysics of body and causation. While the central questions arerefocused, the central figures remain the same, even while other figures, such as Gassendi,Boyle and Newton, are also discussed.The entrenched stability of the figures in the canon highlights another aspect: itshomogeneity.2 In the early modern period there were many women actively engaged inphilosophy, and yet most researchers in and instructors of the early modern period do notread any women thinkers of the period. The momentum here, however, is rapidly changing.One might also imagine that there were also Africans, Arabs, Jews and Indians in EuropeSee Anstey 2000 and 2011.A recent (2015) issue of The Monist was devoted to this question. Of particular interest with respect to mydiscussion here are Hagengruber 2015 and Waithe 2015.122

Forthcoming in Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Accepted August 30, 2016.engaged in philosophy, but even fewer of us have been working to rediscover and engagewith the work of these figures.3Whether or not one shares the sense that the history of early modern philosophyneeds to be revisited, or is concerned about the homogeneity of the philosophical canon,reflecting critically on our focus on a set of figures and a set storyline with core questionscan allow us to better understand how canons work in our discipline. I begin by consideringthe function and structure of any philosophical canon to be in a better position to evaluatethe canon as it stands, and to consider what ought to constitute a philosophical canon. Myaim is not to advocate directly for introducing new figures into the canon or removing anyone figure from it. Rather, I aim to show how our canon might be different. To this end, Iprovide a case study that focuses on different core questions to develop a storyline. Earlymodern philosophical accounts of mind were just as distinctive as the accounts of body. Andjust as do accounts of body, accounts of mind are offered and picked up in a particularcontext. Central to that context are philosophical writings about education. By reframing thequestions about the mind we take as central, we can not only change up the narrative of thehistory of philosophy, but also introduce a more diverse and heterogeneous set of figuresand works into our philosophical histories. A philosophical canon ought to be driven bycentral questions, and we do well to look to the history of philosophy to rediscover lines ofinquiry that have fallen out of fashion yet are currently relevant.I begin my discussion of the philosophical canon by attending to the internaljustification of who gets included. Through considering the early modern canon as it stands,There are some exceptions here. Justin Smith has worked on Anton Wilhelm Amo, and recently NathanielColeman (2015) has discussed African-European philosophers of the period in an interview published online.In addition, Jonardon Ganeri surveys Indian philosophical thought of the early modern period, and he suggests,using the example of François Bernier's sojourn in India, that there was significant cross-fertilization of ideasbetween Europe and Indian (after Bernier returned to France he edited the Abregé of the works of Gassendi).See Ganeri 2011.33

Forthcoming in Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Accepted August 30, 2016.we can see three central and intertwined elements of this internal justification: the canondepicts a causal account of the intellectual historical development of philosophy aroundanswers to set of philosophical questions which are centrally constitutive of the discipline presentedin set of important distinctively philosophical works.4 In Section 2, I illustrate this point withrespect to the traditional canon. In Section 3, I show how efforts to contextualize earlymodern philosophy within the history of science have shifted the central questions subtly,even while preserving a large part of the causal line of intellectual influence, as well as anassumption about the genre of a distinctively philosophical work. The case study focused onthe intellectual historical context of discussions of the nature of mind, and in particular earlymodern philosophical discussions of education, which I will consider in Section 4, traces adifferent causal story, and in doing so it opens up a new set of philosophical questions -about the interrelation of consciousness, ownership of thought, rationality, education andhabit -- as central to the discipline, as well as challenges what defines a work as properlyphilosophical. In doing so, it also introduces a set of women (as well as men thinking aboutwomen) as key figures in the philosophical discussion. In this way, it challenges the internaljustification of the canon.In critically revisiting the philosophical canon, it is important to recognize that thecanon functions within the discipline in a particular way and that internal to the canon itselfare structural features that further justify and stabilize it. First, reading canonical figures inthe history of philosophy plays a central role in teaching students what philosophy is: whatmethods we use, what topics or questions philosophy addresses, and how our philosophicalThere need be no appeal to philosophical greatness in marking out canonical figures -- they need only markimportant points in efforts to address central philosophical questions. Kuklick (1984) does take the canon tomark out philosophical greatness, and I do think that many philosophers simply assume the greatness of thecanonical figures to justify their status as canonical. But since what counts as philosophically great is elusive,and indeed, admits of cultural variation (the French canon is different from the German canon which are bothdifferent from the North American canon), I am inclined to discount this justification, especially since it seemsto me that marking a philosopher as great presupposes each of the three criteria I do consider.44

Forthcoming in Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Accepted August 30, 2016.past brings us into the philosophical present. The canon thus has a pedagogical function.Second, as Richard Rorty (1984) noted, the canon is also justificatory of contemporaryphilosophical interests. Contemporary philosophers often want to situate their current workwithin a long-standing tradition in order to position their contemporary discussions asmaking progress from earlier engagement with the same or similar questions; the canon thusserves as a geistesgeschichte.5 While these are conservative pressures, they can also be leveraged.I conclude by considering whether a destabilized canon can continue to functionpedagogically and how it can help support contemporary philosophical concerns. It isimportant function of work in the history of philosophy to open new lines of contemporaryinquiry, and, equally to provide the resources to support those investigations, and these newlines of inquiry are easily introduced into teaching.2. The Canonical Story of Early Modern PhilosophyTo illustrate these justificatory strategies, consider the traditional early modern canon.It purports to depict a causal chain of intellectual events that begins with Descartes, a figuredepicted as essentially self-caused.6 His philosophically innovative dualist metaphysics goeson to impact Spinoza and Leibniz, each of whom read Descartes, and Leibniz read Spinoza.They each develop their own philosophical systems in response to perceived strengths andweaknesses in Descartes's account, preserving the epistemological insight that knowledge isgrounded in the nature of the human mind or reason, even while they resist Descartes's viewNote that Rorty assumes that the history of philosophy does have value and is concerned to articulate justwherein that value lies. One might assume that contemporary philosophical discussion is interesting justbecause people are currently interested in what they are doing. I endorse Rorty's assumption and am notinterested here in trying to justify the study of the history of philosophy to those who are uninterested in it. Iwill just make two observations. First, even contemporary philosophy becomes the history of philosophysometime: the new subfield of the History of Early Analytic Philosophy bears this out. The shape of mydiscussion here may well help in the development of that narrative. Second, it also seems that many threads incontemporary philosophical discussion could be enriched by looking to historical antecedents.6 This aspect of the standard story has long been challenged, at least since Etienne Gilson's Index ScolasticoCartesien, Recent scholarship aimed at demonstrating the debt Descartes owes to his predecessors include workby Robert Adams , Roger Ariew, John Carriero, Dennis Des Chene, Helen Hattab, Paul Hoffman, StephenMenn and Marleen Rozemond.55

Forthcoming in Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Accepted August 30, 2016.that there are two existentially independent finite substances (independent save for theirdependence on God), mind and body. Spinoza takes issue with the consistency ofDescartes’s ontology, and argues that there is only one substance, infinite substance, whichhas infinitely many infinite attributes, of which thinking and extension are two – the two, wehuman beings are capable of understanding. Leibniz, in turn, responds to both Descartesand Spinoza, aiming to address the intractable problem of the interaction of really distinctsubstances, while resisting monist metaphysics and preserving individuals. In his ultimateview, what exists are monads, the only entities with a complete individual concept, each ofwhich expresses the whole universe, though not all of it clearly. The particular entities weencounter are simply aggregates of monads that stand in pre-established harmonic relationswith one another.Locke too was impacted by Descartes, though he developed an alternative to theCartesian epistemological system, rejecting innatism about reason, and taking knowledge tobe grounded in what experience brings in, and remaining largely agnostic about metaphysics,with the possible exception of a fundamental human power to act, or liberty, and the natureand existence of God. For Locke, pure substance in general is 'something I know not what'that serves as that substrate in which qualities inhere, rather than a self-subsisting entity.Particular substances are simply whatever is picked out by the names that we assign clustersof qualities that come together. However, just as Descartes's dualism has its issues, so toodoes Locke's commitment to the primacy of sense perception. Berkeley and Hume each readLocke carefully (and Hume read Berkeley), and are affected by his empiricist commitments,developing their own philosophies so as to avoid problems in Locke while preservingempiricism. They might share Locke's nominalism about particular substances, but they eachpoint out key assumptions that escape Locke's empiricist methodology: Berkeley6

Forthcoming in Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Accepted August 30, 2016.demonstrates that there is no basis in experience for drawing distinctions between theproperties we take to be essential to bodies and those we take as dependent on ourperception; Hume takes on causation, applying empiricist principles to the articulation ofthat concept. The intellectual causal chain of the canonical story leads inexorably to Kant asits culmination. Much is made of Kant's claim that Hume woke him from his dogmaticslumbers, and so of the causal link between Hume and Kant, but it is also the case that Kantis taken to synthesize the insights of those writing in both the Cartesian and the Lockeantraditions in such away that the avoids the pitfalls of each tradition.The second internal justificatory strategy is deployed in the construction of this wellworn story. A small set of core philosophical questions structure the storyline: theepistemological question of the basis for claims to knowledge, and the metaphysicalquestions of what sorts of things exist and how they causally interact. Non-canonical figureshave been worked into the narrative in virtue of their addressing these questions.Malebranche is introduced as a leading figure of Cartesianism, who fleshes out how thenature of mind grounds knowledge by appealing to our perception of ideas in the mind ofGod and develops a theory of occasional causation to address issues about causal interactionof distinct substances. And occasional causation prefigures Hume's account of causation.Gassendi offers us an earlier version of the empiricism championed by Locke, though, as theauthor of the Fifth Objections to Descartes's Meditations, he is not so much causallyinfluenced by Descartes as in collision with him. Reid is understood as developing hisaccount of the powers of man in direct response to Hume. It should be clear that thesequestions -- about the nature of mind and how that nature affords the possibility ofknowledge, and about what exists and the nature of causation -- are still central in7

Forthcoming in Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Accepted August 30, 2016.contemporary philosophy. It should be equally clear that questions concerning moral, socialand political philosophy are pushed into the background.7Just addressing a central philosophical question, however, is insufficient to beincorporated into the canon. Canons are essentially conservative and canonical figures have adistinctive authority. At least part of the authority derives from their having written what isdeemed a major philosophical work, as if that is a genre unto itself: the Meditations, Ethics,Monadology, Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Principles of Knowledge, Treatise on HumanNature, and of course, Critique of Pure Reason, are all supposed to be of a piece. To introducea new figure into the canon, we appeal to their having written a philosophical treatise, a workof a particular genre, for that legitimizes them as a philosopher.8 This rationale forlegitimizing new canonical figures then quickly becomes a criteria for marking out anyproper philosopher: if you are a legitimate philosopher, you must have written a properphilosophical work, where a proper philosophical work is taken to be a work of a particulargenre, the genre of the other great works.3. Contextualism and a subtle shift in the storyRecent efforts by historians of early modern philosophy have aimed to contextualizethe philosophical positions within the history of science. As the result of thiscontextualization, there has been a subtle shift in the questions driving the philosophicalstoryline. Rather than focus on epistemology, and in particular answers to skepticism or themetaphysics of substance, scholars are delving more deeply into metaphysical questionsabout the nature of body.These questions typically are addressed in a History of Ethics course, completely separated from the rest ofthe discussion of the philosophical period.8 There are, of course, complications. Gassendi's Syntagma philosophiae Epicuri is a comprehensive six-volumetreatise-- covering logic, physics and ethics, that is, the whole of philosophy. It might well be claimed that thesheer size of his masterwork while granting him legitimacy also undercuts any efforts to canonize him: there issimply too much there to fit him neatly into the storyline.78

Forthcoming in Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Accepted August 30, 2016.The narrative arc starts from Descartes's definition of body as extended substance,and examines debates about the nature of extension or space, whether it is a plenum or cansupport a vacuum, what body is and how bodies are individuated within space, and inparticular, whether there are atoms, the nature of the interaction between bodies, includingwhether bodies have causal efficacy and the basis for laws of nature governing thoseinteractions. Of course, some more traditional questions, including the nature of causation,remain quite alive in this narrative.While the central questions have shifted slightly, the central characters of thestoryline remain largely the same. Descartes and Leibniz figure prominently; Locke and

philosophical canon -- a causal story, a set of core philosophical questions and a set of . inquiry that have fallen out of fashion yet are currently relevant. . They each develop their own philosophical systems in response to perceived strengths and weaknesses in Descartes's account, preserving the epistemological insight that knowledge is

Related Documents:

May 02, 2018 · D. Program Evaluation ͟The organization has provided a description of the framework for how each program will be evaluated. The framework should include all the elements below: ͟The evaluation methods are cost-effective for the organization ͟Quantitative and qualitative data is being collected (at Basics tier, data collection must have begun)

Silat is a combative art of self-defense and survival rooted from Matay archipelago. It was traced at thé early of Langkasuka Kingdom (2nd century CE) till thé reign of Melaka (Malaysia) Sultanate era (13th century). Silat has now evolved to become part of social culture and tradition with thé appearance of a fine physical and spiritual .

On an exceptional basis, Member States may request UNESCO to provide thé candidates with access to thé platform so they can complète thé form by themselves. Thèse requests must be addressed to esd rize unesco. or by 15 A ril 2021 UNESCO will provide thé nomineewith accessto thé platform via their émail address.

̶The leading indicator of employee engagement is based on the quality of the relationship between employee and supervisor Empower your managers! ̶Help them understand the impact on the organization ̶Share important changes, plan options, tasks, and deadlines ̶Provide key messages and talking points ̶Prepare them to answer employee questions

Dr. Sunita Bharatwal** Dr. Pawan Garga*** Abstract Customer satisfaction is derived from thè functionalities and values, a product or Service can provide. The current study aims to segregate thè dimensions of ordine Service quality and gather insights on its impact on web shopping. The trends of purchases have

Chính Văn.- Còn đức Thế tôn thì tuệ giác cực kỳ trong sạch 8: hiện hành bất nhị 9, đạt đến vô tướng 10, đứng vào chỗ đứng của các đức Thế tôn 11, thể hiện tính bình đẳng của các Ngài, đến chỗ không còn chướng ngại 12, giáo pháp không thể khuynh đảo, tâm thức không bị cản trở, cái được

Le genou de Lucy. Odile Jacob. 1999. Coppens Y. Pré-textes. L’homme préhistorique en morceaux. Eds Odile Jacob. 2011. Costentin J., Delaveau P. Café, thé, chocolat, les bons effets sur le cerveau et pour le corps. Editions Odile Jacob. 2010. Crawford M., Marsh D. The driving force : food in human evolution and the future.

Le genou de Lucy. Odile Jacob. 1999. Coppens Y. Pré-textes. L’homme préhistorique en morceaux. Eds Odile Jacob. 2011. Costentin J., Delaveau P. Café, thé, chocolat, les bons effets sur le cerveau et pour le corps. Editions Odile Jacob. 2010. 3 Crawford M., Marsh D. The driving force : food in human evolution and the future.