Comments | duckrabbit: why I hate what many philosophers have to say about rationality

duckrabbit

why I hate what many philosophers have to say about rationality

Oct 08, 2007 22:53

All too often, we find that learned philosophers exercise great ingenuity to establish what they in fact all be began by agreeing to: the belief that rationality is that virtue best exemplified by philosophers ( Read more... )

philosophy

Comments 11

danman3459 October 9 2007, 06:28:41 UTC

I went to a talk with him a month or so before he died. He was on the losing side of an argument there too.

duckrabbit October 10 2007, 02:31:29 UTC

the argument with death?

danman3459 October 10 2007, 02:33:32 UTC

ha. yea. death totally nailed him.

duckrabbit October 10 2007, 03:23:04 UTC

*eyeroll*

What did he argue at the talk you attended?

Thread 6

metonyma October 9 2007, 13:41:02 UTC

I met him too, at Penn last fall. He always distinguished himself in his commitment to being a public philosopher, not by dumbing down his ideas but simply by not obscuring them unnecessarily. This passage is a perfect example.

How's your thesis going? How are YOU? I'm visiting Philaswarthmawr Wednesday-Sunday of this week but just realized it's fall break starting Friday so nobody's going to be free/sane/around. :( I'll have to crash Lady Philosophers' Dinner on a future visit.

duckrabbit October 9 2007, 23:20:39 UTC

I'll be there Saturday night / Sunday. Dinner and a movie on Saturday night? Eh?

elder_statesman October 10 2007, 01:39:55 UTC

I can't really speak to the first three paragraphs, just in terms of my philosophical exposure up to this point ( ... )

duckrabbit October 10 2007, 02:26:19 UTC

Rationality has been contrasted with reasonableness by some philosophers. In contrast with reasonableness, rationality typically connotes a sort of pure, unfeeling, mathematically self-interested method of thinking. Reason is thought of as little more fuzzy, morally-infused and emotional. So by saying that rationality is in caring about the right things, Solomon is trying to undermine the purported rationality/reasonableness contrast.

A lot of philosophers would accuse Solomon of conceptual confusion on that point, so if you're suspicious, that's probably a good thing. I'm not totally sure where I stand on this question, but I feel inclined to side with Solomon in arguing that the rationality/reasonableness distinction is misleading (as are similarly-motivated distinctions between strictly-correct practical reasoning and morally-good practical reasoning). I think there is a difference between moral and epistemic norms, but I think in practical reasoning, the norms become really hard to separate. But there's an excellent debate to be ( ... )

elder_statesman October 10 2007, 04:50:26 UTC

Heh, yeah, it's actually on my bookshelf just a few feet away; I haven't managed to read it yet, but even so.