Preludes to pragmatism : toward a reconstruction of philosophy / Philip Kitcher.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Kitcher, Philip, 1947- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Pragmatism.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xxxii, 424 pages) : illustrations

Other Title:

Toward a reconstruction of philosophy

Place of Publication:

New York ; Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2013.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Over the last two decades the distinguished philosopher Philip Kitcher has started to make a serious case for pragmatism as the source of a new life in contemporary philosophy. There are some, like Kitcher, who view today's analytic philosophy as mired in narrowly focused, technical disputes of little interest to the wider world. What is the future of philosophy, and what would it look like? These essays try to install the pragmatic spirit into contemporary philosophy, renewing James and Dewey for our own times.

Contents:

The importance of Dewey for philosophy (and for much else besides)

The naturalists return

Real realism: the Galilean strategy

On the explanatory role of correspondence truth

Pragmatism and realism: a modest proposal

Does race have a future?

Mathematical truth?

Carnap and the caterpillar

Philosophy inside out

A pragmatist's progress: the varieties of James's strategies for defending religion

Challenges for secularism

Militant modern atheism

Naturalistic ethics without fallacies

The hall of mirrors

Education, democracy, and capitalism

Public knowledge and its discontents

Varieties of altruism.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 415-416) and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

0-19-989956-8