On 5/26/06, Mike Geary <atlas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> I have the book and I'm half way through the first chapter. I don't know
> why the man can't just say what he thinks. He seems so scared I'll catch
> him in some incautious phrasing. Jesus.
>
I know what you mean. To me, however, stylististically speaking Taylor
resembles some of my other favorite philosophers, Wittgenstein (in
_Philosophical Investigations_), J.L. Austin (in _How to do Things
with Words_) and Stanley Cavell (in _Conditions Handsome and
Unhandsome_ or _The Claim of Reason_). All eschew the authority that
claims to have finished an argument and present us, instead, with what
are, in effect, examples of thinking out loud. They thus allow us to
follow the way their thinking develops instead of presenting an
argument as if it were a mathematical proof, logically impeccable and
leading to a definite conclusion. I know this way of doing philosophy
takes some getting used to, especially to those of us schooled to seek
Decartes' self-evident Truth. To me, however, it is a style very
fitting, indeed, for philosophy as practiced by examples of Taylor's
modern selves, for whom every thought is at best a partial
approximation.
Cheers,
John
--
John McCreery
The Word Works, Ltd., Yokohama, JAPAN
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