[Wittrs] What constitutes "Analytic Philosophy"?
- From: John Phillip DeMouy <jpdemouy@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 28 Apr 2011 21:48:09 -0400
And what reasons have you for defining it as you do?
This might seem to be an invitation to pointless squabbling over
terminology, but my goal is rather to elicit various perspectives so
that communication on these matters might be facilitated.
For example, in some quarters, "Analytic Philosophy" seems to be used
derisively, even pejoratively, and at any rate as something to be
contrasted with Wittgensteinian philosophy. I wonder how much this has
to do with the criticism some self-identified "Analytic Philosophers"
have of Wittgenstein and Wittgensteinian thought.
It does seem peculiar that the sister group of the "Analytic Philosophy"
group on Yahoo!, a group known as "Analytic-borders", should have been
dominated by discussions of Wittgenstein. Is Wittgenstein really on the
"borders" of Analytic Philosophy? Is he not, rather, a central figure?
The Analytic Philosophy group lists as canonical (or at any rate,
representative) figures in Analytic Philosophy, the following names:
"Frege, Russell, Moore, Wittgenstein, Carnap, Austin, and Quine". Such
a pantheon seems well-justified and most likely familiar to students of
the subject. How then is Wittgenstein on the "borders", while at the
same time regarded as a representative figure?
Of course, anyone who has studied the history of the subject in the last
half century or so is well-acquainted with the fact that Wittgenstein is
frequently lauded in the mainstream of Anglo-American philosophy, but
that many of his views - and certainly his methodological strictures -
are not so favored. So this seemingly contradictory attitude on Yahoo!
Groups does not reflect any capriciousness among the group owners and
members: it reflects a much more widespread phenomenon in the world at
large.
Still, to regard "Analytic Philosophy", per se, as something
antithetical to Wittgensteinian philosophy, seems odd indeed.
Certainly, there are particular philosophical approaches that fall under
that rubric with which Wittgenstein would take issue. And more still
with which he likely would take no interest at all. (No doubt the
attitude would be mutual in many cases.) But "Analytic Philosophy" is
not a monolith. And any history of the subject will feature
Wittgenstein. Prominently.
Frankly, I think one concedes too much in treating Wittgenstein as the
antithesis of Analytic Philosophy.
If I were discussing philosophy with someone familiar with the subject,
but not knowing their particular interests and background, my starting
assumption would be that "Analytic Philosophy" meant something like,
"contemporary Anglo-American or Anglophone philosophy", "Philosophy
taking its lead from the tradition started by Russell and Moore - or
perhaps Frege - and including Logical Positivism and Ordinary Language
Philosophy", or something of that sort. More to the point, I would be
guided by context: were they drawing a contrast with "Continental"
philosophy? With the ancient Greeks? With modern figures like
Descartes, Locke, Hume, or Kant?
In any case, that's the sort of rough and ready usage I would start
from. And in many cases, that would be perfectly adequate. Still, I am
interested in knowing what further expectations and assumptions attend
to the label "Analytic Philosophy" among various readers of these
boards.
When one looks at the wide range of views among philosophers identified
as "Analytic", the term starts to seem quite vague. Not much seems to
unite them. The descriptive use elaborated above accommodates all of
that but at times I am inclined to use the term more prescriptively.
By my reckoning, Analytic Philosophy is a response both to Kantianism
and the autonomy of the sciences, with the problematizing of metaphysics
and suspicion of the existence of such a thing as "philosophical
knowledge" and to the excesses of the Idealism which followed. This
response regards philosophy as engaged, not in the discovery of truths
(empirical matters referred to the various sciences), but in
clarification, in the analysis and explication of concepts and their
relationships. The idea of conceptual analysis, interpreted and applied
variously, unites those reckoned to be "Analytic Philosophers" in the
first half of the last century.
Where some now call "Post-Analytic" those philosophers who have sought a
rapprochement and dialog with the "Continental" philosophers, I am
revisionist in that I would regard as "Post-Analytic" much of Anglophone
philosophy since Quine. The naturalistic turn is a clear departure from
the idea that philosophy and science are quite distinct. Further
developments, including the revival of metaphysics in Kripke, Lewis, and
others, further depart from (classical) Analytic Philosophy.
This is a minority view, albeit one shared by some Wittgenstein
scholars, such as Peter Hacker and (sometime contributor to Internet
discussions of Wittgenstein) TP Uschanov, and I would not insist upon it
if it got in the way of more substantive issues. At present, the
current usage is fairly entrenched anyway. But this revisionist view
does point to what is similar among the diverse figures of (early)
Analytic Philosophy and how different (Post-)Analytic Philosophy has
become.
Where my own revisionism runs even deeper is in going further back. I
see Analytic Philosophy's true father as Bolzano. His work was so
thoroughly modern in its approach and anticipated so many concerns that
would become central to Analytic Philosophy, that I think it difficult
to underestimate his genius.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Bolzano
Peirce to is an important precursor, but Pragmatism has long been seen
as closely connected with Analytic Philosophy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Sanders_Peirce
Finally, though Phenomenology (and the thought of those influenced by
Brentano) has long been regarded as decisively on the other side of the
"Analytic"/"Continental" dichotomy, I think the similarities between
much of Phenomenology and early Analytic Philosophy are too easily
overlooked. (What Heidegger and others did with Phenomenology no doubt
played a decisive role in this divorce.)
Frege's exchanges with the early Husserl and the fact that Husserl went
on from those debates to oppose Logicism with arguments similar to
Frege's and with some of his own should be noted. Brentano's influence
on Meinong and the role of Meinong in Russell's "On Denoting" should be
remembered. So too should Ryle's interest in the Phenomenologists. And
Wittgenstein's interest in Phenomenology, most notably during his
transitional period of the early 1930s but even in remarks written near
the end of his life, concerning color concepts.
In fact, a good deal of Wittgensteinian philosophical psychology,
particularly on the subject of Intentionality, can be profitably read as
being addressed to the Phenomenologists.
As well, the influence of Brentano on Twardowski and the Warsaw-Lvov
school of Polish logicians (fellow travellers of the Vienna Circle, and
the background of such important figures as Tarski) should be noted.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Brentano
The "rough and ready" approach to defining "Analytic Philosophy" -
especially when the contrast is being made with "Continental" philosophy
- will tend to emphasize its Anglophone or Anglo-American character.
But this neglects the extent to which so much of the origins are in
Central Europe. Wittgenstein, though he taught at Cambridge, still
sepnt much of his life in Austria. Many of the great Analytics fled
Hitler and settled at schools in the US and Britain, but the
intellectual milieu in which they developed was decidedly European. And
the concerns of the Phenomenologists, the Gestalt psychologists, and
others influenced by Brentano were widely discussed among them.
Influences aside, it is noteworthy as well that Phenomenology is also a
form of conceptual analysis, also suspicious of metaphysics, also
troubled by the role of philosophy vis-a-vis modern science. In fact,
when one sets aside some of the methodological pretenses, one discovers
in many of the Phenomenologists some superb examples of concept analysis
that might just as well have been the outcome of close examination of
meaning and use.
Thomasson does an admirable job (though I disagree on some points) in
drawing out many of the connections between Phenomenology and Anlytic
Philosophy.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CBoQFjAA&url=http%
3A%2F%2Fconsciousness.anu.edu.au%2Fthomasson%2FPhenomenology%2520and%
2520Analytic%2520Philosophy.doc&rct=j&q=thomasson%
20phenomenology&ei=Qxa6TenDNcK2tweaubzeBA&usg=AFQjCNFSWXH97P2v_GhO9Wi7SA6RoIKGAA&cad=rja
It is my suspicion that future historians of philosophy, no longer tied
to the contrasts of "Analytic" and "Continental" philosophy, will come
to see these trends as more similar than dissimilar and as rooted in
shared concerns and similar answers to the status of philosophy as a
field of genuine inquiry.
Anyway, rather than trying to advocate for my own, admittedly
revisionist view, my main purpose here is to provoke thought and inspire
others to share their own conceptions of Philosophy generally and of
Analytic Philosophy in particular.
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