What is Continental Philosophy?

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What is Continental Philosophy?

• Kareem Khalifa
• Department of Philosophy
• Middlebury College

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Outline

• Failed definitions
• Critchleys Wisdom-Knowledge Distinction
• Historicity
• Critique, Praxis, and Emancipation
• Scientism versus Obscurantism

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I. Failed Definitions

• The Continental-Analytic Split
• Bad Labels
• Bad Caricatures

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The Split
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Are the labels correct?

• Continental is a misnomer
• Many key analytic figures are from Germany and
  Austria
• Analytic is a misnomer
• Widespread consensus that there is no such thing
  as an analytic truth.
• Pragmatism, naturalism are generally regarded as
  alternatives to analytic philosophy
• So the labels arent correct.

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Are the caricatures correct?

• Continental philosophers use mathematical tropes
  and scientific concepts
• Topology (Deleuze, Lacan), Set Theory (Badiou)
• Much of contemporary science studies is
  Continental in its theoretical orientation
  (Latour, Pickering)
• Analytic philosophers use literary and religious
  tropes and concepts
• The Mystical (Wittgenstein) Frictionless
  spinning in the void (McDowell) Joycean
  machines (Dennett)
• So the caricatures arent correct.

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II. Critchley on the split

• Knowledge versus Wisdom
• Suggested amendment
• Forms of Rationality versus Value of Cultural
  Practices

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Knowledge versus Wisdom

• Analytic philosophers concerned with knowledge.
• Theoretical concern about how one can be
  rational in accepting that things are the way
  they are.
• Paradigm Science
• Continental philosophers concerned with wisdom.
• Practical concern about how to lead a good
  life, typically construed as life of reflection.

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Virtue of Critchleys Distinction

• Continental philosophers are concerned with
  wisdom
• They are also rarely concerned with knowledge
  independent of wisdom
• Ex. Foucault is interested in how forms of
  knowledge
• Arise under specific social conditions
• Serve as vehicles for controlling people
• Ex. Habermas is interested in how scientific
  knowledge presupposes several practical interests

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Problem 1 with Critchleys formulation

• Analytic philosophers are concerned with ethical,
  social, political, aesthetic, and religious
  questions
• Analytic studies of morality, applied ethics
  (bioethics, just war, etc.), justice, law,
  democracy, poverty, music, art, God, etc.
• These dont seem terribly scientific or
  epistemic
• These also seem important for leading a good
  life.

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Problem 2 with Critchleys formulation

• Search for Wisdom Search for meaning of life
• Meaning of life is unfortunate phrase
• Meaning has a long history in analytic
  philosophy.
• Life has both a cultural and a biological sense.

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Proposed modification to Critchley

• Analytic philosophers are concerned with forms of
  rationality
• Regardless of the topic (science, ethics, social
  and political philosophy), the concern is with
  providing reasons for a belief, doctrine, action,
  or policy
• Continental philosophers are concerned with the
  value of cultural practices
• A more precise gloss on whats meant by the
  meaning of life
• Cultural practices include lifestyles, beliefs,
  folkways, traditions, etc.

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III. Historicity

• Recap, and lingering ambiguities
• Historicity
• Distance
• Assessment of Critchleys historicity
• Alternative account of historicity

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Recap and a lingering problem

• Thus far, Continental philosophy philosophy
  concerned with the value of cultural practices
• However, analytic philosophy is also concerned
  with the value of cultural practices, such as
  science, law, biomedicine, government, etc.

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Differences in method

• Analytic philosophy is concerned with conceptual
  problems
• Ex. External world, other minds, the objectivity
  of moral claims
• Continental philosophy is concerned with
  contextualized problems
• Ex. Heideggers conception of the external world,
  Husserls problem of other minds, the objectivity
  of Marxist moral claims

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The biography objection

• Contextualizing problems conflates biography and
  history with philosophy
• Heideggers thinking that the external world is
  knowable doesnt tell us that the external world
  actually is knowable.
• For the latter issue, we need rigorous
  argumentation that can tell us whether or not it
  is rational to believe in an external world

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Historicity the argument against pure
conceptual problems

• The historicity claim a persons beliefs,
  values, and problems are influenced by
  (embedded in) his/her historical context
• This includes philosophers
• Ex. Most analytic philosophers of science from
  the 18th through the early 20th century believed
  that causation was a metaphysically dubious
  concept now it is considered the most central
  concept in philosophy of science

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The limits of the historicity claim

• The historicity claim justifies contextualizing
  problems only if
• There is always a significant distance between
  us and the people (philosophers) we interpret
• i.e., only if our assumptions are very different
  than theirs
• If not, then we can treat their problems as
  identical to our own
• Call this the distance claim

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Do historicity and distance justify
contextualizing problems?

• Both the historicity and the distance claims
  depend on historical and social-scientific facts
  about us and the people we study
• The historicity claim is probable
• The distance claim is contingent, depending on
  who were interpreting
• Thus, this shows only that in certain cases, one
  can contextualize problems productively
• It does not show that one must always do so so
  sometimes the biography objection is
  well-placed

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A stronger historicity claim

• Recall analytic philosophy is concerned with
  forms of rationality
• Forms of rationality depend on historical context
• To be continued on Thursday
• So analytic philosophy should contextualize
  problems
• Though perhaps not in the same way as Continental
  philosophy

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IV. Critique, praxis, and emancipation

• Recap and lingering problem
• The two cultures solution
• Critique of the two cultures solution
• A better solution critique, praxis, and
  emancipation
• Crisis
• Historicity again
• Tradition

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Recap and Problem, Redux

• Recap Continental philosophy contextualizes
  problems concerning the value of cultural
  practices
• Problem How does one contextualize a problem?
  How does one solve that problem?

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The Two Cultures Critchleys view
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The Two Cultures My view
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The Two Cultures contextualizing and solving
problems

• Continental philosophy contextualizes problems
  concerning the value of cultural practices using
  quasi-artistic and spiritual hermeneutical
  methods
• It solves those problems by reclaiming certain
  traditions that have been lost or forgotten

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Problems with The Two Cultures model

• Continental philosophy typically aims to be
• Progressive by reclaiming traditions,
• Critical by being hermeneutical
• Pragmatic, spiritual, and aesthetic
• Critical of forms of rationality by
  hermeneutically reconstructing them as
  presupposing values of cultural practices, etc.
• How do we reconcile these dichotomies?

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Critique, Praxis, and EmancipationThe Common
Solution

• Key idea We reorient ourselves of our traditions
  to affect social change
• We can thus overcome the dichotomies of the two
  cultures model
• We can also elaborate how to contextualize and
  solve problems about the value of cultural
  practices

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Crisis

• Producing a crisis (critique) consists of making
  people aware of the fact that some present set of
  practices (praxis) is
• Taken for granted
• Contingent (because of historicity claim)
• Bad/Problematic and
• Can be changed for the better (emancipation)

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Critique, historicity, and praxis

• If the historicity claim is correct, then all
  human experiences are contingent, in that if
  history had been otherwise, our cultural
  practices (praxis) may have been different.
• Thus, historicity implies that the human being is
  a finite subject embedded in an ultimately
  contingent network of history, culture, and
  society (64).
• This invites us to think about how our practices
  might have been better, i.e., to critique our
  practices.

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Tradition

• One can recover something from a past tradition
  that heightens awareness of a contemporary
  problem.
• This is a critical confrontation or (using
  Husserls term) reactivated experience of
  tradition.
• It is contrasted with a dogmatic reception, taken
  for granted, or sedimented experience of
  tradition.
• Resolves many of the Two Cultures dichotomies

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What is Continental Philosophy?The Ultimate
Answer!

• Continental philosophy argues that certain
  cultural practices are
• Taken for granted
• Contingent
• Bad/Problematic and
• Can be changed for the better by having a
  reactivated experience of the tradition from
  which they arose

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V. Scientism versus obscurantism

• Continental philosophy of science
• Anti-science versus Anti-scientism
• Anti-science as obscurantism

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Continental philosophy of science

• Continental philosophers often hold that science
  consists of a set of practices that
• Are easily taken for granted
• Contingent
• Problematic and
• Can be changed for the better by having a
  reactivated experience of the tradition from
  which they arose

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Example Heidegger

• Science looks at physical objects in abstract and
  theoretical ways and forgets the practical
  value that they have in everyday practices.
• This is one expression of how modern human
  existence is routinized, mundane, inauthentic,
  impersonal, etc.
• Thus, we need to remind ourselves of how objects
  exist for us in everyday practice.

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Scientism and Science

• Scientism is (by definition) bad.
• Exaggerated trust in the efficacy of the methods
  of natural science applied to all areas of
  investigation (as in philosophy, the social
  sciences, and the humanities)
• Science can be good
• Cures for diseases
• But it also can be bad
• Pollution
• Critiques of scientism are often confused with
  critiques of science.

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Ways of critiquing scientism

• It privileges knowledge at the expense of wisdom.
• It fails to recognize that science and technology
  play a role in alienating human beings from the
  world, e.g.,
• By disenchanting the world
• By turning all objects into commodities that can
  be traded without full appreciation of the deeper
  values they possess beyond a market structure
• It fails to recognize that science has its own
  set of unjustified assumptions, and furthermore,
  there is no way that these assumptions can be
  justified scientifically.
• Ex. Habermas critiques scientism on the grounds
  that it takes for granted the interests
  underlying the search for scientific knowledge

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The Slippery Slope to Obscurantism

• Scientisms faults are not sciences faults
• Failure to appreciate this leads to obscurantism
• A style characterized by deliberate vagueness or
  abstruseness typically opposed to the spread of
  knowledge or the exchange of ideas.
• More precisely, Critchley characterizes this as
  the rejection of the causal explanations offered
  by natural science by referring them to an
  alternative causal story, that is somehow of a
  higher order, but essentially occult. (118)

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VI. Conclusion

• Continental philosophy argues that certain
  cultural practices are
• Taken for granted, contingent, problematic and
  can be changed for the better by having a
  reactivated experience of the tradition from
  which they arose
• Analytic philosophy argues that certain forms of
  thinking are more rational than others
• These need not compete with each other

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Useful connections

• Continental philosophers must show that it is
  rational to accept that a cultural practice is
  taken for granted, contingent, problematic, and
  capable of improvement.
• Analytic philosophy must examine the historicity
  of forms of rationality.
• Productive disagreements distance claims and
  biography objections
• Checks and balances against analytic philosophys
  scientistic tendencies and continental
  philosophys obscurantist tendencies