After finishing the research for the Bechtel Room portrait guide, I can’t help wondering: is the path that Anglo-American philosophy took in the 20th century really “progress,” the natural evolution of the discipline?  Or is it merely the result of a set of personalities, egos, historical circumstances, ideologies, and such that came together at a particular point in history to drive Anglo-American philosophy down a particular path that was not inevitable?

I realize that I’m being provocative with my questions, given that there is a common perception that what did happen is precisely natural and progress.  Yet, I don’t want to slip into some post-modern silliness, either.

What do you think, readers?  I’m genuinely curious to know your views.

As  I’m working on the guide that I mentioned in my post two weeks ago, I want to share with you some good general histories and critiques of and guides to American philosophy and philosophers that I’ve uncovered.  A few of these overlap with the earlier post, but I want to include them here as well.

Alcoff, L. M.  (2003).  Singing in the Fire: Stories of Women in Philosophy.  New York: Rowman & Littlefield.

Campbell, J.  (2007).  One Hundred Years of Pragmatism.  Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society 43(1): 1-15.

Charles S. Peirce Society.  (2009).  Retrieved 8 October 2009 from http://www.peircesociety.org/.

DeArmey, M. & Good, J. A. (Eds.) (2001).  The St. Louis Hegelians.  3 Vols. New York: Thoemmes Continuum.

Ferguson, A.  (1994).  Twenty Years of Feminist Philosophy.  Hypatia 9(3): 197-215.

Field, R.  (2005).  The St. Louis Hegelians.  Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.  Retrieved 5 October 2009 from http://www.iep.utm.edu/hstlouis.

Floyd, J. & Shieh, S.  (2001).  Future Pasts: The Analytic Tradition in Twentieth-Century Philosophy.  New York: Oxford University Press.

Goodman, R. (2009).  Transcendentalism.  The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. E. N. Zalta (Ed.).  Retrieved 5 October 2009 from http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2009/entries/transcendentalism.

Haldane, J.  (2002).  American Philosophy: ‘Scotch’ or ‘Teutonic’?  Philosophy 77(301): 311-329.

Hollinger, D. A. (1980).  The Problem of Pragmatism in American History.  Journal of American History 67(1): 88-107.

Kaag, J.  (2008).  Women and Forgotten Movements in American Philosophy: The Work of Ella Lyman Cabot and Mary Parker Follett.  Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society 44(1): 134-157.

Karnos, D. D. & Shoemaker, R. G.  (1994).  Falling in Love with Wisdom: American Philosophers Talk About Their Calling.  New York: Oxford University Press.

Kuklick, B.  (1977).  The Rise of American Philosophy: Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1860-1930.  New Haven: Yale University Press.

Kuklick, B.  (2002).  A History of Philosophy in America, 1720-2000.  New York: Oxford University Press.

Marsoobian, A. T. & Ryder, J.  (Eds.) (2004).  The Blackwell Guide to American Philosophy.  New York: Wiley-Blackwell.

Miller, P.  (1970). The Life of the Mind in America: From the Revolution to the Civil War.  New York: Mariner.

Outlaw, L. T. (1996). The “Future” of Philosophy in America. In On Race and Philosophy.  New York: Routledge.  183-204.

Outlaw, L. T. (1997).  Africana Philosophy. Journal of Ethics 1(3): 265-290.

Pragmatism Cybrary.  (2009).  Retrieved 8 October 2009 from http://www.pragmatism.org/.

Rorty, R.  (1980).  Philosophy in America Today.  In Consequences of Pragmatism: Essays, 1972-1980.  Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.  211-230.

Soames, S.  (2003).  Philosophical Analysis in the Twentieth Century.  2 vols.  Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy.  (2009).  Retrieved 9 October 2009 from http://www.american-philosophy.org/index.htm.

West, C. (1989).  The American Evasion of Philosophy: A Genealogy of Pragmatism.  Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.

Wettstein, H. & French, P. A. (Eds.).  (2004).  The American Philosophers. Midwest Studies in Philosophy, Vol. XXVIII.  New York: Wiley-Blackwell.

Yancy, G.  (Ed.).  (1998).  African-American Philosophers: 17 Conversations.  New York: Routledge

Are there others that I’m missing?

The September 2009 book reviews from Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews are available.

The reviewed books cover Hannah Arendt, Aristotle, St. Augustine, Ernst Cassirer, David Kaplan, Rene Descartes, David Hume, Socrates, Stephen Stich, and Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Topics covered include aesthetics, Asian philosophy, ancient philosophy, moral & political philosophy, and time, among others.

Are any worth considering for the Robbins collection?

I haven’t posted a link to recent podcasts from Philosophy Bites, so I want to include the link today.  Recent podcasts include:

• John Armstrong on What Can You Do With Philosophy?
• Sabine Döring on Emotion
• Ben Rogers on Pascal’s Pensées
• Marilyn McCord Adams on Evil
• Luciano Floridi on the Fourth Revolution

This is a great series of podcasts, and definitely worth taking some time to listen to them.  The interview with Armstrong is especially good.

It would not be too much to say that the passion for originality begins with modern philosophy. Each thinker is intent on developing his own system and contrasting it with previous efforts. One wants a personal stamp on what one proposes: the Bullwinkle theory of knowledge, the Basil Faulty [sic] account of moral evil. There is indeed a lot of originality in modern philosophy, a lot of novelty. Most of it has a very short shelf life, pushed aside by the new and improved. In philosophy, as in the arts, novelty is all too easily come by, but truth is neither new nor old.

– Ralph McInerney, “Philosophia Perennis“

• Simon Critchley discusses the relevance of Heidegger here, here, and here. (A hat-tip to Bookforum.com for these.)
• The June 2009 book reviews from Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews are in.
• Update: I received word this morning about new changes to Project MUSE:

“– A ‘Search this Journal’ search box. This search box appears on each journal’s home page, on the Table of Contents (TOC) of each issue, and on each article. The ‘Search This Journal’ feature enables a user to quickly check all issues of the journal in MUSE, with a single search, for all articles in that journal pertaining to a particular subject.

– Summaries (abstracts) for articles. MUSE now provides a link for the summary of each article. Users know that the ability to scan summaries of articles is essential to determining which articles are relevant to their research. That ability is now available in MUSE. The Summary links appear on the TOCs and in search results, next to the article format options of HTML and PDF.

New Option for Custom Print
–Custom Print is a service provided by Sheridan Press that allows a user to click on a link from MUSE and purchase an article or groups of articles for the purpose of creating a custom publication. MUSE is one of the first online providers to activate this service. The user may choose either print or electronic format for the purchased articles. At this time, articles contained in ‘The American Indian Quarterly’ published by the University of Nebraska Press are the only articles in MUSE for which this option is available. On the article page, look for the link ‘Custom Print’ to initiate the transaction.

MUSE on Facebook
MUSE has been on Facebook for some time now, but we just secured our own URL and wanted to pass the word on to MUSE users. Find MUSE at www.facebook.com/ProjectMUSE. Become a fan of MUSE! You can also follow us on Twitter, @ProjectMUSE.”

I will be on vacation starting next and will be away for two weeks.  I’ll resume posting on 24 July.  Until then, have a happy and safe Fourth of July, and I’ll see you when I return!

– Lesek Kolakowski, Modernity on Endless Trial.

I will be out next Friday, so next week’s post will be on Thursday morning.  See you then!

For your reading pleasure this week:

The new May 2009 reviews from Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews are now available.   There’s quite a variety of philosophers and topics covered this month — Hegel, Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, al-Kindi, Simplicius, Epictetus, the liar paradox, the will, aesthetics, and more.  Are any of these worth considering for the Robbins collection?

I came across this article, “The Case for Working With Your Hands,” by Matthew Crawford, several days ago, via Brian Leiter and a few friends posting it on Facebook.  It’s a very thoughtful and profound essay, on work, education, and where our culture places its priorities.

Next week, we’re back to our regular Friday posting schedule.  See you then!

Five items of interest today — the first, third, and fourth items are via Bookforum.com:

• Julian Baggini reports on Jonathan Israel’s attempts to get analytic philosophy to reconsider an historical and contextual approach to philosophy.
• Simon Critchley writes about happiness.
• Nathan Schneider looks at how scientists and theologians are coming together on questions about the multiverse problem.
• Along a similar vein, in terms of theoretical physics, Paul Steinhardt and Peter Galison discuss philosophy, physics, and truth.
• Microsoft is rebranding its search engine to “Bing,” and restructuring how its searches are performed.  If I’m reading this story correctly, the new Bing engine is the next attempt to topple Google’s dominance in the search engine market.

Next week’s post will be on Wednesday, since I will be out for commencement exercises next Thursday and Friday.  See you then!

Here’s a piece that I found yesterday while browsing through Bookforum.com: John Cottingham writes “The Fine, The Good, and the Meaningful,” examining what and how philosophy helps us to discover what the good life is for human beings.  Well worth a read.

See you Monday!