| Abstract | The purpose of this work is to outline the constitutive elements of the views of the American philosopher Richard Rorty (1931-2007). His entire philosophy is marked by a trope known as “anti-essentialism.” Anti-essentialism, simply put, is a radical critique of traditional philosophy that sought to be grounded in ahistorical and intelligible essences. Essentialism begins with a pivotal moment in the history of philosophy, specifically Plato's epistemological framework, reaching its zenith with ... More the Kantian system. Anti-philosophers (Groys 2012), such as Nietzsche and later Heidegger, are among the first anti-essentialists. Essentialism finds its support in academic thermos-topes, where its status is seldom questioned. In this paper, we will address the radical critique of essences through Rorty’s views, whether they derive from a theoretical-centric provenance, such as epistemology (in the analytical tradition), or arise from a more practical realm, as seen in certain ideologies. For Rorty, epistemological totalitarianism is not fundamentally different from ideological totalitarianism, as both are constructed upon the yearning for an unquestionable and monomaniacal essence.
The trajectory of Richard Rorty’s intellectual development coincides with the intensification of his critique. In his first magnum opus, “Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature”, he provides a radical critique of philosophy centered on epistemology. This critique encompasses both the historical dimension and contemporary thematizations in the philosophy of language, mind, and science, all of which are closely related to representationalism—a mode of thought around which essentialism gravitates within the analytical philosophy circles. This critique corresponds with the first part of this dissertation, which elaborates on the concept of the mirror of nature and Rorty’s ‘edifying’ alternative. In the first section, Rorty’s critique is examined against what he refers to as Glassy Essences and the Eye of Mind, which, when reduced, relate to the extension of Descartes' philosophy into analytical philosophy. This extension initially permeates current debates surrounding the problem of consciousness and mind—a debate between cognitivism and philosophy of mind. Both positions, while differing, are derivatives of the marking of the ‘mental’ or ‘mentalism’, which is a legacy of Descartes. Rorty observes these impulses in the philosophy of language as well. The central aspect, according to Rorty, is the critique of the Kantian derivative in the Anglo-Saxon reflective tradition. This Kantian derivative is facilitated through a conceptual tool that Kant calls “Erkenntnistheorie.” This conceptual tool will undergo a metamorphosis, emerging in current philosophical trends as epistemology or theory of knowledge. Through this theory, representationalism is established, which implies the “secure path of philosophy to science.’ Representationalism, via the theory of knowledge, creates a dictation surrounding the problem of knowledge—this dictation is conveyed through discursive extensions: 1) privileged representations and 2) accurate representations. Representationalism aims to establish [Philosophie als strenge Wissenschaft] (Heidegger), thus positioning philosophy as a rigorous science that engages with specific problems and themes related to logic, truth, language, and mind—a kind of attempt to detach philosophy from social dynamics. Yet, within this essentialist framework, certain sparks emerge, attempting to create new paths outside the rigid worldviews of the analytical tradition. This turn is known as ‘behaviorism’ or ‘psychological nominalism’ and is represented by a dynamic quartet: Nelson Goodman, W.V.O. Quine, Wilfrid Sellars, and Donald Davidson. These thinkers disrupt the analytical worldview by creating new forms of expression. The influence of these thinkers renders Rorty’s pragmatism a ‘linguistic pragmatism.’
The alternative to this philosophical approach can be found in what may be termed “Rorty’s pragmatic hermeneutics.” As a framework that can temporarily withstand epistemological domination, Rorty proposes hermeneutics. The variant he embraces combines several tropes of classical hermeneutics, such as historicity and horizon, with the historical approach of the philosophy of science (Kuhn, Feyerabend, Lakatos). Pragmatic hermeneutics serves as a viable means to engage with the interpretative community and democratize science. This democratization seeks a shift from cognitans to sur-cognitans, as Bachelard posits. The truths of science are not the creations of an individual but are part of the flow of the scientific interpretative community within a specific temporal context, a notion that Fleck refers to as ‘mutual attunement.’ We will conclude this first part by presenting the antidote to representationalism: ‘edifying’ philosophy. For Richard Rorty, edifying philosophy means: “I shall use ‘edification’ to stand for this project of finding new, better, more interesting, more fruitful ways of speaking. The attempt to edify (ourselves or others) may consist in the hermeneutic activity of making connections between our own culture and some exotic culture or historical period, or between our own discipline and another discipline which seems to pursue incommensurable aims in an incommensurable vocabulary” (Rorty 1979: 360). Edifying philosophy encompasses not only Rorty’s philosophical ‘heroes’—Heidegger, Dewey, and Wittgenstein—but also continental philosophers like Nietzsche, Foucault, and Derrida. Edifying philosophy will serve as a gateway to consolidating his pragmatic variant, as well as the notion that is both debatable and polemical: the concept of post-philosophical culture.
In the second part, we will outline Rorty’s neo-pragmatism. Rorty's neo-pragmatism is based on discourse rather than experience, as is the case with classical pragmatism. Considering this, we may refer to this redesign of pragmatism as linguistic pragmatism. In this section, alongside elaborating on linguistic pragmatism as a radical critique of two theories of truth—those of correspondence and coherence—we will focus on the concept of post-philosophical culture. We will dissect post-philosophical culture by making comparisons and drawing tangents with the concept of anti-philosophy. Post-philosophical culture is part of the context created by post-metaphysical thought. Thus, it is democratic, plural, and marked by the moment of the decline of sovereign registers, both in epistemology and other dimensions of social dynamics. From this juncture, Rorty’s entire academic career will be characterized by his confrontations with thinkers of both provenances regarding the idiosyncratic reading of pragmatism.
In the third part, we will focus on the elaboration of the problem of contingency. Rorty's philosophy cannot be fully understood without examining contingency. In fact, Calcaterra refers to Rorty’s reflections on contingency as “contingentism” (Calcaterra 2019). Rorty's contingentism is constituted by two main elements: 1) contingency and 2) nominalism. In Rorty's contingentism, contingency and nominalism achieve harmony, as both are situated within history. In this section, we will dissect the concept of contingency in Rorty across its three dimensions: 1) as contingency in language, viewing language not as something ahistorical or intelligible, but as a product of historical contingencies; 2) the contingency of selfhood, which can be interpreted as a critique of subject-centrism, yet also as an affirmation of the creative potential expressed through contingency; and 3) the contingency of community, which represents the neuralgic point of Rorty’s reflection, as he attempts to link his anti-foundationalism and anti-essentialism with his political worldviews. Through community, he emphasizes the primacy of democracy over philosophy. Rorty's democratic community consists of an inseparable triptych that includes democracy, solidarity, and freedom.
In the fourth part, we will elaborate on what we term ‘authentic liberality’ and Rorty’s non-theoretical solidarity. Rorty’s authentic liberality will initially be analyzed through a historical lens, examining how liberalism as an idea has been constructed in political philosophy. This historical analysis leads to the conclusion that there is no precise definition of liberalism, except for certain postulates that, depending on different thinkers and periods, have held various meanings and connotations. At this juncture, Rorty’s authentic liberality represents a combination of the egalitarian root and the freedom inherent in liberalism with the American democratic principles of Whitman and Dewey, which emphasize brotherhood, solidarity, and an ethical/radical democracy. These values are essential for understanding the emancipatory anthropo-poetic vision that Rorty endeavors to present. His vision, at first glance, may seem romantic, but it embodies a ‘romanticism of everyday life’ (Critchley 1999).
After elaborating on authentic liberalism, we will focus on dissecting the concept of the liberal ironist. Initially, we will analyze his critique of “agelasts” (people who do not laugh), based on reflections by writer Milan Kundera. Then we will conduct a historical introspection regarding the problem of irony, starting from a philological aspect and moving to the philosophical dimension, and ultimately to literature and literary criticism, where irony finds significant application in both reflection and creativity within the literary process. The conclusion of this section will attempt to synthesize a narrative through the lens of the political turn in Rorty’s thought. In this section, we will also analyze the concept of hope, which in Rorty does not have messianic overtones. Perhaps the best way to understand hope, in the context of Richard Rorty’s philosophy, is through Havel’s expression that ‘hope is not a preorganization.’ After analyzing the concept of hope, we will turn to the concept of ‘non-theoretical solidarity,’ one of the most important concepts in Rorty’s work. ‘Non-theoretical solidarity’ has three main components: a) it is historical, b) it is contextual, and c) it is not subjected to any theoretical or ideological projection. These two conceptual tools—hope and non-theoretical solidarity—create what Rorty calls ‘social poetry.’ Social poetry allows us to maintain a manifesto for improvement, with the aim of reducing institutional cruelty and social denigration. According to Rorty, through social poetry we make the world less cruel.
In the final section, we will delve into the context of constructing essentialism through the urging of philosophers towards the truth. At this point, we will conduct a genealogy of the concept of truth, examining how it becomes a crucial part of thinking within the metaphysics-epistemology binomial. In this chapter, we will present Rorty’s critique of this mode of philosophical thought and truth. At the same time, in this section, we will also outline his position regarding truth, which is constructed, contextual, and should be based on events and actuality. This vision of truth could also be freely referred to as ‘minimal truth’ (Davidson).
In conclusion, we will offer a turn towards narrative as a poetic and human-too-human way of constructing our hopes. Perhaps the conclusion encapsulates the very phrase as follows: ‘A poiesis as a creative act for a human-all-too-human praxis.’ Less |
| Abstract (croatian) | Svrha ovog rada je prikazati konstitutivne elemente pogleda američkog filozofa Richarda Rortyja (1931.–2007.). Njegova filozofija obilježena je tropom poznatim kao „anti-esencijalizam“. Anti-esencijalizam, pojednostavljeno rečeno, predstavlja radikalnu kritiku tradicionalne filozofije koja se nastojala temeljiti na ahistorijskim i razumljivim esencijama. Esencijalizam ima svoje ishodište u ključnom trenutku povijesti filozofije, konkretno u Platonovom epistemološkom okviru, dosežući svoj ... More vrhunac u Kantovom sustavu. Anti-filozofi (Groys 2012.), poput Nietzschea i kasnije Heideggera, ubrajaju se među prve anti-esencijaliste. Esencijalizam pronalazi uporište u akademskim termotopima, gdje je njegov status rijetko dovođen u pitanje. U ovom radu razmatrat ćemo radikalnu kritiku esencija kroz Rortyjeve stavove, bilo da proizlaze iz teorijsko-centrične provenijencije, poput epistemologije (u analitičkoj tradiciji), ili izviru iz praktičnijeg područja, kao što je slučaj s određenim ideologijama. Za Rortyja, epistemološki totalitarizam nije bitno različit od ideološkog totalitarizma, budući da su oba izgrađena na težnji za neupitnom i monomaničnom esencijom.
Razvoj intelektualne putanje Richarda Rortyja podudara se s intenziviranjem njegove kritike. U svom prvom magnum opusu, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, Rorty nudi radikalnu kritiku filozofije usmjerene na epistemologiju. Ta kritika obuhvaća i povijesnu dimenziju i suvremene tematizacije u filozofiji jezika, uma i znanosti, koje su usko povezane s reprezentacionalizmom—načinom mišljenja oko kojega se esencijalizam okuplja unutar krugova analitičke filozofije. Ključni aspekt, prema Rortyju, jest kritika kantovskog derivata u anglosaksonskoj refleksivnoj tradiciji. Taj kantovski derivat ostvaruje se kroz konceptualni alat koji Kant naziva „Erkenntnistheorie“. Taj konceptualni alat prolazi metamorfozu, pojavljujući se u suvremenim filozofskim tendencijama kao epistemologija ili teorija spoznaje. Kroz ovu teoriju, uspostavlja se reprezentacionalizam, koji podrazumijeva „sigurni put filozofije prema znanosti“. Reprezentacionalizam, putem teorije spoznaje, diktira problematiku znanja—ta diktatura se provodi kroz diskurzivne ekstenzije: 1) privilegirane reprezentacije i 2) točne reprezentacije. Reprezentacionalizam nastoji uspostaviti Philosophie als strenge Wissenschaft (Husserl), pozicionirajući filozofiju kao rigoroznu znanost koja se bavi specifičnim problemima i temama vezanim uz logiku, istinu, jezik i um—vrsta pokušaja odvajanja filozofije od društvene dinamike.
U drugom dijelu prikazat ćemo Rortyjev neo-pragmatizam. Rortyjev neo-pragmatizam temelji se na diskursu, a ne na iskustvu, kao što je to bio slučaj s klasičnim pragmatizmom. S obzirom na to, ovaj redizajn pragmatizma možemo nazvati jezičnim pragmatizmom. U ovom ćemo dijelu, uz razradu jezičnog pragmatizma kao radikalne kritike dviju teorija istine—one korespondencije i koherentnosti—posebno obraditi koncept post-filozofske kulture. Post-filozofsku kulturu analizirat ćemo usporedbom i povlačenjem paralela s konceptom anti-filozofije.
U trećem dijelu fokusirat ćemo se na razradu problema kontingencije. Rortyjevu filozofiju nije moguće u potpunosti razumjeti bez sagledavanja kontingencije. Calcaterra čak Rortyjeve refleksije o kontingenciji naziva „kontingentizmom“ (Calcaterra 2019.). Rortyjev kontingentizam sastoji se od dva glavna elementa: 1) kontingencije i 2) nominalizma. U Rortyjevom kontingentizmu, kontingencija i nominalizam dolaze u sklad, budući da su oba smještena unutar povijesti. U ovom ćemo dijelu analizirati koncept kontingencije kod Rortyja u tri dimenzije: 1) kao kontingenciju jezika, koji se ne shvaća kao nešto ahistorijsko ili razumljivo, već kao proizvod povijesnih kontingencija; 2) kontingenciju sebstva, koja se može interpretirati kao kritika subjekt-centričnosti, ali i kao afirmacija kreativnog potencijala izraženog kroz kontingenciju; i 3) kontingenciju zajednice, koja predstavlja neuralgičnu točku Rortyjeve refleksije, jer pokušava povezati svoj anti-fundacionalizam i anti-esencijalizam sa svojim političkim svjetonazorima.
U četvrtom dijelu razradit ćemo ono što nazivamo „autentičnom liberalnošću“ i Rortyjevom ne-teorijskom solidarnošću. Autentičnu liberalnost najprije ćemo analizirati kroz povijesnu prizmu, istražujući kako je liberalizam kao ideja konstruiran u političkoj filozofiji. Povijesna analiza dovodi do zaključka da ne postoji precizna definicija liberalizma, osim određenih postulata koji, ovisno o različitim misliocima i razdobljima, imaju različita značenja i konotacije.
Nakon elaboracije autentične liberalnosti, usmjerit ćemo se na analizu koncepta liberalnog ironika. Prvotno ćemo analizirati njegovu kritiku „agelasta“ (ljudi koji se ne smiju), oslanjajući se na refleksije pisca Milana Kundere. Zatim ćemo provesti povijesnu introspekciju problema ironije, počevši od filološkog aspekta i prelazeći na filozofsku dimenziju, a potom na književnost i književnu kritiku, gdje ironija pronalazi značajnu primjenu i u refleksiji i u kreativnosti unutar književnog procesa. Možda je najbolji način za razumijevanje nade u kontekstu filozofije Richarda Rortyja kroz Havelov izraz da „nada nije preorganizacija“. Nakon analize koncepta nade, prelazimo na koncept „ne-teorijske solidarnosti“, jednog od najvažnijih koncepata u Rortyjevom djelu. „Ne-teorijska solidarnost“ ima tri glavne komponente: a) povijesna je, b) kontekstualna je i c) nije podvrgnuta nikakvoj teorijskoj ili ideološkoj projekciji. Ta dva konceptualna alata—nada i ne-teorijska solidarnost—čine ono što Rorty naziva „socijalna poezija“. Socijalna poezija omogućuje održavanje manifesta za unapređenje, s ciljem smanjenja institucionalne okrutnosti i društvenog poniženja.
U završnom dijelu ulazimo u kontekst izgradnje esencijalizma kroz težnju filozofa prema istini. Na ovoj točki provodimo genealogiju koncepta istine, istražujući kako ona postajeključnim dijelom mišljenja unutar binoma metafizike-epistemologije. U ovom ćemo poglavlju predstaviti Rortyjevu kritiku tog načina filozofskog mišljenja i istine.
Na kraju, nudimo zaokret prema naraciji kao poetskom i ljudski-previše-ljudskom načinu izgradnje naših nada. Zaključak se možda najbolje sažima u frazi: “Poiesis kao kreativan čin za ljudski-previše-ljudsku praxis“ Less |
