Philosophical Explanations

Template:Short description Template:Template otherTemplate:Wikidata image Philosophical Explanations is a 1981 metaphysical, epistemological, and ethical treatise by the philosopher Robert Nozick.

The book received positive reviews. Commentators have compared Philosophical Explanations to the philosopher Richard Rorty's Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (1979) and praised it for Nozick's discussions of the fundamental questions of philosophy and of topics such as epistemology and ethics, and welcomed it as a convincing response to charges that American academic philosophy is overly concerned with technical issues. Nozick's discussions of knowledge and skepticism have received much critical attention.

Summary

Nozick discuses branches of philosophy such as metaphysics,Template:Sfn epistemology,Template:Sfn and ethics,Template:Sfn specific philosophical problems concerning issues such as free will,Template:Sfn skepticism,Template:Sfn the mind–body problem and the problem of other minds,Template:Sfn the nature of personal identity,Template:Sfn and the meaning of life,Template:Sfn and the work of individual philosophers, such as Immanuel Kant. He discusses Kant's Critique of Pure Reason (1781).Template:Sfn

Publication history

Philosophical Explanations was first published in 1981 by Harvard University Press. By 1994, it was in its eleventh printing.Template:Sfn

Reception

Reviews

Philosophical Explanations received positive reviews from the philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre in The New York Times Book Review,Template:Sfn the philosopher Ian Hacking in The New Republic,Template:Sfn the philosopher David Gordon in Library Journal,Template:Sfn the political scientist Mark Lilla in The American Scholar,Template:Sfn and the philosopher Stephen F. Barker in Harvard Educational Review.Template:Sfn The book was also reviewed by the philosopher Robert Cummings Neville in Modern Age,Template:Sfn the philosopher Robert Fogelin in The Journal of Philosophy,Template:Sfn Russell Hardin in Ethics,Template:Sfn Leslie Stevenson in the British Journal for the Philosophy of Science,Template:Sfn George Weckman in the Journal of the American Academy of Religion,Template:Sfn Anthony Ellis in Mind,Template:Sfn Jeffrey Stout in The Journal of Religion,Template:Sfn and by The Economist.Template:Sfn

MacIntyre considered the book an important, well-written, and rewarding discussion of the central problems of philosophy, writing that it "communicates its author's own excitement about both the problems and his solutions". MacIntyre credited Nozick with showing "striking and imaginative originality" by proposing that philosophy should replace the ideal of proof with "the notion of explanation", vindicating the importance of technical discussions in the philosophy of language and the philosophy of mind with "the uses he finds for their conceptual end products", and indirectly showing "how Continental philosophers who have been explicitly concerned with human value and significance have too often presented us with impoverished and barren discussions on these great issues because they have neglected the more technical discussions of Anglo-American analytic philosophy." He also praised Nozick's discussions of the identity of the self, knowledge, free will, and skepticism, writing that they provide "splendid insights and arguments".Template:Sfn

Hacking believed that, like the philosopher Richard Rorty's Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, Philosophical Explanations had the potential to bring renewed public attention to philosophy in the United States. He believed that the book would also impress philosophy professors. He compared the difficulty of reading it to that of reading the Critique of Pure Reason, writing that in both works there was "apparent indifference to the reader"; he also considered Nozick's philosophical approach in some ways similar to Kant's.Template:Sfn Gordon described the book as "amazingly original", and praised the "extraordinary elegance" of Nozick's arguments, as well as his "vigorous and enthusiastic style."Template:Sfn Lilla wrote that the book showed the same "intellectual virtues" as Nozick's previous work Anarchy, State, and Utopia (1974), and that it "testifies to the voraciousness of his intellectual appetite." He praised Nozick's chapter on ethics as "probably the most accomplished in the book", and suggested that together with Rorty's Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, Nozick may have helped achieve "a revival in American academic philosophy." He credited Rorty and Nozick with confronting philosophy's crisis with "careful reason, wit, and a humane concern for the fundamental questions", thereby showing that academic philosophy is still worth studying. He described both their works as "major books" that directly address the "doubt in which academic philosophy finds itself" due to charges that it is overly technical and ignores or misunderstands continental philosophy.Template:Sfn

Barker compared the book to Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature and MacIntyre's After Virtue (1981), and described it as "powerful", brilliant, and well-written. He welcomed what he saw as Nozick's call for a "calmer and more tolerant tone in philosophical discussions" and praised Nozick's discussions of "the self" and of the metaphysical question, "Why is there something rather than nothing?". However, he maintained that some of the explanations Nozick advanced of various subjects explained them only to a limited degree.Template:Sfn

Other evaluations

Philosophical Explanations was discussed by the National Review,Template:Sfn Frederick Kroon in The Philosophical Quarterly,Template:Sfn the philosopher Jim Holt in The American Scholar,Template:Sfn the criminologist Nigel Walker in Philosophy,Template:Sfn the philosopher Alvin Goldman in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research,Template:Sfn and St Hope Earl McKenzie in Philosophy and Literature.Template:Sfn

Kroon, though expressing sympathy for Nozick's view that the claim that people know many facts about an independently existing world can be reconciled with the position that people do not know that certain skeptical possibilities do not obtain, questioned whether Nozick had correctly identified how to accomplish this, and suggested that a better way was available.Template:Sfn Holt credited Nozick with having "clever things to say about every issue in contemporary philosophy".Template:Sfn Walker, discussing Nozick's justification of punishment, questioned his "analogy between revenge and retribution", arguing that it created problems that "raise questions about Nozick's attitude to utility." He agreed with Nozick that "satisfaction is the point of revenge" but questioned "whether it is also the point of retribution."Template:Sfn

The philosopher Bernard Williams credited Nozick with providing "the most subtle and ingenious discussion of propositional knowledge that I know".Template:Sfn The philosopher Jonathan Wolff observed that Nozick's discussions of knowledge and skepticism have received much critical attention.Template:Sfn The philosopher A. R. Lacey commented that reviewers generally agree that Nozick's chapter on epistemology is the book's best chapter. He credited Nozick with usefully developing ideas first put forward by the philosopher Fred Dretske a decade or more earlier.Template:Sfn The philosopher Michael Bratman described the book as "a rich and wide-ranging exploration of some of the deepest issues in philosophy". He praised Nozick's discussion of free will, describing it as "fascinating" and "suggestive". However, he argued that "Nozick's views about personal identity and value themselves raise a host of difficult questions."Template:Sfn

See also

• Libertarianism (metaphysics)

References

Bibliography

Books

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