What Philosophers Know: Case Studies in Recent Analytic Philosophy

by Gary Gutting

Philosophy has never delivered on its promise to settle the great moral and religious questions of human existence, and even most philosophers conclude that it does not offer an established body of disciplinary knowledge. Gary Gutting challenges this view by examining detailed case studies of recent achievements by analytic philosophers such as Quine, Kripke, Gettier, Lewis, Chalmers, Plantinga, Kuhn, Rawls, and Rorty. He shows that these philosophers have indeed produced a substantial body of disciplinary knowledge, but he challenges many common views about what philosophers have achieved. Topics discussed include the role of argument in philosophy, naturalist and experimentalist challenges to the status of philosophical intuitions, the importance of pre-philosophical convictions, Rawls' method of reflective equilibrium, and Rorty's challenge to the idea of objective philosophical truth. The book offers a lucid survey of recent analytic work and presents a new understanding of philosophy as an important source of knowledge.

Genres: Philosophy

264 pages, Hardcover

First published April 2, 2009

About the author

Gary Gutting was an American philosopher and holder of an endowed chair in philosophy at the University of Notre Dame.

Reviews

[Michael A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

an informative and well-explained explication of some important analytic philosophers, and although i didn't necessarily disagree with it, i thought the overall thesis of the book left something to be desired.

[Robert Corbett · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a clear and compelling set of case studies dedicated to describing the content of American academic philosophy which, in the most respected departments, remains substantially analytic. The book concludes with the philosopher who did the most to delegitimate analytic, or for that matter any other form, any pretension that philosophy is anything more than a specialized genre of writing, Richard Rorty. Gutting doesn't write this, but Rorty's claim has a positivist tenor: the distinctions dwelt upon by philosophers analytical and continental can't be measured so they can't matter. Rorty meant to expand the canon of philosophy with his work, but Gutting is right to repair the sense that philosophy is not about anything in particular. His studies illuminate what can be learned from various philosophers from the 20th century in the analytic tradition, and the claims are compelling. Where he leaves us is where Deleuze did in much different register. That philosophy is a set of tools, not merely redescription, and the tools can do work. Gutting adds that, given that first principles are often assumptions, even in the work of the great such as Quine, the work of philosophy cannot be the eradication of another's belief. Having a starting point should be no embarrassment: the work of philosophy is in its elaboration.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book and really shows Gutting's range as a scholar. He's perhaps more well known for his work on contemporary European philosophy and Michel Foucault in particular. But, in this book he takes up the task of showing what philosophers in the "analytic" philosophy have achieved in regard to some key philosophical debates. Gutting challenges the popular (mis)conception of philosophy as mere opinion and shows what philosophical inquiry has achieved in regard to some key issues in metaphysics, epistemology, language, and the philosophy of religion. The latter area will probably of most interest to the non-specialist.