conformism-in-analytic-philosophy
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conformism-in-analytic-philosophy
A slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophyUNDARIES AND PREJUDICES1AARON PRESTONContemporary work in the history of analytic philosophy has revealed that there are not now and never have been any views shared by all and only canonical analytic philosophers. On a traditional understanding of what it means to be a philosophical school, this im conformism-in-analytic-philosophyplies that analytic philosophy is not and never has been a philosophical school. But if it is not a philosophical school, what is analytic philosophy,conformism-in-analytic-philosophy
and how did it come by its dominant status in academia? This paper argues that (i) analytic philosophy is best regarded a social collectivity unifiedA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophyl views traditionally associated with it, but to “norm conformism"—a mode of meme-propagation involving humans’ propensity to adopt the most prevalent memes in their local population in order to “fit in" and thus to maximize opportunities for social success.[S]ince we have suggested that yesterday’s conformism-in-analytic-philosophy hostility to metaphysics was at least not conclusively pressed home, we ought to give some consideration to the present position of that subject. Isconformism-in-analytic-philosophy
it, as some have supposed, either likely or desirable that there should be a metaphysical revival? May it be that its recent and contemporary recessioA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophyhen a theory] in no way prefers an inwardly evident judgement to a blind one ... [ijt thereby destroys the very thing that distinguishes it from an arbitrary, unwarranted assertion. (Husserl 1900-01, 135 f.)21. IntroductionThe first of the two epigraphs selected for this paper conies from G. J. Warn conformism-in-analytic-philosophyock’s book, English Philosophy Since 1900. As one might expect given the title, Warnock’s subject is what has come to be known as analytic philosophy,conformism-in-analytic-philosophy
and the hostility to metaphysics he mentions is that peculiar hostility which, for a time at least, seemed to be part and parcel of the analytic moveA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophya long time thought to be one of analytic philosophy’s defining features might have been a matter of mere fashion rather than the result of sufficiently well-founded arguments and views (which is what Warnock means by saying that the hostility was not conclusively pressed home). My primary aim in th conformism-in-analytic-philosophyis paper will be to develop this suggestion vis-à-vis the phenomenon of conformism and to show that, thus construed, there are good grounds for thinkiconformism-in-analytic-philosophy
ng it true. Specifically, I shall argue for what I call the conformist hypothesis: the view that it is (and always has been) a mistake to regard analyA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophyt memeticists call interactional memes, maintained at high frequency by conformist transmission. My secondary aim will be to make a case for the claim that, if Warnock was right, then something was terribly wrong about the way analytic philosophy came both to exist and to dominate the social world o conformism-in-analytic-philosophyf academic philosophy in certain geographical regions (America, Britain, etc.) during the twentieth century.Now a good bit of conceptual scaffolding wconformism-in-analytic-philosophy
ill need to be put in place before these claims will appear plausible, let alone true. Consequently, 1 will begin (section 2) by3explaining the connecA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophysm, especially as concerns the formation of groups and group-boundaries among philosophers. Specifically, 1 shall atguc that philosophical unity is a matter of agreement in theoretical views, so that the various sorts of collectivities that one commonly runs into in die discipline of philosophy (sch conformism-in-analytic-philosophyools, movements, or traditions) are properly designated "philosophical” if and only if the unity of its members is grounded in agreement on theoreticaconformism-in-analytic-philosophy
l issues. Next, Ĩ will begin to develop the c ase for thinking that Warnock was on the right track. This will require that we take note of some findinA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophyto my knowledge, no contributor to this field has yet done)—namely, that analytic philosophy is not and never was a philosophically unified entity, and hence not a genuinely philosophical entity of any son (school, movement, tradition, etc.). This conclusion will justify the extension of Warnock’s s conformism-in-analytic-philosophyuggestion beyond analytic philosophy’s historic anti-metaphysical orientation to apply it to many of the features once thought to have been central toconformism-in-analytic-philosophy
. even definitive of, analytic philosophy (all this in sec tion 4). Next (section 5), I will present ••eyewitness testimony” from two figures—Ernest NA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophyesent concerns about die status of analytic philosophy. Specifically, T shall argue that, insofar as the conformist hypothesis is well-founded, it provides significant support for the view (frequently voiced in recent literature) that4analytic philosophy is in a state of crisis, and that it gives US conformism-in-analytic-philosophy significant insight into what the root of that crisis is.2. Intellectual Fashion and ConformismOur case begins with Warnock’s suggestion that what waconformism-in-analytic-philosophy
s long regarded as a defining feature of analytic philosophy may have been more a matter of intellectual fashion than well-founded conviction. FashionA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophycialists who deal with memetics (the science of memes) as to just what memes are and just how they function (cf. Sperber 2000, Gil-White 2004). Since 1 am not a specialist in this area, and since it will be sufficient for my present purposes, I will rely on the general understanding of memes conveye conformism-in-analytic-philosophyd in, for example, the Oxford English Dictionary and The American Heritage Dictionary definitions of “meme”. The former defines a meme as “an elementconformism-in-analytic-philosophy
of culture that may be considered to be passed down by non-genetic means.” The latter is more specific about the means of transmission, defining a memA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophy.”Memes are often understood on analogy with genes, though there is some dispute about just how far the analogy can be carried (cf. Gil-White 2004). One thing that most everyone agrees upon, however, is that, like genes, memes can be transmitted by blind, more-or-less mechanical processes spurred on conformism-in-analytic-philosophy by human instinct rather than human understanding, and that many memes are transmitted in precisely this manner. This is where the notion of conformiconformism-in-analytic-philosophy
st transmission (introduced by Boyd and Richerson (1985))5comes in. The conformist transmission model of social learning claims that, as a result of nA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophynd Boyd 1998, 219), where “cultural trait” is synonymous to “meme” as I have defined it above, and “most frequent" means “most common" in some specified, local population.This propensity is not, in the usual case, something of which humans are fully aware. Rather, it guides human behavior without an conformism-in-analytic-philosophynouncing itself. Often it does this through the mechanism of imitation. The notion of imitation is, of course, implicit in the term “meme” and its cogconformism-in-analytic-philosophy
nates, as they are derived from the Greek mimeisthai, to imitate. Conformist transmission operates by various mechanisms of direct social learning, toA slightly shorter version of this paper was published in The Monist, 88:2 (April 2005).CONFORMISM IN ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY:ON SHAPING PHILOSOPHICAL BOU conformism-in-analytic-philosophyalso the ability to infer and emulate the goals toward which those behaviors are directed. In fact, as they explain, the “imitation” involved in infocopying need not take the form of the simple parroting of behavior, but can take more subtle forms of emulation, such as sliding one’s political opinio conformism-in-analytic-philosophyn along a continuum so that it is brought closer to that of an admired model.The evolutionary advantages of conformist transmission are evident. For econformism-in-analytic-philosophy
xample, in what is called information-gathering conformism "we acquire the locally most common memes because we are betting (not always consciously) tGọi ngay
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