Beyond The Analytic Continental Divide

This forward-thinking collection presents new work that looks beyond the division between the analytic and continental philosophical traditions—one that has long caused dissension, mutual distrust, and institutional barriers to the development of common concerns and problems. Rather than rehearsing the causes of the divide, contributors draw upon the problems, methods, and results of both traditions to show what post-divide philosophical work looks like in practice. Ranging from metaphysics and philosophy of mind to political philosophy and ethics, the papers gathered here bring into mutual dialogue a wide range of recent and contemporary thinkers, and confront leading problems common to both traditions, including methodology, ontology, meaning, truth, values, and personhood. Collectively, these essays show that it is already possible to foresee a future for philosophical thought and practice no longer determined neither as "analytic" nor as "continental," but, instead, as a pluralistic synthesis of what is best in both traditions. The new work assembled here shows how the problems, projects, and ambitions of twentieth-century philosophy are already being taken up and productively transformed to produce new insights, questions, and methods for philosophy today.

Analytic and Continental philosophy have become increasingly specialised and differentiated fields of endeavour. This important collection of essays details some of the more significant methodological and philosophical differences that have separated the two traditions, as well as examining the manner in which received understandings of the divide are being challenged by certain thinkers whose work might best be described as post-analytic and meta-continental. Together these essays offer a well-defined sense of the field, of its once dominant distinctions and of some of the most productive new areas generating influential ideas and controversy. In an attempt to get to the bottom of precisely what it is that separates the analytic and continental traditions, the essays in this volume compare and contrast them on certain issues, including truth, time and subjectivity. The book engages with a range of key thinkers from phenomenology, post-structuralism, analytic philosophy and post-analytic philosophy, examines the strengths and weaknesses of each tradition, and ultimately encourages enhanced understanding, dialogue and even rapprochement between these sometimes antagonistic adversaries.

Several debates of the last years within the research field of contemporary realism – known under titles such as "New Realism," "Continental Realism," or "Speculative Materialism" – have shown that science is not systematically the ultimate measure of truth and reality. This does not mean that we should abandon the notions of truth or objectivity all together, as has been posited repeatedly within certain currents of twentieth century philosophy. However, within the research field of contemporary realism, the concept of objectivity itself has not been adequately refined. What is objective is supposed to be true outside a subject’s biases, interpretations and opinions, having truth conditions that are met by the way the world is. The volume combines articles of internationally outstanding authors who have published on either Idealism, Epistemic Relativism, or Realism and often locate themselves within one of these divergent schools of thought. As such, the volume focuses on these traditions with the aim of clarifying what the concept objectivity nowadays stands for within contemporary ontology and epistemology beyond the analytic-continental divide. With articles from: Jocelyn Benoist, Ray Brassier, G. Anthony Bruno, Dominik Finkelde, Markus Gabriel, Deborah Goldgaber, Iain Hamilton Grant, Graham Harman, Johannes Hübner, Andrea Kern, Anton F. Koch, Martin Kusch, Paul M. Livingston, Paul Redding, Sebastian Rödl, Dieter Sturma.

Simon Critchley's Very Short Introduction shows that Continental philosophy encompasses a distinct set of philosophical traditions and practices, with a compelling range of problems all too often ignored by the analytic tradition. He discusses the ideas and approaches of philosophers such as Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche, Husserl, Heidegger, Sartre, Habermas, Foucault, and Derrida, and introduces key concepts such as existentialism, nihilism, and phenomenology by explaining their place in the Continental tradition. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

This volume, edited by Tiziana Andina, tackles some of the most compelling questions addressed in contemporary philosophy. Covering areas so diverse as metaphysics, ethics, philosophy of language, philosophy of science, political philosophy, philosophy of art, epistemology and philosophy of mind, this book maps the past fifty years of philosophical reflection, Bridging the Analytical Continental Divide. Not only will the reader get to know philosophy’s most interesting and promising developments, but she will also be immersed in human thought in a broader sense, as the book explores both our ability to explore the world and ask questions and our capability to organize societies, create art and give humankind an ethical and a political dimension. Contributors include: Tiziana Andina, Annalisa Amoretti, Luca Angelone, Alessandro Arbo, Carola Barbero, Andrea Borghini, Francesco Berto, Chiara Cappelletto, Stefano Caputo, Elena Casetta, Annalisa Coliva, Francesca De Vecchi, Maurizio Ferraris, Valeria Ottonelli, Andrea Pedeferri, Daniela Tagliafico, Italo Testa, Giuliano Torrengo, Vera Tripodi.

In the spring of 1929, Martin Heidegger and Ernst Cassirer met for a public conversation in Davos, Switzerland. They were arguably the most important thinkers in Europe, and their exchange touched upon the most urgent questions in the history of philosophy: What is human finitude? What is objectivity? What is culture? What is truth? Over the last eighty years the Davos encounter has acquired an allegorical significance, as if it marked an ultimate and irreparable rupture in twentieth-century Continental thought. Here, in a reconstruction at once historical and philosophical, Peter Gordon reexamines the conversation, its origins and its aftermath, resuscitating an event that has become entombed in its own mythology. Through a close and painstaking analysis, Gordon dissects the exchange itself to reveal that it was at core a philosophical disagreement over what it means to be human. But Gordon also shows how the life and work of these two philosophers remained closely intertwined. Their disagreement can be understood only if we appreciate their common point of departure as thinkers of the German interwar crisis, an era of rebellion that touched all of the major philosophical movements of the dayÑlife-philosophy, philosophical anthropology, neo-Kantianism, phenomenology, and existentialism. As Gordon explains, the Davos debate would continue to both inspire and provoke well after the two men had gone their separate ways. It remains, even today, a touchstone of philosophical memory. This clear, riveting book will be of great interest not only to philosophers and to historians of philosophy but also to anyone interested in the great intellectual ferment of Europe's interwar years.

Throughout much of the twentieth century, the relationship between analytic and continental philosophy has been one of disinterest, caution or hostility. Recent debates in philosophy have highlighted some of the similarities between the two approaches and even envisaged a post-continental and post-analytic philosophy. Opening with a history of key encounters between philosophers of opposing camps since the late nineteenth century - from Frege and Husserl to Derrida and Searle - the book goes on to explore in detail the main methodological differences between the two approaches. This covers a very wide range of topics, from issues of style and clarity of exposition to formal methods arising from logic and probability theory. The final section of this book presents a balanced critique of the two schools' approaches to key issues such as time, truth, subjectivity, mind and body, language and meaning, and ethics. "Analytic versus Continental" is the first sustained analysis of both approaches to philosophy, examining the limits and possibilities of each. It provides a clear overview of a much-disputed history and, in highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of both traditions, also offers future directions for both continental and analytic philosophy.

This book provides a discussion of the philosophy of being according to three major traditions in Western philosophy, the Analytic, the Continental, and the Thomistic. The origin of the point of view of each of these traditions is associated with a seminal figure, Gottlob Frege, Immanuel Kant, and Thomas Aquinas, respectively. The questions addressed in this book are constitutional for the philosophy of being, considering the meaning of being, the relationship between thinking and being, and the methods for using thought to access being. On the one hand, the book honors diversity and pluralism, as it highlights how the three traditions may be clearly and distinctly differentiated regarding the philosophy of being. On the other hand, it honors a sense of solidarity and ecumenism, as it demonstrates how the methods and focal points of these traditions constitute, and continue to shape, the development of Western philosophy. This book contributes toward an essential overview of Western metaphysics and will be of particular interest to those working in the history of philosophy and in the philosophy of being.