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Richard Rorty (1931-2007)
Richard Rorty's death on 8 June prompted a number of journals in the Eurozine network to publish obituaries and articles. We republish them here along with articles from the Eurozine archive.
Richard Rorty
An obituary
Obituary Richard Rorty can be placed alongside Hume, Montaigne, and Wittgenstein in a tradition of dissident philosophy, writes Jan Philipp Reemtsma. All wanted to put an end to the traditional philosophical discussion, but have become, in one way or another, part of the philosophical establishment. [ more ]
The afternoon of a pragmatist faun
Richard Rorty (1931-2007)
Obituary In a non-philosophical age, Richard Rorty offered a fast and easy solution to a fundamental philosophical question. Rorty's critique of universalism constituted a liberation but left no alternative to moral ethnocentrism. [Slovenian version added.] [ more ]
Richard Rorty
Editorial for "Kritika & Kontext" 34 (2007)
In Memoriam "A true sceptic remains silent in depression, a cynic laughs with Schadenfreude, while Rorty pleads with us before it is too late – sadly, after 8 June, only through his texts", writes editor Samuel Abrahám in an issue of Kritika & Kontext dedicated to "our intellectual mentor". [ more ]
Democracy and philosophy
Philosophy Moral insight "is a matter of imagining a better future, and observing the results of attempts to bring that future into existence". In "Kritika&Kontext", Richard Rorty (1931-2007) outlines the anti-foundationalist premise of his philosophy. [Turkish version added] [ more ]
"We anti-foundationalists"
Debate In Richard Rorty's article "Democracy and philosophy", he argued that moral insight is "not a product of rational reflection but a matter of imagining a better future, and observing the results of attempts to bring that future into existence." For Bela Egyed, this constitutes cultural and historical relativism and an abdication of critical rationality. [ more ]
A rejoinder to Béla Egyed
Debate Richard Rorty defends the charge of abdicating objectivity and critical rationality in his essay "Democracy and philosophy". In a rejoinder written in March 2007, Rorty writes that being rational has nothing to do with the attempt to reduce moral disagreements to clashes between abstract principles. [ more ]
From the archives
Without illusion, but with conviction
The pragmatism of Richard Rorty
Conversation "The goal of establishing a world federation, a 'Parliament of Mankind', seemed much more realistic fifty years ago than it does now. Then it was thought that the United Nations might evolve into something like a world government. Now nobody has this dream, even though the need for such a government has grown much more urgent", says Richard Rorty in this 1999 interview. [ more ]
The dull decencies of normality
A debate on the contemporary uses of liberalism
Debate Will utopian promises gain sway over the "dull decencies of normality" offered by liberalism in the coming century? Why is it that liberalism's most vehement critics come from within its charmed circle? And how will liberalism and its institutions respond to global social and economic change? Leading Canadian and American political philosophers in correspondence with Slovakian journal Kritika & Kontext. [ more ]