THE CONCEPT “SYSTEM OF PHILOSOPHY”: THE CASE OF JACOB BRUCKER'S HISTORIOGRAPHY OF PHILOSOPHY1

In this essay I examine and discuss the concept “system of philosophy” as a methodological tool in the history of philosophy; I do so in two moves. First I analyze the historical origin of the concept in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Thereafter I undertake a discussion of its methodological weaknesses–a discussion that is not only relevant to the writing of history of philosophy in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but also to the writing of history of philosophy in our times, where the concept remains an important methodological tool. My first move is to analyze Jacob Brucker's employment of the concept in his influential history of philosophy, Historia critica philosophiae, dating from 1742–1744. To Brucker, a “system of philosophy” is characterized by the following four features: (a) it is autonomous in regard to other, non‐philosophical disciplines; (b) all doctrines stated within the various branches of philosophy can be deduced from one principle; (c) as an autonomous system it comprises all branches of philosophy; (d) the doctrines stated within these various branches of philosophy are internally coherent. Brucker employed the concept on the entire history of philosophy, and he gave it a defining role in regard to two other methodological concepts, namely “eclecticism” and “syncretism,” which he regarded as more or less successful forms of systematic philosophy. My second move is to point out the weakness of the concept of “system of philosophy” as a methodological tool in the history of philosophy. I argue that the interdisciplinary nature of much premodern philosophy makes Brucker's methodological concept “system of philosophy” inadequate, and that we may be better off leaving it behind in our future exploration of premodern philosophy.     

HYPOTHESES,GENERALIZATIONS, AND CONVERGENCE: SOME PEIRCEAN THEMES IN THE STUDY OF HISTORY

This essay examines the relationship among some key elements of Charles Sanders Peirce's general theory of scientific inquiry (such as final causality, real possibility, methodological convergence, abductive reasoning, hypothesis formation, and diagrammatic idealization) and some prominent issues discussed in the current philosophy of history, especially those pertaining to the role of generalizations in historical explanation. The claim is that, appropriately construed, Peirce's recommendations with respect to rational inquiry in general can provide a reasonable basis for formulating a productive critical method for a responsible philosophy of history. The essay further seeks to reduce the tension between Peirce's interest in epistemic convergence and the arguments that champion the value of historical distance and perspectival pluralism. On the account offered, the kind of methodological convergence envisioned by Peirce need not conflict necessarily with a responsibly construed historical pluralism. On the other hand, the critical perspective of an epistemically disciplined philosophical inquiry may prove indispensable in weeding out wishful but unrealistic ideological perspectives from the writing of history. Hence, the resulting proposal envisions the critique of historical imagination as one potentially viable modality for the pragmatist philosophy of history.     

THE IMPLICATIONS OF ROBERT BRANDOM'S INFERENTIALISM FOR INTELLECTUAL HISTORY

Quentin Skinner's appropriation of speech act theory for intellectual history has been extremely influential. Even as the model continues to be important for historians, however, philosophers now regard the original speech act theory paradigm as dated. Are there more recent initiatives that might reignite theoretical work in this area? This article argues that the inferentialism of Robert Brandom is one of the most interesting contemporary philosophical projects with historical implications. It shows how Brandom's work emerged out of the broad shift in the philosophy of language from semantics to pragmatics that also informed speech act theory. The article then goes on to unpack the rich implications of Brandom's inferentialism for the theory and practice of intellectual history. It contends that inferentialism clarifies, legitimizes, and informs intellectual historical practice, and it concludes with a consideration of the challenges faced by inferentialist intellectual history, together with an argument for the broader implications of Brandom's work.     

Textual context in the history of political thought and intellectual history

ABSTRACT

We can easily misread historical texts if we take ideas and passages out of their textual contexts. The resulting errors are widespread, possibly even more so than errors through reading ideas and passages out of their historical contexts. Yet the methodological literature stresses the latter and says little about the former. This paper thus theorises the idea of textual context, distinguishes three types of textual context, and asks how we uncover the right textual contexts. I distinguish four kinds of textual-context error, and offer practical tips for avoiding these errors. However, the beating heart of this paper is the history–philosophy debate: in contrast to the prevailing assumption that historical and philosophical analysis are fundamentally different, I show that a commitment to textual context, which should be entirely uncontroversial, also commits one to think philosophically.     

THE TEETH OF TIME: PIERRE HADOT ON MEANING AND MISUNDERSTANDING IN THE HISTORY OF IDEAS1

The French philosopher and intellectual historian Pierre Hadot (1922–2010) is known primarily for his conception of philosophy as spiritual exercise, which was an essential reference for the later Foucault. An aspect of his work that has received less attention is a set of methodological reflections on intellectual history and on the relationship between philosophy and history. Hadot was trained initially as a philosopher and was interested in existentialism as well as in the convergence between philosophy and poetry. Yet he chose to become a historian of philosophy and produced extensive philological work on neo‐Platonism and ancient philosophy in general. He found a philosophical rationale for this shift in his encounter with Wittgenstein's philosophy in the mid‐1950s (Hadot was one of Wittgenstein's earliest French readers and interpreters). For Hadot, ancient philosophy must be understood as a series of language games, and each language game must be situated within the concrete conditions in which it happened. The reference to Wittgenstein therefore supports a strongly contextualist and historicist stance. It also supports its exact opposite: presentist appropriations of ancient texts are entirely legitimate, and they are the only way ancient philosophy can be existentially meaningful to us. Hadot addresses the contradiction by embracing it fully and claiming that his own practice aims at a coincidence of opposites (a concept borrowed from the Heraclitean tradition). For Hadot the fullest and truest way of doing philosophy is to be a philosopher and a historian at the same time.     

INTELLECTUAL HISTORY,INCONCEIVABILITY, AND METHODOLOGICAL HOLISM1

The debate between individualism and holism in the philosophy of history pertains to the nature of the entities relied on in historical explanations. The question is whether explanations of historical items (for example, events, actions, artifacts) require the assumption that the collective historical entities (for example, civilizations, cultures, and so on) used in these explanations are (sometimes) conceived of as irreducible to the actions, thoughts, and beliefs of individual human beings. In this paper I analyze two methodological problems that holist explanations face in the writing of intellectual history. The first problem derives from the fact that holist explanations in intellectual history have to rely on the claim that certain beliefs were inconceivable to some individuals because they were members of specific collectives, whereas it is unclear how historical research can justify such claims when made from the holist position. The second problem pertains to the difficulties the holist position faces when it has to account for the novel properties of artifacts studied by intellectual history.     

Big Philosophical Questions: Why They Matter and Why They Are Still Around

Big philosophical questions—about the mind, the idea of the good, justice, beauty, knowledge—have been the prime interest of philosophers ever since Plato first raised them in his dialogues. However, regardless of how hard philosophers have been trying to find answers to them, it seems that all they have ever managed to do was to find reasons for disagreements, and, on the whole, to have failed to reach a consensus on pretty much anything. Some philosophers now claim that there hasn’t been much progress in philosophy, especially when compared to the sciences. I take up this verdict and try to refute it, first by offering an alternative view on what counts as progress, and then by analyzing big philosophical questions and their relevance for our intellectual and practical pursuits. I argue that, due to the distinctive nature of philosophical curiosity, coming up with answers to the big philosophical questions is an ideal that can hardly be met, but that philosophy nevertheless delivers various benefits, intellectual and practical, which the proponents of the No-Progress View tend to ignore.     

Danto, History, and The Tragedy of Human Existence

Philosophy of history is the Cinderella of contemporary philosophy. Philosophers rarely believe that the issues dealt with by philosophers of history are matters of any great theoretical interest or urgency. In their view philosophy of history rarely goes beyond the question of how results that have already been achieved elsewhere can or should be applied to the domain of historical writing. Moreover, contemporary philosophers of history have done desperately little to dispel the low opinion that their colleagues have of them. In this essay I argue that Arthur Danto is the exception confirming the rule, for Danto's philosophy of representation may help us understand how texts relate to what they are about. The main shortcoming of (twentieth‐century) philosophy of language undoubtedly is that it never bothered to investigate the philosophical mysteries of the text. The writing of history is a philosophical goldmine and we must praise Danto for having reminded us of this.     

批判与革新：南粤史家张荫麟历史哲学管窥

张荫麟是中国近代学术史上著名的史学家,他在历史哲学领域颇有建树,他批评目的史观、循环史观、进步史观、辩证法史观、演化史观等传统历史哲学观点,试图建立一套新的、完善的历史哲学体系,这是中国近代历史理论建设的重大创举。发掘与总结张荫麟在历史哲学研究方面的成就,不仅有利于考察20世纪前半期中国历史理论的演变,而且对于继承先哲学术遗产、创新史学理论学科发展亦大有裨益。     

From Organismic Biology as History and Philosophy to the History and Philosophy of Biology—the Work of Hans-Jörg Rheinberger in the German Context**

In this paper, I ask about the broader context of the history and philosophy of biology in the German-speaking world as the place in which Hans-Jörg Rheinberger began his work. Three German philosophical traditions—neo-Kantianism, phenomenology, and Lebensphilosophie—were interested in the developments and conceptual challenges of the life sciences in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Their reflections were taken up by life scientists under the terms theoretische Biologie (theoretical biology) and allgemeine Biologie (general biology), i. e., for theoretical and methodological reflections. They used historical and philosophical perspectives to develop vitalistic, organicist, or holistic approaches to life. In my paper, I argue that the resulting discourse did not come to an end in 1945. Increasingly detached from biological research, it formed an important context for the formation of the field of history and philosophy of biology. In Rheinberger's work, we can see the “Spalten” and “Fugen”—the continuities and discontinuities—that this tradition left there.     

MOVING BEYOND BIOPOWER: HARDT AND NEGRI'S POST-FOUCAULDIAN SPECULATIVE PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY

I argue in this paper that the attempt by Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri in Empire and Multitude to “theorize empire” should be read both against the backdrop of speculative philosophy of history and as a development of the conception of a “principle of intelligibility” as this is discussed in Michel Foucault's recently published courses at the Collège de France. I also argue that Foucault's work in these courses (and elsewhere) can be read as implicitly providing what I call “prolegomena to any future speculative philosophy of history.” I define the latter as concerned with the intelligibility of the historical process considered as a whole. I further suggest, through a brief discussion of the classical figures of Kant, Hegel, and Marx, that the basic features of speculative philosophy of history concern the articulation of both the telos and dynamics of history. My claim is that Hardt and Negri provide an account of the telos and dynamics of history that respects the strictures imposed on speculative philosophy of history by Foucault's work, and thus can be considered as providing a post‐Foucauldian speculative philosophy of history. In doing so, they provide a challenge to other “theoretical” attempts to account for our changing world.     

“Wachstum” oder “Revolution”? Ernst Cassirer und die Wissenschaftsgeschichte

“Growth” or “Revolution”? Ernst Cassirer and History of Science. Ernst Cassirer's contributions to history of science have been long time neglected. The aim of this paper is to show the historical and philosophical framework of Cassirer's engagement in this field, starting from his seminal work about the problem of knowledge in science and philosophy of the modern age. Moreover the author suggests that Cassirer's late studies about Galilei and the origins of mathematical science are of some interest in order to comprehend both his commitment to contemporary history of science (from Burtt to Koyré) and his intellectual heritage for our agendas in a post‐Kuhnian era.     

THE ALLURE OF DARK TIMES: MAX WEBER,POLITICS, AND THE CRISIS OF HISTORICISM

This article argues that realist invocations of Weber rely on an unrealistic reading of Weber's realism. In order to escape the allure of Weber's dramatic posture of crisis, we place his seminal lecture on “Politics as a Vocation” (1919) in its historical and philosophical context of a revolutionary conjuncture of dramatic proportions, compounded by a broader crisis of historicism. Weber's rhetoric, we argue, carries with it not only the emotion of crisis but is also the expression of a deeper intellectual impasse. The fatalistic despair of his position had already been detected by some of his closest contemporaries for whom Weber did not appear as a door‐opener to a historically situated theory of political action but as a telling and intriguing impasse. Although the disastrous history of interwar Europe seems to confirm Weber's bleakest predictions, it would be perverse to elevate contingent failure to the level of retrospective vindication.     

The place of historiography in the network of logical empiricism

ABSTRACT

In this paper I investigate how intellectual problems concerning an epistemology of history and a historical view of knowledge played a role in the network of logical empiricist philosophers between 1930 and 1945. Specifically, I focus on the practical efforts of Hans Reichenbach and Otto Neurath to incorporate these intellectual stakes concerning history. I argue that Reichenbach was mainly concerned with creating more institutional space for scientific philosophy. Consequently, he was interested in determining his relation to historically oriented philosophy on the practical level only. Otto Neurath, I claim, was interested in promoting an intellectual incorporation of an epistemology of history and a historical view of knowledge into the Unity of Science movement. His attempts, however, largely failed. I conclude that the intellectual stakes concerning history did have an effect within the network of logical empiricist philosophers, but that, by 1945 these stakes were entirely dissolved. The displacement of the network to the United States removed Reichenbach’s practical problems, while Neurath was unable to persuade enough actors before his death.     

NIETZSCHE'S RELATION TO HISTORICAL METHODS AND NINETEENTH‐CENTURY GERMAN HISTORIOGRAPHY

Nietzsche is generally regarded as a severe critic of historical method and scholarship; this view has influenced much of contemporary discussions about the role and nature of historical scholarship. In this article I argue that this view is seriously mistaken (to a large degree because of the somewhat misleading nature of Vom Nutzen und Nachtheil der Historie für das Leben). I do so by examining what he actually says about understanding history and historical method, as well as his relation to the founders of modern German historiography (Wolf, Niebuhr, Ranke, and Mommsen). I show, contrary to most expectations, that Nietzsche knew these historians well and that he fundamentally affirmed their view of historical method. What he primarily objected to among his contemporaries was that historical scholarship was often regarded as a goal in itself, rather than as a means, and consequently that history was placed above philosophy. In fact, a historical approach was essential for Nietzsche's whole understanding of philosophy, and his own philosophical project.     

The Relevance of Cassirer and the Rewriting of Intellectual History

Summary

This essay aims to discuss the historiographical implications and premises of Peter Gordon's masterly book Continental Divide, in which he re-evaluates the Davos meeting between Ernst Cassirer and Martin Heidegger. This impressive reminder of the prospects of intellectual history deserves to be paid serious attention, particularly in European philosophy departments. Gordon's book exemplifies how problems of systematic philosophy can be clarified by a detour through history.

I want to highlight three aspects of Gordon's book that fundamentally transform and deepen our understanding of intellectual history in general and the Davos meeting in particular. First, I highlight one of the main merits of Gordon's study: his emphasis on the plurality behind the term ‘continental philosophy’. This opens up a whole new perspective on a seemingly well-known event within the history of twentieth-century philosophy. Second, I address Gordon's methodological premises, which challenge and fundamentally transform our understanding of intellectual history. Third, I attempt to summarise, from an intellectual history perspective, Gordon's argument about Cassirer's relevance. Here we are faced with the task of realigning and legitimising philosophy in a radically historicised world. To adumbrate the core of my comment I should say that I am thrilled by Gordon's book. I agree with nearly everything he says apart from his conclusions. In a closing remark I will try to explain the reasons for this surprising divergence.     

TRUTH AND MEANING IN HISTORICAL INTERPRETATION: A DAVIDSONIAN APPROACH

This essay argues that Donald Davidson's work in philosophy sheds light on debates about truth, meaning, and context in historical interpretation. Drawing on distinctions between Davidson's project and that of his mentor, W. V. O. Quine, I aim to show that certain ambiguities that have arisen in the methodological reflections of Quentin Skinner and Frank Ankersmit, to take representatives of contrastive approaches to intellectual history, are clarified once we reckon with Davidson's ideas. This discussion leads to a case for the broader pertinence of Davidson's work to historical writing, which insists that his focus on the centrality of truth to disagreement bears salutary consequences for thinking about what constitutes compelling historical scholarship.     

DWELLING WITHIN: THE INHABITED RUINS OF HISTORY1

Addressing the recent call to rethink history as a form of presence, the essay works toward a recovery of a space in which such presence of history is encoded. I argue that history as a form of active perception is akin to virtual witnessing of the past in the moment of our encounter with historical artifacts, be they texts, photographs, or buildings. To this end, I engage with the conceptual and material aspects of historical perception, deriving a model of history as “inhabited ruins,” the way it emerges together with historical consciousness and finds an especially dynamic expression in Georg Simmel's philosophy of culture. Throughout, I work with the notion of distance and trans‐dimensional presence as the forces that shape and reshape historical awareness. Ruins, intimately connected to the modern historical imagination, are approached not as sites of commemoration or nostalgia, but as spaces of active exchange between presence and disappearance. As such, they are taken to be the models for the transitive character of history itself, blurring the division between perception and thought. In other words, ruins are taken as structures that evoke and summon the past to an encounter with contemporary reality—a type of co‐appearance that opens the possibility of virtually witnessing the past. I conclude that the logic of “inhabited ruins” constitutes the event‐horizon of modern identity, always placing history right at the threshold of fragmentation.     

METHOD AND MEANING: RANKE AND DROYSEN ON THE HISTORIAN'S DISCIPLINARY ETHOS

In this article I revisit nineteenth-century debates over historical objectivity and the political functions of historiography. I focus on two influential contributors to these debates: Leopold von Ranke and Johann Gustav Droysen. In their takes on objectivity and subjectivity, impartiality and political engagement, I reveal diametrically opposed solutions to shared concerns: how can historians reveal history to be meaningful without resorting to speculative philosophy? And how can they produce a knowledge that is relevant to the present when the project of “exemplary” history has been abandoned? I focus especially on the relativist themes in Ranke's and Droysen's answers to these questions. Ranke's demand for impartiality leads him to think of all historical epochs as equally valid, whereas Droysen's emphasis on subjectivity relativizes historical truth. In order to explain why Ranke and Droysen nevertheless remained unfazed by the problem of historical relativism, I analyze their normative conceptions of the historian's disciplinary ethos. I show that Ranke and Droysen think of objective impartiality and subjective partiality not only in methodological terms but also in terms of justice and ethical duty. By way of this normative element, their historical methodologies secure for the professional study of history an ethical-political relevance for the present.     

Spinoza’s genealogical critique of his contemporaries’ axiology

Among Spinoza’s principal projects in the Ethics is his effort to “remove” certain metaethical prejudices from the minds of his readers, to “expose” them, as he has similar misconceptions about other matters, by submitting them to the “scrutiny of reason”. In this article, I consider the argumentative strategy Spinoza uses here – and its intellectual history – in depth. I argue that Spinoza’s method is best characterised as a genealogical analysis. As I recount, by Spinoza’s time of writing, these kinds of arguments already had a long and illustrious history. However, I also argue that, in his adoption of such strategies, we have good reason to think Spinoza’s primary influence was Gersonides. Elucidating this aspect of Spinoza’s critique of his contemporaries’ axiologies brings a number of explicatory and historical boons. However, regrettably, it also comes at a cost, revealing a significant flaw in Spinoza’s reasoning. Towards the end of this article, I consider the nature of this flaw, whether Spinoza can avoid it and its ramifications for Spinoza’s wider philosophical project.