Martin Benjamin

Ethics and The Pragmatic Temperament:
A Discussion Review of Martin Benjamin, Philosophy and This Actual World

In Philosophy and This Actual World,  Martin Benjamin defends the thesis that knowledge, including practical knowledge, is a social phenomenon, the creation of human beings in their active commerce with the world.  Philosophy has tended to conceive of knowledge as something whose basics are somehow given to us by the world, we being passive in the reception of this knowledge.  Benjamin weaves together cogent criticisms of this Cartesian influence in philosophy, drawing upon the writings of the classical pragmatists, Wittgenstein, and contemporary philosophers influenced by them.  Among the large philosophical topics discussed are skepticism, realism, the mind-body problem, and freedom of the will.  Although these matters are complex and difficult, Benjamin offers explanations that render the basic ideas transparent.  Philosophy and This Actual World  is the work of an able philosopher who is a master teacher, and it should be accessible to the intelligent general reader. . . .
(continued)

A colleague of mine once recounted her experience as a beginning graduate student in philosophy, enrolled in a course on metaphysics and epistemology. She was meeting with her professor to discuss a paper on Descartes, and was interested in exploring the biographical life of Descartes as background to understanding his skeptical methodology. After listening to her proposal, my colleague described her philosophy professor as pausing, looking around the room, at her, and then responding to this new graduate student: “There is one thing you will need to learn. And that is that philosophy is not about life.  Philosophy is about ideas. Life and ideas are not the same.”. . .
(continued)

A Reply to Comments by Courntey Campbell and James Wallace

I’m grateful to Courtney Campbell and James Wallace for their thoughtful comments and criticisms.  My response centers on Campbell’s criticisms and draws on Wallace’s admirably clear and concise summary of my position. 

Campbell has three main criticisms.  First, he thinks I need some sort of external criterion to determine whether changes in our moral framework are  changes for the better.  Without some sort of fixed goal, he asks, how can we know whether alterations in the “ship of morality” make it more seaworthy or whether changes in its direction take us closer to our destination?    Second, he questions whether my conception of ethics has a “critical edge.”  Without such an edge, he  suggests, it may incapable of “genuine moral critique, of saying that a particular act or practice is ‘wrong’.”  Finally, Campbell. . . .
(continued)