Richard Rorty was born in 1931 in New York. He studied first at the University of Chicago and then completed graduate school at Yale University. He taught at various universities and colleges in the United States: from 1961 at Princeton University, from 1982 at the University of Virginia, and from 1998 at Stanford University.
In the last quarter of the 20th century, Rorty became one of the iconic figures who embodied the new face of modern philosophy. At the same time, he can hardly be credited with the authorship of any original philosophical solutions, new directions in philosophy, or the creation of fundamental works. His popularity is explained rather by the fact that he attempted to take the broadest, most understandable position in philosophy and thereby expressed the most general tendency of modern philosophical thought. This combination of accessibility with originality was reflected even in the external appearance of his philosophizing. His philosophy is presented mainly in articles, the only monograph, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, published in 1979, contains not so much the author’s holistic concept as it develops a number of its provisions, and it is quite natural that it was continued in many articles covering the widest range of philosophical discussions.
Eliminative materialism and Darwinism. Rorty, as an independent philosopher, first came forward in the mid-1960s with his own version of the solution to the classical problem of “consciousness – body”, the “mind-body problem”. Rorty’s solution was distinguished not so much by the direction in which his thought moved, as by the radicalism and decisiveness with which he was going to rid philosophers of one of the “eternal” problems. The general logic of Rorty’s reasoning was based on the fact that the division of “mental and physical” cannot find its foundations in experience itself and, therefore, can and should seek them and, accordingly, the path to its resolution in the field of linguistic practice. The dilemma of “mental” and “brain processes” was resolved by Rorty unequivocally in favor of the language of neurophysiology, describing human states in terms of neurons and excitations of the cerebral cortex. What is usually called “sensations” simply does not exist. Ordinary language, which refers to certain internal states, to which the “sensing” person has privileged and unmistakable access, must be forced out of circulation. Rorty defines his position at that time as eliminative materialism and is in solidarity with one of his teachers, Paul Feyerabend, who had previously also categorically insisted on the elimination of spiritual entities and the affirmation of physicalism. Rorty sees the specificity of his position in the fact that his theory of the identity of the mental and the physical establishes a special relationship between the language of science and ordinary language. The language of neurophysiology, which talks about neurons, is to the language that uses expressions like “sensations” and “intentions” in the same way that the language of modern physics is to the language of physics in past eras. If scientists used to say “caloric”, now they say “kinetic energy of molecules”. And if they used to talk about internal self-sensations, now it is more correct to talk about the state of neurons in the brain. Statements about sensations must disappear and give way to new expressions. If people used to talk about demons, witches, or Zeus’s lightning, and now they talk about discharges of atmospheric electricity and people suffering from certain hallucinations, then the issue is not in the different empirical bases, but in the advantages of one or another language. The language of neurophysiology does not deprive a person of the privilege of accurately expressing his internal sensations, but it eliminates his claims to “final epistemological authority” on this issue. According to Rorty, his empirical and essentially nominalistic position presupposes a state of research when “there will be no situation in which absolute epistemological authority is guaranteed to belong to anyone” (8: 51). Similarly, the divisions into “observable” and “inaccessible to observation”, “private” and “public”, associated with the division into the inner world of consciousness and the outer world of the body, must be removed by turning to various linguistic practices, since only they are responsible for the way in which our relations as a special organism are formed,belonging to the world, with this world as a whole. “Knowledge of how our consciousness works is of no more importance for the development or correction of our views than knowledge of how our tonsils or our molecules work” (9: 233). The main thing is the adaptation of our organism to the surrounding world, but this very adaptation, for which we can thank biological evolution, turns out to be connected with how we understand the goals towards which our actions are aimed. This position, which allows us not only to get rid of the concept of “consciousness” as a special spiritual entity opposed to the world (Rorty, like many modern philosophers, places the blame for such an error on Descartes’ rationalism), but also places man as a biological organism in the general structure of cause-and-effect relationships to which all animals are subject, Rorty connects with Darwinism and, more broadly, with naturalism. From an evolutionary point of view, there is no fundamental gap between how an amoeba adapts to the temperature of the water around it and how people change their ideas in science, art and politics. People are the same animals that, in the course of evolution, have invented special tools for adapting to the world in the form of various linguistic practices. Accordingly, the only thing that can determine these practices is their success and people’s consent to use them. Here, the general pragmatic approach is already quite clearly evident, which will subsequently be decisive for Rorty’s philosophy.which would later become defining for Rorty’s philosophy.which would later become defining for Rorty’s philosophy.
During this period, Rorty still acts as a linguistic philosopher (see his introduction to The Linguistic Turn (1967)), but his approach is oriented not so much toward a special linguistic position in philosophy, but toward providing philosophy with the opportunity to be independent not only from the language of science, but also from the opposition of language and reality. Therefore, in the future, Rorty not only strengthens his critical attitude toward analytical philosophy and turns toward an alternative to it, modern European philosophy, but also consistently moves from eliminative materialism and Darwinism further in the direction of developing his own philosophical POSITION.
Pragmatism and the Project of Educational Philosophy. The next important stage in the development of Rorty’s concept is the book Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. In this work, he appears as an already established philosopher, completely confident in the line of philosophizing he has chosen. Its general direction is quite consciously defined by him as pragmatism. However, among the leading reference points he has chosen, in addition to Dewey, he also mentions Heidegger and Wittgenstein. As for substantive issues, here Rorty’s position is almost equally divided between the criticism of analytical philosophy that had already been successfully carried out by analytical philosophers themselves: Quine, Sellars, Davidson, and which Rorty uses in a ready-made form. To this material are added his sympathies for individual representatives of European philosophy: Heidegger and Sartre, Gadamer and Derrida. Rorty’s collaboration with them is extremely limited: the American philosopher pays attention only to individual moments of their teachings, which, as it seems to him, can support his own position.
As for the self-criticism of analytical philosophy, the situation is the opposite. Rorty relies most thoroughly on those acclaimed significant developments of analytical philosophers that allowed her to move away from traditional empirical premises and revealed rationalistic prejudices where previous empirical philosophy had not looked. One of such movements within analytical philosophy is associated with the names of W. Quine, W. Sellars, D. Davidson, another direction is associated with the historical approach to science and is represented by the names of T. Kuhn and P. Feyerabend.
From the latter, Rorty borrows a historical approach to the development of scientific knowledge and, in general, all human ideas, but deviates from following the positivist priority of scientificity in favor of recognizing the historical and structural diversity of various cultural trends. He argues that in the process of developing knowledge, we do not move from old solutions to new solutions to problems, but revise our understanding of the problems themselves. He applies these conclusions primarily to ideas about philosophy in general and, in particular, to its relationship with science and culture as a whole. The thinker categorically rejects the positivist legacy in the form of “three hundred years of rhetoric about the importance of strict divisions between science and religion, science and politics, science and art, science and philosophy, and so on” (9: 330). All these divisions were called upon to justify the special status of scientific philosophy or epistemology in culture, and, like all other cultural privileges, they should be abandoned. Rorty extends the historical approach to all spheres of culture, insists on overcoming the divisions between the natural and human sciences, as well as on revising previous ideas about philosophy, which assigned it the role of the main arbiter in resolving all scientific disputes and contradictions within culture. Rorty connects this idea of philosophy primarily with epistemology as the main science responsible for the scientific methods themselves and for the validity of certain points of view in both “scientific” and other areas of culture. In his attack on epistemology, Rorty mobilizes the criticism of the general empirical platform of analytical philosophy that other philosophers have made. As a result of this criticism, according to Rorty, the very idea of philosophy as epistemology can be considered destroyed. We cannot claim that our knowledge is based on some structure that is outside of it and serves as a criterion of its scientific value. The language of epistemology, which claims to be a neutral and universal point of view, a science of knowledge or views, is completely discarded. We cannot approach consciousness as a special subject of special philosophical knowledge, just as we cannot claim that some property of being given to consciousness or awareness provides the foundation for our empirical statements and generally precedes language. We must reject the representativeness of our relations to the surrounding world, built on the same, outdated, as Rorty believes, idea of consciousness as a special entity, of our mind as a “mirror of nature”, on the division into the spiritual and the mental. The division into the objective and the subjective is also rejected, “objectivity” is nothing more than “a property of theories that, after careful discussion, have been chosen by agreement of rational interlocutors” (9: 338). Instead of the concept of truth, “social justification of belief” (9: 170), “agreement between researchers” (9: 335) are proposed. In general, there is no single criterion,which would allow philosophy or epistemology to separate justified from unjustified beliefs.
At the same time, Rorty does not forget to make a reservation and disclaim accusations of idealism: “to reject the existence of some kind of “rational reconstruction” that can legitimize current scientific practice does not mean to claim that the atoms, wave packets, and so on discovered by physicists are creations of the human spirit” (9: 345). As a defense against idealism, Rorty resorts to the pragmatist criterion of truth and a practical realist position: we do not reflect the world, but adapt to it. The infinity and inexhaustibility of the surrounding world makes it impossible for there to be a single and universal way of communicating with it and precisely opens up an infinite perspective for human research.
The instability of all these divisions, or epistemological demarcations, that Rorty speaks of, deprives philosophy of the right to act as some kind of solid foundation for our knowledge and our culture as a whole. In this regard, so-called “linguistic philosophy” cannot consider itself in a privileged position either, since, Rorty emphasizes, “it is a great temptation to think that an explanation of how language works will help us see how language is hooked onto the world, and how truth and knowledge are thus possible” (9: 265).
In return, philosophy must act exclusively in the therapeutic role of a mediator between different linguistic practices and cultures. This is precisely what, according to Rorty, modern hermeneutics teaches. Culture as a whole is a field where the most diverse linguistic practices and vocabularies collide; it cannot be built according to a hierarchical principle. Philosophy is only “a voice in the conversation of mankind,” says Rorty, referring to the expression of the English philosopher M. Oakeshott about poetry. No single and neutral dictionary for everyone or a single universally commensurable text can exist. Developing these thoughts further, Rorty quite naturally comes to a critical attitude towards philosophy in general as a special profession, which acts as the final authority, “getting the facts right and telling us how to live” (9: 385).
In the absence of theoretical criteria proper, Rorty’s concept is forced to turn to the sphere of social life. Since, according to Rorty, behind all theoretical divisions there are people, their mutual relations and the social conditions of their life, this means that the most fundamental distinction we can consider is that between “normal” and “abnormal” discourse. If the former is supported by the majority of the community or “the consensus of researchers”, and “the expression ‘corresponds to the things themselves’ is rather a standard compliment to a successful normal discourse” (9: 372), then the supporters of the latter are marginal individuals. Their languages can vary from ordinary madness to brilliant insights in science and art. Rorty’s project of “educational philosophy” is to improve the condition of humanity, “since educational discourse is supposed to be abnormal, to take us beyond our former personalities by its strangeness. To help us become new beings” (9: 360). Ultimately, as is obvious, Rorty has to resort once again to the pragmatist criterion. This criterion forces Rorty himself to use in a very definite way such categories as “madness,” “absurdity,” “lack of education,” “lack of tact,” or “bad taste,” and, conversely, “the best idea,” “the best and newest way of talking.” “To resort to abnormal discourse initially, without being able to recognize our own abnormality, is madness in the most literal and terrible sense of the word. To insist on hermeneutic practice where it is sufficient to resort to epistemology—to make us unable to see normal discourse in terms of its own motives and able to see it only in terms of our own abnormal discourse—is not madness, but a clear sign of lack of education” (9: 366). Elsewhere, the philosopher notes that the “lack of tact” in science is more likely due to “lack of nutrition and secret police” (9: 389). In this way, the philosopher turns to the sphere of morality and politics and is already sorting out relations not so much with philosophers and scientists, but with moralists and politicians and public opinion in general.
Postmodern bourgeois liberalism and ethnocentrism. In general solidarity with the liberalism of the philosophy of the Enlightenment, as is clearly evident from his writings,
Rorty, however, opposes the theoretical constructs on which Enlightenment liberalism and humanism were based. He rejects the idea of a human nature, of the human self as a structure with a center, essence, or nature; for him, man is rather “a flexible system of beliefs, desires, and convictions, arbitrarily interwoven with one another, like a set of attributes without a substratum-subject, without a center” (6: 204). The Kantian division between morality and prudence is softened by him to the point of indistinguishability. Man is merely a two-sided self, consisting of two types of beliefs: moral ones, shared with other members of the group, and prudential ones, determined by pragmatic, individual experience. Liberal institutions must find support not in intellectuals, theories, and verbal constructions, but in solidarity with one’s community. Modern liberal democracy does not need “ideas about the ‘rational and moral nature’, ‘natural rights’ and ‘dignity’ of man”, “appeals to the principles of solidarity and mutual assistance are quite sufficient to act productively” (6: 202). The prerequisite and starting point for the formation of the moral character of an individual is his awareness of his own belonging to a certain concrete historical community (or tradition), and such a concept is “neither irresponsible nor socially harmful or dangerous” (6: 203).
Rorty opposes his ethnocentrism, as the philosopher openly calls it, to the cosmopolitanism represented by some supposedly neutral and scientific cultural studies, and he himself advocates an ethnocentric cosmopolitanism. “The idea that any tradition is ‘sufficiently’ rational and moral, that is, no less and no more ‘progressive’ than any other and all traditions taken together, is a supernatural, inhuman idea, since it is so abstract that it excludes all doubt, questioning, and empirical research, since it leads us away from the problems of history and cultural dialogue to contemplation and metanarrative” (6:209). The distinction exploited by cultural studies between the “intercultural” and the “intracultural” is rejected by Rorty on the same grounds as all similar distinctions between the internal and the external. Rorty does not need the notion of a “universal transcultural rationality” in the spirit of the Enlightenment. Instead, he proposes to adhere to pragmatist criteria in assessing one’s attitude toward another culture. “The difference between different cultures is not essentially different from the difference between the different theories advanced by members of the same cultural community” (12: 9). In this case, “either we recognize a special privilege for our own community, or we claim an impossible toleration toward any other group” and, Rorty concludes, “We must say that we must in practice privilege our own group, although there can be no justification for this other than a circular one” (12: 12). Rorty defines his community as “the community of liberal intellectuals of the secular modern West” (12: 12). Although he expresses his commitment to the ideals and institutions of the Enlightenment, he finds the only opportunity to reinforce his own commitment to them in the contingency of his cultural belonging to the West.
Literature
1. Rorty R. Chance, Irony and Solidarity. Moscow, 1996.
2. Rorty R. Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. Novosibirsk, 1997.
3. Rorty R. Finding Our Country: Left Politics in Twentieth-Century America. M, 1998.
4. Rorty R. Philosophy and the Future // Questions of Philosophy. 1994. No. 6. P. 29-34.
5. Rorty R. Pragmatism without Method // Logos. 1996. No. 8. P. 155-172.
6.
Rorty R. Postmodernist bourgeois liberalism. // Dzhokhadze I.
7. Richard Rorty’s Neopragmatism. Moscow, 2001. P. 199-210.
8. Richard Rorty’s Philosophical Pragmatism and the Russian Context. Moscow, 1997.
9.Rorty R. Mind-body Identity, Privacy, and Categories // The Review of Metaphysics, 1965, v. 19, No. 1, p. 24-54.
10.Rorty R. Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. Princeton, 1979. 10.
Rorty R. Consequences of Pragmatism. Minneapolis, 1982.
11. Rorty R. Philosophical Papers. Vol. 1-3. Cambridge, 1991-98.
12. Rorty R. Solidarity or Objectivity//Post-Analytical Philosophy. NY, 1985, P. 3-19.
13. Rorty and Pragmatism. Nashville, 1995.