Do you lean more toward Continental or Analytic philosophy?
For those who don't understand the question, here's a summary of the division I wrote in another thread recently, which prompted me to post this poll:
In the early 20th century, philosophy in the English-speaking world became dominated by a group of philosophers who put very heavy emphasis on logic and empiricism, focusing almost all their philosophy on language and mathematics and leaving everything else either to be the work of the natural sciences or else denounced as utter nonsense. They emphasized philosophy as a professional academic discipline concerned with rigorous logical analysis of concepts. Like-minded philosophers from across continental Europe fled to Britain and America during the build up to WWII. Their way of thinking and its descendants are the Analytic branch of contemporary philosophy that still dominates in the English-speaking world of professional philosophy today (though not so much in other humanities departments).
In contrast, all the rest of contemporary philosophy is "Continental", referring to the continent of Europe in juxtaposition to the islands of Britain, and by comparison to the Analytic tradition it focuses more on philosophy as an examination of the lived experience of being a person embodied in the world trying to figure out what to do and why.
EDIT: One of the first responses below added some more good detail to the distinction, which I think it worth retro-quoting up here in the OP:
Quoting Terrapin Station
In the early 20th century, philosophy in the English-speaking world became dominated by a group of philosophers who put very heavy emphasis on logic and empiricism, focusing almost all their philosophy on language and mathematics and leaving everything else either to be the work of the natural sciences or else denounced as utter nonsense. They emphasized philosophy as a professional academic discipline concerned with rigorous logical analysis of concepts. Like-minded philosophers from across continental Europe fled to Britain and America during the build up to WWII. Their way of thinking and its descendants are the Analytic branch of contemporary philosophy that still dominates in the English-speaking world of professional philosophy today (though not so much in other humanities departments).
In contrast, all the rest of contemporary philosophy is "Continental", referring to the continent of Europe in juxtaposition to the islands of Britain, and by comparison to the Analytic tradition it focuses more on philosophy as an examination of the lived experience of being a person embodied in the world trying to figure out what to do and why.
EDIT: One of the first responses below added some more good detail to the distinction, which I think it worth retro-quoting up here in the OP:
Quoting Terrapin Station
The distinction is not just one of subject matter or the overall approach to subject matter, but very importantly, it's a difference of style, of methodological focus, and of expression preferences. Analytic philosophy tends towards tackling things with a relatively narrow focus, one thing at a time, with a preference for a plain, usually rather dry, more or less scientific and/or logical approach. Continental philosophy tends towards a much broader, "holistic" focus, where it tries to tie together many threads at once, with a preference for a far more decorative, looser/playful approach to language. Both sides tend to see the other side as approaching things in a way that doesn't really work/doesn't really accomplish what we're trying to accomplish as philosophers. Those with a continental preference tend to see analytic philosophy as too dry, too boring, too narrow, pointless, mind-numbingly laborious, etc. Those with an analytic preference tend to see continental philosophy as too flowery, inexact, sometimes incoherent, too ready to make unjustified assumptions, etc.
Comments (64)
Then the philosophical investigations - Wittgenstein basically did an about face - truth is relative - if we all agree on something then it is true. That is an over simplification but relatively accurate (pun intended)
So maybe the real question is about if either of those 2 categories still makes sense 100 years later? Philosophy of mind and the more scientific metaphysics are rife with all kinds of suppositions. The reality is that the grounding of truth is no nearer than it used to be, nor any further. Those categories are just for those who want to label themselves...
An old continental philosophy still has an internal logic to it. And the old analytical philosophies do too. But so what? What is the next phase of philosophy? Where is it moving?
Which I'm noticing more because for the most part I think that continental philosophy sucks. ;-)
The distinction is not just one of subject matter or the overall approach to subject matter, but very importantly, it's a difference of style, of methodological focus, and of expression preferences. Analytic philosophy tends towards tackling things with a relatively narrow focus, one thing at a time, with a preference for a plain, usually rather dry, more or less scientific and/or logical approach. Continental philosophy tends towards a much broader, "holistic" focus, where it tries to tie together many threads at once, with a preference for a far more decorative, looser/playful approach to language. Both sides tend to see the other side as approaching things in a way that doesn't really work/doesn't really accomplish what we're trying to accomplish as philosophers. Those with a continental preference tend to see analytic philosophy as too dry, too boring, too narrow, pointless, mind-numbingly laborious, etc. Those with an analytic preference tend to see continental philosophy as too flowery, inexact, sometimes incoherent, too ready to make unjustified assumptions, etc.
Most regulars here are far more continental-leaning. That jibes with most people here being self-taught (per another recent poll). A handful of continental philosophers--Kant, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Sartre, for example, are far more well-known in general than any analytic philosophers. (Although Wittgenstein is the weirdo--he's basically a continental philosopher who got mixed up with the Vienna Circle). Part of the reason for the popularity is that continental philosophy has more of a "literary" or poetic quality to it--which is one of the problems with it in many analytic opinions. People with some interest in philosophy who are looking to guide themselves to philosophers to read will usually stumble on those famous continental folks first (well, in addition to Plato and Aristotle), and that leads them to other continental philosophers.
However, admitting that you have a continental leaning is like admitting that you're a hipster--the stock move is to deny the term even really picks anything out, so we're unlikely to have many people select that answer.
Continental philosophy had more or less the right answers for the wrong reasons.
SO the task at hand might be described as reaching continental conclusions using analytic method.
So, I'll vote no.
As I like to say; those who claim adherence to one camp over another, are adhering to being half a philosopher.
Agree with this characterisation. I don’t much like philosophy as it is understood in secular culture. To me the purpose of philosophy is practical and ethical and is aimed at what Platonism describes as anamnesis, the recollection of forgotten wisdom. There are some individual philosophers and works of philosophy that I appreciate in both camps but to me the expression ‘modern philosophy’ tends towards the oxymoronic. ;-)
Quoting Banno
:up:
I'll gladly be half a philosopher if it means I don't write like Hegel . . . or Heidegger . . . or Derrida . . . etc.
Well, I'm attempting to write a work of philosophy bridging things "from the meaning of words to the meaning of life", and to quote the introduction of that, "I aim to once again reconcile the linguistic abstraction (as well as the precision, detail, and professionalism) of the contemporary Analytic school, in which I was primarily educated, with the practical and experiential emphasis (as well as the breadth, holism, and personal applicability) of the contemporary Continental school." So, that's where I think we should be headed.
Quoting Terrapin Station
That is the historical origin of the division: the positivists and their descendants vs their opponents and their descendants. As time wears on the distinction gets blurrier, so that historical split is where I chose to emphasize the difference. I did try to name some broad characteristics of both movements as well though, and I did miss an important one that you thankfully caught for me (the narrow vs wide focus).
Quoting Terrapin Station
My formal education is almost entirely in Analytic philosophy and I barely know any Continental stuff, so if anything my bias would be toward Analytic; but I try to bridge the gap between the two, so I voted Yes.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Kant isn't a Continental philosopher, he predates the division and is pretty much the last philosopher claimed in common heritage by both sides of contemporary philosophy, marking the end of the core era of Modern philosophy that was characterized by the Rationalist vs Empiricist division instead.
Quoting Terrapin Station
Pfft, hipsters are too mainstream. I didn't give a shit about what was popular before that was cool.
Quoting Banno
:up:
Quoting Mark Dennis
That's kind of a logic joke. "P or Q" is true if either P is true, or Q is true, or P and Q are both true, so if someone asks you "P or Q?" and at least one (or more) of them is true, "yes" is a valid answer. So that's where "both" fits. "No" is, likewise, "neither".
Quoting Ciceronianus the White
I've found that seeming true myself, though there is a lot of variation within pragmatism so it's kinda hard to pin down. Some neopragmatists can get awfully relativistic, but I wholeheartedly embrace a form of pragmatism myself that, like Banno said above, basically uses Analytic-like means to pursue Continental-like ends, being very dry, practical, and precise, by asking what exactly are we trying to do here and why, what use would an answer to this philosophical question be in actually living our lives, as a manner of clarifying what exactly we're even asking and how to go about answering it. Pragmatism kind of evolved outside of the Continental-Analytic schism itself, principally in America so in the shadow (and so influence) of Analytic philosophy's dominance of the Anglophone world, but still apart from it, and so sharing more concern for things the Analytics cast aside as nonsense and the Continentals continued to pursue.
:cool:
Kant is commonly considered the start of the division.
Here's a practical example reflecting that: see the first section of this anthology--
https://www.amazon.com/Companion-Continental-Philosophy-Simon-Critchley/dp/0631218505 (You can use the "Look Inside" function)
[quote=Janus] I refer to the two traditions as the Anal Tradition and the Incontinent Tradition. [/quote] :lol:
Quoting Pfhorrest
:clap:
That sounds like more or less what I said. Kant is the most recent common ancestor of both Analytic and Continental philosophers, and is studied extensively within contemporary Analytic philosophy departments (like I was educated in) as basically the apex of Modern philosophy, after which we skip all of the intervening Continental stuff and move right on to 20th century Analytic works. He's "not a Continental philosopher" in the same way that Plato isn't; which isn't to say that Continentals don't trace back to either of them, but that neither are exclusive to their branch of the contemporary divide.
Quoting Janus
I just now on my third re-read caught how clever this is.
EDIT: wallows isn't a wanker
Thank you haha flew over my head there! Should have a discussion on humour soon.
Did you get a chance to read the last link I sent you to the philosophical-feeling piece?
Kant is considered the start of the division a la being the first continental-style philosopher, where other continental philosophy carried on in his wake, at least initially.
The schools I went to and that I'm familiar with, even though they're analytic-oriented, require you to be familiar with Kant, Hegel, Marx, Husserl, Heidegger, etc. They're not a huge focus, but they're too historically important to just ignore altogether.
What's specifically "continental-style" about Kant? It seems to me he'd be among the more "analytic" philosophers of his time.
Thank you both. I had googled these terms with mixed results. Between your 2 summaries I am feeling better informed. Still probably too ill-informed to get involved in the discussion, but I will be following along better as I read from the shadows.
Sounds rather continental.
Read that section of the Blackwell Companion that I referred to.
Were you referring to the introduction or the first essay? I read the parts of the former that were available, and it didn't seem to consider Kant a continental philosopher.
Holy moley. So why, in your view, was the entire first section of that continental philosophy companion about Kant/"The Kantian Legacy"? They just wanted to ramble on with some off-topic stuff before getting to the main subject matter?
Because Kant is the jumping-off point for continental philosophy?
Why wouldn't Hume be? A lot of Kant's work was in response to Hume, after all.
Why not pick any random philosopher? The first essay in the companion you cited isn't titled "Hume's legacy".
This is the water that I'm trying to lead you, a horse, to.
They didn't just pick any random philosopher, and there's a reason that the first section (not just essay) is "The Kantian Legacy."
If it's because "Kant is the jumping-off point for continental philosophy" somehow despite not being a continental philosopher in their estimation, how does that work rather than picking some other philosopher, like Hume?
Or think, man.
If we were going to write a history of the evolution of humans in particular, not the evolution of all life but just the speciation of the human species, we would logically start with the most recent common ancestor of humans and their closest relatives. We would then describe how some group of that MRCA over time evolved into the origins of the lineage that ends up with humans eventually. To do so is not, however, to claim that MRCA as exclusive to the human lineage; a similar history of bonobo evolution would begin with that same MRCA.
Similarly, a history of Continental philosophy would logically start with the "most recent common ancestor" of both Continental philosophy and its closest "relatives", and then show how some group of that "MRCA" evolved into the Continental branch of contemporary philosophy. But a similar history of Analytic philosophy would begin likewise, starting with Kant as the branch point between Continental and Analytic, the last point of common agreement, and then following early anti-Hegelians etc opposing the way the what-would-be-called Continental school was developing until it came to a head with the Vienna Circle, and the subsequent evolution of Analytic philosophy since then.
A history of analytic philosophy wouldn't begin with Kant. It would begin with Moore and Russell, or sometimes it would go back to Frege.
There are earlier philosophers for whom it would make sense to say are more of an analytic bent (and whom we could say were admired and emulated by analytics philosophers--although we might just as well mention folks like George Boole, Francis Bacon, etc. there), but there's not a continuous tradition until we get at least to Frege if not Moore/Russell.
Consider also other forks in philosophical tradition, like Platonists vs Aristotelians. Both claim everyone up to Socrates in their philosophical heritage, and Aristotle was a student of Plato, but the Aristotelian tradition does not incorporate many Platonic views, but rather opposes many of them. It seems to me, looking back over the history of philosophy, that every schism works that way: at some point everyone agrees on everything up to some philosopher or school of philosophy, but then things start trending in one direction from there, that other people find contentious, and eventually rebel against.
The presocratic schism between Ionians and Italiotes traces back to a common agreement on Thales, then the Ionians following after Thales' student Anaximander, and the Italiotes following after Anaximander's student Pythagoras. The classical era had the common agreement up to Socrates and then a split between his student Plato and Plato's student Aristotle. I'm not aware of a clear schism in the medieval era, thanks probably to the unifying influence of the Church. But then out of that Descartes began the Modern era with Rationalism, and then Empiricism emerged in rebellion against that. Those were united together under Kant, and what would be called the Continentals continued after him, until the Analytics rejected most of their work since him and went on to do their own thing.
There's also, presumably, a reason why the first section is specifically about Kant's legacy and not Kant's work itself.
Quoting Terrapin Station
It works just fine to say that the jumping off point is not itself a part of any branch. Though ultimately it's irrelevant anyways, since everyone agrees Kant is important. I was just wondering whether there was something specifically continental about Kant's philosophy.
There's a 22-page chapter on Kant. (On his work itself.)
Specifically continental about Kant’s philosophy is more along the lines of geo-political and religious turmoil, and his response to it, than having to do with some philosophical dichotomy, as I’m sure you’re aware.
Kantian epistemological philosophy was, by his own admission, with respect to Hume’s lackadaisical dismissal of a priori knowledge...slave of the passions and all that empiricist foolishness.....but it wasn’t for that, that the continental aspect for his philosophy came about. The tripartite Critiques taken as a whole, which were much more than merely epistemological, were a subtle rebuke of the writings of Jacobi (con) and Mendelssohn (pro), with respect to Spinozan pantheism, the religious turmoil of which was rampant in continental academia. While not naming any of them in more than passing, nor criticizing the general religiosity of the time, one can find a few anti-pantheisms hidden in those massive, paragraph-long sentences. In addition, throw in the French Revolution, which Kant tacitly condoned, at least in form, as shown in “The Science of Right”, it is clear how “continental” relates to Kant.
* The structure of individual sentences, including the length of sentences and the relative simplicity versus complexity of them, including willingness to nest countless prepositional phrases, to write run-on sentences, etc.
* Word choices, including just how eager the author is to invent neologisms or to use words in very novel ways that might change connotations in many different contexts
* The flow of one sentence to another--that is, the logical and semantic scope and flow of sentences. Is the semantic scope broad or narrow? Is the logical flow tightly controlled versus something more free-flowing or even stream-of-consciousness?
* The willingness to incorporate relatively obscure or esoteric references and allusions in conjunction with the willingness to explain them or not
Etc.
Both groups seems extremely problematic to me when they have overweening confidence (I know, that's tautological, given 'overweening') The conteninentals can drive right into the Sokal controversy making up a lot of shit and cherry picking from a dozen fields on their way there for a picnic. The little journey sounded grandiose, tale told by an idiot type stuff, however. And the analytical can think they have evaded all that contingent, cultural, psychological stuff. They can think of themselves as the rational team, under control, knowing their assumptions, when this is simply because their culture seems obvious to them.
But it also seems to me they are trying to do rather different things and solve different problems.
Yeah, that's part of it seeing science and logic/mathematics as methodological ideals. Continental philosophy often seems like its ultimate goal is to be about "the human condition" in much the same way that (especially realist) fiction often has an aim of "illustrating the human condition." So that's more likely to be historico-cultural.
Analytic philosophy is more concerned with "what is this stuff/how exactly does it work," where that often has very little if anything to do with humans or "the human condition." Continental philosophers want to point out the necessity of epistemology in talking about "what is this stuff/how exactly does it work" but analytic philosophers see the constant focus on that as being as OCDishly annoying as if we were to constantly tell physicists or chemists that they need to be talking about epistemology all the time and not just talking about forces and atoms and molecules and bonds and so on. It's not that the epistemological aspects are being denied or ignored. It's rather that analytic philosophers, like most scientists, most mathematicians, etc. think that we don't have to constantly just talk about epistemology.
That's interesting. The analytic tradition studying knowledge (at least from what I've read) usually looks at how statements are justified and how we tell the truth using them. The continental tradition studying knowledge (at least from what I've read) usually looks at knowledge as a social product. The focus on epistemology in that narrow analytical stereotype sense is one big disconnect between the two paradigms.
:up:
This seems an odd characterization. One of the more common critiques of 'continental philosophy' is it's almost utter neglect of epistemology.
What it neglects is approaching epistemology the way that analytic philosophers approach it.
It's a bit hard to ignore what we know/how we know it when one is an idealist, for example, and there are plenty of idealist continental philosophers.
Debatable, but not particularly worth debating.
--
As far as continental philosophy goes, I like Catherine Malabou's characterization of it as broadly transcendental in outlook: asking after the various conditions of modalities [possibility/actuality] of various things. This being what it learns from Kant. I lean continental, obviously, but I quite like the analytic tradition too.
My other favourite cheeky way of characterizing the split is Jack Reyonds' one, in which analytic philosophy is sadistic and continental philosophy is masochistic [link, pdf]. That's more probably the level at which the discussion should take place.
https://existentialcomics.com/comic/146
Ah, but what are you becoming...
I don't think the distinction is that tight.
After all, English philosophy was mostly Hegelian, and it was this that Russel and Moore were rejecting, using Frege's style of analysis.
So it might be best to think of continental philosophy as consisting of those folk who did not follow Russel and Moore into the Light.
If you need this to be neat, then the last common philosopher would be Hegel, not Kant; and the analytic tradition is the rejection of this ancestor.
But all this commentary is post-hoc, and unimportant.
Nowadays even if I try it doesn't work itself out.
Ok, that's a rarity for me.
I am heartened to see the third one mentioned, the Critique of Judgement brought into view.
The matter of what is peculiarly "continental" seems deeply connected to to whatever getting beyond the Scholastics was about. The history of philosophy is very interesting and I wished I had a better understanding that reading everything would probably help give me. Without that super scholarship, I am left with just the narratives that set up each bit of explanation each is willing to provide.
Explaining the course of philosophy as a product is an odd practice. It always comes off as an excuse not to do something.
What little continental philosophy I've read hasn't caught my interest.
I can see how that might be argued...:chin:
I entirely agree that Moore is unappreciated - from what you say, even by yourself. I keep returning to Principles of Ethics as a source of clear thinking on that most misunderstood topic.
How?
As for Moore himself, his main feat, as I see it, was to look at philosophical questions in the same register that you look at any other question. It sounds silly, but philosophers conduct their discussions in an alternate register, where the rules of reality don't really apply, and are bracketed for the sake of discussion. In other words, philosophers don't really take their own questions seriously, and don't really care about what they are talking about, or how it matches up with everything else they talk about. What is remarkable about Moore is that he simply took philosophical claims at their word, and when you do that, it becomes apparent how puzzling, and utterly batshit, they are.
This led, ultimately, to a new way of doing philosophy, which began not in puzzlement at the world, but in puzzlement at philosophers -- what could possibly cause someone to think and talk this way? And this in turn led to the fruitful program of seeing the conditions under which we make claims, how things get their meanings to begin with. Everything from positivism to quietism follows from that, and it seems to me to have been much more insightful and edifying than traditional philosophy.
Nice.
Others have called it an extension of Peirce. I'll leave such things as moot.
Hence my bias that there is something lazy about continental philosophy, that its proponents hide in their obtuse writing.
I suspect that as a profession, the path they found themselves on was self-defeating. One will not attract many students to study philosophy if the upshot is: Don't study philosophy, do something else.
I wonder about it myself – the more one learns about philosophy, the less appealing it is. What if the blunter statements of the analytics are right, and philosophy isn't really any more contentful than New Age stuff? I am becoming more sympathetic to the position, and maybe the solution is not to reform the discipline, but simply to ignore it and do something else.
If you have a choice, then go for it. I seem to keep getting dragged back to it.
One approach may be more appropriate for one idea in particular and so on.
If we reduce the idea of different philosophical views to the notion that they collectively attempt to represent meaning this would allow us to see how "opposing" philosophical attitudes may just be two sides of a multi-sided coin.
Philosophical attitudes are generally corollary to another and can't exist independently out of nothing.
(post structural view of literary work being one facet of a complex organism of culture, conditioning, genre, etc.)
If we see it this way could we get more use out of it?
I'll try and allegorize this with the development of language.
Language evolved in tandem with us. We went from purely surviving, to surviving efficiently and eventually to having (for the most part, at least in the first-world western societies) some sort of containment/mastery on basic physical survival e.g. food is practically almost always accessible, life expectancy growing etc.
As a result of this evolution out from basic physical survival, we had the time/energy and even the larger brains we grew to express more complex ideas/sentiments.
We needed/developed a language that expressed more complex ideas then "Warning" "food""safe" etc.
New words were formed either by combining words or creating new ones with the sounds we were able to put together to express these relatively more complex ideas.
To liken philosophy to this notion, different philosophical attitudes are like different words that we develop.
We put theses words together, categorize them phonetically, conceptually syllabically etc. (conscious of this purpose or not)
e.g. a lot of basic, common objects are given simple names; (chair, pen, house, etc.) while a lot complex notions are given longer names (usually greek)etc.
But all these words together no matter how simple or complex are all dependent upon each other to express/represent some meaning. They form the language that we employ and continually develop in order to best express meaning (whatever that is)
So I guess continental haha
Yeah....the proverbial red-headed step-child of the Critical Period, huh. By far the most difficult from which to extract the good stuff. That, and it took about 150 years before anyone thought there was any good stuff in there to extract, probably because it didn’t take Schopenhauer long at all, to jump all over what he considered to be massive inconsistencies with respect to the two preceding Critiques. Nowadays of course, some philosophical academia acknowledges CoJ for its insights and ground for modern aesthetics, re: Derrida, and equally dismissed by the modern analytic school, the so-called deconstructionists. (Sigh)
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Quoting Valentinus
Bullseye!!!! It may be argued the Renaissance put the proverbial nail in the Scholastic coffin, but the Enlightenment drove the nail with a very large hammer. Nevertheless....sign of the times....even Enlightenment philosophers in general needed to maintain sponsorships and benefactors for their respective university chair appointments and publishing, the benefactors themselves being invariably religious, so metaphysical efforts centered more on elevating humanism rather than ostracizing idealistic spiritualism.
Fun times in the world of human thought, and long since dissolved by.....er, dare I say....less than interesting......philosophy.
Same here.
:rofl: