Neil Gascoigne provides the first comprehensive introduction Richard
Rorty's work. He demonstrates to the general reader and to the student
of philosophy alike how the radical views on truth, objectivity and
rationality expressed in Rorty's widely-read essays on contemporary
culture and politics derive from his earliest work in the philosophy of
mind and language. He avoids the partisanship that characterizes much
discussion of Rorty's work whilst providing a critical account of some
of the dominant concerns of contemporary thought.
Beginning with Rorty's early work on concept-change in the philosophy of
mind, the book traces his increasing hostility to the idea that
philosophy is cognitively privileged with respect to other disciplines.
After the publication of Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, this led
to a new emphasis on preserving the moral and political inheritance of
the enlightenment by detaching it from the traditional search for
rational foundations. This emerging project led Rorty to champion
'ironic' thinkers like Foucault and Derrida, and to his attempt to
update the liberalism of J. S. Mill by offering a non-universalistic
account of the individual's need to balance their own private interests
against their commitments to others.
By returning him to his philosophical roots, Gascoigne shows why Rorty's
pragmatism is of continuing relevance to anyone interested in ongoing
debates about the nature and limits of philosophy, and the implications
these debates have for our understanding of what role the intellectual
might play in contemporary life. This book serves as both an excellent
introduction to Rorty's work and an innovative critique which
contributes to ongoing debates in the field.
