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We must all make choices about how we want to live. We evaluate our possibilities by relying on historical, moral, personal, political, religious, and scientific modes of evaluations, but the values and reasons that follow from them conflict. Philosophical problems are forced on us when we try to cope with such conflicts. There are reasons for and against all proposed ways of coping with the conflicts, but none of them has been generally accepted by reasonable
thinkers. The constructive aim of The Nature of Philosophical Problems is to propose a way of understanding the nature of such philosophical problems, explain why they occur, why they are perennial, and propose a pluralist approach as the most reasonable way of coping with them. This approach is
practical, context-dependent, and particular. It follows from it that the recurrence of philosophical problems is not a defect, but a welcome consequence of the richness of our modes of understanding that enlarges the range of possibilities by which we might choose to live. The critical aim of the book is to give reasons against both the absolutist attempt to find an overriding value or principle for resolving philosophical problems and of the relativist claim that reasons unavoidably come to
an end and how we want to live is ultimately a matter of personal preference, not of reasons.
List of contents
- INTRODUCTION
- PART ONE: FROM MODES OF UNDERSTANDING TO PHILOSOPHICAL PROBLEMS
- 1: MODES OF UNDERSTANDING: A GENERAL ACCOUNT
- 2: MODES OF UNDERSTANDING: PARTICULAR ACCOUNTS
- 3: CONFLICTS AND PROBLEMS
- 4: THE PROBLEMS AND THEIR CONTEXTS
- PART TWO: PROBLEMATIC PROPOSALS
- 5: HISTORY AND GENEALOGY
- 6: MORALITY AND MORALISM
- 7: POLITICS AND IDEOLOGY
- 8: SCIENCE AND SCIENTISM
- PART THREE: TOWARD A PLURALIST APPROACH
- 9: GOOD REASONS
- 10: THE PLURALIST APPROACH TO GOOD LIVES, PROVIDENTIAL ORDER, AND THE IDEAL STATE
- 11: THE PLURALIST APPROACH TO CONTROL, REASONABLE HOPE, AND MORAL ABSOLUTES
- NOTES
- WORKS CITED
- INDEX
About the author
John Kekes has for many years been Professor at the State University of New York and is now Research Professor at Union College. He is the author of many books, most recently
Enjoyment (OUP, 2008) and
The Human Condition (2010). He has received fellowshps from the Canada Council, NEH, and the Woodrow Wilson, Rockefeller, and the Earhart Foundations. He has been Visiting Professor in Canada, Estonia, Hungary, Portugal, Singapore, and the United States Military Academy.
Summary
John Kekes proposes a new way of understanding the nature of philosophical problems, and defends a pluralist approach towards coping with them. He argues that the recurrence of such problems is not a defect, but a consequence of the richness of our modes of understanding that enlarges the range of possibilities by which we might choose to live.
Additional text
An illuminating, engaging, and convincing discussion on an important topic
