Posties

Richard Rorty

  • Der Philosophische Diskurs der Moderne: Zwölf Vorlesungen by Jürgen Habermas
    Suhrkamp, 302 pp, 54.00, February 1985, ISBN 3 518 57702 6

A third-rate critic of an original philosopher usually attacks him (or her) for frivolous irresponsibility, or corrupting the youth, or for having (by underhand ‘rhetorical’ means) briefly made the worse appear the better cause. By contrast, a second-rate critic will spot lacunae in the philosopher’s arguments, ambiguities in her use of terms, and vagueness in her conclusions. Such a critic defends the conventional wisdom which the radical philosopher criticised, and does so by detailed examination of the ipsissima verba of those criticisms, pointing out how often they either missed the point or begged the question.

You are not Logged In

  • If you have already registered login here
  • If you are a print subscriber using the site for the first time please register here
  • If you are not yet a subscriber you can subscribe here
  • If you are a member of a subscribing institution or University library please login here
  • If you have an Institutional print subscription and online access is not included, find out about our Institutional online subscriptions

[1] A translation, by Frederick Lawrence, of Der Philosophische Diskurs der Moderne will be published in October by MIT Press in America and in November by Polity in Britain. I have used Lawrence’s translation in the quotations contained in this review.

[2] For the young Habermas’s attitudes toward Heidegger, see the volume of interviews with him edited by Peter Dews, Habermas: Autonomy and Solidarity (Verso, 1986).

[3] LRB, 17 April, 8 May and 24 July 1986.