I

l I I l I I l t l l l I I

i I I I I l t I

i I l I

1 l I l I I

I I I I I I I l !

Philosophy and Its History

Elements of Methodology

Gianfranco So/dati

1. The question and its motivation'

The nature of the relation between philosophy and its history · d' t d So h. k h'l h . l'k h IS lspu e . me

t m P I osop y, JUSt 1 e ~at ematics, medicine or biology, can and should be done, and thu.s t.aught, wnhout any consideration of its history. Others think that phtlosophy ts m some more fundamental sense historical and thus cannot ~ done and taught ~ithout proper consideration of its history. The difference ts not purely theoreucal. It has practical consequences when it comes to the or­ganisation, for ins~ance, ~f philosophy departments. One finds that most depart­ments on the conunent gtve a more or less strong weight to the history of phi­losophy, while departments in the Anglo-Saxon area, mainly those that share the so called "analytic" orientation, give less, and sometimes no weight at all to the study of the history of philosophy. There are, useless to say, notable excep­tions on both sides.

The difference needs some qualifications. There is a rather obvious sense in which philosophy is historical. lt is historical in the sense that it has a history just as much as any other discipline, be it theoretical or practical. There is a his­tory of philosophy just as much as there is a history of mathematics, of the arts, of technology of medicine and of sport. The acquisition of the kind of knowledge required for the exercise of a human discipline often involves a further relation to the past. A foothall player learns to play in part by looking at others who have learned by looking at others and a mathematician acquires mathematical knowl­edge through people around him who acquired their knowledge from people around them. In so far as these testimonial dependencies go into the past, andin so far as their mere presence constitutes a motive for a subject to act orthink in a certain way, these disciplines have a tradition and the relation to that tradit.ion is a constitutive part if their exercise.2 Philosophy, just as much as mathemaucs.

' Research for this work was partially funded by the MICINN, Spanish Government. und~r the CONSOLIDER tNGENIO 2010 Program. gram CSD2009-0056. Some ideas presented 10

this paper originated from talking to Josep Corbi. I should like to thank htm and Ehsa­betta Lalumera for comments on the final version. I thank Corahe Dorsaz for feedback on my meanderings while writing this paper. . . . .

1 1 2 Having a history and having a tradition m~y not necessanly co.mctde. ~~:~a~;~~s

would say that a domain has a history when tts ttems are ordered m a way

Gianfranco Soidati 84

·n is what it is by virtue of what it has ~come through re-football and coolo g, . g and readjustment that occurred m the unfolding of

d esses of Jearm n . . . peate proc . h body seriously d1sputes the trnportance of an inquiry . . ltake 1t t at no . . 11s h1srory: f hi/osophy in any of these senses. It JS a cruc1al part of the inro the h1story 0 P ·1 and of its deeds.

f h hisrory of humam Y . . study o 1 .e. . ncerning the histoncal character of phtlosophy, a claim

A spec1f1c c/a1m co · , . . . h philosophy from many (not necessanly all)- other human

that would dlstmgUJs h I . h . . . . ld th 5 need 10 involve more than I e c a1m t at ph1losophy has diSCiphnes. wou u . h · · · h . d d·1·00 In this paper I w1s 10 1nqUJre mto w at such a claim hiSIOTY an a tra I I · • 3 ifl . l ·m could be and what its consequences for the study of philos-the spea rctty c m • . o hy and of its history rnlght be. . . p Two assumptions are needed before we start. r.he f1rst 1s that there is indeed

d.f... in the relation to history between ph1losophy and some other dis-a I 1erence 0

. . . . 1. eh as mathematics and football. 1sagreemen1 concernmg th1s point ~~w . . . . .

e from radically opposed corners. Some wnh heavy theoreucal mch-may com . h . . . nations may urge that philosophy is just hke mat emaucs: . 1t stmply ought to

ent claims (theorems) and arguments (proofs). Others, w1th a strong histori-pres . . h' . I. h cal orientation, may claim that even mathemaues ts tstonca tn t e sense that its claims and proofs owe their entire legitimacy to their historical pedigree. Both posilions reject the specificity of the relation philosophy holds to its own history. Both positions appear wrong to me, but my primary goal in th~ presem paper is not to argue against them. I rather want to understand, as I sa1d above, the na­ture and the consequences of the specificity claim.

The second assumption we need is that philosophy involves genuine theoreti­cal claims and arguments. By genuine theoretical claims and arguments I mean claims and arguments that are made with the intention to be assessed for their truth and validity. In this sense philosophy is not to be compared to fictional dis­course and its aim is not merely to produce a narrative that eilher speaks or does not speaJc to its reader.

To submit that philosophy contains genuine theoretical claims does not pro­scribe the possibility to read those claims from another point of view. It is per­fectly legitimate to inquire into the non-theoretical motives that move a philos­opher to present a certain claim or a certain argument. And the position under consideration does not entail that there is no narrative, and in some sense even fictional dimension to philosophy, a dimension that often plays a crucial roJe in

essentially on the passage of time. There further is a tradition when with the passage of time there is learning and readjustment, and when subjects that take themselves to

~long to the tradition find in it, in the tact that they belong to the tradition, a suffi­cJent reason to acr or think in a certain way.

1 The re/ t' h'l . . .a 10n P 1 osophy bears to its history arguably presents a nurober of important SlmJlantles ro the relar· · . . . . IOn many ans, such as mus1c or v1sual arts, and probably most

bd~sc!phnes that are generally grouped under the heading "humanities" bear to their !Story. More on this later. '

Philosophy and lts History 85

the persuasive force of an argument • All we need · d · · . . · m or er to gtve a bne to what follows 15 the assumpuon that in philosophy there is indeed room for claims and arguments that are made m a way that allows a genu1·ne th · 1 . . . eoret1ca assessment. Advocates of strong hlstonc1sm typically challenge th1·5 ass t' · h . . . . . . ump 1on, argumg t at ph1los?ph1cal clalms o~e thetr leg1llmacy entirely to the historical conditions of the1r occurrence. It IS so~etimes argued that philosophical claims and argu­~ents cannot be ~ssessed wnh respect their truth and validity from our point of v1ew, but onl~ wnh respe~t to .t~eu assertibility within their original context of utte.ranc.e .. Th1~ form of .h•stonc1sm is flawed in my eyes, but I shall not argue agam~t 1t m th1s paper enher .. I .shall rather ask myself in what sense the history of ph1losophy can play a spec1f1c role with respect to philosophy from the point of view of somebody who recognises the genuinely theoretical character of any authentic philosophical endeavour.

Having set up the problern in the way suggested so far confers to the question concerning the relation between philosophy and its history a distinctive flavour. It invites us to avoid both the modest and the ambitious point of view, which Iead both to the denial of the specificity claim. The modest point of view acknowledg­es the theoretical character of the philosophical enterprise. along with that of aii other scientific disciplines. and conceives inquiries into the history of philoso­phy as being simply part of the general study of history of human achievements. There is no specific issue concerning the relation philosophy bears to its history and philosophers can happily go on with their job without caring more about the history of philosophy than what Roger Federer might have to care about the his­tory of tennis. 5 In this perspective philosophy would live a life parallel to its own history. The ambitious point of view rejects the theoretical status of philosophy (possibly, albeit even less plausibly, along with that of all other scientiftc disci­plines) and argues that philosophy has no specific relation to its history simply because philosophy does not exist as a theoretical discipline. From this point of view philosophy cannot be anything eise than the study of its own history.6

• More on the role of narratives in philosophy below. 5 As the example suggests. the relevant factors with respect to the relation of a discipline

to its own history do not appear to depend essentially on whether the discipline is theo­retical or practical.

6 I have always been intrigued by the fact that some historians who study philosophers who were resolutely committed to the theoretical dimension of their work (from Pla­to and Aristotle to Thomas, Descartes, Leibniz, Hume, Kant, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Frege, Husserl, Quine and Habermas), are attracted by the view that all these philo.so­phers were entirely misled about the very nature of their own intellectual en~erpnse. This pessimistic error theory is sometimes motivated by the insigh~ tha~ "? ph1lo~oph•· cal claim or argument has resisted criticism without damage. But tf th1s m.s•ght 1s m~­portant in itself (it should commend intellectual accuracy and modesty. for mstance). II is far from entailing the sceptical conclusion that philosophy shou~d n~t be cons1de~ed as a theoretical discipline. Jndeed. it is only because we do cons1der II as theoreucal that criticism is possible and that arguments and claims can be proven wrong.

\ I I

86 Gianjranco Soidati

I have insisted on the fact that in what follows I am assuming, and . I h f d . not argu

'ng for the specificity cla1rn. n t e course o stu ymg the nature and h -1 . . . t e con­sequences of thls cla1rn I shall however menuon some arguments in its .,

I . h ·r· . ~avour I still insist on the fact that am assummg t e spect ICtty claim because I · rather worried about the real force of those arguments. If no sufficiem a~ . d . reason m favour of the specificity clatm can be ma e avatlable, then I would cena· 1 · · I · h 'II b f 10 Y opt for modes~ rather th.an amb1t.1o~. t mtg t stt . e ~se ul to clarify what the spe. cificity clalm would mvolve, tf tt were true. Thts, 11 seems to me, is not alwa

5 fully acknowledged. Y

2. The contingently historical character of philosophy

What do we need the speci ficity claim for? In the light of what we have seen far, its main interest would be related to a normative issue: should a philosophso know the history of philosophy? And if yes, why? The specificity claim concer~; the scope of the kind of reason we might be asked to provide. It submits that the answer to the normative question ought to be specific to philosophy in the sense that it ought to apply to it for reasons that are not common to all human disci­plines (albeit it might not be specific to philosophy only). Since all human disci­plines have a history and a tradition, the simple fact that philosophy has a history and a tradition does not qualify as a kind of reason we were asked to provide. But it may be a good reason on its own. And so one may think that the problern does not really lie with philosophy, but with all the other disciplines. A mathematician and a physician should know about the history of mathematics and medicine just as much as a philosopher should.

The normative question is asked in a certain perspective. I think the best way to understand that perspective is by using the notion of expertise. The question is whether someone ought to know the history of philosophy in order to be an expen in philosophy. The notion of expertise we are using in this context is epis­temic. It has to do, for instance, with the conditions that entitle a person to serve as an authority with respect to the acquisition of philosophical knowledge. It does not seem plausible, from this perspective, to argue that for a physician tobe an expert on bodily ailments, for us to consider him as an authoriry concerning our physical health, he needs to have knowledge about the history of medicine.7

There may be many other perspectives under which it would be better if he had such knowledge, but medical expertise alone does not yield such a requirement. The sam~, .1 .should think, applies to mathematics and to many other disciplines. The spectftctty claim is hence still in place.

7 Remember .• again, that this is not to deny that his knowledge is partly historical in the sense that I! depends on the history of medicine.

Philosophy and fts History

87

Now. there are many senses in h' h . . ered tobe a condition for philosophw t htstoncal knowledge may be consid­fice for the kind of reason we are 1

1cak. expenJse. But not all of these senses suf

. oo mg for In . · cal knowledge requ1red is. I should : many cases the kmd of histori-for the specificity claim to have a sa~, .contmgemly htstorical. And I think that Let me explain. rea tmpon, we should be looking for more.

In doing philosophy one is typically re . d phil~sophical positions against each otherq~~e to. compa~e and weight different son ts generally based on the readin d . agamst one s own. Th1s compari­that are situated in a comext. So a ~0 an .mterpretation of philosophical texts knowledge of he relevant comext. ~e ~~ mterpretauo~ of t~ose texts requires One ought to determine, for instance the eva~tt contehext IS mal~ly phllosophical.

. . . . . • pos1 1ons t author 1s reactmg to a d the presuppostuons that are 1mphcu in the author' · . . ' n . s v1ew, presupposmons he may share wuh some or maybe even all of his contem · b · . . poranes, ut not w1th us. Oth-er, non-ph1losoph1cal comextual factors may also be el 0 · . . r evant. ne such obv10us factor ts constttuted by the author's language One needs k 1 d f h , . . now e ge o t e au-th~r s langu~ge, an~ thts, ~s we lmow, especially when it comes to tbe interpre­tauon of phtlosophlcal wntmgs, requires knowledge of the related culture. The more the language .a~ the culture of the interpreted text are foreign to us. the m~re we ne~d exphcll extra-philosophical, e. g. philological knowledge in order to mterpret 11.8

. This may be true for philosophy more than for many other disciplines for the stmple fact ~h.at we c~nsider positions by authors from the past as acrual in a way that IS spectflc to ph1losophy. lf one is interested in virrue ethics. one can still gain insight by studying Aristotle's Ethics, and a proper srudy of Leibniz's Meta­physics can still be of great help in our understanding of the nature of a priori knowledge. It would certainly be a sign of poor intellectual accuracy, and so of little expertise, if a philosopher working on scepticism were to ignore what Des­cartes had to say about it four cemuries ago.

ls it however essential, in the light of what we have said so far, !hat we un­derstand the texts we are imerpreting as belonging to the history of philosophy? For all we have said, knowledge of the context in which the texts we are study­ing are situated is necessary only for a proper understanding of their coment. If we want to understand what Leibniz bad to say about a priori knowledge. we need to rely on knowledge of the context of his writings, but once this has been provided, it might appear, we can go on forgetting the fact that they belong to a certain period of the history of philoso.phy. Once the text h~s ~en interpret~, we can treat its content as if it were Slmply part of humamty s umeless ph1lo-

8 Wh ich contextual factors are taken tobe relevant for the understanding of past philo-. · · · f d' t Some areready to go very far and to m-sophJcal posmons 1s a matter o some tspu e. . . ~ A mple of such a rather extreme v1ew

clude sociological and econom1cal .actors. n exa . . 1 can be found in an influential handbook published in ltaly m 1975 (see Vegettl et a .

1975).

88 Gianjranco Soidati

. 0 this view, which may be more or less explicit in the h. 1 equ1pment. n h . f . Way

sop 1ca . ad philosophical texts. t e mam unct1on of the stud ntemporanes re . . y of

many. co h"l phy is 10 retain. and to make access1ble, 1deas that m· h the hiSIOTY of P 1 OSO 9

1& t ·se have been forgotten.

other~• . . 1 3 legilimate goal and in so far as we think that past phil Thls ts certaln Y . oso-

"nd ed worth studying in order to obtam a better understanding of th Phers are 1 e . d d · . e

. we are addressing. or m or er to 1scover quest10ns we should very quesuons · h

d . knowledge of the history of phllosop Y appears useful and com be ad ressmg, . .- . -

d bl But if this is all there is that speaks m 1avour of knowmg the history men a e. · · I h. · I T of philosophy, then philosophy IS ~nly conungent y lstonca . he fact that those . belong to the history of phllosophy. the fact that they belong not only to

VteWS . h" I . d th I but to the past of our own phllosop 1ca v1ews, oes not appear to play

e pas. . I • ·r h . any role in justifying our mtere~t for them .. n 1act, 1 t ose v1ews c.ould be made available without studying the h1story of phalosophy, that would be JUS! as good.'o

lf the specificity claim is to be rooted i~ ~he nature of phi.losophy as a disci­pline. then more than these contingent condmons should obtam. Let us see what

they could be.

3. The essentially historical character of philosophy

What is the value, from a philosophical perspective, of knowing how to locate a certain view in the history of philosophy? The explicit restriction to the philo­sophical perspective is meant to emphasise the theoretical dimension I mentioned earlier. So the question is this: what is the value. from the perspective of some­body who intends to present philosophical claims and arguments, of knowing how to locate a certain philosophical view in the history of philosophy? What is the added value of not only knowing the content ofthat view, but of knowing that it belongs to a certain past period of philosophy?

The main goal of this paper would be attained if what I said so far were to suffice in order to show that for the specificity claim to make sense, and thus for a position between modesty and ambition to be available, a proper answer to

9 1t is indeed a striking and often embarrassing fact, that philosophers all to readily adorn themselves with the discovery of ideas that have been fully articulated a long Urne before. The study of the history of philosophy can obviously help to avoid finding oneself m such an embarrassing posture

10 1t is oft ·d h · · . . en sat t at past phtlosophical writings constantly need to be reinterpreted. lf thts 15 tr~e, and much speaks in its favour, then there is a further impediment against cons1denng work in the h" 1 f h"l · · k . ts ory o p 1 osophy as havmg simply the funcuon to ma e past phllosophical · · 1 . · · . vtews llme essly ava1lable. But again, we have to understand tf thts ts due to the contingent ~ h .

f act t at our mterpretations are always corrigible, or to some more Undamental tra·t f h · . 1 o I e relauon phtlosophy bears to its own history.

Philosophy and lts History 89

this question has to be provided. Let me howe 1 · . h h ver specu ate, m th1s fmal section

about ow suc an answer could Iook like and h · · . • . w at s ll consequences m1ght be II appears that af there is an added value for a h"l h . · . . . p 1 osop er to know a past phll-

osoph•cal vaew, then th1s has tobe related to atleast two 'eat Th r· , h d · h · I' ures. e 1rst ~ea-

ture as to o Wll ume. II must be relevant •or the h" · 1 k 1 d . . . • I' IStonca now e ge under

consJderat1on. that u concerns a view that is known 10 be 1 d h · . ocate somew ere m the past. But th1s alone can't do lt is nOtJ·ust be1·ng kno t b h . · wn o e past t at counts; what ~urther counts as the ~act that the position is considered to belong to our own past. To know that ~ v1e:' ~longs to the past of a foreign culture helps to understand that culture, us ~tstoncal roots and its development, but it does not affect our present ph1losophtcal view in the way knowing a position we consider to belong to our own past does.

Alt~ough they are fairly widespread. these are delicate claims. and they would mvolve much more space and time in order to be properly supponed. But Iet us suppose they can be supported. What would their consequences be for our way of doing philosophy? How should we proceed in order to do justice to them? What sort of understanding of past philosophical views would redeem the added value of knowing them?

II appears that one such understanding would be that provided by a narra­tive. By narrative I mean (at least) this: a discourse where a series of events, or in our case of philosophical views, are brought in an essentially temporal rela­tion to each other, so that the temporal ordering of the items matters for the con­tent of the narrative. Knowledge of the history of philosophy would then provide access not only to the views that emerged in the past, but also to the way they succeeded to each other in time.'' Our understanding of these views would be enriched by the narrative we construct on the basis of our knowledge of the his­tory of philosophy.

To say that in a narrative items are temporally ordered does not mean that a narrative is nothing eise, or nothing more, than a mere Iist of items chronologi­cally ordered. So much more needs tobe said in order to obtain a proper appre­ciation of the sort of understanding we gain through narration. But if the tem­poral articulation is essential to the narration, and if our understanding of tbe history of philosophy is essentially narrative. then we have at least a first reason to doubt that all the history of philosophy can provide us with is access to a time­less world of philosophical ideas.

But we need to understand, at this stage. how the philosophical narrative we construct on the basis of our knowledge of the history of philosophy impinges on the theoretical dimension of philosophy. In what sense does our intention to present true claims and valid arguments depend on our narrative understanding

11 Something similar appears to motivate Williams's notio~ of g:nealog~ (~ Williams 2002). A proper comparison of the view under cons1derauon wuh W1lhams use of the notion of genealogy must be left for another occas1on.

90 Gianfranco Soldati

of the history of philosophy? After all, one might wonder, does the narrative d d. h'l h. not

simply offer a belter way of un erstan mg p~st_ P 1 os~~ 1cal positions? And if this were so, would we not find ourselves agam m a pos1t10n where we now need historical narration, just as much we needed_c_omextual knowledge, simply in or­der to grasp past positions? Once those pos1110ns have been ~ade available, we could again conclude. we may forget both context and narrative. Nothing would then be lost if the positions were accessible without any knowledge of their con­text and without any narrative. Should we then not conclude that the historical narrative is just as contingent with respect to our philosophical endavour as our knowledge of the historical context of past philosophical views is?

One rather direct way to avoid this conclusion is to admit that there is some­thing misleading in a certain way of understanding the distinction between the narrative and the theoretical dimensions of philosophy. They are not independent from eacb other and there is no precise line where one could and should draw a border between them. lt is quite obvious that one cannot evaluate what one does not understand. But understanding a position involves not only grasping the conditions under which it would obtain, if true, but also seeing the reasons that speak in its favour. So the more one sees those reasons the more one understands the position, and the more one understands the position, the more one sees what speaks it its favour. This point might, but need not be established on the basis of a specific theory of understanding. lt is enough, for our purpose, to recognise that it holds as a basic principle of philosophical exegesis.

Philosophcrs have often used narratives in order to back their views. Pla­ton's use myths, Descartes' autobiographical setting in the Meditations, Kant's explicit historical understanding of transeendental philosophy as a mediation be­tween rationalism and empiricism, and Rawls story of the veil of ignorance are all examples, albeit quite different, of uses of narration in philosophy. The point for us would now be that those pieces of narration have to be conceived as part of a more generat role narration plays in our way of understanding philosophi­cal claims and arguments. Narratives are means that help to understand the very nature of philosophical positions, and understanding that nature is an essential pan of appreciating the reasons the speak in their favour. Since temporal articu­lation is not a contingent, but an essential part of narratives, the understanding ac~uired through historical narration is essentially temporal. And if there is no stnct _ border between understanding and evaluating, knowledge of the history of ph1losophy becomes an essential part of the theoretical endavour involved in philosophy.

!?e narrative based on our knowledge of the history of philosophy plays a d~clslve role in many further aspects., lt reveals for instance, the roots of the v1ews th t · · ' . a c~nsu~ute the mtellectual core of our present philosophical concep-uo?s. Th~ hlstoncal narrative thus helps to articulate and critically reflect the phllosophlcal tradition to which we belong

The kind of underst d' · · · · 'ts a d

. . . an mg we obtam through narrauon obv1ously men ISCUSSIOn On llS own 1 · h · . . . k wl-

• WIS to end wtth ms1stmg on the fact that the ac no

Philosophy and fts History 91

edgemenl of lhe roJe narration 1 . . · . . P ays tn ph1losophy h ld . t1on wnh the 1dea that philosoph . . s ou not enter m comradic-

. Y IS an essentially th · 1 . . . one does ph1losophy only in so f . eoretica d1sc1phne and that

ar as one mtends 1 · ments that are evaluated for truth a d 1.d. o _present cla1ms aod argu-

. . n va I ny There 1s no · · b · · better phllosophtcal underslanding if that is n~ pomt m o tammg a we can evaluate in the light of our b

1 d 1 the understandmg of something

. . es stan ards of obiect' ·1 p h' . cal poslltons need to be constantly . , lVI Y· ast p tlosophl-re-exammed beca th d. · to is not a weight we silently carry on our sh ld u~ e tra _mon we belo?g torical narration shows is that understandingou ders. I h~t the tssue a~ut hls-

. . an eva uation are two pomts on a contmuous hne. There is neither understand· . h . · · mg wn out evaluat1on nor evalu-atton w1thout understanding. This 1 should th . k · & • . . . • m , IS a 1eature ph1losophy has m com~~n wnh many, 1f not all disciplines that fall under the general heading "humamttes".12

lf what has been said so far is along the right track, if the specificity claim can and should b~ supported by the considerations presented above, then there is at least o~e practtcal consequ~nce that_ can be drawn from it. It is this. Not only should phtlosophers engage wnh the h1story of their discipline, but historians, in so fa~ as they ~a~e themselves to make a contribution to philosophy, should eo­gage m the acuvny of presenting philosophical claims and defending them with arguments that are rich enough to stand against our most recent and powerful evaluative Standards. Where the former is missing, one has only partial grasp of the nature of one own philosophical position; where the latter is missing one does not measure the real import of the views one traces the genealogy of.

References

VEGETTJ, Mario; ALESSIO, Franco; FABIETTJ, Renato; PAPJ, Fulvio 1975: Filosofie e Societa. Bologna: Zanichelli.

WILLIAMS, Bernard (2002): Truth and Truthfulness. Princeton: Princeton Uni-versity Press.

WtLLIAMS, Bernard 2006: Philosophy as a Humanistic Discipline. In: Bemard Williams, Philosophy as a Humanistic Discipline. Princeton: Princeton Uni-

versity Press, 180- 199.

12 On this point see Williams 2006.