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Metaphilosophy is the study of the subject, matter, methods and aims of philosophy. It is the "philosophy of philosophy". Many people consider the recursive study of philosophy to be a part of any philosophical enterprise because it is intertwined with all branches of philosophy as is logic or epistemology. Philosophy is, however, commonly understood to encapsulate metaphilosophy, so the distinction is seldom made.
The primary question for metaphilosophy is, "What is philosophy?", and because different philosophers have offered different answers, it is the task of meta-philosophy to adjudicate. Prior to adjudication, however, the metaphilosopher must identify, clarify, and understand the alternative conceptions of the nature of philosophy.
Taxonomy of philosophical problems
What is not controversial are the general types of problem branches which are included in philosophy. These are the major branches: metaphysics, epistemology, axiology, and logic. Philosopher and encyclopedist Mortimer Adler, however, excludes logic and includes all second-order problems (i.e. questions presupposing the existence of abstract ideas and subsequently trying to understand them). Second-order problems are often found arranged under various branches of philosophy which start with the phrase "philosophy of...." Adler (1994) divides these second-order philosophical problems into two branches. The first branch addresses the objects of thought, such as Being, Cause, Change, Infinity, Fate, Love. The second branch addresses the subjects, or procedural domains, of thought, e.g. philosophy of religion, philosophy of history, philosophy of language, philosophy of science. Metaphilosophy also attempts to understand both branches of second-order thought aided by the other major branches, e.g. metaphysical knowledge in religion, epistemology in religion, axiology in religion. In any case, one problem in metaphilosophy is to provide such a taxonomy.
Existing metaphilosophical stances
Three main methods of philosophy have been the Ancient Greek, epistemic and linguistic approaches. The order written represents the historical progression of the conceptions of Philosophy.
Typical of the first variety were the thinkers Plato, Socrates, Aristotle and Epicurus. The questions of this form of Philosophy consist mainly of those relevant to the search for a happy life and the cultivation of the virtues, although political and religious philosophy is featured in recorded thinking. Consequently, much of Grecian philosophy would now be better termed psychology.
The epistemic approach centers upon the foundations of knowledge, in particular the debate between Rationalism and Empiricism. Typical of this era of speculation were Locke, Hume, Descartes, Jeremy Bentham and Immanuel Kant. Ethical philosophy developed from speculative psychology into a logical study of meta-ethics, while normative ethics showed signs of practical development towards social reform, notably under the prodigous lawyer and philosopher Jeremy Bentham.
Linguistic philosophy is the most recent development. Criticised as being vacuous and without relevance, the logical study of meaningful language is in decline in many universities. A.J. Ayer in his post-war debut Language, Truth and Logic sets two criteria for a definition of Philosophy. Firstly, the science must be a genuine branch of knowledge, and secondly it must bear relation to the realm of ideas and impressions commonly known as "Philosophy". In the aformentioned publication, Philosophy is (contentiously) defined as a wholly analytic task and as a compilation of "in-use" definitions. It is commonly suggested by this school that questions such as "What is Truth?" or more generally "What is x?" are requests for definitions rather than empirical facts.
Skepticism about philosophy
From a theoretical perspective, the most radical approach to the nature of philosophy is to take a skeptical stance, and proclaim that philosophy as such is impossible, deluded, worthless—even evil or dangerous. A milder skepticism would make similar claims about one or more of the major or minor branches of philosophy, e.g. that metaphysics (or epistemology, axiology, logic, etc.) is either impossible, deluded, worthless, or dangerous. For each of these skeptical approaches one can find historical representatives; the logical positivists, one seminal example, rejected axiological statements as neither true nor false and, therefore, meaningless.
Progress in philosophy
Whether or not there is progress in philosophy depends on one's assumptions about the nature of philosophy and the criteria of progress.
Metaphilosophical writings
Many philosophers have written on metaphilosophy. The tradition goes back to Plato, whose dialogues are directly concerned with ethics, but constantly raise questions concerning
- the nature of philosophy and its methods (most explicitly addressed in the Meno)
- the value and proper aims of philosophy (in the Apology, Gorgias, Protagoras, etc.)
- the proper relationship between philosophical criticism and everyday life (a pervasive theme explored most famously in the Republic)
Ludwig Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and Philosophical Investigations directly address logic, the philosophy of language, and the philosophy of mind, but the nature of philosophical puzzles and philosophical understanding is central to all of the discussions. Wittgenstein frequently diagnoses philosophical errors as involving confusions about the nature of philosophical inquiry.
C. D. Broad is known for distinguishing Critical from Speculative philosophy. See his "The Subject-matter of Philosophy, and its Relations to the special Sciences," in Introduction to Scientific Thought, 1923. Curt Ducasse, in Philosophy as a Science, examines several views of the nature of philosophy, and concludes that philosophy has a distinct subject matter: appraisals.
Reference
- Adler, Mortimer (1994). The Four Dimensions of Philosophy. New York: MacMillan.
See also
External links
"Metaphilosophy"