A Discussion

Author(s): Rorty, Taylor and Dreyfus

Source: The Review of Metaphysics, Vol. 34, No. 1 (Sep., 1980), pp. 47-55
Published by: Philosophy Education Society Inc.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20127458
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A DISCUSSION
RORTY, TAYLOR, AND DREYFUS

Imight explain that the last few sentences of my remarks

AVorty:
were

I knew

before

written

what

would

Dreyfus

say.

heard

Having

his remarks, I'm not sure that Dreyfus

and I differ, for Iwould like to

take what

than

he

rather

the religious
left over
"micropractices"

that

calls

from

the

an earlier

secular
day

I agree
the

line.

us resist

help

disciplinary society, and I think itwould be advantageous ifwe could

come up with a cultural paradigm which embodied more of them and
less of the Cartesian tradition of scientism.
still bedevil the debate and
TAYLOR: Several misunderstandings
we
can
can
I
be identified,
maybe if they
disagree more fruitfully.
the word

for using
apologize
Bernard Williams's

book

and absolute

ject-related

I was

"absolute."

on Descartes.
is very

The

different

from Kant's

tween the in-itself and the phenomenal,

Rorty's

assumed

argument

it was

that

it from
borrowing
distinction
between
sub
distinction

be

and I think that most

same

the

distinction.

of

We

must distinguish the distinctions.

The Kantian distinction between
us distinguishes things as they
for
and
things-in-themselves
things
are outside

of any

relation

to human

from

(in-themselves)

knowledge

things as they are in relation to human knowledge (for us). That dis
tinction deserves to be fundamentally criticized. By the very defini
tion, we can never
would
be a hopeless
illustrated
by the

of such a world-in-itself.
knowledge
for science
direction
to take.
However,

achieve

distinction

This
what

is

is some

secondary-primary
property
to come to an understanding
found it very useful
We
thing different.
we sorted out the way
of how we fit into the world
or, in other words,
us from the mechanisms
which
in us
the world
affects
these effects
by
a distinction
are produced.
can be made
As a consequence,
between
certain
terize

that we want

features
the way

we

to attribute

are affected

by

to the world
versus

the world

which

certain

charac
other

de

scriptions which characterize the important dimensions of the world

which explain how it so affects us, or how some bits of it affect other
bits

it, even

of

role.

when

we

aren't

on

the

scene

or we

aren't

To explain the interaction of inanimate things,

that way,

we

sort

Review of Metaphysics

out descriptions

which

things

have

34 (September 1980): 3-23 Copyright ?

playing

if I can put it
only

insofar

as

1980 by the Review of

Metaphysics

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RORTY,TAYLOR,AND DREYFUS:

48
are

they

in the

situated

of our action

context

or our concern

from

de

scriptions we can make of things quite outside that context. This is

how I distinguished between subject-related and absolute proper
didn't mean

"Absolute"

ties.

to our

relative

"in-itself

or our

interests

not
simply meant
I perhaps
should

"; "absolute"
of action.

context

have used another term. I think Dreyfus has put itwell in his gloss
of Heidegger's
interpretation of the development of science: we try to
get descriptions inwhich we take things out of the context of our im
we

much;

concerns.

and

interests

mediate

don't

to my

objections

too

thing weighs

and I think that many

That is a very important distinction,

Rorty's

the

say

ten grams.

it weighs

say

We

the

missed

remarks

because

target,

of

they

seem to me to be directed against the Kantian distinction rather than

tant
we

one.

that

against
natural

science
our

perceptive

see

one

how

last two

to the successful

role
and

I don't
in the

centuries

sorting
powers

can interpret
the success
of
an
without
ascribing
impor
as it were,
in which
of the way

out,
fit into

the

It might,

universe.

of

course, have been otherwise. As Rorty puts it at one point, itmight

have been the case that the theories of the high Renaissance or of
out to be better
have
turned
would
"correspondences"
we
and Descartes.
sciences
the natural
have from Galileo

science

than

But

that

would have been because the way inwhich things react and relate to
each other would have been of the kind which is characterizable in the

There's

a second

point

of difference

on.

so

and

of correspondence,
concepts
meaning,
have been very different.
would

I want

which

The
to bring

universe
I

out.

think Rorty is wrong in saying, for instance, that the objection we

have to Skinner is that he's treating human beings like objects. That
a successful
that there's
implies
whatever
ing, or at least achieving

of understand
practice
to achieve,
science
attempts

Skinnerian
goals

with human beings as the objects of science, and that we only have
That would be like saying
moral objections to its being practiced.
a
natural science in the di
of
is
there
perfectly possible development
rection

of more

jection

to that

damaging.

to pose a moral
but one wants
technology,
on
the
that
its
consequences
development
grounds

But it seems to me that the case is quite other.

no successful

is absolutely
it's contradictory.
of confusions;
on a very
to Skinner,
except
perhaps

argue
tissue

that

there

tific objections.

ob

nuclear

It doesn't work;

science

I don't
high

level,

here

are

I would

at all;

it's a

have moral
but

objections
I do have scien

it doesn't yield any knowledge;

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it

A DISCUSSION

49

doesn't yield any insight.

I don't think you have to have a theory of

essence

this

in order

to make

must

describe

makes

what

Some

point.

tually pay off in what we might

scientific

ac

attempts

call insight or understanding.

science

good

some

and

good

We

scientific

pro

grams utterly fail to pay off. It's an interesting fact, I think, that the
ones that try to eschew what I call subject-related properties fail.
They don't fail because they're morally bad. They fail by the criteria
of science,
scured by

and

the moral

"absolute"

Kant's.
help,

important

and

(I'm not
because

which

point

must

not

be

ob

point.

If I understand Taylor,

RORTY:
the

a very

that's

the

sure

Williams's

the distinction he makes

between

is Locke's
rather
than
"subject-dependent"
The reference
about this.
to Williams
doesn't
use

of "absolute

reality"

an ambigu

conceals

ity between the weird notion of "a conception of reality as itwould be

apart from any description in our language" and the trivial notion of
"a conception
But
suppose
as

tinction

as
of reality
one does take

of "absolute-vs.-subject-dependent."

illustrative

agree with

of our knowing.")
causally
independent
the Lockean
dis
primary-vs.-secondary

the interpreters

of Locke who say that he gets that dis

tinction
ence

simply by asking Boyle what

needs.
The terms Boyle
needs

jects; the others don't.

of the day

vocabulary

I would

terms
signify

This fast little absolutization

doesn't

seem

to me

sci

Boylean
corpuscular
ideas which
resemble
to produce

ob

of the scientific
an

interesting

I disagree with Taylor when he says that it

philosophical distinction.
is impossible to read the history of the last two centuries of science
without

that
using
an account

to give
It is usually

It seems

distinction.
of modern

science

that

to me
set

was able
that Dewey
that distinction
aside.

that Kant's

thought

tion.

noumenal-vs.-phenomenal
on Locke's
improvement
primary-vs.-secondary
or not, Locke's
was
Whether
it was
distinction

tive.

Modern

tion was

distinc

an

scientists

merely

adopted

a set

distinc
rather

of terms?the

primi
terms

for Lockean primary qualities?which

got them what they wanted.
see
But I don't
that those terms point to a distinction between abso
lute versus

subject-dependent.

Regarding Skinner, I thoroughly agree with all the things Taylor

said in The Explanation
of Behavior about the conceptual confusions
involved in Skinner's descriptions of what he's doing. On the other
hand, the descriptions ofmost scientists with respect to what they're
doing

are

imprecise

or confusing.

I doubt

that

Skinner

is more

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con

RORTY,TAYLOR,AND DREYFUS:

50

it seems to me,

ceptually confused than Freud, although Freud,

scientist.
But I'm not sure that Skinner's
far the greater
us
to
and
control
doesn't
work.
how
ing
predict
people
in Skinnerean
and control human behavior
ways,
predict
to
But
do some very unpleasant
your subjects.
things
a disciplinarian

want

sort which

of the

society

is by

of tell
way
In order
to

you have to
if you really
states
totalitarian

the

are acquiring the ability to inflict on us, Skinner is a fairly decent

guide. I'd be inclined to say that it does work, conceptually confused
or not.
do,

you

You

can divide

have

only moral

through

If you

confusion.

the conceptual

by

objections.

DREYFUS: First, I want to clarify something I said. Rorty attrib

utes to me the view that if one is any kind of holist one wouldn't see
the natural

between
any difference
a
theoretical
argue that

holist

does

see a difference.

difference,

that he must

holist

there's

another

way

and

the social

sciences.

be a theoretical

to look at matters

and

holist.
not

see

I want

to

but a practical
didn't see any

see any difference,

I thought,
because
Rorty

won't

Now
any

I see that
difference?

that is, by not taking theoretical holism seriously at all. The reason
doesn't

Rorty

wissenschaften
tween
theory
practice.
practice,
cial about

see any difference

and the Natur
between
the Geistessee any important
is that he doesn't
difference
be
as he remarks,
is a kind of
and practice,
because,
theory

would
Heidegger
hold
but he would

I agree
theory.
and absolute
of relative

terms

secondary qualities.
tion between
the

situated

practice

is a kind of
of course,
that theory
agree,
is nonetheless
that there
spe
something
that the difference
can't be captured
in
properties,

For Heidegger
and

ready-to-hand

nor

in terms

of primary

and

inBeing and Time, the distinc

to the difference
amounts
between
theory
In
and the de-situated
present-at-hand.

the later writings, this same distinction comes out as the difference
between calculative thinking (the last stage of theory) and meditative
thinking (the involved attempt to preserve and focus the meaning of
our practices).

There are, then, three possibilities:

(1) Theoretical holism,
which takes the holism of natural science very seriously and tries, like
Then one
Quine and F0llesdal, to extend it to cover all knowledge.
see

natural
between
and human
science.
(2)
any difference
a
which
isn't
holds
that
there
any
view,
Rorty's
impor
pragmatism
and practice,
and therefore
there isn't
tant difference
between
theory
doesn't

any important difference between

kinds of discipline.

Or, (3) Hei

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A DISCUSSION

51

holism
which
takes
very
practical
theory
seriously
that
for
it
works
but
maintains
that
nature,
grants
brilliantly
can't have a theory
of that sort for human
beings.

and

degger's

to another

turn

To
tradiction

the

between

matter,
early

thinks

Rorty
part of my

grounding;
other people's

Deweyan
thing
more
than mere

and

paper

don't see it, so I'd like to hear what

I was

there

I was not asking for

it is.

our preferences
of criticizing
and
a
which would
I
suppose,
be,
respectable
to say that we must
That
have
is, I want

asking

and mere
preferences
a great
at
must
have
deal
stake.
We
one interpretation
and defend
against

conversations,
conversations
not

another,

could ever be absolutely right by corresponding

I do want

to hold

interpretations.
I see a contradiction

with

me

that

in Rorty's
and

and preferences
are
there

versation
with

paper

then

question
sation" when

hermeneuticist,

practical

religious,

that

is

organize
one
either

to things as they are

and worse

talking about con

end that he agrees
us
which
still connect

in the

strange?it

be just a
may
and "conver

"preference"
If Rorty
is a
is salvation.
really
he cares about
then what
is salva

means

he really

what

which

there

between

saying

deep micropractices
sources.
I find
What
religious
his talking
about
of language?is

since

can be better

there

that

our

be a con
might
the conclusion.
I

for a way

preferences,
to want.

in themselves.

one

tion; that is, he cares about keeping

in touch with the practices

that

are and to which

the disciplinary
society
or death
a
not
of
life
do justice.
It's
but, more
question
or damnation.
That's
the only language
for it
of salvation
seriously,
a
sounds
like
liberal
have
that I know.
you
your
saying, well,
Rorty
cer
and
should
I
have
and
my
everybody
preferences,
preferences,
have

we

us what

made

cannot

tainly

he prefers.

do whatever

RORTY: The contradiction

between

along

going

with

I thought I saw in Dreyfus's

the

later Heidegger,

paper was

on the one hand,

and

preserving the traditional distinction between theory and practice

(and thus distinctions like "true theory versus finding one's way
around"),

on the
there

Heidegger

mulate
Dewey.
holists

It seems

other.

is no place

for

to me
such

that

if one

distinctions.

follows

the

I'm trying

later
to for

a view which
links together the later Heidegger
and
The last thing I want iswhat Dreyfus says that theoretical
want,

namely,

bermas's mistake

theory

of

practice.

It

is precisely

Ha

to think that everything will be fine once we bring

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RORTY,TAYLOR,AND DREYFUS:

52

theory and practice together by, of all things, having a theory about
It would

practice.

as much

make

sense

theorizing.

already
got one,
of practice.
don't need a theory
sure that
I'm
not
conversation,

you

theorizing,

Regarding
more
than verbal.
The

sation."

to say, let's have a practice

a practice
if you have

of

and

We've

I want

paradigm

to give a very
context
for my

our

of

is
disagreement
sense to "conver

high-toned
sense
of the

term

mous essay of Michael Oakeshott, "The Voice of Poetry

If you think of the conversation
versation of Mankind."

is the

fa

in the Con
of mankind

for the whole

human
chat, but as standing
enterprise?cul
a
is
word
if
"conversation"
reasonable
like?then
you
ture,
perfectly
In
It does connect
salvation.
for what we do to be saved.
up with
as

not

deed, it strikes me that precisely this is the interesting difference be

decides that, since the
tween Dewey and Heidegger.
Heidegger
work

didn't

Nazis
to me,

is saying:

out, only
No, neither

a God

us now.

it seems
Dewey,
nor something
like the Nazis,

can save

something

That is, just us

like the descent of the spirit, but just conversation.

on

our

own.

was

Heidegger
might

save

us from

right

which

in saying that the micropractices

a disciplinary

society

emerged

in the recovery

of

I think Dewey would say the

the Greeks by the German Romantics.
same. He would agree that, by the infiltration of those voices into
the

we would
not have had if
which
got something
in the spirit of seventeenth
century mechaniza
along
as the conversation
of mankind,
If you think of conversation
vo
than as mere
you not only have an acceptable
conversation,
we

conversation,
things had gone
tion.
rather

for

cabulary

which

stating

is better

than Heidegger's.

politics,

Heidegger's

Heideggerean
as conveyed

God Can Save Us Now,"

themes

but,

on

the whole,

It's better because

in the Speigel

one

the spirit of

interview,

"Only

is deplorable.

I understand this position better now. Let me ask one

question. Within discourse of this level of seriousness, how much can

TAYLOR:
be

about

said

than others?
entific

what

makes

some

remarks

more

worthy

to

listen

to

And how is this, in turn, connected with canons of sci

relevance,

usefulness,

understanding,

or content?

I think nothing general can be said. That is, I don't think

philosophy or any other discipline (including hermeneutics, whatever
that is) supplies a framework within which the conversation takes
I
place, nor one by reference to which its progress can b? judged.

RORTY:

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53

A DISCUSSION
think that it's hopeless to look for criteria of relevance within
as a model.

Science

agreement
an
ever

integrated
is not a model

This

There's

TAYLOR:

be as they

of

wher

as

usual.

as a com

justification,
these

by

rules,

No one would ask why should the rules of bridge

can one

How

set up and played

been

has

that wouldn't

are;

mankind.

occurs

science

treating

a purely arbitrary

activity with

which

rather like bridge.

with

wrong

something

is, as a game

discourse,
right that

science

the kind

things
is pursuing
business
of mankind.
conversation

for the

self-contained

pletely
that

only provides
as getting
counts
little profession

on what

normalized

believe

conversation
of
be part of the serious
of man
in the serious
conversation

kind and at the same time take this attitude toward an activity as im
portant
its own
really

as natural

can one

How

science?

have

doesn't
rules, which
the natural
illuminates

as

see

it as a game

a deeper

justification

played
by
that it

universe?

RORTY: To say it illuminates the natural universe is perfectly true.

But there is no puzzle about why adopting the Lockean/Galilean vo
nor

so well,

works

cabulary
it works

so well.

Sure,

the

illuminated
novel
century
"How
no
answer
to
the
is
question,

the nineteenth
there

do it?" any more

than

an answer

as an answer

to the

latter

terms."

subject-independent

universe,
universe.
the human
scientists

to the question,

as

just

But

to
manage
"How did the

I don't think it helps to

"Because

question,
But
that's

that

the fact

natural

did the

to do it?" In particular,

novelists manage
offer

there's

from

to be drawn

any moral
it illuminated

because

they found
I don't think

some
any

thing would help.

I think that we may agree completely, but Iwant to pur

DREYFUS:
sue

it further.

with

own

my

I can see
concerns,

that Rorty's
term, "conversation,"
as those of the later Heidegger.

want to attribute to the later Heidegger

save

us."

lem, namely

I understand

As

the problem

coincides

as well

it, this
of finding

But

the view that "only a God can

refers
a new

to a very
paradigm

particular
or "work

prob
of art"

that can focus our dispersed inherited micropractices and linguistic

is right; there's nothing we can do
I think that Heidegger
practices.
tices.
calls
tant

this

new

The

role

All we

can do

is keep alive these microprac

I see now,
is exactly what Heidegger
of conversation,
a very
and that's certainly
the role of being a preserver,
impor
ensure
to
that
this
is conversation
role.
But
preserva
enough

to find

focus.

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RORTY,TAYLOR,AND DREYFUS:

54

tion will succeed and become important in our lives? There must be
some

of focus

kind

as a view

either
way

and paradigm.
Does
to
attributed
Heidegger

strike you as strange?

or as a description
of the

that

are?

things

RORTY: I would want to disjoin the notion that a focus and a para
digm is needed from the notion that it is the task of philosophy to give
it to us.

No, that's the way God comes in; it is not the task of phi

DREYFUS:
losophy.

RORTY: Yes, but there ought to be amiddle ground between philos

professors

ophy

DREYFUS:

and God.

Who,

for instance?

I have no idea. It seems to me that after Kant, philoso

phers began to have the notion that if culture was going to be saved it

RORTY:
would

be saved

the nature
of ra
they could explain
It would
be nice to abandon
this no

by them, because
and progress.
method,

tionality,

tion. I haven't the slightest idea how a shift in focus might occur.
But anything like traditional Kantian philosophy (in the form inwhich
this

in people,

survives

for example,

who

think

as a

of hermeneutics

is probably a bad way of proceeding.

method)
TAYLOR:

I think that's wrong.

I don't

here.

missing
particularly

see how

a conversation

There's
one

inspired

something very important

can have
by certain

a serious
basic

conversation,
ideas of Heideg

ger, which doesn't give an important role to the activity of bringing to

some of our important
And
therefore
I can't see
speech
practices.
as
how a conversation
could avoid
such
to ar
including
things
trying
or to what
ticulate why natural
science
has been
extent
illuminating,
it has

been

illuminating,

or even

whether

we

want

to use

the word

"illuminating" or not. I don't object to saying that that's not a philos

let that other agent not be
opher's job but somebody else's job?only
God. Whether it is somebody else's job is a demarcation dispute, and
that

to policy,
not to the serious
conversation
itself.
But
belongs
our practices,
there is an activity
of articulating
and one of its tasks
is
can be said about why
to say what
the natural
sciences
have been
illu
minating,

how

they

relate

to other

practices,

and

so on.

What

might

arise from that reflection is the determination that our practice of en

quiry is not illuminating in the same way for the human sciences as it

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55

A DISCUSSION
is for the physical
stand a conversation
seems

tion.

This

sciences.

think

a question
there might

I know,

I can't

so, but

under

end up asking
this kind of ques
a question,
not
this
is
that
holding
our natural
work
sciences
but that nothing

It seems to me

that

be

that wouldn't
to be

that

Rorty
can be said, that
nothing
can be said about why
they work.
encounter
ineffability
everywhere?

RORTY:

not

may

can we

What

converse

that we don't encounter

probably
have been

doesn't

a usable

have

an interesting

answer

about

if we

ineffability

if we

answer.

For

all

to the question,

"Why does Galilean-type science work so well?" Philosophy for most

of the last three hundred years has devoted itself to this question and
hasn't

answered

it.

thinner
increasingly
modern
philosophy,
There

isn't

something

on the method

Reflection

If there's

since Kant.
it's

that

there

the

that's

scientists
either

of science

has

become

of that part of
any upshot
a secret.
didn't
have

effable

or ineffable.

To un

derstand how they do what they do is pretty much like understanding

how

any
reduction

other

bunch

of skilled

of philosophy
of science
to an ineffable
secret of success;
secret
of success.

craftsmen

do what
Kuhn's
they do.
to sociology
of science
doesn't
point
it leaves us without
the notion of the

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