THE SOCIOLOGICAL ABOLITION OF PHILOSOPHY:
A CHALLENGE FOR MEDITATION AND RESPONSE

 

Nikolai S. Rozov

Voprosy Filosofii, 2008, No 3. P. 38-50.

 

One of core development lines of philosophical thought is the intellectualistic tradition of abolition and prevail of philosophy (Sanchez, Descartes, Bacon, Espinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Hume, French Encyclopedists, Kant, Marx, Comte, Nietzsche, Buchner, Moleschott, Russell, Husserl, Vienna Circle, Wittgenstein, Heidegger). Now sociologists first of all R.Collins and S.Fuchs make a new attempt. For Collins philosophers are doomed to eternal debates and repeating splitting and merging of positions according to “the law of small numbers”. Fuchs says that “philosophy has made little, if any, progress in resolving it foundational enigmas” and the reason is not theirs deep and mysterious nature but wrong approach. He shows “how to sociologize with a hammer” philosophical problems — to reduce them to problems of “the comparative sociology of observers” allowing variation. History, dependence of relations and conditions of observation and description. Some outline ways of counterargumentation are suggested. The conclusion is that modern attempts of abolitions and prevail of philosophy should be not neglected but used for renewal and further development of philosophical thought.

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