A.W. Moore, The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics

This isn’t going to be a review, because I received the book just before the trip to Southampton, and only started looking at it tonight. It’s 605 pages, looks very thorough, and comes from the “analytic vs. continental distinction is ridiculous” way of looking at things (and though I don’t always agree with that outlook, it makes for a rather comprehensive product).

There are 21 20 philosophers in the collection, running chronologically from Descartes through Deleuze. Any time you pick the 21 20 most important of anything, people are going to be upset or shocked that their own favorites were left out and someone they loathe was included. So I don’t want to add too much to that predictable dynamic. [ADDENDUM: There are only 20 philosophers in the book. I hadn’t noticed that Wittgenstein gets two of the twenty-one chapters to himself. Moore really loves Wittgenstein, it seems.]

That said– how can you possibly leave Whitehead out of a survey of the 21 most important metaphysicians since Descartes? (The only reference to Whitehead in the entire book is in a minor footnote about the Principia Mathematica.)

One way you could do it is if you were a fire-breathing analytic philosopher who thinks that “Whitehead is fuzzy,” or something like that. But Moore is not such a fire-breather, which makes this a puzzling omission.

Another minor complaint– the introduction, concerning how to define metaphysics, goes on for a bit too long. My view is that it’s rarely a good idea to start with definitions. By no means is it true that you have to be able to define a thing clearly before you can start working with it. Definitions are best left towards the end of projects, when the lessons of experience with any given subject matter allow more precise definitions to be attempted.

That said, this looks like a promisingly systematic book. I intend to read the whole thing, but not in sequential order. I’ll jump around depending on which philosopher I feel like reading about on any given day, probably starting with Heidegger and leaving Dummett to the very end.

French review of L’Objet quadruple

By Jean-Clet Martin, HERE.

I crossed out Martin’s name because it’s only on his blog, apparently. Charles H. Gerbet is listed as the author of the review. (The style did seem very different from the style of Martin’s review of Garcia, come to think of it.)