By Peter Unger - Empty Ideas: A Critique of Analytic Philosophy (2014-07-29) [Hardcover]

by Peter K. Unger

Peter Unger's provocative new book poses a serious challenge to contemporary analytic philosophy, arguing that to its detriment it focuses the predominance of its energy on "empty ideas." In the mid-twentieth century, philosophers generally agreed that, by contrast with science, philosophy should offer no substantial thoughts about the general nature of concrete reality. Leading philosophers were concerned with little more than the semantics of ordinary words. For Our word "perceives" differs from our word "believes" in that the first word is used more strictly than the second. While someone may be correct in saying "I believe there's a table before me" whether or not there is a table before her, she will be correct in saying "I perceive there's a table before me" only if there is a table there. Though just a parochial idea, whether or not it is correct does make a difference to how things are with concrete reality. In Unger's terms, it is a concretely substantial idea. Alongside each such parochial substantial idea, there is an analytic or conceptual thought, as with the thought that someone may believe there is a table before her whether or not there is one, but she will perceive there is a table before her only if there is a table there. Empty of import as to how things are with concrete reality, those thoughts are what Unger calls concretelyempty ideas. It is widely assumed that, since about 1970, things had changed thanks to the advent of such thoughts as the content externalism championed by Hilary Putnam and Donald Davidson, various essentialist thoughts offered by Saul Kripke, and so on. Against that assumption, Unger argues that, with hardly any exceptions aside from David Lewis's theory of a plurality of concrete worlds, all of these recent offerings are concretely empty ideas. Except when offering parochial ideas, Peter Unger maintains that mainstream philosophy still offers hardly anything beyond concretely empty ideas. "This incisive book lays crucial challenges at the door of mainstream analytic philosophy, for Unger argues persuasively that (contrary to its explicit self-conception), a great deal of recent philosophy has been concerned with merely conceptual issues-nothing 'concretely substantial'. The book is sure to provoke controversy and healthy debate about the role and value of philosophy." -Amie L. Thomasson, Professor of Philosophy and Cooper Fellow, University of Miami

Genres: Philosophy

Hardcover

First published June 13, 2014

About the author

Peter Unger is Professor of Philosophy at New York University. He has written extensively in epistemology, ethics, metaphysics and the philosophy of mind. He has had fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Guggenheim Foundation.

Reviews

[Valeriano Diviacchi · Rating 1 out of 5]

The title "Empty Ideas" must refer to the author's empty ideas and not anything in analytic philosophy. Mr. Unger goes through this entire book without mentioning Ludwig Wittgenstein or any of his philosophy of language that is the foundation and keystone for all analytic philosophy while repeating the philosophical mistake Wittgenstein's analytic work established to be the worse error any philosophy can make: assume words are more real than reality. Analytic philosophy’s goal is to apply logical technique to attain conceptual clarity of reality’s problems and not to attain reality or any truths about reality as is true of classical philosophy. Practicing analytic philosophy in everyday life means that you do not allow words or wordgames to become their own reality causing you and society to waste life’s limited time and energy on nonsense. Analytic philosophy has the potential to be a counterbalance to the pragmatic Orwellian Newspeak that is everywhere and used by everyone in modern technological society— conservative, liberal, religious, non-religious, everyone. I am not saying pragmatism or technology is an evil, I believe the opposite. However, one of their unavoidable outcomes is that language becomes a very powerful tool and with power comes corruption. Furthermore, with the breakdown of social norms for meaning in life leaving each individual to seek their own meaning for their life, there is much temptation to seek a purely artistic or aesthetic meaning for life as advocated by such elitist existentialists as Schopenhauer and Nietzsche. There is nothing more aesthetically pleasing to the intellect then listening to itself talk or reading its own words on a page regardless of whether or not it says anything. I am not just referencing politics or the law but even so-called “social sciences” who desperately want to be science as their source of meaning in life but lack its falsifiability and therefore create all sorts of wordgames to give the appearance of being a science. If Mr. Unger's particular analytic thought ever had this potential, he has surrendered it o the aesthetics of wordgames as has most of mainstream analytic philosophy. Hopefully, analytic philosophy working in the trenches and the product of Wittgenstein's work will not do so.

[Carl · Rating 5 out of 5]

hilarious, bizarre, typo-ridden, often tedious as hell, and seemingly indisputable

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

TLDR; Peter Unger puts his physics envy on full display through claiming, essentially, that any philosophy that isn't "concretely substantial" (i.e., it describes concrete, physical reality) is, generally, not worth our time (unless your name is David Lewis; then you can write whatever you want). Unger spends about half the book pumping his own "concretely substantial" idea, scientiphicalism (it refers to science and physics in the name!). He spends the rest of his time criticizing modern philosophers for not being "concretely substantial" and overtly states that going forward philosophers should also be trained physicists or gtfo basically.

On a deeper level, this is a disgruntled philosopher's attempt to unleash his mounting anger on, what seems to be, his regret in committing his life to the craft of philosophy and not something more "concretely substantial." Unger never comes unglued, but at times you can feel he's close. Evidence suggests what I'm suggesting isn't that farfetched. This (2014) was his last publication. Looking at his NYU page, you can see he's still employed but basically given up on philosophy. He's now contributing to experimental psychology, apparently.

I was drawn to this book because, on some level, I agree with Unger. There's a lot of modern philosophy out there that feels so overly nuanced, semantic, and ultimately meaningless. But as I read on, I was left thinking: does it really matter? First of all, as you get deep into any field, the work becomes overly nuanced. It has to be, as any study has to address the tedious details to get to the truth. Secondly, the ultimately point of a big portion of philosophy (metaphysics), is to explain the things that physics can't reach. It's complementary to physics for the exact reason that Unger is annoyed about: it's not physics!

Even if Unger's mission here was sanctified, he does a pretty lazy job of defending it. As mentioned, half the book is about his own (rather boring and derivative) "concretely substantial" idea. This has ultimately nothing to do with his later criticisms of modern philosophy and is a waste of time.

Unger's criticisms are entertaining and at times cathartic. But ultimately a bit desperate. His manuscript feels incomplete in many places. Unconvincing. At one point he launches a viscious criticism of Jon Schaffer's monism writings (which, in my view, are far more enlightening than anything Unger's ever written), then just ends it there. Feels like he just doesn't like Jon as opposed to having a problem with his work.

At the end, Unger undoes all his good deeds by, in a self-owning manner, publishing an email reply from a philosopher of physics that he clearly admires. In that email, said philosopher basically says that Unger is being way too myopic in his thinking about the role of philosophy and to chill out a little bit. I don't think Unger quite understood how bad publishing that makes him look.

All in all, as mentioned, this is controversial and certainly entertaining. But I was disappointed in how unserious an effort it was. This was clearly Unger's last gasp, taking advantage of his relationship with Oxford Publishing to put it out. He should have left it in his desk and moved on with his life instead of putting out this "analytically empty" effort.

[Ivan Panchenko · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some corrections:

• Page xiii: “perfectly accurately” → “perfectly accurate”

• Page xiii (and index): “Elliot” → “Elliott” (possibly)

• Page 5 (and index): “Stephen” → “Steven”

• Page 8: “‘Meaning,’.” → “‘Meaning.’”

• Page 17: “neither or them” → “neither of them”

• Page 20: “, And” → “, and”

• Page 26: “many people each remembers that he, or she, went to college” → “many people remember having gone to college”

• Page 29: “Spatial-Extentionism” → “Spatial-Extensionism”

• Page 41: “Epiphenomalism” → “Epiphenomenalism”

• Page 42: “Why does there occur, in the two cases, the two very” → “Why do there occur, in the two cases, the two very”

• Page 42: “useful to most readers, is” → “useful to most readers is”

• Page 43: “extentionless” → “extensionless”

• Page 45: “dynamical” → “dynamical”

• Page 47: “Hillary” → “Hilary”

• Page 47: ““The Meaning of ‘Meaning,”” → ““The Meaning of ‘Meaning,’””

• Page 48: “(quasi-) causal” → “(quasi-)causal”

• Page 50: “behavorially” → “behaviorally”

• Page 56: “Putnam’s,” → “Putnam’s”

• Page 57: “has implication’s” → “has implications”

• Page 57: “like “qualia”,”” → “like “qualia”,”

• Page 58: “in front of me’”” → “in front of me’”.”

• Multiple occurrences: “URL=” → “URL =”

• Page 61: ““The Meaning of ‘Meaning,”” → ““The Meaning of ‘Meaning,’””

• Page 66: “allowed What” → “allowed. What”

• Page 66: “U S” → “US”

• Page 66 (2 occurrences): “SEALS” → “SEALs”

• Page 69: “Home-spinner” → “Home-Spinner”

• Page 69: “spin).” → “spin.)”

• Page 74: “too.)” → “too).”

• Page 77: “quasi- causal” → “quasi-causal”

• Page 79: “Billion” → “billion”

• Page 79: “concretely reality” → “concrete reality”

• Page 81: “D. Davidson (eds.)” → “D. Davidson (eds.),”

• Page 83: “pages. 1417–19” → “pages 1417–19”

• Page 83: “pages. 261–70” → “pages 261–70”

• Page 87: “again.)” → “again).”

• Page 88: “exist.)” → “exist).”

• Page 90: “strable , as” → “strable, as”

• Page 92 (two occurrences): “Eliot” → “Elliot”

• Page 92: ““suddenly arrived “” → ““suddenly arrived””

• Page 92: “there‘s” → “there’s”

• Page 99: “true.)” → “true).”

• Page 101: “quite the like” → “quite like the”

• Page 103: “wonder- wand -maker” → “wonder-wand-maker”

• Page 111: “word “capper As” → word "capper". As

• Page 113: “Indiscernibility”” → “Indiscernibility,””

• Page 114: “by fine” → “by Fine”

• Page 119: “that.)” -> “that).”

• Page 123: “spoon-and-and-an-alphas” → “spoon-and-an-alphas”

• Page 123: “spoon-and-and-alphas” → “spoon-and-an-alphas”

• Page 125: “Across Time”” → “Across Time,””

• Page 128: “form” are” → “form”, are”

• Page 129: “why” → “why”

• Page 132: “why” → “why”

• Page 137: “Neils Bohr” → “Niels Bohr”

• Page 141: “Wasserman, (eds.)” → “Wasserman (eds.)”

• Page 144: “commonsensical, not nihilistically, inclined” → “commonsensically, not nihilistically, inclined”

• Page 161: “([from” → “[from”

• Page 165: “items already acknowledge” → “items already acknowledged”

• Page 170: A comma is missing before “pages” multiple times.

• Page 173: “too boot” → “to boot”

• Page 174: “too boot” → “to boot”

• Page 175: “Peristentism” → “Persistentism”

• Page 176: “they tenselessly)” → “they (tenselessly)”

• Page 179: “in in” → “in”

• Page 179: “(London: Routledge” → “(London: Routledge)”

• Page 179: “Tense, Time and Causation, Time, Tense and Causation” → “Time, Tense and Causation”

• Page 179: “our central to” → “central to”

• Page 180: “(eds.)” → “(eds.),”

• Page 193: “Page 346” → “page 346”

• Page 195: “idea, (except” → “idea (expect”

• Page 197: ““Survival and Identity” a paper” → ““Survival and Identity,” a paper”

• Page 198: “festschrift” → “festschrift”

• Page 202: “no to discredit to” → “no discredit to”

• Page 204: “Brian.)” → “Brian).”

• Page 208: “least” → “least”

• Page 208: “I am certain other electron” → “I am a certain other electron”

• Page 210: ““Which Physical Thing Am I?” an Excerpt from ‘Is There a Mind-Body Problem?’.”” → ““Which Physical Thing Am I?”, an excerpt from “Is There a Mind-Body Problem?”.”

• Page 213: “body.” (page 144).” → “body” (page 144).”

• Page 213: “Descartes route” → “Descartes’ route”

• Page 213: “of behalf of” → “on behalf of”

• Page 213: “Mediations” → “Meditations”

• Page 213: “Eli Hirsh” → “Eli Hirsch”

• Page 213: “eds. Oxford” → “eds., Oxford”

• Page 221: “in say, just” → “in, say, just”

• Page 221: “being discussing” → “been discussing”

• Page 227: “world.)” → “world).”

• Page 230: “(eds.)” → “(eds.),”

• Page 240: “depth, or breath” → “depth, or breadth”

• Page 241: “me an one” → “me and one”

• Page 242: “that that” → “that”

• Page 243: “more that a bit” → “more than a bit”

• Page 255: “apriori vs. a posteori” → “a priori vs. a posteriori”

• Page 255: “Baker, Lynn” → “Baker, Lynne”

• Page 255: “Bennett Karen” → “Bennett, Karen”

Some page numbers in the index are wrong as well.

[Valeriu Gherghel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Încă o diatribă în contra filosofiei. Obiceiul de a proclama inutilitatea ei e mai vechi decît autorul acestui volum. Mă gîndesc la cărțile lui Giovanni Papini, la Jean-François Revel... Adesea, Peter Unger are dreptate, deși, dacă e să-l credem pe Aristotel, chiar cînd refuzi să filosofezi, filosofezi.

Filosofii contemporani nu mai spun nimic semnificativ cu privire la lume (ca întreg). Filosofii ar trebui să devină biologi, fizicieni, chimiști etc. Doar în științe se mai poate spune ceva interesant și cu miez. Filosoful de azi este un individ cu totul neserios, un mînuitor de vorbe goale și un constructor de argumente / inferențe care nu mai conving pe nimeni. Filosofia a devenit o flecăreală inutilă (voi să nu credeți asta, e doar părerea lui Unger).

Un citat semnificativ din diatriba lui Unger: „Some of the most intelligent and philosophically talented young people must become serious scientists, contributing a great deal to the science in which they are involved and, what's more, contributing at least about as much to science as they contribute to philosophy. (p.239)