Stephen Law

A common Post Modern defence of unclarity in philosophy is that e.g. some boundaries are vague/unclear. 'If reality is vague and unclear, then we must be vague and unclear in talking about reality. Otherwise we are not being true to reality.' The analogy here is, perhaps, painting a picture. If a storm is something vague and fuzzy, then to be accurate your painting of it must be vague and fuzzy, like a Turner. Being clear is a mistake - it involves crudely pixelating what is in reality highly subtle. But this is to muddle clarification with simplification. A crude pixelated image is a simplification of what we see, not a clarification. Analytic philosophers do not recommend simplification. They value perspicuity, so we can see/understand clearly how things are.  Being opaque is no aid to seeing/understanding how things really are, irrespective of whether how they are is simple, or infinitely subtle and complex. The subtlety and complexity of the subject matter is *no justificat...

I posted this under the Nigel Warburton interview below, but thought it also worth posting properly... There's a sort of Hegelian story about reason, the Enlightenment, the French revolution and the Terror, and later, with Lyotard etc., the Holocaust, to which many in the continental tradition sign up. On this story, reason, as understood by Enlightenment thinkers - and also by today's analytic tradition - is in reality something rather crude and, to some extent, oppressive (even just another form of power). Indeed, it is reason (thus understood) and the Enlightenment that are ultimately responsible for the horrors of both the guillotine and Auschwitz. I guess that's what anonymous is alluding to when he connects philosophical clarity to "the Terror"? There's a certain sort of "continental" bullshit artist that, having become familiar with this narrative, then plays the following game: 1. Alludes knowingly to the narrative, so that those also familia...