The upcoming NYTimes book section has a graceful review by Anthony Gottlieb of a new and rather tawdry-sounding popularization of philosophy, America the Philosophical, by Carlin Romano.
Actually, if you have ever lived in or visited America, or perhaps even glimpsed its image on a postcard, you may wonder how -- for all its brilliant strengths -- America as a whole (vice the immediate environs of Emerson Hall and a few such choice venues) can be characterized as “philosophical”. This is, after all, the country in which the likes of Donald Trump is permitted to walk around unhanged. So how is the term philosophical being used? Answer: In an opportunist sense, new-forged for the occasion:
His claim depends on redefining the term “philosophy,” giving it a nebulous meaning that embraces far more than is taught under that name in universities. (More later about this revisionist wordplay.)
This is the semantic sleight-of-hand that we earlier noticed under the rubric “terminological land-grab”. We commented on an earlier philosophical name-changing/game-changing foray (by philosopher Colin McGinn) here.
Romano’s pop offering also provides lush dish of the sort we previously skewered anent The New Yorker’s descent into philosophy porn. Gottlieb administers a deserved rebuke:
But do we need to know the model number of Sontag’s stereo amplifier? Such a detail might have been more at home in the pages about Hugh Hefner.
(Apparently the goat-god porn-king Hefner is also lauded in this eclectic book.)
For more on “philosophy porn”, click here.
For an additional antidote, here.
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