Description:
Christopher Norris raises some basic questions about the way that analytic philosophy has been conducted over the past 25 years. In doing so, he offers an alternative to what he sees as an over-specialisation of a lot of recent academic work. Arguing that analytic philosophy has led to a narrowing of sights to the point where other approaches that might be more productive are blocked from view, he goes against the grain to claim that Continental philosophy holds the resources for a creative renewal of analytic thought.
Brief description: Christopher Norris is Distinguished Research Professor in Philosophy at the University of Cardiff, Wales. He is the author of many widely-acclaimed books on various aspects of philosophy and critical theory, among them (most recently) Quantum Theory and the Flight from Realism and Minding the Gap: Epistemology and Philosophy of Science in the Two Traditions.
Review Quotes: These engaging essays discuss topics ranging from anti-realism to the extended mind hypothesis and the ontology of political song. They use analytic as well as continental philosophers to provide a compelling demonstration, performative as well as logical, that the boundaries of academic specialization are an obstacle to creative philosophical thought.-- "Paul Patton, University of New South Wales"