[MD] Rorty and Mysticism

[Matt Kundert]

DMB said:
I actively dislike the philosopher you like best and it bugs you. Of 
course it does.

Matt:
That, however, is not what bugs me, just as my relative low esteem 
of James' Essays in Radical Empiricism in comparison to his 
Pragmatism is not what bugs you.  It's because you don't think I 
understand enough of what James meant by "radical empiricism" that 
you are bugged.  Likewise, I couldn't care less if you didn't like Rorty's 
writings very much.  A lot of people I know, and like the thinking of, 
don't like Rorty, or know much about him.  That doesn't bug me.  It's 
because you still seem to want to use him as a punching bag, as a 
foil for the thing that represents a kind of bad philosophy.  To do that, 
to actively use him as your enemy, I would think one would need a 
good understanding.  I don't use "radical empiricism" like 
this--at all--and so remain relatively insouciant in favor of other 
avenues of research.

I understood at the time that the choice of "Texts and Lumps" was 
likely not yours.  I understood it was for a seminar, and I know how 
seminar papers work.  Which is why my suggestions took the form 
they did: they weren't criticisms at all, they were of the form, "if you 
want to really press these claims, here are the other places I would 
go to in this person's corpus to look for his strongest arguments and 
presentation."  I was trying to help you do better what you wanted to 
do: criticize Rorty.  Because you overextend your argument against 
Rorty in the paper, and it shows as ignorance of what the name 
"Rorty" stands for.  It's bad scholarship.  Seminar papers aren't 
meant to be complete scholarship, but rather launching pads for an 
investigative path.  The fact that you've renounced traveling the path 
(for example, by not pursuing an understanding of one of Rorty's most 
famous concepts, the "strong poet") suggests to me that you need a 
different punching bag.  That you're just throwing red meat to piss 
someone off.  But it just looks like bad form to me.

This has always been my inmost agony: I want you to be better than 
you are.  That you wish the same of me is obvious from your catty 
exhortations that take the form of "it's obvious you a smart guy, so 
why you actin' so sputid?"  So what do we do?  Chalk it up to 
different wavelengths?  Is there any common terrain on which we 
can have a productive and interesting conversation where we both 
enjoy and take seriously the exchange of opinions?

In the last couple years, I've moved to the different-wavelengths option.  
It helps me manage my time and energy better, into useful channels 
that will return in dividends.  So, why do you do it; just for shits and 
giggles?  Do you have any other tone than the ill-will that seemingly 
drips on everyone?

I've seen it once or twice over the years.  And it makes me think, gosh, 
we could begin an interesting conversation from here.  But it never lasts.

Matt