Reza Yaghoubi on the Publication of Anthony Kenny's A New History of Western Philosophy: 'Philosophy and the Historiography of Philosophy'

1_ Why does the history of philosophy matter? Experts in philosophy and the historiography of philosophy all agree that no discipline refers to its past and its history as much as philosophy does, and no discipline needs its history and its past as much as philosophy does (let us, for now, set aside the question of whether philosophy is or is not a science). Timothy Williamson, one of today's leading analytic philosophers, says on this matter, “In philosophy departments, they are mostly teaching the history of philosophy, but in mathematics or natural science departments, the history of mathematics or the history of the natural sciences is not taught much, or not taught at all” (Doing Philosophy, 98). Perhaps for us Iranians, who often begin, and have begun, learning philosophy through the history of philosophies (in earlier times, when histories of philosophy lacked today's diversity, The Course of Wisdom in Europe was the starting point for learning philosophy for academic and especially non-academic enthusiasts), the question of the nature and reason for the history of philosophy is not as pressing as it is for Westerners. But willy-nilly, due to the increasing specialization of the branches and fields of science, the history of philosophy has itself automatically become a topic and subject, and it is a matter of academic discussion for us as well, and our researchers also grapple with it. Today, the historical approach is one of the most important approaches to teaching philosophy, and even if we teach philosophy in a highly thematic way, we are still compelled to state and recount opinions, views, problems, and discussions according to their historical sequence, precedence, and succession.

The great prevalence of this practice has led to separate study and research on the history of philosophy, and this form of learning philosophy has been promoted to such an extent that it is reported Quine jokingly said, “Those interested in philosophy are of two kinds: those who are interested in philosophy and those who are interested in the history of philosophy” (Philosophy in History, 40). But this is not the only reason for the importance of the history of philosophy. Another reason, and perhaps the most important one, is philosophy's own frequent and constant reference to its history. In fact, philosophy, unlike the history of the sciences, is not a history of the rupture and refutation of theories. In many sciences, history means the falsification of older theories and the proof of newer, more correct ones, and consequently, the history of that science is a kind of breaking away from the past; but the history of philosophy is the history of frequent reference to the past and rethinking based on the principles and foundations that were laid in the past (past here means the historical past, not something that is bygone and whose time is over). MacIntyre (b. 1929), the prominent contemporary neo-Aristotelian philosopher, in an essay titled “The Relationship of Philosophy to its Past,” published in a book titled Philosophy in History by Cambridge University Press, writes about the difference between the history of philosophy and the history of science and the enduring importance of the history of philosophy: “In philosophy, for reasons that are now obvious, to accept that current philosophy determines what counts as past philosophy[1] is fatal to our entire project.

Of course, this does not mean we lack initiative. For while the experimental sciences derive their minimal unifying definition from the point they have now reached, philosophy can derive its analogous minimal unifying definition from its point of origin. Anyone who is to be considered a philosopher must ultimately be measured against the standards that Plato laid down” (Philosophy in History, 45). The reason for this is precisely that, firstly, philosophy has frameworks and foundations, and if someone operates outside them, they are not considered a philosopher (for instance, a philosopher always deals with foundations, even in the philosophies of specific fields; if, for example, a moral philosopher engages in giving advice instead of dealing with foundations, they are considered a moral scholar, not a moral philosopher), and these frameworks are so intertwined with its history that they can only be understood through that history (since it is these very foundations that are constantly being rethought). It is this commonality that always keeps philosophy's connection to its past alive. Williamson, in his book Doing Philosophy (2018), in a chapter titled “Using the History of Philosophy,” writes, “When mathematicians question the fundamental assumptions of mathematics or physicists question the fundamental assumptions of physics, they tend to be placed in the category of philosophers.

But when philosophers question fundamental philosophical assumptions, they are still considered philosophers. Since philosophers always return to foundations, they share more with their distant predecessors" (Doing Philosophy, 109). However, Anthony Kenny, the author of the history of philosophy that occasions this piece, also reminds us of the importance of "methodology" in philosophy and points to the crucial point that one of the fundamental importances of the history of philosophy lies in its methodology. In an article titled "The History of Philosophers and the History of Philosophy," published in a book titled Analytic Philosophy and History of Philosophy (2005), he writes, "What makes history essential in philosophy, and philosophy important for the historian of philosophy, is that we philosophers, unlike physicists, astronomers, physicians, and linguists, still pursue the goals of Aristotle and Plato with the same methods that were available to them" (Analytic Philosophy and History of Philosophy, 16). In fact, "the original works of the past do not lose their importance in philosophy; rather, their intellectual application changes" (ibid., 19). Anthony Kenny believes we read the history of philosophy for two reasons: a historical reason and a philosophical reason. The philosophical reason is that we consult the history of philosophy to solve philosophical problems (to understand approaches, innovations, methods, and the problems themselves), and the historical reason is to enter the intellectual world of the past (ibid., 20), in which case our intention is curiosity and acquiring information. An example is that without knowledge of the political institutions of that time and their formation, structure, function, and people's perception of them, we cannot properly understand Plato's and Aristotle's critique of democracy (ibid., 24).

2_ The Nature of the History of Philosophy: One of the long-standing and old debates about the history of philosophy is whether the history of philosophy can be considered philosophy. Is the history of philosophy identical with philosophy? And if someone engages with the history of philosophy, are they engaging with philosophy itself or with past events and histories? Leo Catana, an associate professor of philosophy at the University of Copenhagen, in an article titled "Philosophical Problems in the History of Philosophy," published in the book Philosophy and its History (2013), attacks the editors' introduction to the book Philosophy in History and questions their assumptions. He says the authors of Philosophy in History, in the book's introduction, distinguish between the history of philosophy and intellectual history, and claim that the history of philosophy deals with philosophical problems, not with contexts, and that contexts are examined in intellectual history; after criticizing and rejecting their view, he considers the examination of both contexts and problems to be the task of the history of philosophy (see Philosophy and its History, 116). He says this claim is based on an unreflective understanding of the philosophical problem and a questionable distinction between internal and external elements in the history of philosophy, a distinction in which problems are considered the internal element of philosophy's past and context its external element (ibid., 118). He also attacks the claim of Hans-Johann Glock (born 1960) that the problem-oriented approach to philosophy's past is "congenial" with analytic philosophy (ibid., 117).[2]

According to this view, which is also our assumption, the problems of philosophy and the history of philosophy are not separate; problems have a history, and separating them from their contexts leads to misunderstanding in both. Interestingly, because our approach to Islamic philosophy has always been problem-oriented, a concern for the history of Islamic philosophy did not develop in us until the modern era, and the history of Islamic philosophy still lacks a coherent and masterful history that can compete with Western histories of philosophy (despite the numerous works now written under this title in both the East and the West). When those interested in learning Islamic philosophy turn to traditional books such as the Manẓūmah of Mullā Hādī Sabzawārī, or ʿAllāmah Ṭabāṭabāʾī's (raḥimahu Allāh) Bidāyat al-Ḥikmah, or Mullā Ṣadrā's Asfār, or even Ibn Sīnā's Shifāʾ, they grapple from the very beginning and without any background with metaphysical problems, for example, the self-evidence and univocality of existence and the general matters. Existing histories of Islamic philosophy have also merely recounted the lives and summarized the views of philosophers, leaving the task of stating similarities and differences, comparative discussions, critique, and contextual research to the reader (it should be noted that Mullā Ṣadrā's method in the Asfār is admirable from this perspective, as in every topic he cites the views of predecessors and even the names of books, evaluates them, and then presents his own conclusions, inventions, and innovations. Although he frequently refers to unsourced opinions and beliefs—such as "it has been said that..." or "in this regard they have brought that..."—his method is highly admirable and innovative for his time). Therefore, the history of philosophy is neither pure philosophy nor pure history. The history of philosophy is exactly what its name implies, affirming both its nature as history and its nature as philosophy.

The challenge between the historical view and the philosophical view, and the privileging of one over the other, leads to an incomplete understanding and distorted thinking about eras and ideas (like those who, without the slightest understanding of philosophical problems, question the problem of first principles and imagine that the empirical sciences are capable of overthrowing the fundamental intellectual problems of humanity). Anthony Kenny's belief in writing the history of philosophy is the same. He believes that "the historical task compels the historian of philosophy to state his own opinion on the subjects. This is in order to show why past thinkers held such beliefs, also to reflect on the propositions that thinkers implicitly brought into their arguments, and to assess the coherence and soundness of the conclusions reached by those thinkers.

But providing reasons for philosophical conclusions, uncovering hidden propositions in philosophical proofs, and logically evaluating philosophical inferences all invigorate philosophical activities. Consequently, any important history of philosophy must itself be an exercise in philosophy, just as it is an exercise in history" (A New History of Western Philosophy, vol. 1, 35). John Cottingham (1943) writes of this approach by Kenny: "Unlike the writings of many contemporary philosophers who ignore or downplay philosophy's relationship with its past, Anthony Kenny has chosen to focus much of his work over the past forty years on a few key figures in the history of philosophy. Kenny has found that 'getting into the mind-set of some of the great philosophers of the past' is a highly effective way of achieving philosophical insight. The history of philosophy, as Kenny has engaged with it, far from being a purely historical task or an ancillary discipline, is often itself a very fruitful way of doing philosophy. For philosophy is not a way of acquiring new knowledge but (in Kenny's words) 'a way of understanding, that is to say, of organizing what is known'" (Mind, Method, and Morality, 208).

Anthony Kenny believes that in order to write the history of philosophy, we must first understand the meaning of the history of philosophy and then answer the question of whether philosophy makes any progress at all. Because writing history for something that has made no progress and has remained in its original form is a meaningless and, of course, impossible task. The meaning of the history of philosophy, in his view, "depends on what the historian considers fundamental in philosophy" (Analytic Philosopy and History of Philosophy, 14). He then considers two assumptions and examines both: one, that we regard philosophy as a science, and the other, that we regard philosophy as an art. What happens if we regard philosophy as a science? Science, as we see in the empirical sciences, is knowledge, the acquisition of information, and the making of discoveries. In science, new theories constantly refute older ones, and a new theory, by discovering new knowledge and information, as well as greater compatibility with other advanced scientific systems and better responsiveness to problems, brings about scientific progress. According to Kenny, if philosophy is a science in this sense, then it is necessary that new philosophical systems have invalidated previous philosophical systems, and that the current state of philosophy is its best and most advanced state.

As a result, new works surpass previous ones, and we overtake Plato and Kant and retire them (ibid., 15) (a claim we rejected in the opening lines of the article, citing McIntyre and Williamson as evidence). But what happens if philosophy is an art? Since in art, artistic works always retain their value and originality, and no work becomes obsolete or invalidated, all philosophical works gain originality and are all placed on a par with one another; "in that case, you can philosophize by reading Democritus just as well as by reading Davidson" (ibid., 16). We know this is not the case, because no one considers the works of the Sophists on the same level as the works of Plato, Aristotle, and so on. Now that philosophy is neither a science nor an art, how can it be considered to possess progress and have a history written for it? He says the first problem with the fact that progress in philosophy is not tangible is that when a philosophical problem is solved, no one considers it a philosophical problem anymore (ibid., 18); he provides many examples for this claim in the introduction to the history of philosophy and in the article that is our source. Anthony Kenny posits four forms of progress in philosophy: therapeutic, contextual, interpretive (hermeneutic), and analytic (ibid., 20).

Therapeutic progress is the treatment of the intellectual maladies of each age. His example for this form of progress is Plato's disambiguation of the Greek word "to on" used by Parmenides, where there was ambiguity as to whether it meant "is," "exists," "existent," "existence," or "being," and Plato, with his classifications, sufficiently clarified this issue and left no pretext for further distortions (see A New History of Western Philosophy, 32). Contextual progress is a form of progress in which, considering the situation and context in which we find ourselves, we discover and apply the uses of original philosophical works. Interpretive progress is also a form of progress in which, given the current level of information and understanding of the world and its problems, we arrive at a newer understanding of the original works of the past. Since philosophy is not science but understanding (meaning, for example, when we understand the law of causality, the first principle of the world, and ontological issues, we have actually arrived at a kind of understanding of the universe, not that we have acquired specific scientific information), every time we arrive at a newer understanding of the world, we have progressed in understanding and, in fact, in philosophy. That is, every philosophical system is a mode of understanding the universe that differs from previous understandings, and this is precisely hermeneutic progress. Analytic progress is progress in the analysis of language. "If we accept the claim that philosophy is fundamentally the clarification of language, there is much room for progress" (Analytic Philosopy and History of Philosophy, 19). An example of this is the linguistic analyses common in analytic philosophy.

3_ The Method of the Historiography of Philosophy: We have discussed sufficiently the importance of history in philosophy and the relationship between the two, and it has now become sufficiently clear that the historian of philosophy must be trained and specialized in both matters and must not set one aside in favor of the other. Kenny says the historian of philosophy does two things: first, examining the degree of truth of opinions and the reasons for believing in them, and enumerating their consequences; and second, examining the environmental and social conditions and explaining it as a historical fact (ibid., 20). If the historian's scales tip toward one of the two sides, their task remains incomplete. "The philosophical gaze must not lead to neglect of history, nor must the historical gaze lack philosophical skill and lead to superficiality" (ibid., 23).

One whose historical side weighs heavier will express philosophical problems superficially and, without engaging with the depth and substance of the issues, will content themselves with mere reportage. One who makes the philosophical side heavier, on the other hand, will neglect the situations, consequences, and causes behind the formation of problems, leaving the reader bewildered as to what these problems are about, from what they arose, why they were raised, and what became of them. "Historians who are unconcerned with the philosophical problems that troubled past writers truly fail to understand how those writers directed their thought. A philosopher who ignores the historical context of the great figures of the past will be unable to arrive at a fresh perspective on the problems that confront us today" (ibid., 24). Thus, the historian of philosophy must be both a philosophical historian and a historical philosopher in order to manage both tasks. In Williamson's words, "Judging the internal consistency of a complex philosophical text requires philosophical skills that those with a historical rather than a philosophical cast of mind may lack" (Doing Philosophy, 104).

Of course, attaching great importance to history in the history of philosophy and extensively discussing and scrutinizing causes and contexts is not the only form of inclination toward history that threatens the historiography of philosophy and even philosophy itself. Privileging history in the sense of historicism and evolutionism is also a danger from which the impartial historian must remain free. That is, the supposition that history and the history of thought follow a single, progressive course in which thought and reflection attain a perfection they previously lacked. The same applies to other claims of evolution and developmentalism in their various forms (developmentalists, to escape this accusation, posit forms of development of which evolutionary development is only one). Henry Corbin, attacking historicism from a phenomenological standpoint, considers the philosopher to be above and in command of history, not the reverse; "Truly, if he is a philosopher, he dominates what is mistakenly called time, whereas this time is in no way his own, for it is the anonymous, featureless time of everyone" (Iranian Philosophy and Comparative Philosophy, 29). He considers the human being prior to history and argues how a history that began with the human being could dominate them. "With the human being, something called history begins, and therefore the human being inherently carries with them something that forever precedes history" (ibid., 31).

Fundamentally, if it is the case that philosophers and their thoughts are the causal consequences of an evolutionary process (in whatever form), how can the emergence of two different thinkers and philosophies in the same context and era be explained? It is here that both the analytical and phenomenological approaches stand opposed to evolutionism and avoid it. In this light, we will appreciate the late Zarrinkoub's efforts in defending the idea that Islamic Sufism and the ethics arising from it are rooted in the Quran and are not the product of ideas that infiltrated Islam (Gnostic, Buddhist, Hindu, etc.); a scholarly and admirable endeavor carried out in the book The Quest for Sufism in Iran, and Mr. Jalal Sattari has an effective piece on this matter in the introduction to the book Mystical Love. It is as if those Orientalists who seek historical causes for the formation of Islamic mysticism are incapable of conceiving that a spontaneous, independent, and unique phenomenon could take shape within history and initiate a new current. An example Timothy Williamson gives in the world of philosophy is modal logic. He says, "Modal logic developed independently of Leibniz's theory of possible worlds. Instead of ideas in the mind of God, he used 'state descriptions,' which are complete and consistent stories in a vocabulary... If modal logic had not evolved independently, the utility of possible worlds would not have been understood" (Doing Philosophy, 108).

4. On Anthony Kenny's History of Philosophy: In this article, we have spoken sufficiently about Kenny's approach to the history of philosophy and clarified the approach with which he has dealt with the history of philosophy. Now let us point out a few more detailed points. This history of philosophy is one of the few histories of philosophy written by a single author and in several volumes, and for this reason, it has its own particular appeal. In this book, he has combined thematic and historical approaches, and at the beginning of each volume, he has devoted two or three chapters to a historical overview and written the subsequent chapters thematically. Each volume is dedicated to a historical period; the first volume covers ancient philosophy, the second the Middle Ages, the third the rise of modern philosophy, and the fourth modern philosophy. Depending on the important subjects of each historical period, the thematic chapters change slightly. For example, political philosophy and aesthetics do not appear in the first and second volumes, and the political and aesthetic theories of those eras are only discussed in the historical section. Of course, there is a reason for this. He says, "It was only from the time of Machiavelli and More that the political institutions of the time became sufficiently similar to the institutions of our own time for the attitudes of political philosophers to be relevant to the debates of our day" (Introduction to Volume Three). Conversely, the third volume lacks a chapter on logic, because, in his own words, logic did not make particular progress at that time, and the main discussions were directed toward metaphysics, epistemology, and psychology. Aesthetics also only appears in the fourth volume.

In terms of being up-to-date, this book can also be considered the most current history of philosophy today. It has followed Continental philosophy up to Heidegger and modern analytic philosophy up to the most important analytic philosophers of the modern era; Bertrand Russell, G. E. Moore, Frege, Wittgenstein, Gilbert Ryle, Strawson, Quine, Davidson, and Kripke are among them. Alvin Plantinga is the last philosopher of religion he has examined, and in the discussion of ethics, he has proceeded up to Elizabeth Anscombe, Peter Geach, Philippa Foot, and Bernard Williams. Regarding not mentioning schools such as the Neo-Stoics, Neo-Hegelians, Neo-Kantians, etc., he has said, "I must ask the reader to bear in mind that this is the final volume of a history of philosophy that began with Thales, and for this reason, it differs from a history of philosophy that independently examines the history of contemporary philosophy.

For example, I have not spoken of the Neo-Scholastics of the twentieth century or the Neo-Kantians, and I have said very little about the numerous generations of Neo-Hegelians. To exclude these schools from a book devoted to the philosophy of the last two centuries is to leave a great lacuna in the history of philosophy. But the importance of these schools is that they recall the importance of the great philosophers of the past to the modern era. A history of philosophy that has already devoted many pages to Aquinas, Kant, and Hegel has no need to repeat these reminders” (Introduction to Volume Four). A final point: although in the introduction to all the volumes he has said that he has tried to write this book for undergraduate students and interested beginners, in the text of the book he has both used technical terms and, as a philosopher, offered interpretation, commentary, original analyses, and novel, scholarly, and illuminating points, such that in interpreting the views of philosophers, it contains many points for researchers and advanced students of philosophy as well (such as the criticisms he levels at Russell or his critique of Thomas Aquinas’s five proofs in the second volume, on which he has written a separate book, or the thorough discussion he has in the first volume on Parmenides’ ontology).

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Bibliography:

A New History of Western Philosophy, Anthony Kenny, translated by Reza Yaghoubi, Parseh Book Translation and Publishing Agency, Tehran, 1398 [2019/2020].

Iranian Philosophy and Comparative Philosophy, Henry Corbin, translated by Javad Tabatabai, Toos Publications, Tehran, 1369 [1990/1991].

The First Greek Philosophers, Sharaf al-Din Khorasani, Elmi Farhangi Publications, Tehran, 1395 [2016/2017].

The Eleatics: Parmenides, Zeno, Melissus, William Keith Chambers Guthrie, translated by Mehdi Qavam Safari, Fekr-e Rooz Publications, Tehran, 1376 [1997/1998].

Doing Philosophy, Timothy Williamson, Oxford, 2018.

The philosophers history and history of philosophy in Analytic Philosophy and History of Philosophy, Oxford, 2005.

The rilationshop of philosophy to its past in Philosophy in History, Edited by Richard Rorty, J. B. Schneewind, Quentin Skinner, Cambridge, 1998.

Philosophical problems in the history of philosophy: what are they? In Philosophy and its History,Edited by Moens Laerke, Justin E. H. Smith, Eric Schliesser, Oxford, 2013.

Cartesian Autonomy in Mind, Method, and Morality, Edited by John Cottingham and Peter Hacker, Oxford, 2010.

Philosophy and the Historical perspective, Edited by Marcel Van Ackeren, Oxford, 2018.

Early Greek Philosophy, John Burnet, Palala Press, 1908.

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[1] . past

[2] . For Glock's view on this, see the article

what have the historians ever done for us? in Philosophy and the Historical Perspective, Edited by Marcel Van Ackeren, Oxford, 2018.

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Philosophy and the Historiography of Philosophy

(On the Margins of the Publication of Anthony Kenny's A New History of Western Philosophy)

Reza Yaghoubi

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