A Decent Obituary for Richard Rorty

I have been somewhat confounded by the incomprehension attending much that I have read in the press about Richard Rorty since his passing. Part of the problem is the fact that professional philosophy has largely put itself out of the intellectual reach of the average educated reader. Rorty bemoaned this fact--and abandoned academic philosophy for comparative literature. Even so, many of those who have written about him and his thought have done so with a dismissive tone--as if they have a better grasp of the problems than he did. These are journalists, mind you. Journalists. Apparently, they didn't like where he came from (intellectually) or where he went.

I will admit that I often found Rorty's thinking frustrating; at times I found him inconsistent; occasionally, I regarded him as too Utopian for my tastes--and I'm a self-identifying Utopian forgodsake! But at his passing, I honor his intellectual struggles and the ways in which he challenged me in my own.

Rorty was something of an inspiration to me. He gave me permission to recognize, with Cornel West, that the tradition of American philosophy is largely a tradition of "evading" European metaphysics and anti-metaphysics. Consequently, philosophizing in the American grain most often takes place outside of academic departments of philosophy. Rorty had the cajones to publicly disassociate himself from the "Continental vs. Analytic" pissing-match that overshadowed my own philosophical training as an undergraduate. He reassured me that my habit of reading Kierkegaard and Wittgenstein in conversation was a healthy and productive way to think. He was intellectually honest and, as the Grappion has reminded me, I was often in the habit of referring to him as the "last honest man."

Rest in peace, Richard.

Here is a decent obituary penned by Jurgen Habermas.