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| Photo: Hilary Putnam, Cogan University Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy at Harvard |
Hilary Putnam, Cogan University Professor Emeritus in
the Department of Philosophy at Harvard, was one of the most
influential philosophers of our time. His extraordinarily wide-ranging
contributions, spanning 24 books and over 300 articles, are unusual not
only because of their originality, but also for a fearless habit of
criticising and rethinking his views. This radical practice of
philosophy also brought him into conversation with numerous philosphers,
giving an unmatched breadth to his work. He was also unique in his
ability to re-set the research agenda in key areas of philosophies of
science, mathematics, language and mind.
In 1927, when Hilary was six months old, the family
moved to Paris where his father, Samuel Putnam, translated the works of
Rabelais and edited the literary magazine The New Review.
Putnam grew up in the cosmopolitan artistic world of Gertrude Stein,
Hemingway, Ezra Pound, Elliot, Joyce, and Ford Madox Ford. His
upbringing contributed to a distaste for the narrowness and insularity
of much of contemporary philosophy. The blog Sardonic Comment, which he
launched in 2013 and kept going until the onset of ill health in October
2015, is a testament to his commitment to inclusivity.
Putnam’s earliest writing focused on philosophy of
mathematics and science. Two central arguments, the “indispensability
argument” in philosophy of mathematics and the “no-miracle argument” in
philosophy of science, advance the claim that we are unable to explain
the successes of scientific theories unless we assume that they provide
true accounts of how things stand in the world. Both arguments remain
central to philosophical discussions of science and mathematics. In
addition to his philosophical work, Putnam’s co-publication with M.
Davis and J Robinson, of a proof of Hilbert’s Tenth Problem, established
him as a major figure in mathematics, giving further support to the
claim by many, including his life-long friend Noam Chomsky, that he was
one of the finest minds of our time.
Putnam’s most influential contributions are to philosophy of language and mind.
Read more...
Related link
Hilary Putnam - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Source: Irish Times
