(Lewandowsky et al., 2012: p. 122)
On the whole, philosophical correspondence and philosophical conversation alike are often interesting and productive, and sometimes profoundly significant. Indeed, sometimes philosophical correspondence and philosophical conversation are mind-changing or life-changing, and even—in accordance with Marx’s famous dictum that thus far philosophers have only ever interpreted the world in different ways, but the point is to change it (Marx, 1964: p. 69)—world-changing. By contrast, philosophical debate is only very rarely, if ever interesting and productive, never profoundly significant, never mind-changing, life-changing, or world-changing, and generally combative, rhetorical, superficial, and unproductive. And especially when it’s exclusively between male philosophers, it’s usually nothing but an intellectual pissing contest. All that being so, in “On Fundamental Disagreements and How to Resolve Them,” Robert Hanna focuses on a stubborn and troubling phenomenon that arises very frequently in philosophical correspondence, philosophical conversation, and especially philosophical debate, alike: fundamental philosophical disagreement. His four-part argument runs as follows. First, real philosophers should always wholeheartedly strive to become as critically self-conscious of and self-reflective about their own worldviews and their own corresponding set of thought-shapers, as humanly possible. If they don’t already have a worldview, or if they have doubts about their own worldview, then they should critically self-consciously and self-reflectively explore different actual or possible worldviews with an eye to explicitly creating, presenting, defending, and recommending one of their own, or a new one of their own, in a strictly rationally autonomous way. Second, real philosophers should engage in philosophical correspondence, philosophical conversation, and especially philosophical debate with another philosopher or philosophically-minded person only if any disagreements they have are strictly non-fundamental, because either (i) both people share essentially the same worldview and corresponding set of thought-shapers, hence they’re like-minded, or (ii) at least one of the people is agnostic about and uncommitted to any particular worldview and corresponding set of thought-shapers, hence they’re open-minded. Philosophical correspondence or philosophical conversation with like-minded or open-minded people can be interesting, productive, profoundly significant, mind-changing, life-changing, or world-changing. Third, if a real philosopher experiences fundamental philosophical disagreement with an interlocutor, they should politely and respectfully propose mutually agreeing to disagree, and then get the hell out of there—because no philosophical good will ever come of further encounters with a highly unreflectively thought-shaped, unlike-minded, closed-minded interlocutor. Now, obviously, this is a highly skeptical view of resolving philosophical disagreements that are grounded in synoptic differences in worldviews. But could there be some workable way around this rational impasse? Yes. Fourth, one possible workable way around it might be to treat a worldview not as a monolithic unit, but instead as a complex holistic structure built up out of constituent specific synoptic insights or reflections about some or another domain of information about the rational human condition, each of which could be individually identified, and then compared or contrasted with differing insights or reflections about that domain. Then, philosophers who have encountered a fundamental philosophical disagreement might come to synoptic agreement on some individual parts of a Big Picture, and then go on to construct a holistic shared worldview piece-by-piece, like a team working together on an enormous puzzle. If a given insight or reflection doesn’t fit into the current shared Big Picture, then it can be temporarily put aside for later discussion and possible inclusion. If fundamental agreement between philosophical interlocutors can be reached on a partially-assembled worldview, then that would constitute genuine philosophical progress, even if they do not ultimately share one comprehensive and complete worldview. Let’s call this the puzzle-building-teamwork method of shared synoptic reflection. If this proposal is correct, then philosophical interlocutors who have encountered a fundamental philosophical disagreement might be able to work around it by engaging in the puzzle-building teamwork method of shared synoptic reflection. This wouldn’t bring about complete agreement, but it would resolve the deadlock of mutually uncomprehending fundamental disagreement.
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