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Rescher and Emmet on the Notion of Ideal

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Abstract

The notion of ideal is surely one of the most important legacies of Western philosophy, yet it has been much neglected by contemporary philosophy, probably because of the negative destiny it has suffered during the last century, by being firstly abused through forms of totalitarianism and secondly censured through forms of anarchism. But there are two interesting exceptions: two monographs written by two noteworthy philosophers, the first being Nicholas Rescher, who published in 1987 Ethical Idealism. An Inquiry into the Nature and Function of Ideals, and the second being Dorothy Emmet, who published in 1994 The Role of the Unrealisable. A Study in Regulative Ideals. In this article I shall take into account their positions arguing that both Rescher and Emmet work on a very important topic, as they highlight the essential role the notion of ideal played, and still plays, in human life, yet, the role of the notion of ideal they highlight may be notably increased by more precisely understanding its own genesis and history.

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Notes

  1. See S. Chiodo, What an Ideal is, “Philosophia” 43/4 (2015), pp. 961–974.

  2. N. Rescher, Ethical Idealism. An Inquiry into the Nature and Function of Ideals, Berkeley-Los Angeles-New York: University of California Press, 1987, reviewed by M.D. Stohs, “Ethics” 98/4 (1988), p. 839, H.J. Johnson, “Philosophy in Review” 9/3 (1989), pp. 112–114, T. McConnell, “Philosophy and Phenomenological Research” 49/4 (1989), pp. 748–752 and G. Graham, “The Modern Schoolman” 67/4 (1990), pp. 325–326.

  3. N. Rescher, Cognitive Idealization. On the Nature and Utility of Cognitive Ideals, London: Cambridge Scholars Press, 2003.

  4. D. Emmet, The Role of the Unrealisable. A Study in Regulative Ideals, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1994, reviewed by M. Stanford, “Cogito” 8/2 (1994), pp. 189–192 and C.A.J. Coady, “Ethics” 106/2 (1996), pp. 453–455.

  5. N. Rescher, Ethical Idealism. An Inquiry into the Nature and Function of Ideals, cit., p. 118.

  6. Ibid., p. 119.

  7. Ibid.

  8. Ibid., p. 121.

  9. Ibid.

  10. Ibid., p. 119.

  11. Ibid., p. 118.

  12. Ibid., p. 119.

  13. Ibid., p. 121.

  14. Ibid., p. 83.

  15. Ibid., p. 6.

  16. Ibid.

  17. Ibid., p. 9.

  18. Ibid., p. 12.

  19. Plato, Resp. 596 b (translated by P. Shorey, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1969).

  20. I. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A 569/B 597 (edited by P. Guyer and A.W. Wood, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998).

  21. Ibid.

  22. D. Emmet, op. cit., p. 92.

  23. Ibid.

  24. Ibid., p. 122.

  25. Ibid.

  26. I. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A 569/B 597.

  27. See especially G.W.F. Hegel, Aesthetics. Lectures on Fine Art, translated by T.M. Knox, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1975, Id., Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, edited by R.F. Brown and P.C. Hodgson, with the assistance of W.G. Geuss, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2011 and Id., Elements of the Philosophy of Right, edited by A.W. Wood, translated by H.B. Nisbet, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.

  28. N. Rescher, Ethical Idealism. An Inquiry into the Nature and Function of Ideals, cit., p. 139.

  29. Ibid.

  30. Ibid.

  31. Ibid., p. 140.

  32. Ibid.

  33. Ibid.

  34. See Plato, Resp. 596 b-c and Id., Tim. (translated by R.G. Bury, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, London: William Heinemann Ltd., 1981).

  35. Id., Resp. 500 d.

  36. Ibid., italic mine.

  37. N. Rescher, Ethical Idealism. An Inquiry into the Nature and Function of Ideals, cit., p. 123.

  38. I. Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 233 (edited by P. Guyer, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000).

  39. Ibid., 5: 234.

  40. Ibid.

  41. D. Emmet, op. cit., p. 48.

  42. Ibid.

  43. Ibid.

  44. Ibid., p. 58.

  45. Ibid., p. 48.

  46. Ibid., p. 51.

  47. Ibid., p. 54.

  48. See G.W.F. Hegel, Aesthetics. Lectures on Fine Art, cit.

  49. See Id., Elements of the Philosophy of Right, cit.

  50. Ibid., p. 317.

  51. D. Emmet, op. cit., p. 58.

  52. See I. Berlin, The Crooked Timber of Humanity. Chapters in the History of Ideas, edited by H. Hardy, London: Murray, 1990, Id., The Power of Ideas, edited by H. Hardy, London: Chatto & Windus, 2000 and Id., The Sense of Reality. Studies in Ideas and their History, edited by H. Hardy, with an introduction by P. Gardiner, London: Chatto & Windus, 1996.

  53. See K.R. Popper, The Open Society and its Enemies, London: Routledge, 1945.

  54. N. Rescher, Ethical Idealism. An Inquiry into the Nature and Function of Ideals, cit., p. 83.

  55. Ibid.

  56. Ibid., p. 117.

  57. Ibid., p. 120.

  58. Ibid., p. 117.

  59. Ibid., p. 137.

  60. Ibid., p. 114.

  61. Ibid., p. 117.

  62. Ibid., p. 121.

  63. Ibid., pp. 125–126.

  64. J.C.F. Schiller, The Ideal and the Actual Life, in The Poems and Ballads of Schiller, translated by Sir E. Bulwer Lytton, Leipzig: Tauchnitz, 1844, p. 171.

  65. Id., Letters upon the Aesthetic Education of Man, in Literary and Philosophical Essays. French, German and Italian, New York: Collier, The Harvard Classics, 32, 1910, Letter IV.

  66. J.G. Fichte, Some Lectures Concerning the Scholar’s Vocation, in Id., Early Philosophical Writings, edited by D. Breazeale, Ithaca-London: Cornell University Press, 1993, p. 157.

  67. Ibid., pp. 169–170.

  68. N. Rescher, Ethical Idealism. An Inquiry into the Nature and Function of Ideals, cit., p. 132.

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Correspondence to Simona Chiodo.

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Chiodo, S. Rescher and Emmet on the Notion of Ideal. Philosophia 45, 1063–1075 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-017-9829-9

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