Le débat sur le libre arbitre continue depuis des siècles, réfractaire à toute tentative de solution positive. Cette thèse présente une contribution visant à dissoudre le problème plutôt qu’à le résoudre. L’approche négative et « thérapeutique » du travail est d’inspiration largement wittgensteinienne : son noyau réside dans la thèse selon laquelle les problèmes philosophiques – y compris le problème du libre arbitre – ont pour origine une confusion dans l’usage des mots. Dans les deux premiers chapitres, j’examine le débat analytique sur le libre arbitre et l’approche récente de la philosophie expérimentale. Je montre que la difficulté d’arriver à un niveau d’accord même minimal sur les questions principales du débat rend déraisonnable de vouloir le poursuivre. Dans le troisième chapitre, je présente l’approche négative des problèmes philosophiques défendue par Paul Horwich dans son travail sur Wittgenstein et dans ses échanges avec Timothy Williamson et Richard Rorty. Dans le quatrième chapitre, j’applique la thèse wittgensteinienne de la confusion linguistique à la question du libre arbitre. Au centre du cinquième chapitre se trouve la position défendue par Peter Strawson dans son article « Freedom and Resentment » (1962), dont je présente une lecture pragmatique. Selon cette interprétation inspirée par Rorty, Strawson montre que le scepticisme à l’égard de la responsabilité morale représente une forme de politique culturelle vouée à l’échec. / Philosophical attempts to solve the free will conundrum have proven unsuccessful across the centuries. In this work I aim at dissolving rather than solving the problem. The negative and “therapeutic” approach I adopt is inspired by Wittgenstein, its core being the thesis that such philosophical problems as free will stem from linguistic confusion. In the first and second chapter I examine the contributions on free will provided within analytic philosophy and within the so called experimental philosophy. I argue that it is not reasonable to pursue this debate, insofar as it is by now clear that its main questions admit of no shared solutions. In the third chapter I present the negative approach to philosophical problems defended by Paul Horwich in his work on Wittgenstein and in his exchanges with Timothy Williamson and Richard Rorty. In the fourth chapter I apply to the free will issue an approach focused on Wittgenstein’s thesis concerning linguistic confusion. In the fifth chapter I provide a pragmatic reading of the position defended by Peter Strawson in his « Freedom and Resentment » (1962). According to this interpretation inspired by Rorty, Strawson shows that scepticism about moral responsibility comprises an unfruitful form of cultural politics.

Tableau d’honneur de la Faculté des études supérieures et postdoctorales, 2008-2009 / Étant donné l'universalité de la médiation linguistique conditionnant notre rapport au monde, à quoi fait-on référence lorsqu'on utilise le concept de "vérité" en épistémologie contemporaine? Doit-on nécessairement supposer que nos énoncés correspondent à une réalité extérieure pour faire sens du concept de vérité? Un réalisme sans la représentation est-il possible? Le présent mémoire tente de répondre à ces interrogations en exposant deux conceptions de la vérité radicalement différentes: celle de Jürgen Habermas et celle de Richard Rorty. Après une présentation des grandes répercussions du tournant linguistique sur les conceptions épistémologiques classiques, j'analyserai la position néopragmatiste rortienne qui affirme que le tournant linguistique a épuisé la validité conceptuelle du dualisme croyance-vérité. J'expliquerai en quoi consistent la position antiréaliste de Rorty, son traitement déflationniste de la distinction vérité-justification et ses thèses mélioristes. Cela me mènera à poser la question suivante: est-ce possible de préserver un concept transculturel de vérité après le tournant linguistique? Dans le but de répondre à cette question, j'exposerai la théorie épistémologique que développe Jürgen Habermas dans Vérité et justification. J'expliquerai la conception bidimensionnelle de la vérité qu'il y développe en insistant sur l'interaction constante des sphères de l'action et de la discussion. Cette exposition me permettra de procéder à une analyse exhaustive du débat entre ces deux auteurs. J'insisterai sur leurs désaccords concernant l'explication théorique, du point de vue des acteurs, du déroulement de la praxis quotidienne et des processus de justification.

This thesis explores and makes explicit various aspects of Richard Rorty's rhetorical program for shifting our traditional conceptions of reference and truth. Rorty wants to persuade us to adopt verification (coping) semantics in place of correspondence seeking semantics. I argue against his intuition pumps by considering Keith Donnellan's remarks on description and reference and argue for a view of correspondence truth that is based on what the object, whatever the object, permits us to say. Making this point allows us to see a purposeful conflation in Rorty's work. If beliefs are true because they are justified, Rorty's fallibilistic remark that any of our beliefs may not be true (in the cautionary sense) would follow. But truths may pay because they follow (as "attributive representations") from 'unblocked' objects, or they may just pay. Thus, I suggest that Donnellan preserves William James' remark that we desire correspondence truth, an everyday explanatory notion.

One of the core and primary functions of the school is to transmit knowledge from one generation to the next. The theory and practice of schooling (teaching and learning) should be founded on a sound concept of knowledge. A change in epistemology entails a change in approach to schooling. This study investigates how the postmodern idea of knowledge may affect schooling both in theory and practice. The author traces how the concept of knowledge has changed from modern to the postmodern era, in order to find the general features of the recent view of knowledge. The postmodern idea of knowledge is characterised by doubt about objective knowledge, the shift from universal reason to plural reason, criticism of foundationalism and awareness of the peculiar role of language. This study focuses on Richard Rorty's theory to analyse the postmodern idea of knowledge and its educational implication. In order to figure out the problems of postmodern epistemology, the author criticises Rorty's idea of knowledge immanently and transcendentally. Not only self-contradictions but also hidden foundations (or beliefs) in Rorty's idea of knowledge are revealed. This study comes to conclude that although the postmodern idea of knowledge reveals the shortcomings of the modern idea of knowledge, it also has many flaws in achieving a sound concept of knowledge. This study indicates an alternative view of knowledge from a Reformational perspective in order to overcome the shortcomings of postmodern epistemology. The author suggests a new possibility of objective knowledge based on the notion of creational law, and also various kinds of legitimate knowledge based on the multi-dimensional modality of reality. As a final point, this study suggests the notion of stewardship in education. Schooling should open up the multidimensional reality for students to become responsible stewards who care for the world and their fellow human beings. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Education))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2007.

This dissertation examines the techniques and themes of William Burroughs by placing him in the American Pragmatist tradition. Chapter One presents a pragmatic critical approach to literature based on Richard Rorty and John Dewey, focusing on the primacy of narration over argumentation, redescription and dialectic, the importance of texts as experiences, the end-products of textual experiences, and the role of critic as guide to experience rather than judge. Chapter Two uses this pragmatic critical lens to focus on the writing techniques of William Burroughs as a part of the American Pragmatist tradition, with most of the focus on his controversial cut-up technique. Burroughs is a writer who upsets many of the traditional expectations of the literary writing community, just as Rorty challenges the conventions of the philosophical discourse community. Chapter Three places Burroughs within a liberal democratic tradition with respect to Rorty and John Stuart Mill. Burroughs is a champion of individual liberty; this chapter shows how Burroughs' works are meant to edify readers about the social, political, biological, and technological systems which work to control individuals and limit their liberties and understandings. The chapter also shows how Burroughs' works help liberate readers from all control systems, and examines the alternative societies he envisions which work to uphold, rather than subvert, the freedom of human beings. Chapter Four concludes by suggesting some of the implications of Burroughs' work in literature, society, and politics, and by showing the value and importance of Pragmatism to the study of American literature and culture.

Faith-based initiatives have the potential to alter church-state relationships as they remove barriers to the public funding of human services in organizations that promote the role of values, beliefs, and other characteristics of faith. In seeking to "level the playing field" for these faith-based organizations, faith-based initiatives suggest moving away from past practices, where "religious" organizations utilized public funding for the delivery of "secular" human services, and toward the public funding support of organizations whose human service activities are based on faith in a more thoroughgoing manner.This research inquires into meanings assigned to opportunities and risks related to the public funding of faith-based organizations, as articulated by a variety of stakeholders, from government officials to the leaders of faith-based organizations. The guiding research question, What are the meanings of church-state relationships for faith-based organizations?, asks the leaders of faith-based organizations in one Virginia locality, as well as other local, state, and national stakeholders, about their understandings of various aspects of the church-state relationships that develop when faith-based organizations utilize public funds for the provision of human services.The findings of this inquiry, presented in a narrative case study report, and the implications of this case study provide a richer understanding of the multiple meanings that faith-based organizations assign to relationships with government programs, government agencies, and the use of public funds. The multiple meanings of church-state relationships that are offered by diverse research participants provide valuable insights into the complex phenomenon of faith-basis organizations providing human services with government monies. The interpretations offered in this dissertation provide greater knowledge of the role of faith as a basis for publicly funded human services, and furthermore, this knowledge may find value in its recognition of the implications of faith-based, publicly funded human services.

The thesis presented here explores the relevance of the classical works of Emile Durkheim and George Herbert Mead to contemporary postmodern cultural critiques. Postmodern social theory specifically that of Richard Rorty and Jean Baudrillard have come to offer a type of social theory that challenges the notion of the social. This referential problem of the social becomes a striking attack on the epistemology of sociology, which purports to offer scientific knowledge about the human condition as a social process. The theoretical works of Durkheim and Mead especially their respective concepts of the "collective consciousness" and the "generalized other" are offered here as closely related articulations of the core sociological concept of "the social." It is argued that postmodernism, by postulating an excessively precarious social theory, falls short as a theory of society when juxtaposed to the classic sociologies of Durkheim and Mead. However, it is also noted that the transformation of the field of sociology from a primarily textual discourse to a quantitative enterprise increasingly exposes the field of sociology to uniquely postmodern critiques.

This dissertation offers a phenomenology of that mode of self-interpretation in which it becomes possible for an interpreter to intentionally participate in the production of moral norms to which the interpreter himself or herself feels bound. Part One draws on Richard Rorty's notion of the "ironist" in order to thematize the phenomenon I call "moral friction"; a condition in which an interpreter becomes explicitly aware of the historical and cultural contingencies of their own moral vocabularies, practices, and concerns and as a result find themselves incapable of feeling the normative weight implicit in these. Part Two draws on Heidegger's existential analytic of human being, Gadamer's development of Hermeneutic Phenomenology, and Hegel's notion of "sublation" in order to map how novel interpretations can irreversibly displace the coherence of older interpretations. I call this form of interpretation "moral phenomenology." Finally, in Part Three, I utilize a selective phenomenology of musical improvisation to plot the unique temporal orientation of self-interpretation that results from intentionally deploying this irreversible displacement of older interpretations that involve normative moral implications. I call the form of life that is marked by this hermeneutic mode the "improviser." The result is a description of a form of life in which it becomes possible to explicitly participate in the production of moral norms within a historical and culturally contingent context that nevertheless preserves standards of rational justification for normative moral judgment without the need for atemporal first principles. The availability of this mode of self-interpretation displaces the sharp distinction between non-normative descriptive phenomenology and normative moral reasoning by placing the latter within a non-teleological historical practice that engages in the production of interpretations which irreversibly displace older interpretations--a practice that is governed by the critical cultivation of contingent moral norms within the open investigation into the good life for human being.

The thesis examines the nature of political reform and the role of culture in the liberal utopia envisaged by Richard Rorty in Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity. Rorty's overall project is outlined, and situated within the anti-foundationalist critique that has been the hallmark of his recent career. The perilous position of nonintellectuals within the otherwise-acceptable utopia is detailed. Harold Bloom's conception of the strong poet is then examined and compared to the use Rorty makes of Bloom; I conclude that the faults of the liberal utopia lie primarily in establishing the strong poet as that culture's hero. I turn to Rorty's reading of Sigmund Freud, a reading which consistently inverts Freud's insights in order to make Freud fit into Rorty's plan. Finally, I re-examine Freud and suggest ways in which he can be used to correct the faults of the liberal utopia.

One of the core and primary functions of the school is to transmit knowledge from one generation to the next. The theory and practice of schooling (teaching and learning) should be founded on a sound concept of knowledge. A change in epistemology entails a change in approach to schooling. This study investigates how the postmodern idea of knowledge may affect schooling both in theory and practice. The author traces how the concept of knowledge has changed from modern to the postmodern era, in order to find the general features of the recent view of knowledge. The postmodern idea of knowledge is characterised by doubt about objective knowledge, the shift from universal reason to plural reason, criticism of foundationalism and awareness of the peculiar role of language. This study focuses on Richard Rorty's theory to analyse the postmodern idea of knowledge and its educational implication. In order to figure out the problems of postmodern epistemology, the author criticises Rorty's idea of knowledge immanently and transcendentally. Not only self-contradictions but also hidden foundations (or beliefs) in Rorty's idea of knowledge are revealed. This study comes to conclude that although the postmodern idea of knowledge reveals the shortcomings of the modern idea of knowledge, it also has many flaws in achieving a sound concept of knowledge. This study indicates an alternative view of knowledge from a Reformational perspective in order to overcome the shortcomings of postmodern epistemology. The author suggests a new possibility of objective knowledge based on the notion of creational law, and also various kinds of legitimate knowledge based on the multi-dimensional modality of reality. As a final point, this study suggests the notion of stewardship in education. Schooling should open up the multidimensional reality for students to become responsible stewards who care for the world and their fellow human beings. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Education))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2007.