ABSTRACT

This edited volume systematically addresses the connection between Wilfrid Sellars and the history of modern philosophy, exploring both the content and method of this relationship. It intends both to analyze Sellars’ position in relation to singular thinkers of the modern tradition, and to inquire into Sellars’ understanding of philosophy as a field in reflective and constructive conversation with its past. The chapters in Part I cover Sellars’ interpretation and use of Descartes, Leibniz, Hume, Kant, and Hegel. Part II features essays on his relationship with Peirce, Frege, Carnap, Wittgenstein, American pragmatism, behaviorism, and American realism, particularly his father, Roy Wood. Sellars and the History of Modern Philosophy features original contributions by many of the most renowned Sellars scholars throughout the world. It offers an exhaustive survey of Sellars’ views on the historical antecedents and meta-philosophical aspects of his thought.

chapter |12 pages

Introduction

The lingua franca of Thought. Wilfrid Sellars and the History of Philosophy

part I|103 pages

Sellars and Modern Philosophy

part II|138 pages

Sellars and the Beginning of the Contemporary Age

chapter 8|21 pages

“We pragmatists mourn Sellars as a Lost Leader”

Sellars’s Pragmatist Distinction Between Signifying and Picturing

chapter 10|19 pages

Sellars and Carnap

Science and/or Metaphysics

chapter 12|22 pages

Wilfrid Sellars and Roy Wood Sellars

Theoretical Continuities and Methodological Divergences

part |22 pages

Conclusions

chapter 13|20 pages

Thinking With Sellars and Beyond Sellars

On the Relations Between Philosophy and the History of Philosophy