Introduction

what a better epistemology can do for moral philosophy

Charles W. Lowney

pp. 1-11

in: Charles W. Lowney (ed), Charles Taylor, Michael Polanyi and the critique of modernity, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2017

Abstract

Lowney introduces the revolution in epistemology that took shape in the mid-twentieth century and how it presents new openings for moral meaning. Both Michael Polanyi (1891–1976) and Charles Taylor (1931) surmise that Modern assumptions supporting analytic, foundationalist and reductionist tendencies can undermine human meaning and a robust sense of moral reality. In the 1960s, Polanyi co-organized the Study Group on Foundations of Cultural Unity and the Study Group on the Unity of Knowledge, which were designed to discuss different possibilities for understanding the grounds of knowledge in the physical and human sciences. The young Charles Taylor participated in meetings of the Study Groups and in years since his work continued to develop toward an overarching and historically informed vision that spans across academic disciplines. The other authors in this volume relay and develop Polanyi's ideas and bring them into conversation with Taylor. In introducing the book's chapters, Lowney discusses how a constructive dialogue between the ideas of Taylor and Polanyi presents new possibilities for understanding modernity and for developing a view of science, history, and society that allows for robust realism about moral values.

Cited authors

Taylor Charles

Polanyi Michael