James Mark Connelly

abstract In what follows I respond to Henry Shue's paper by focusing on three principal themes. The first is the relation of philosophical theory to practice, in which I agree that philosophers have to run the risks attendant upon applying reason to concrete cases. The second is the use of examples in moral philosophy, in particular the example used in the justification of torture as an exception; here I draw distinctions between different types of examples in philosophy and the uses to which they are put. Thirdly, in a brief consideration of our responses to climate change I suggest that, contra Shue, we are not being asked to go beyond a normal requirement so much as to re-establish the boundaries of what counts as normal.

This book argues that R.G. Collingwood developed a complete and coherent political philosophy of civilization. In making this case it also demonstrates that Collingwood's philosophical work comprises a unity in which, although there was development, there is no fundamental discontinuity between his earlier and later writings. A philosophy of civilization must situate its subject matter within the full context of human experience and therefore Collingwood's political philosophy of civilization must be situated within the context of his whole philosophy. The book presents the case that Collingwood developed a coherent philosophy of politics and civilization, that this had its roots in both the early and the later work; and that his overall philosophical approach comprises a generally consistent and integrated whole.

This is a big book, conceived on a grand scale. Sprigge does not fight shy of addressing the large central issues. He takes James and Bradley head on and expounds their philosophy without compromise and without assuming that the only way we can appreciate them is by making them more palatable to the modern mind by watering down what they wrote. While he relates their thought to modern philosophical concerns he does not presuppose that modern philosophical concerns as such should act as the arbiter of what counts as philosophical good sense. In other words, we can learn from Bradley and James, whether or not they could also learn from us.

In so far as Collingwood is branded an ‘idealist’, the corresponding assumption is that he subscribed to the broad themes associated with the ‘English idealists or Hegelians’; in so far as he is thought to have broken free from their pernicious influence he is regarded as a proto-Kuhn or Wittgenstein who saw the error of his early ways. This paper suggests that neither picture is fully accurate, and that while the figure of F.H. Bradley perhaps played a more significant part in Collingwood’s philosophical development than is often recognised, his role was that of a spur or challenge to his thinking. Coming to terms with Bradley was a struggle throughout his philosophical career. I suggest that Collingwood took from Bradley the dual problematic of the method appropriate to philosophical thought and the tangled question of the nature of metaphysics. These were both problems which he wrestled with throughout his life, and Bradley’s work can be seen as setting the agenda for his thought on these matters.