Eric Thomas Weber

This article argues for a definition of public philosophy inspired by John Dewey’s understanding of the “supreme intellectual obligation.” The first section examines five strong reasons why more public philosophy is needed and why the growing movement in public philosophy should be encouraged. The second section begins with a review of common understandings of public philosophy as well as some initial challenges that call for widening our conception of the practice. Then, it applies Dewey’s argument in “The Supreme Intellectual Obligation” to public philosophy, which must not be seen simply as a one-way street from intellectuals to the masses but, rather, as the task of fostering the scientific attitude and intellectual habits of mind in all citizens.

John Lachs has argued that the value of academic philosophers rests not in their scholarly writing, but fundamentally in their ability to educate minds to be critical and open. In this paper, I show the continuity of this outlook on the work of philosophers with Lachs's stoic pragmatism. Stoic pragmatism is the view that the pragmatic optimism of thinkers like James, Royce, and Dewey must be tempered by a stoic acceptance of our limitations as human beings. While I support Lachs's controversial views regarding stoic pragmatism, I suggest some ways that we can employ the skills of philosophers beyond the classroom as well.

In Morality, Leadership, and Public Policy, Eric Weber argues for an experimentalist approach to moral theory in addressing practical problems in public policy. The experimentalist approach begins moral inquiry by examining public problems and then makes use of the tools of philosophy and intelligent inquiry to alleviate them. Part I surveys the uses of practical philosophy and answers criticisms - including religious challenges - of the approach, presenting a number of areas in which philosophers' intellectual efforts can prove valuable for resolving public conflicts. Part II presents a new approach to experimentalism in moral theory, based on the insights of John Dewey's pragmatism. Focusing on the elements of good public inquiry and the experimentalist attitude, Weber discusses ways of thinking about the effective construction and reconstruction of particular problems, including practical problems of public policy prioritization. Finally, in Part III the book examines real-world examples in which the experimentalist approach to ethics proves useful, including instances of "bandwidth theft" and the controversies surrounding activist judges in the US Supreme Court.