Partially Examined Life

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Rorty would never say a question is not legitimate. Rather it’s not a question that is likely to bear fruit. Similarly whether or not there is a fact of the matter that would resolve a claim depends on what counts as resolution. Is it because it’s true in some non linguistic correspondence system or because the claim is warranted. Rorty feels we’ll do better to think in terms of warranted assertability or justification rather than a matching observation with a state of affairs. The only way to adjudicate the fact or observation is through justification. If you need to use a representational concept to verify an observation you may but it is optional. You can just as well adjudicate through justification and need not worry about who commands the facts. Rorty felt too much ink was spilled over this unnecessary, unhelpful distinction. One doesn’t need to turn it into an epistemological problem. Of course in order to explain his message he did engage with the analytical school using state of the art philosophical language. But even so he preferred a style that favored telling his version, not necessarily through argumentation but through suggesting an alternative approach.