A Study On Richard Rorty’s Pragmatist Ethics

In today’s globalized world,human relationships are becoming increasingly close,complex,and diverse.The study of ethics has also followed the development of human beings and has continued to raise new issues and offer new explanations.In the face of changing societies,traditional ethics has also come under attack,with the original worship of universal moral spirit and principles shifting to a vision of respect for pluralism and mutual inclusion.The philosophical thought of the American neo-pragmatist philosopher Richard Rorty is transcendental,and his ethics inherits the logic of pragmatism on top of dismantling traditional Western philosophy to form a new view of cultural ethics.First of all,this thesis clarifies the development of Rorty’s philosophical thought to provide a philosophical base for the later study of ethical thought.The third of Rorty’s generalizations of pragmatism is the most preferred,i.e.,“only dialogue constrains”.The shift from experience to language is also one of the marks that distinguish old and new pragmatism,thus forming an anti-metaphysical view of language and a philosophy of dialogue.While rejecting philosophical traditions such as essentialism and epistemology,Rorty also offers new interpretations of concepts and ideas in traditional ethics.Therefore,the thesis explored Rorty’s unprincipled ethics,and also explains the ethical content related to the concepts of goodness and rationality and the theory of justice.Rorty’s ethical thought is completely different from traditional ethics,but presents an unprincipled character.Post-philosophical culture is an important turn in Rorty’s philosophical thought,and his ethical thought is explained in more detail in it.What’s more,the thesis also elucidates Rorty’s attitude toward philosophical culture and literary culture from the long-standing historical controversy between poetry and philosophy.On the side of literary culture,Rorty argues that moral progress and human development do not depend on a priori reason,but only a more contingent and imaginative literature can perform the function of moral progress and thus bring salvation and hope to humanity.Finally,the thesis further outlines the contours of Rorty’s ethics,reflecting its differences from traditional ethics.The humanistic spirit is a particularly prominent point in Rorty’s ethical thought,and its pragmatic character also makes his ethical thought extraordinarily heavy,both of which can reflect the value of Rorty’s ethical thought.By comprehensively sorting out and deeply explaining Rorty’s ethics,this thesis hopes to throw light on this and propose research ideas and directions that can be extended in both theory and practice for others to further study.