Charles Taylor, author of "A Secular Age" (about which I blogged nearly ad nauseam here, here, here, here, and here) has won the first Berggruen Prize for philosophy. You can read the brief NYT account here. The Toronto Globe and Mail has a longer story here.
One doubts that the 84-year old Taylor pursued his interest in philosophy in the hope of winning a cool $1 million. The chances of winning that amount in the lottery are probably about the same. I am pleased, however, to know that someone not entrenched in either the Anglo-American analytic tradition or the contemporary Continental tradition, much of which I would characterize as nonsense on stilts, has won. While a somewhat plodding (and sometimes prolix) writer, with a reasonable modicum of effort one can understand Taylor. And that effort is, in my opinion, worth the while.
One doubts that the 84-year old Taylor pursued his interest in philosophy in the hope of winning a cool $1 million. The chances of winning that amount in the lottery are probably about the same. I am pleased, however, to know that someone not entrenched in either the Anglo-American analytic tradition or the contemporary Continental tradition, much of which I would characterize as nonsense on stilts, has won. While a somewhat plodding (and sometimes prolix) writer, with a reasonable modicum of effort one can understand Taylor. And that effort is, in my opinion, worth the while.
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