Does “Race” Have a Future or Should the Future Have “Races”? Reconstruction or Eliminativism in a Pragmatist Philosophy of Race

Phillip Kitcher, author of Preludes to Pragmatism, argues in chapter six, “Does ‘Race’ Have a Future” that developments in evolutionary biology may support a separation of our species into subcategories that could be regarded as races. This article begins with a presentation of Kitcher's accoun...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society 2014, Vol.50 (1), p.29-47
Main Author: Carter, Jacoby Adeshei
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Analysis
Biology
Eliminative materialism
Evolution
Genetic engineering
Human genetics
Humans
Kitcher, Philip
Medical genetics
Phenotypic traits
Philosophers
Philosophy
Population
Population genetics
Pragmatism
Race
Racism
Reproductive isolation
Social constructionism
Species
Works
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Phillip Kitcher, author of Preludes to Pragmatism, argues in chapter six, “Does ‘Race’ Have a Future” that developments in evolutionary biology may support a separation of our species into subcategories that could be regarded as races. This article begins with a presentation of Kitcher's account of race as biologically real, and socially constructed. From there it moves on to a consideration of racial eliminativism. An important aspect of the view Kitcher argues for is the claim that pragmatism may be incompatible with racial eliminativism. The article ends with a critical evaluation of Kitcher's proposed biological conception of race. It is argued that pragmatist considerations notwithstanding there are reasons to doubt that divisions of humanity into subspecies constitute races, or that such divisions will track the historical and cultural divisions people find salient.
ISSN:0009-1774
1558-9587
DOI:10.2979/trancharpeirsoc.50.1.29