Book Title: Philosophical Tools for Thinking about Polarization

Book Description

In this book, students of the MA Philosophy program of the University of Groningen thought about how one might apply philosophical tools and methods to this question. Philosophical methods, as discussed, e.g., in Schönwälder-Kuntze, are ways of philosophical thinking such as hermeneutics or phenomenology that can be used to approach a topic like polarization, yielding a particular set of questions and a particular way to approach these questions. Philosophical tools, as discussed in Fosl & Baggini, may comprise these philosophical methods but also cover more specific, smaller-scale philosophical notions or ideas such as fallacies or the is-ought gap, which can yield interesting insights for thinking about polarization.

For this book, students chose a particular philosophical tool or method which they thought might yield interesting insights about polarization. In each chapter, a different philosophical tool is first introduced and then applied to one or more specific issues related to polarization. Students made an effort to describe the philosophical tools in a simple way so that readers are hopefully enabled to apply the tool themselves. To further encourage this, each chapter contains philosophical exercises intended to stimulate such philosophical exploration.

The reader interested in applying philosophical tools to topics other than polarization may want to consult two other open educational resources: Philosophical Tools for Climate Change(opens in new tab) and Migration: A Philosophical Toolkit(opens in new tab).