Filsafat_kontemporer
Proses
Jerman adalah negara pertama yang menjalankan proses profesionalisasi dalam filsafat. Pada akhir tahun 1817, Hegel adalah filsuf pertama yang ditunjuk sebagai profesor oleh Negara, yaitu oleh Menteri Pendidikan pemerintah Prusia, sebagai efek dari reformasi Napoleon di Prusia. Di Amerika Serikat, proses profesionalisasi bidang kerja filsafat tumbuh dari reformasi yang berlangsung di negara-negara bagian Amerika Serikat yang masuk melalui sistem pendidikan tingginya di mana sebagian besarnya didasarkan pada model yang telah sebelumnya diterapkan di Jerman. James Campbell menjelaskan proses profesionalisasi filsafat di Amerika Serikat sebagai berikut:"The list of specific changes [during the late 19th-century professionalization of philosophy] is fairly brief, but the resultant shift is almost total. [...] No longer could the [philosophy] professor function as a defender of the faith or an expounder of Truth. The new philosopher had to be a leader of inquires and a publicizer of results. This shift was made obvious when certified (often German-certified) philosophy Ph.D.'s replaced theology graduates and ministers in the philosophy classroom. The period between the time when almost no one had a Ph.D. to when almost everyone did was very brief. [...] The doctorate, moreover, was more than a license to teach: it was a certificate that the prospective philosophy instructor was well, if narrowly, trained and ready to undertake independent work in the now specializing and restricted field of academic philosophy. These new philosophers functioned in independent departments of philosophy [...] They were making real gains in their research, creating a body of philosophic work that remains central to our study even now. These new philosophers also set their own standards for success, publishing in the recognized organs of philosophy that were being founded at the time: The Monist (1890), The International Journal of Ethics (1890), The Philosophical Review (1892), and The Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods (1904). And, of course, these philosophers were banding together into societies--the American Psychological Association (1892), the Western Philosophical Association (1900), and the American Philosophical Association (1900)--to consolidate their academic positions and advance their philosophic work." Profesionalisasi di Inggris sama-sama terikat dalam kerangka perkembangan pendidikan tinggi. Dalam karyanya pada T. H. Green, Denys Leighton membahas perubahan-perubahan dalam filsafat Inggris dan ia memperoleh gelar pertama filsuf akademik profesional di Britania Raya: "Henry Sidgwick, in a generous gesture, identified [T.H.] Green as Britain's first professional academic philosopher. Sidgwick's opinion can certainly be questioned: William Hamilton, J.F. Ferrier and Sidgwick himself are among the contenders for that honour. [...] Yet there can be no doubt that between the death of Mill (1873) and the publication of G.E.Moore's Principia Ethica (1903), the British philosophical profession was transformed, and that Green was partly responsible for the transformation. [...] Bentham, the Mills, Carlyle, Coleridge, Spencer, as well as many other serious philosophical thinkers of the nineteenth century were men of letters, administrators, active politicians, clergy with livings, but not academics. [...] Green helped separate the study of philosophical from that of literary and historical texts; and by creating a philosophy curriculum at Oxford he also established a rationale for trained teachers of philosophy. When Green began his academic career much of the serious writing on philosophical topic was published in journals of opinion devoted to a broad range of [topics] (rarely to 'pure' philosophy). He helped professionalize philosophical writing by encouraging specialized periodicals, such as 'Academy' and 'Mind', which were to serve as venues for the results of scholarly research." Hasil akhir dari profesionalisasi di bidang filsafat menunjukkan bahwa pekerjaan yang dilakukan di lapangan sekarang hampir secara eksklusif dilakukan oleh dosen-dosen universitas yang memegang gelar doktor di bidang penerbitan yang bersifat sangat teknis, jurnal peer-review. Sementara itu, masih jamak juga dipahami di kalangan masyarakat pada umumnya bahwa mereka memiliki satu set pandangan agama, politik atau filsafat tertentu yang mereka bisa anggap sebagai "filsafat", cara pandang semacam ini jarang diniatkan terhubung ke pekerjaan yang sedang dilakukan dalam profesi filsafat hari-hari ini. Selain itu, tidak seperti banyak bidang ilmu lain yang mengalami perkembangan industri yang baik di bidang perbukuan, majalah, dan televisi melalui ilmu pengetahuan populer, para filsuf akademik profesional justru mengomunikasikan hasil-hasil penelitian mereka secara teknis dan amat jarang mereka mengomunikasikan penemuannya kepada masyarakat umum. Filsuf Michael Sandel melalui bukunya "Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do?" dan Harry Frankfurt "On Bullshit" adalah contoh dari karya-karya yang ditulis oleh filsuf akademik profesional tetapi diarahkan ke tengah publik luaas dan akhirnya populer di kalangan pembacanya yang lebih luas dari kategori non-filsuf. Kedua karya itu menjadi New York Times best seller.