Philosophy in the Modern World, Vol. 4 Book

I honestly wouldn't know to begin with a project like this, which seems to make life doubly difficult for itself by electing to treat the continental and analytic schools in conjunction rather than in isolation. I probably wouldn't end with a philosopher I so disdained as much as Anthony Kenny clearly disdains Derrida, though perhaps this is his way of communicating a certain pessimism about the future of philosophy. I recall a (possibly apocryphal) story about Derrida's selection for an honorary degree at the University of Cambridge, only for the proposal to be nixed by its own philosophy department, who were so incensed that Derrida should even be considered a proper philosopher, much less one recognised outside his own circle. It is easier to believe after after read Kenny's account.

His best section is, understandably, on Wittgenstein, a philosopher whom Kenny has focused the bulk of his study. But the chronological half of the book is usually lucid by the standards of the genre, and where this lucidity breaks down I'm inclined to place the blame at the feet of Hegel et al for coming up with the theories in the first place. The thematic chapters (or those that I read) I found harder to follow, and some were predominantly focused on questions I hadn't considered - the chapter on Philosophy of Mind had much to say on intentionality (for me difficult to distinguish from a problem of semantics) and little on the renewed materialism of neuroscience, but possibly those with more philosophical training than I (that is to say, anyone with any philosophical training at all) may agree with Kenny's approach.