[version: 2025-06-29] This issue is in progress. Articles and book reviews will be added when available.

Preface Round II

In this issue of TAD, we take an extended look at Martin Turkis II’s recent book The Metaphysics of Michael Polanyi: Toward a Post-Critical Platonism (Palgrave Macmillan, 2024). In it, Turkis seeks to mutually illuminate and extend aspects of both Polanyian and Platonic metaphysics, and bring them into comparison with parallel schools of thought. Turkis’ thesis has sparked a very lively debate, earning responses from Dale Cannon, Graham Harman, Vincent Colapietro, and William M.R. Simpson.

About the authors:
  • Dale Cannon (cannodw@wou.edu) is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Western Oregon University. He is a long time member of the Polanyi Society and has published numerous articles on Polanyi and the post-critical turn.
  • Vincent Colapietro (vcolapietro@uri.edu) is an Adjunct Professor of Humanities at the University of Rhode Island. His research interests include American pragmatism (especially Peirce, James, and Dewey), literature, film, and music (especially, jazz), semiotics, poststructuralism, psychoanalysis, social and political philosophy, and philosophical and experimental psychology.
  • Graham Harman is an American philosopher with a focus on metaphysics. His work has given rise to Object-Oriented Ontology, an influential approach to metaphysics. He is a central figure in the Post-Continental movement known as Speculative Realism. The author of many books and articles, he is Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the Southern California Institute of Architecture.
  • William M.R. Simpson is a philosopher and theoretical physicist whose research falls at the intersection of physics and philosophy, spilling over into philosophy of mind and philosophy of religion. He is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Durham University. He is also a Research Fellow of the University of Oxford and a Research Associate of the University of Cambridge.
  • Martin Turkis II (mturkis@yahoo.com) is a teacher, writer, and musician residing in San Francisco. He received his doctorate in philosophy from the University of Navarra in Pamplona, Spain. His interests include metaphysics, virtue ethics, philosophy of education, and political economy.

Preface Round I

The first round of contributions to Volume 51 of Tradition & Discovery had two contributions which encourage us to approach Polanyi’s thought again with fresh eyes and a different take.

  • First is Jon Fennell’s “Everyone a Sailor: Oakeshott’s Affinity for the Polanyian Vision of Human Activity” – an attempt to plumb deeper, unrecognized resonances between M.P. and the famous British skeptic, conservative, and Hobbes commentator, Michael Oakeshott.
  • Second is a review E. San Juan Jr.’s Peirce’s Pragmaticism: A Radical Perspective by new TAD contributor Paloma Pérez-Ilzarbe. Pérez-Ilzarbe’s review invites us to think of Pierce’s work a bit differently – from the direction of the concerns of the New Left and social activism.
About the authors:
  • Jon Fennell (jfennell@hillsdale.edu) is professor emeritus at Hillsdale College. He is the author of numerous studies on Polanyi.
  • Paloma Pérez-Ilzarbe (pilzarbe@unav.es) is Associate Professor of Logic and Philosophy of Science at the University of Navarra (Spain). Her main publications concern late medieval and post-medieval terminism.

With Volume 51, Tradition & Discovery’s seriatim publishing also moves to a new format, which we hope will improve its accessibility, its visibility on the Web to search engines and academic institutions, and the overall efficiency of publication. Each article of the 3 initial “tranches” of the volume will be published in HTML and a simplified PDF format, with the final complete volume being packaged and designed in a manner consistent with our previous volumes

Table of Contents

Article

Book Review

Reviews of Martin Turkis’s Book and Author’s Response

  • Dale Cannon – A Review Essay of “The Metaphysics of Michael Polanyi: Toward a Post-Critical Platonism” by Martin Turkis II
    (View HTML) (View PDF)
  • Vincent M. Colapietro – The Eclipse of the Personal? Affirmations, Proposals, and Questions
    (View HTML) (View PDF)
  • Graham Harman – Michael Polanyi and Object-Oriented Ontology: In Response to Turkis
    (View HTML) (View PDF)
  • William M. R. Simpson – Matter and Form in Polanyi’s ‘Post-Critical Platonism’
    (View HTML) (View PDF)
  • Martin E. Turkis II – Space for a Post-Critical Platonism: A Response to my Interlocutors
    (View HTML) (View PDF)