Critical Realism

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THE POWER OF NEGATIVE THINKING

Andrew Collier

Roy Bhaskar’s previous writings have belonged to definite regions of philosophy – for the most part the philosophy of science and social science. But their implications have been much wider. They have been one of the various twentieth century attempts to undo the damage done by Descartes and his successors, and in my view the most successful attempt. Dialectic leaves this guerrilla struggle in the marginal zones and joins battle in open country with the whole philosophical heritage. To change the metaphor, it stakes out the whole philosophical ground and claims it for a new, dialectical critical realist, ontology. And this is such a huge task that, even in over 400 pages, there is no space to ...