Alasdair MacIntyre has died, but his philosophy of virtue should be resurrected

Last month, a philosopher died. His passing is remarkable because it confirms an assertion he had made decades ago. Alasdair MacIntyre observed that philosophy was dead, retreating beyond the horizon of relevance because of paths chosen from the Enlightenment to present. Evidence of this irrelevance is that the most important and “influential” philosopher of the past century can die, and it doesn’t make the news.

MacIntyre’s most influential book, 1981’s After Virtue, not only explained the state of contemporary Western civilization but also meticulously described how we got here.

In laying the foundation for his thesis, MacIntyre asks the reader to imagine a post-apocalyptic world where society attempts to rebuild, but the building blocks of their technological society have been obliterated. All that remains are discreet fragments of information without context or an overarching theory of how things work (e.g., understanding electricity without the benefit of Watt, Ohm, Edison, or Tesla).

#AmericanThinker #AlasdairMacIntyre #Philosophy #Society

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