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[Note: If there was a tag for that, I'd tag this question as philosophy-of-history-of-philosophy (as convoluted as this term is, I think it fits the question the most).]

This might be a bit too historicisty, but bear with me.

First I'd like to ask for a particular view: was there any philosopher who presented the progression of philosophy* as such that over the course of it, we see many philosophical questions being taken in many different interpretations, in all sorts of contexts, and the questions (generally speaking), remain pretty much the same - only that in different contexts there are different answers. So, we can infer that the way philosophy works over the course of history is by answering the same questions, but in the way that fit to the culture at the time. This way we have a sort of predefined number of questions (the only things that can have new "progress"/ideas are sub-questions and interpretations). Note: this "predefined number" isn't a metaphysical statement on its own, but rather a sociological or epistemological one- those questions are simply what interest us as the human kind (similar in a way to the idea of "noosphere").


*by "progression of philosophy" I mean like for example how Kuhn identifies progression of science as paradigms, or the classic linear view of progression.


Second, I'd like to ask a more general question - what are some popular views regarding the way philosophy progress? (as I've said regarding science, linear would be the neutral view.)

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  • I have no idea what you are asking here. You seem to be comparing two methods of... eh... what? Presenting the history of philosophy? And you are asking what philosophers think of the two different methods of presenting the history of their field of study? That sounds incredibly meta to me...
    – MichaelK
    Commented Mar 29, 2018 at 11:04
  • @MichaelK it is incredibly meta, yes. Although it's been done time and again (maybe not in the way I presented, but many philosophers have presented a "history of philosophy" books). And if not for philosophy, it has definitely been done for science. I don't see why it can't be done for philosophy too, it seems very intuitive for me. Commented Mar 29, 2018 at 11:35
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    I do not understand the question either, "the answer" to what? There are plenty of ways to present past philosophy and different philosophers opted for different ones, some arrange it chronologically, some by subject, some by problem, some by loose association. Almost no one supports the idea of "progress" or of any "predefined number", but the two aren't mutually exclusive. So the "middle" of what?
    – Conifold
    Commented Mar 29, 2018 at 21:04
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    @Conifold I'm sorry, I have trouble phrasing this. I mean "progression" in a similar manner to how Hegel presents history as the realization of the Spirit(/freedom) via dialectics. Presenting only those two options might be wrong, but I also don't mean what you suggested. Sorry for incomprehensible comment, I don't seem to find the appropriate phrasing. Commented Mar 29, 2018 at 21:38
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    Hegel presented it as self-realization of the Spirit, Spengler as part of life cycles of "cultures", Marx as a march towards communism, and Heidegger as wrestling with obfuscation of "being" by Plato's tradition of ideas/essences. But what of it, what is the question? Is it about the "one true way in the middle"? I seriously doubt there is such a thing, philosophy is about perspectives, but I quoted one "middle" view (Friedman's) in the answer to your previous question What do philosophers make of intractable metaphysical controversies?
    – Conifold
    Commented Mar 29, 2018 at 22:15

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