Rorty on Cant

[Thomas Seay]

The work in question is that of enlarging oneself.
That requires being ready to be bowled over by
tomorrow’s experiences—to remain open to the
possibility that the next book you read, or the next
person
you meet, will change your life. Increased
rationality—increased coherence of belief and
desire—cannot
close itself off from this possibility of disruption
without falling victim to cant. You are such a victim
insofar
as you believe that you already possess criteria for
judging the value of any books or people you may
encounter—criteria that will provide you with good and
sufficient reasons for tucking each of them into
some familiar pigeonhole. To avoid such victimization,
you must give up one of the dreams of
philosophy—the dream of completeness, of the
imperturbability attributed by the wise, of the
mastery
supposedly possessed by those who have, once and for
all, achieved completion by achieving
enlightenment.  

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"The tradition of all the dead generations

 weighs like a nightmare on the brain of the living"

-Karl Marx

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