%% [[Hypertext]] [[Writing Philosophy]] %% [[Writing Philosophy with Hypertext]] - [[Linking Your Thinking]] - [[Interlinked Modular Writing]] - [[Writing Academically with Links]] - **[[Hypertext Philosophy]]** - [[Conclusion - Writing Philosophy with Hypertext]] # Hypertext Philosophy - The clarification of concepts through consideration of their relation to each other plays a central role in philosophical knowledge production. Philosophers produce knowledge by using writing as a medium in which to perform "conceptual engineering" by connecting concepts to each other. - The words of the sentences of the paragraphs of the sections of the chapters of the texts philosophers compose rely on linguistic convention and the cognitive capacity of readers to link various concepts with others. - The method of reflective equilibrium enshrines such a vision. Here, philosophical writings express judgments that must be compared with other judgments in order to reach a considered balance between them. - While this function does not exhaust the philosophical role of writing, it is important and may be formalized through modular interlinked philosophical texts. These texts would have a form that reflected one important aspect of the method of philosophical cognition: the interrelation of the concepts discussed therein. - Imagine a linked version of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy similar to wikipedia where a number of key terms common across articles (determined by the editors and authors) where hyperlinked to each other. - The hypertext treatment might also be applied to historical philosophical texts, e.g. an edition of Plato's *Republic* that interlinked key terms like "form" (eidos) or "ignorance" (aporia) such that one could navigate between Plato's uses of the term in a non-linear fashion (akin to a curated search function). Perseus.edu has already built a version of this idea (along with much more). - Finally, philosophers might decide to take advantage of digital media to compose nontraditional hyperlinked philosophical "texts" like this one. Such wiki-like philosophy texts may be used in dissertation projects, as secondary material for teaching classes, or someday perhaps as freestanding publishable works. ## References - Carter 2000, "Arguments in Hypertext - A Rhetorical Approach" - Heim 1994, *The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality* - Kolb 1994, *Socrates in the Labyrinth* - Lysaker 2018, *Philosophy, Writing, and the Character of Thought*