The Nicholas Rescher Prize for

Systematic Philosophy In its most common sense, philosophical methodology is the field of inquiry studying the methods used to do philosophy. But the term can also refer to the methods themselves. It may be understood in a wide sense as the general study of principles ...

was established by the

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a public state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is composed of 17 undergraduate and graduate schools and colleges at its urban Pittsburgh campus, home to the univers ...

in 2009 to counter present-day tendencies to narrow specialization by rewarding and showcasing the work of philosophers who have addressed the historical “big questions” of the field in ways that nevertheless command the respect of specialists. Awarded biennially the prize consists of a gold medal together with a sum of $25,000. The prize is named for

Nicholas Rescher Nicholas Rescher (; ; born 15 July 1928) is a German-American philosopher, polymath, and author, who has been a professor of philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh since 1961. He is chairman of the Center for Philosophy of Science and was fo ...

, Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy, who has served on the university’s faculty for over 50 years. The recipients to date are:

Ernest Sosa Ernest Sosa (born June 17, 1940) is an American philosopher primarily interested in epistemology. Since 2007 he has been Board of Governors Professor of Philosophy at Rutgers University, but he spent most of his career at Brown University. Educa ...

(2010),

Alvin Plantinga Alvin Carl Plantinga (born November 15, 1932) is an American analytic philosopher who works primarily in the fields of philosophy of religion, epistemology (particularly on issues involving epistemic justification), and logic. From 1963 to 1982, ...

(2012, joint award) and Jürgen Mittelstraß (2012, joint award),

Hilary Putnam Hilary Whitehall Putnam (; July 31, 1926 – March 13, 2016) was an American philosopher, mathematician, and computer scientist, and a major figure in analytic philosophy in the second half of the 20th century. He made significant contributions ...

(2015), and

Ruth Millikan Ruth Garrett Millikan (born 1933) is a leading American philosopher of biology, psychology, and language. Millikan has spent most of her career at the University of Connecticut, where she is now Professor Emerita of Philosophy. Education and ca ...

(2017).

References

University of Pittsburgh Philosophy awards Awards established in 2009 {{Award-stub