Philosophical Dictionary
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Inkompetenzkompensationskompetenz: Odo Marquard’s 33-Letter Joke About What Philosophers Can Do
By Markus Uehleke
Inkompetenzkompensationskompetenz sounds like a typing accident, but the German philosopher Odo Marquard meant it seriously: philosophy, once competent for everything, is left with one skill. Career websites now use the word for bluffers. Who is right, and what can philosophers actually do that nobody else does?