Der Aufsatz schildert den platonisierenden Antipsychologismus welchen Bolzano, der junge Brentano, Twardowski, Meinong, der Husserl der Logischen Untersuchungen, Frege, der Russell der Jahrhundertwende und der junge Wittgenstein philosophisch vertraten, und versucht eine soziologische und ideologiekritische Interpretation sowohl dieser Einstellung als auch derjenigen des traditionellen Psychologismus des achtzehnten Jahrhunderts. Der Platonismus des neunzehnten und zwanzigsten Jahrhunderts wird als ein Ausdruck fiir - oder vielmehr als eine Reaktion gegen - den Verfall der klassischen burgerlichen Werte aufgefaBt. In Wittgensteins Tractatus spielen Elemente sowohl (...) eines platonisierenden Antipsychologismus wie auch eines relativistischen, verhaltensphanomenologisch orientierten Antipsychologismus eine Rolle: dieses Werk wird also als eine grelle Manifestation des Uberganges von der klassischen zur spatbiirgerlichen Weltanschauung, als ein Obergang vom Glauben an ewige Wahrheiten zur Hinnahme einer Gebrauchs-Theorie der Bedeutung und deren Konsequenzen interpretiert. (shrink)
It is a pleasure for me to give this opening address to the Royal Institute of Philosophy Conference on ‘Explanation’ for two reasons. The first is that it is succeeded by exciting symposia and other papers concerned with various special aspects of the topic of explanation. The second is that the conference is being held in my old alma mater , the University of Glasgow, where I did my first degree. Especially due to C. A. Campbell and George Brown there (...) was in the Logic Department a big emphasis on absolute idealism, especially F. H. Bradley. My inclinations were to oppose this line of thought and to espouse the empiricism and realism of Russell, Broad and the like. Empiricism was represented in the department by D. R. Cousin, a modest man who published relatively little, but who was of quite extraordinary philosophical acumen and lucidity, and by Miss M. J. Levett, whose translation of Plato's Theaetetus formed an important part of the philosophy syllabus. (shrink)
Dr Ian Ramsey has made considerable use of the word ‘disclosure’ in what he has to say about religion and in his attempts to give an account of the meaning of religious language. He sometimes speaks of ‘discernment’ or ‘insight’ but ‘disclosure’ is the word he normally favours. In what follows I shall ask: what a disclosure is, to what extent Dr Ramsey's use of the notion leads to confusions, and what questions have to be faced in order to resolve (...) these confusions. (shrink)
It is characteristic of realists to separate ontology from epistemology and of idealists to mix the two things up. By ‘idealists’ here I am mainly referring to the British neo-Hegelians but the charge of mixing up ontology and epistemology can be made against at least one ‘subjective idealist’, namely Bishop Berkeley, as his wellknown dictum ‘esse ispercipi’ testifies. The objective idealists rejected the correspondence theory of truth and on the whole accepted a coherence theory. The qualification is needed here because (...) H. H. Joachim, in The Nature of Truth, found the coherence theory unable to deal with the problem of error. (shrink)
It has frequently been lamented that while the human species has made immense progress in science it is nevertheless ethically backward. This ethical backwardness is all the more dangerous because the advanced state of scientific knowledge has made available a technology with which we are able to destroy ourselves—indeed a technology which may have got so much out of hand that we may not even have the capacity to prevent it from destroying us.
Hume's doctrine of natural belief allows that certain beliefs are justifiably held by all men without regard to the quality of the evidence which may be produced in their favour. Examples are belief in an external world and belief in the veracity of our senses. According to R. J. Butler, Hume argues in the Dialogues that belief in God is of this sort. More recently John Hick has argued that for some people it is as natural to believe in God (...) as to believe in an external world. I shall first inquire what Hume understands by reasonable belief and by natural belief. I shall then use the results of this investigation to argue, against Butler, that belief in God is not a natural belief; and against Hick, more briefly, that his thesis is not viable in as far as it depends upon Hume's doctrine of natural belief. These discussions are important to the philosophy of religion since by means of natural beliefs it could be urged that belief in God is something justifiable without reference to reason or evidence: a position which would be of immense value to the theist. (shrink)
This paper is partly to get rid of some irritation which I have felt at the quite common tendency of philosophers to elucidate ‘is red’ in terms of ‘looks red’. For a relatively recent example see, for example, Frank Jackson and Robert Pargetter, ‘An Objectivist′s Guide to Subjectivism about Colour’. However rather than try to make a long list of references, I would rather say ‘No names, no pack drill’. I have even been disturbed to find the use of the (...) words ‘looks red’ that I am opposing ascribed to me by Keith Campbell in his useful article ‘David Armstrong and Realism about Colour’. I am not saying that such talk is necessarily wrong. Talk of ‘looks red’ may be a way of harmlessly referring to the behavioural discriminations with respect to colour of a human percipient. Where it is dangerous, at least to those of us who wish to argue for a broadly physicalist account of the mind, is that it may have concealed overtones of reference to epiphenomenal and irreducibly psychic properties of experiences. Moreover even if it does not do so it may be fence sitting on this issue and liable to misinterpretation. (shrink)
In an article in Philosophy R. G. Swinburne set out to argue that none of Hume's formal objections to the design argument ‘have any validity against a carefully articulated version of the argument’ . This, he maintained, is largely because Hume's criticisms ‘are bad criticisms of the argument in any form’ . The ensuing controversy between Swinburne and Olding 1 has focused upon the acceptable/unacceptable aspects of the dualism presupposed in Swinburne's defence of the design argument; upon whether any simplification (...) is achieved by reducing scientific explanation to agent explanation; and upon the problems which arise from taking a man's acting upon his body as the analogy for understanding a disembodied agent acting upon matter. In this article I shall refer to the Swinburne-Olding controversy when appropriate but my main concern is to return to Swinburne's original article and argue, seriatim , that Hume's individual criticisms of the design argument are for the most part a great deal more powerful than Swinburne allowed. I shall contend that cumulatively they destroy the design argument as any sort of rational foundation for theistic belief. But first I shall indicate briefly the character of the argument together with one or two of the distinctions and refinements in terms of which it has been found helpful to carry on the discussion in recent years. (shrink)
A great deal of modern Protestant theology looks very much like an attempt to conduct a salvage operation which is designed to make clear how it is possible to retain belief in Jesus Christ, and at the same time remain intellectually honest. For the same sceptical challenge which faces the secular historian also faces the theologian. If Christians are correct in arguing that the locus of God's revelation to man is in Jesus of Nazareth, then in order to know about (...) this supposed revelation, it is necessary to know about a period of time in the past; it is necessary to know the history of the man's life and actions. Theologians are therefore faced with the question: how, if at all, is it possible to bridge the logical gap between statements describing what Jesus of Nazareth said and did, and statements describing the evidence for what Jesus of Nazareth said and did. The solution found to this question by theologians tends to be determined by their conscious and unconscious philosophical presuppositions; just as it did in the examples discussed above of secular critical philosophies of history. (shrink)
A book review of a "Psychology in Progress" collection of these early 1980s articles from a variety of cognitive science disciplines that were pushing back against behaviourism, exploring the nature and function of consciousness, &/or advancing (or rediscovering) content-driven or representational models. Book Chapters: Editor's introduction: "Human brain anatomy" Harry J. Jerison, "On the Evolution of mind" Keith Oatley, "Representations of the physical and social world" John O'Keefe, "Is consciousness the gateway to the hippocampal cognitive map? A speculative essay on (...) the neural basis of mind" David A. Oakley, "Cognition and imagery in animals" David A. Oakley, "Animal awareness, consciousness and self-image" Freda Newcome, "Neuropsychology of consciousness: a review of human clinical evidence" Joseph E. LeDoux, "Brain, mind and language" David A. Oakley and Lesley C. Eames, "The plurality of consciousness". (shrink)
Ethics support services like Moral Case Deliberation intend to support healthcare professionals in ethically difficult situations. To assess outcomes of MCD, the Euro-MCD Instrument has been developed. Field studies to test this instrument are needed and have been conducted, examining important outcomes before MCD participation and experienced outcomes. The current study aimed to describe how participants’ perceive the importance of MCD outcomes after MCD; compare these perceptions with those before MCD participation; and test the factor structure of these outcomes. Swedish, (...) Norwegian and Dutch healthcare professionals rated the importance of outcomes in the Euro-MCD Instrument after four and eight MCDs. Ratings were compared with those before MCD participation using paired and independent samples t-tests. The factor structure was tested using exploratory factor analyses. After 4 and 8 MCDs, 443 respectively 247 respondents completed the instrument. More than 69% rated all MCD outcomes as ‘quite’ or ‘very’ important, especially outcomes from Enhanced Collaboration, Improved Moral Reflexivity and Improved Moral Attitude. Significant differences for 16 outcomes regarding ratings before and after MCD participation were not considered meaningful. Factor analyses suggested three categories, which seemingly resemble the domains Improved Moral Reflexivity, Enhanced Collaboration and a combination of Improved Moral Attitude and Enhanced Emotional Support. After participation in MCDs, respondents confirmed the importance of outcomes in the Euro-MCD Instrument. The question on perceived importance and the categorization of outcomes need reconsideration. The revised instrument will be presented elsewhere, based on all field studies and theoretical reflections. (shrink)
A good argument is one whose conclusions follow from its premises; its conclusions are consequences of its premises. But in what sense do conclusions follow from premises? What is it for a conclusion to be a consequence of premises? Those questions, in many respects, are at the heart of logic (as a philosophical discipline). Consider the following argument: 1. If we charge high fees for university, only the rich will enroll. We charge high fees for university. Therefore, only the rich (...) will enroll. There are many different things one can say about this argument, but many agree that if we do not equivocate (if the terms mean the same thing in the premises and the conclusion) then the argument is valid, that is, the conclusion follows deductively from the premises. This does not mean that the conclusion is true. Perhaps the premises are not true. However, if the premises are true, then the conclusion is also true, as a matter of logic. This entry is about the relation between premises and conclusions in valid arguments. (shrink)
Semantic and soritical paradoxes challenge entrenched, fundamental principles about language - principles about truth, denotation, quantification, and, among others, 'tolerance'. Study of the paradoxes helps us determine which logical principles are correct. So it is that they serve not only as a topic of philosophical inquiry but also as a constraint on such inquiry: they often dictate the semantic and logical limits of discourse in general. Sixteen specially written essays by leading figures in the field offer new thoughts and arguments (...) about the paradoxes. (shrink)
Semantic and soritical paradoxes challenge entrenched, fundamental principles about language - principles about truth, denotation, quantification, and, among others, 'tolerance'. Study of the paradoxes helps us determine which logical principles are correct. So it is that they serve not only as a topic of philosophical inquiry but also as a constraint on such inquiry: they often dictate the semantic and logical limits of discourse in general. Sixteen specially written essays by leading figures in the field offer new thoughts and arguments (...) about the paradoxes. (shrink)
Extensively classroom-tested, Possibilities and Paradox provides an accessible and carefully structured introduction to modal and many-valued logic. The authors cover the basic formal frameworks, enlivening the discussion of these different systems of logic by considering their philosophical motivations and implications. Easily accessible to students with no background in the subject, the text features innovative learning aids in each chapter, including exercises that provide hands-on experience, examples that demonstrate the application of concepts, and guides to further reading.
