This is the first modern edition of the works of Lady Mary Shepherd, one of the most important women philosophers of the early modern period. Shepherd has been widely neglected in the history of philosophy, but her work engaged with the dominant philosophers of the time - among them Hume, Berkeley, and Reid. In particular, her 1827 volume Essays on the Perception of an External Universe outlines a theory of causation, perception, and knowledge which Shepherd presents as (...) an alternative to what she sees as the mistaken views of Berkeley and Hume. What she ultimately presents is an original and systematic metaphysics and epistemology. Shepherd's Essays consists of two parts. The first is a theory of perception and knowledge of the external world, which is designed to rebut idealism and skepticism about the external world and show that our ordinary beliefs are based on reason. The second is a collection of essays on topics in metaphysics and epistemology, including the immateriality and eternity of the mind, the relationship between mind and body, the possibility of miracles, the association of ideas, the relationship between physical and mathematical reasoning, and the epistemology of testimony. Antonia LoLordo's edition of Shepherd's Essays includes scholarly notes throughout the text that provide historical and philosophical context and expand on the major concepts of Shepherd's system. Her extensive introduction to Shepherd's life and works surveys some of the major points of Shepherd's system, points out directions for future research, and offers guidance for readers planning to teach her work in their courses. This volume is an invaluable primary resource for scholars, graduate students, and undergraduates interested in metaphysics, epistemology, and early modern philosophy. (shrink)

Lady Mary Shepherd’s critique of Hume’s account of causation, his worries about knowledge of matters of fact, and the contention that it is possible for the course of nature to spontaneously change relies primarily on three premises, two of which – that objects are merely bundles of qualities and that the qualities of an object are individuated by the causal powers contributed by those qualities – anticipate contemporary metaphysical views in ways that she should be getting credit for. The (...) remaining premise – that it is impossible for an object to begin to exist uncaused – seems more old fashioned. I argue that Shepherd can do without her old-fashioned premise and that she provides the materials for arguing that her remaining premises demonstrate a stronger anti-Humeanism than is maintained even by the contemporary representatives of those views, even though she may have to concede more to Humeanism than she would like. (shrink)

Shepherd’s argument against Hume’s thesis that an object can begin its existence uncaused has received short shrift in the secondary literature. I argue that the key to understanding that argument’s success is understanding its dialectical context. Shepherd sees the dialectical situation as follows. Hume presents an argument against Locke and Clarke the conclusion of which is that an object can come into existence uncaused. An essential premise of that argument is Hume’s theory of mental representation. Hume’s theory of (...) mental representation, however, is itself implausible and unsupported. Therefore, one need not accept this premise or this conclusion. Thus, Shepherd proceeds to her discussion of the relation of cause and effect free to help herself to the thesis that every beginning of existence must have a cause. Additionally, she elsewhere pays down the debt she incurs in that argument by presenting her own alternative theory of mental representation, which is both plausible in its own right, and can account for the error that she takes Hume to make. (shrink)

The aims of this paper are twofold. First, I offer a new insight into Shepherd’s theory of mind by demonstrating that she distinguishes a threefold ‘Variety of Intellect’, that is, three kinds of minds grouped according to their cognitive limitations. Following Shepherd, I call them (i) minds afflicted with idiocy, (ii) inferior understandings, and (iii) sound understandings. Second, I show how Shepherd’s distinction informs her theory of education. While Shepherd claims that her views serve to improve (...) educational practices, she does not explain how her threefold ‘Variety of intellect’ does so. I argue that Shepherd’s distinction contributes to her aim by providing pedagogues with a more comprehensive grasp of the various cognitive limitations of the people in their care. This allows the former to adjust their expectations and to provide need-oriented guidance. (shrink)

Shepherd appears to endorse something like the following biconditonal regarding qualities and objects. □(An object, O, exists ↔ Some bundle of qualities, Q1, Q2, … Qn exists). There is a growing consensus in the secondary literature that she also takes the right side of this biconditional to ground the left side. I.e. Shepherd is a bundle theorist who takes an object to be nothing but a mass of qualities, or causal powers. I argue here that despite appearances, this (...) interpretation reverses Shepherd's actual view. I.e. I argue that for Shepherd qualities, or causal powers, are grounded in the intrinsic constitutions of objects. In the case of "external objects", these intrinsic constitutions are unknowable to us; in the case of "internal objects", we have direct knowledge of them. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to present an interpretation of Shepherd’s account of our most fundamental cognitive powers, most especially the faculty that Shepherd calls perception, which she claims is a unity of contributions from the understanding and the senses. I find that Shepherd is what we would nowadays call a meaning holist: she holds that the meaning of any natural-kind term is constituted by its place in a system of definitions, which system specifies the causal (...) roles of the objects its terms name. Such an account of meaning raises questions about the contact that such a system of definitions, or conceptual scheme, makes with the world. The natural place to seek answers to these questions is in Shepherd’s account of perception, which I argue Shepherd takes to be our most fundamental cognitive faculty. Our cognitive lives begin with perceptions, representations of objects as the cause of those very perceptions of them. With this interpretation in hand, I draw a contrast between it and Boyle’s and Lolordo’s recent work on Shepherd’s theory of meaning. I argue that for Shepherd truths about the causal powers of objects are analytic, and that the relevant empirical questions answered by science concern whether our conceptual scheme accurately represents the world. Finally, I provide additional support for this interpretation by showing that it comports with Shepherd’s criticism of her philosophical opponents, Berkeley, Hume, and Reid. (shrink)

Mary Shepherd and the Causal Relation - Part One -/- Part One gives context to the life and work of Lady Mary Shepherd. It weaves together the stories of her ancestors, her own stories and the wider social, historical and philosophical context. The aim is to evoke a world from which to mark the emergence of Mary Shepherd, Scotland’s first female philosopher.

Shepherd defends an account of the universe founded on two causal principles: that effects necessarily have causes, and that like causes have like effects. Folding mind into the class of natural phenomena governed by these principles, Shepherd naturalizes the mind, but in doing so she sets herself the challenge of explaining how, within a deterministic universe, agents can be necessary causes of their own actions. With special attention to Shepherd’s resistance to materialism and to any reduction of (...) the mental, the paper argues that we can read Shepherd as leveraging her original theory of causation to develop a distinctive compatibilist view of the psychology of intention, one that makes agents the necessary causal sources of their own actions. Published on 2022-10-28 10:36:44. (shrink)

According to Nicole Oresme (c. 1320–1382), human beings, unlike all other animals, consist of two substances: a thinking substance and a sensing substance. This paper presents and explores the arguments Oresme uses to arrive at this position, which is unusual in medieval philosophical psychology and which at least superficially – though their methods are completely different – resembles what Descartes concluded about the nature of the human soul and body two and a half centuries later. The paper also considers (...) some moments of ambivalence in Oresme’s presentation, as well as unresolved difficulties, several of which have theological as well as philosophical implications. (shrink)

In several early 19th century works, Mary Shepherd articulates a theory of causation that is intended to respond to Humean skepticism. I argue that Shepherd's theory should be read in light of the science of the day and her conception of her place in the British philosophical tradition. Reading Shepherd’s theory in light of her conception of the history of philosophy, including her claim to be the genuine heir of Locke, illuminates the broader significance of her attempt (...) to reinstate reason as the source of scientific knowledge. Reading Shepherd's theory in light of the science of the day helps make plausible her claim that there are robust natural kinds in nature, defined by their causal powers: this is precisely what then-recent advances in chemistry hold. (shrink)

These comments, which take the form of criticism and response, were the basis of a zoom conversation at the Eastern APA, January 2021. Josh is putting them up on philpapers (with permission from all involved) in case they are helpful to people interested in the themes of this book.

In 1827, Lady Mary Shepherd published Essays on the Perception of an External Universe, which offers both an argument for the existence of a world of external bodies existing outside our minds and a criticism of Berkeley's argument for idealism in A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge. In this paper, I evaluate Margaret Atherton's criticisms of Shepherd's case against Berkeley, and provide reasons for thinking that, although Shepherd's particular criticisms of Berkeley do not succeed, she (...) correctly identifies an important problem to which Berkeley's reasoning is subject. (shrink)

Recent work on Mary Shepherd has largely focused on her metaphysics, especially as a response to Berkeley and Hume. However, relatively little attention has thus far been paid to the epistemological aspects of Shepherd’s program. What little attention Shepherd’s epistemology has received has tended to cast her as providing an unsatisfactory response to the skeptical challenge issued by Hume. For example, Walter Ott and Jeremy Fantl have each suggested that Shepherd cannot avoid Hume’s inductive skepticism even (...) if she is granted her metaphysics. In this paper, I examine Shepherd’s epistemology and argue that her response to Hume is more successful than the current literature suggests. In particular, I argue that, if Shepherd is granted her metaphysics, she can answer Hume’s demand for a rational justification of ordinary inductive inferences via a deductively justified uniformity principle and an appeal to parsimony. (shrink)

This is the first modern edition of an important work by a previously neglected early 19th century woman philosopher, Mary Shepherd. Shepherd develops a distinctive philosophical system that can be seen as a competitor to Kant's Transcendental Idealism. The edition is aimed at researchers in early modern philosophy and is also intended to be used in graduate and undergraduate courses. It contains a concise introduction as guide for the reader.

the philosophical writings ofx Lady Mary Shepherd were apparently well regarded in her own time, but dropped out of view in the mid-nineteenth century.1 Some historians of philosophy have recently begun attending to the distinctive arguments in Shepherd's two books, but the secondary literature that exists so far has largely focused on her critiques of Hume and Berkeley. However, many other themes and arguments in Shepherd's writings have not yet been explored. This paper takes up one such (...) issue, what Shepherd means by 'mind,' 'soul,' and 'self.' Shepherd held the unusual view that the mind is an enduring capacity that causes (whether on its own or in conjunction with other partial causes, such as... (shrink)

This paper examines the role of reason in Shepherd's account of acquiring knowledge of the external world via first principles. Reason is important, but does not have a foundational role. Certain principles enable us to draw the required inferences for acquiring knowledge of the external world. These principles are basic, foundational and, more importantly, self‐evident and thus justified in other ways than by demonstration. Justificatory demonstrations of these principles are neither required, nor possible. By drawing on textual and contextual (...) evidence, I will show that Shepherd should have said that we know the first principles of any science, in general, and that “everything which begins to exist must have a cause”, in particular, via intuition, not via reason. Reasoning about such principles can help their self‐evidence shine through in certain cases; their justification, and our being justified in believing them, does not come from this reasoning, however. (shrink)

Peer review is a widely accepted instrument for raising the quality of science. Peer review limits the enormous unstructured influx of information and the sheer amount of dubious data, which in its absence would plunge science into chaos. In particular, peer review offers the benefit of eliminating papers that suffer from poor craftsmanship or methodological shortcomings, especially in the experimental sciences. However, we believe that peer review is not always appropriate for the evaluation of controversial hypothetical science. We argue that (...) the process of peer review can be prone to bias towards ideas that affirm the prior convictions of reviewers and against innovation and radical new ideas. Innovative hypotheses are thus highly vulnerable to being “filtered out” or made to accord with conventional wisdom by the peer review process. Consequently, having introduced peer review, the Elsevier journal Medical Hypotheses may be unable to continue its tradition as a radical journal allowing discussion of improbable or unconventional ideas. Hence we conclude by asking the publisher to consider re-introducing the system of editorial review to Medical Hypotheses. (shrink)

Mary Shepherd (1777–1847) was a fierce and brilliant critic of Berkeley and Hume, who moreover offered strikingly original positive views about the nature of reality and our access to it which deserve much more attention (and credit, since she anticipates many prominent views) than they have received thus far. By way of illustration, I focus on Shepherd's 1824 Essay Upon the Relation of Cause and Effect, Controverting the Doctrine of Mr. Hume, Concerning the Nature of that Relation (ERCE). (...) After a brief setup, I canvas certain of her trenchant objections to Hume’s argumentation; I then present the positive core of her response to Hume, which consists in providing novel accounts of how reason alone or reason coupled with experience can justify, first, that every effect must have a cause, and second, that it is necessary that like causes produce like effects. Among other contributions here, Shepherd provides a distinctively metaphysical argument for the claim that nothing can begin to exist 'of itself' (going beyond an appeal to the Principle of Sufficient Reason, in particular), and leverages difference-making considerations to make the case that a single 'experimentum crucis' can justify causal belief (anticipating Mill's 'method of difference'). I close by highlighting salient features of Shepherd's metaphysics of causation, whereby causation is singularist and local (anticipating Ducasse and Anscombe) and involves synchronic interactions (anticipating Mill's and certain contemporary accounts), and according to which objects are essentially characterized by their causes and effects (anticipating contemporary causal or dispositional essentialist positions). (shrink)

Lady Mary Shepherd holds that the relation of cause and effect consists of the combination of two objects to create a third object. She also holds that this account implies that causes are synchronous with their effects. There is a single instant in which the objects that are causes combine to create the object which is their effect. Hume argues that cause and effect cannot be synchronous because if they were then the entire chain of successive causes and effects (...) would all collapse into a single moment, and succession would not be possible. I argue that Shepherd has a ready, although implicit response, to Hume’s argument. Since causation is combination on Shepherd’s view, she is free to hold that there are times in between those instants in which combinations occur, during which times other, non-combinatory changes occur, which changes account for succession. (shrink)

In the final chapters of her 1824 Essay upon the Relation of Cause and Effect, Lady Mary Shepherd considers what it means for an organism to be alive. The physician William Lawrence had...

Shepherd’s philosophy centers on her rejection of Hume’s arguments against the demonstrability of causal principles. According to Shepherd, the causal maxim—everything that begins to exist must have a cause—is demonstratively true. She begins her first major philosophical work with a proof of this maxim. While scholars have complained that the proof seems blatantly circular, a closer look at Shepherd’s texts and their Lockean background dispels this worry. Shepherd’s premises are motivated not by the causal maxim or (...) her theory of causation, but by a metaphysics that distinguishes between substances and affections and by an empirical understanding of a ‘beginning of existence.’. (shrink)

The simultaneous globalization and demographic shift of the Church to the Global South has produced an unprecedented climate for theological work. Pastors and theologians are confronted with the task of developing theological systems that are faithful to the authoritative standard of Scripture, tailored to the increasingly complex needs of their local contexts, and sensitive to the ongoing dialogue of other leaders around the globe. In light of the increasing cross-cultural dialogue among scholars and pastors within a globalized church and a (...) corresponding desire to encourage greater ‘diasporadic consciousness’ therein, this article presents the biblical-theological shepherd-leader motif as a primary metaphor for understanding the distinct nature and role of pastoral leadership. This article presents shepherd leadership as a robust metaphor of pastoral leadership by reviewing Scripture’s use of the metaphor and recent significant works on the subject. In the second section of the article, I propose a model profile of the biblical shepherd-leader based upon the insights of the biblical-theological review. (shrink)

Nicole Shukin pursues a resolutely materialist engagement with the "question of the animal," challenging the philosophical idealism that has dogged the question by tracing how the politics of capital and of animal life impinge on one ...

On Mary Shepherd's view of our perception of the external world, perceived qualities are "as a landscape, sent from an unseen country by which we may know it". Originally published in 1827, Shepherd's Essays on the Perception of an External Universe made important contributions in epistemology and the philosophy of perception, among other areas. In Antonia LoLordo's much-anticipated new edition of the text, advanced undergraduate students and scholars alike will find an inviting and authoritative introduction to Shepherd's (...) work, followed by a modernized and annotated copy of the text.LoLordo's is the first modern edition of Shepherd's EPEU. Inexpensive... (shrink)

Shepherd propounds a theory of mind with a fair claim to be better than Hume’s at explaining the sources of commonly held human beliefs about causal necessity due largely to her relational theory of sense perception. In comparison with Hume’s account, it incorporates a more sophisticated treatment of mental representation, especially the role of relational structure and logical form. Most important, perhaps, Shepherd’s theory enforces the division, obscured by Hume, between the evidence of necessity and the metaphysical foundation (...) of necessity. (shrink)

There has recently been a resurgence of interest in the early nineteenth century Scottish philosopher Mary Shepherd. This Element is intended to provide an overview of Shepherd's system, including her views on the following wide range of topics: causation, induction, knowledge of the external world, matter, life, animal cognition, the relationship between mind and body, the immortality of the soul, the existence of God, miracles, and the nature of divine creation. The author also provides an overview of relevant (...) secondary literature and argues for their own interpretation of Shepherd's metaphysics. (shrink)

Some of the things we do intentionally we do halfheartedly. I develop and defend an account of halfheartedness with respect to action on which one is halfhearted with respect to an action A if one’s overall motivation to A is weak. This requires getting clear on what it is to have some level of overall motivation with respect to an action, and on what it means to say one’s overall motivation is weak or strong. After developing this account, I defend (...) the claim that one key functional expression of halfhearted action is the possession of impaired control over the action in question. Finally, I elucidate a puzzle that sometimes arises with respect to halfhearted action. The puzzle arises when an agent’s commitment in acting conflicts with an agent’s acceptance of poor performance. (shrink)

Virginia Woolf, in A Room of One’s Own, asked why there were no women writers before 1800. If she had been thinking about philosophers instead of writers in the traditional women’s areas of plays and fiction, she might have asked why there were no women philosophers at all, for I suspect that most people would find it very hard to name a woman philosopher before the present day. To help her in answering her question, she invented a fictional character, Judith (...) Shakespeare, a sister to William Shakespeare. The conditions of Judith’s life made it impossible for her to write, and so Woolf speculated that the women who would have been writers did not lead the kinds of lives that permitted them to realize their talents. Woolf’s image of Judith Shakespeare is a very powerful one but her speculation is only half right. There undoubtedly were many women in the past who would have been talented writers or philosophers if their lives had been different, but Judith Shakespeare’s image can also blot out our knowledge of women who, contrary to Woolf’s speculation, did exist and did write. Indeed, we know now there were even women who wrote philosophy. These women were in many ways exceptional, for Woolf is quite right that most women did not live either with enough privacy or with enough income to allow them to write. Often, they were members of the aristocracy, whose position enabled them to behave eccentrically, sometimes to be able to demand privacy, and sometimes to be able to invite contacts with leading intellectuals. Quite often, these women were childless, which in an age before birth control made them exceptions to the general rule, and at a time when many women were bearing their last child in their forties, was the only thing that could have given them private time. Nevertheless, research in the last ten or fifteen years has uncovered the work of quite a number of these women: for example, Princess Elizabeth of Bohemia, the Electress Sophie, Queen Christina of Sweden, Queen Sophie Charlotte of Prussia, Anne, Lady Conway, Mary Astell, Damaris, Lady Masham, Catharine Trotter Cockburn, Emilie du Chatelet, Catherine Macaulay, Lady Mary Shepherd, and many more. Woolf’s question then comes up again in a slightly different form. Why is it that the work of these women was for so long unknown? Why do so many people even today remain ignorant of the existence of women philosophers before the present day? I am not going to answer this question directly; in fact, I suspect it has multiple answers. Instead, I am going to present a case study from amongst all the cases of all of these women. I hope by considering the history of this woman, and, in particular, considering the way in which she was read, it will be possible to gain some insights into the ways in which women have failed to be incorporated into philosophical history. The woman I am going to discuss is Lady Mary Shepherd. Mary Shepherd actually falls outside of Woolf’s target date of 1800, since she flourished in the first half of the nineteenth century, but this merely reflects my point about the greater ignorance that prevails about women in philosophy. (shrink)

Nicole Hassoun here makes a philosophical argument for health, and access to essential medicines, as essential human rights, and she proposes the Global Health Impact system as a way to ensure those rights. She reports how life-saving medicines are inaccessible and costly for the global poor, and that rather than focusing on treatments for critical, deadly global health problems, pharmaceutical companies instead invest in more profitable drugs. To address this problem, Hassoun's proposal will rate pharmaceutical companies based on their (...) medicines' impact on the improvement of global health, and will reward highly-rated medicines with a Global Health Impact label. (shrink)

This article focuses on the interpretative complexities encountered in the work of Lidwien van de Ven. First, it aims to map out the always porous nature of the relationships between aesthetics, politics and religion that make up her palimpsest-like images. Second, it aims to tease out a three-part analytics of photography. Third, it attempts to flesh out a difficult notion of spectacle that is inherent to her wide-ranging practice, and which distinguishes her project from liberal photojournalism with its obeisance to (...) identity politics and its weak notion of ethics. Finally, it aims to isolate, within the dialectical machinery of spectacle that is so often put to work by western democracies, a pragmatic moment in our encounter with her photographs that has real political purchase. With a variable notion of close reading at the crux of the operation, the article probes the efficacy of this moment so akin to philosophical aesthetics. (shrink)

This guide leads readers systematically through the arguments of Mary Shepherd's two books. Chapters 1-4 cover the arguments in the Essay Upon the Relation of Cause and Effect (1824), where Shepherd argues that causal principles can be known by reason to be necessary truths and that causal inferences can be rationally justified. Shepherd's primary target in this work is Hume, but she also addresses the views of Thomas Brown and William Lawrence. Shepherd considered her second book, (...) Essays on the Perception of an External Universe, and Other Subjects Connected with the Doctrine of Causation (1827), to be an extension of the earlier project on causation; here she appeals to the causal principles established in the first book to argue that we can know through reason that an external world of continually-existing objects must exist independently of us, as the causes of our sensations. Chapter 5 of this Guide addresses Shepherd's accounts of sensation and reasoning; Chapters 6-9 lead the reader through the arguments of the Essays, as well laying out Shepherd's views on skepticism and Berkeleyan idealism, her accounts of mind and body, her philosophy of religion, and the solutions she offers to two puzzles about vision. (shrink)

In this paper we use Husserl’s theory of perception to explore how child and adult perception works through the same mechanisms. First, we explore Husserl’s description of sensory perception, showing that the child, like the adult, will be able to enrich the total perception of the object through access to successive appearances of an object. Next, we explore how the child’s ability to perceive objects can be enriched in complex ways, showing that an adult or a child will both be (...) able to access a greater ‘enduring entity’ of the object. Finally, we consider the child’s ability to remember their perceptions through memory, showing how the child and the adult use the ego’s intentionality, rather than active remembering, as a component of the memory of a perception. (shrink)