Search Results

Alexandria

Wallace Matson

in Grand Theories and Everyday Beliefs: Science, Philosophy, and their Histories

Ptolemy, one of Alexander's generals, a patron of Greek culture, founded in Alexandria, capital of his Egyptian empire, the Library, the greatest depository of Greek literature, and the Museum, a ... More

Ptolemy, one of Alexander's generals, a patron of Greek culture, founded in Alexandria, capital of his Egyptian empire, the Library, the greatest depository of Greek literature, and the Museum, a research institute. Science made great advances in the Museum. The Library produced great scholars but little new literature. The principal philosophical innovation of the period was the rise of Skepticism, which utterly rejected high beliefs, whether tethered or not. Greek Skepticism is the ancestor of modern Positivism and Pragmatism, not of Cartesian skepticism. It was quite correct for its time, but it is a good thing that it did not prevail, for it would have eliminated the element of imagination that is essential to science.Less

The Demise of Reductionism in Philosophy of Science

Steven Horst

in Beyond Reduction: Philosophy of Mind and Post-Reductionist Philosophy of Science

This chapter examines the widespread assumptions that intertheoretic reductions are common in the natural sciences and that reducibility serves as a kind of normative constraint upon the legitimacy ... More

This chapter examines the widespread assumptions that intertheoretic reductions are common in the natural sciences and that reducibility serves as a kind of normative constraint upon the legitimacy of the special sciences. While this was the mainline view in philosophy of science in the mid‐twentieth century, it has received decisive criticism within philosophy of science since the 1970s. The basic reasons for this rejection of Carnap‐Nagel style reductionism are recounted in this chapter.Less

Conclusion

Monika Baár

in Historians and Nationalism: East-Central Europe in the Nineteenth Century

The concluding chapter attempts to locate the historians' accomplishments in the wider context of the European historiographical heritage. It addresses this problem by extending the regional and ... More

The concluding chapter attempts to locate the historians' accomplishments in the wider context of the European historiographical heritage. It addresses this problem by extending the regional and temporal scope of the examination. It discusses the reception of the five scholars' work first by their immediate successors, the Positivist generation, and then by proceeding generations from the interwar period up to the present day. Subsequently, analogies are established between scholarly preoccupations in East‐Central Europe and other ‘peripheries’: Scandinavia, the Iberian peninsula, the Balkans, Ireland and Scotland. Lastly, the overall conclusion is advanced, according to which historiography in East‐Central Europe in the nineteenth century, although dependent on other cultures, was not devoid of innovation. In general, it represented continuity with, rather than deviation from the mainstream European tradition.Less

 After the Civil War: Auguste Comte's Theory of History Crosses the Atlantic

Andrew Witmer

in Prophesies of Godlessness: Predictions of America's Iminent Secularization from the Puritans to Postmodernity

During the second half of the nineteenth century, American intellectuals found much to argue over in the writings of Auguste Comte. A French social theorist generally credited as the founder of ... More

During the second half of the nineteenth century, American intellectuals found much to argue over in the writings of Auguste Comte. A French social theorist generally credited as the founder of modern sociology, Comte grounded his Positivist philosophy in a theory of history predicting the demise of theism and the triumph of naturalistic science and humanistic religion. Debates over Positivism peaked in the United States between the 1860s and 1880s, and became entangled with arguments over Darwinism and the alleged battle between religion and science. Most Americans dismissed Comte's predictions that belief in God would vanish, but his theories won over a small group of important thinkers, clothed Enlightenment attacks on traditional religion in the garb of scientific neutrality and historical inevitability, spurred on the academic secularizers who sought to reduce religion's public influence, and emerged during the middle decades of the twentieth century as a commonplace of modern sociology.Less

The Nature of the Neo-liberal State and the Rule of Law

Raymond Plant

in The Neo-liberal State

This chapter does two related things. First of all it sets out the neo‐liberal case for thinking that the state should be conceived largely in terms of rules and procedures instead of delivering ... More

This chapter does two related things. First of all it sets out the neo‐liberal case for thinking that the state should be conceived largely in terms of rules and procedures instead of delivering certain types of outcomes and goals. To use the terminology of Oakeshott, endorsed by Hayek, the state should be seen as nomocratic and not telocratic. The neo‐liberal state embodies a set of basic rules about mutual non‐coercion as well as contract keeping rather than embodying the pursuit of a specific goal such as social justice, welfare, or a particular understanding of national identity. It looks at the close relationship between these ideas and the neo‐liberal idea of the rule of law. Neo‐liberals are critical of legal positivism and in contrast believe that the rule of law is in fact a moral ideal.Less

Introduction

Matthew H. Kramer

in Where Law and Morality Meet

This introductory chapter distinguishes three varieties of legal positivism. Inclusive Legal Positivism maintains that a norm's consistency with some or all of the correct principles of morality can ... More

This introductory chapter distinguishes three varieties of legal positivism. Inclusive Legal Positivism maintains that a norm's consistency with some or all of the correct principles of morality can be (though need not be) a necessary condition for the norm's status as a law in any particular jurisdiction. Incorporationism maintains that a norm's correctness as a moral principle can be (though need not be) a sufficient condition for the norm's status as a law in hard cases in any particular jurisdiction. Exclusive Legal Positivism maintains that moral principles cannot enter into the law at all, either as laws or as law-ascertaining criteria.Less

How Moral Principles can Enter into the Law

Matthew H. Kramer

in Where Law and Morality Meet

This chapter defends Inclusive Legal Positivism and Incorporationism against objections posed by Scott Shapiro. At the same time, it distinguishes between a bold version and a modest version of ... More

This chapter defends Inclusive Legal Positivism and Incorporationism against objections posed by Scott Shapiro. At the same time, it distinguishes between a bold version and a modest version of Incorporationism, and it explains why the latter is to be preferred to the former.Less

Throwing Light on the Role of Moral Principles in the Law: Further Reflections

Matthew H. Kramer

in Where Law and Morality Meet

This chapter develops further the positions taken in Chapter 1, and it explains how moral principles can enter into the law of a legal system even if legal officials are mistaken in many of the ... More

This chapter develops further the positions taken in Chapter 1, and it explains how moral principles can enter into the law of a legal system even if legal officials are mistaken in many of the concrete moral judgments which they reach during their adjudicative and administrative determinations. It replies to criticisms directed by Scott Shapiro and Jules Coleman against an early version of Chapter 1.Less

On Morality as a Necessary or Sufficient Condition for Legality

Matthew H. Kramer

in Where Law and Morality Meet

This chapter rebuts arguments by Exclusive Legal Positivists who have sought to show that the entry of moral principles into the law would be inconsistent with some of law's prominent features: its ... More

This chapter rebuts arguments by Exclusive Legal Positivists who have sought to show that the entry of moral principles into the law would be inconsistent with some of law's prominent features: its conventionality, its regularity, and its capacity to limit official discretion. After doing battle with Exclusive Legal Positivists (Andrei Marmor, Eleni Mitrophanous, and Joseph Raz), the chapter expounds further the merits of Inclusive Legal Positivism and the modest version of Incorporationism.Less

The Instrumentalist Approach

William Lyons

in Approaches to Intentionality

This chapter discusses the rise of ‘scientific philosophy’, which would expose the logical and conceptual bases of natural sciences. The author traces it back to the 19th-century philosopher Auguste ... More

This chapter discusses the rise of ‘scientific philosophy’, which would expose the logical and conceptual bases of natural sciences. The author traces it back to the 19th-century philosopher Auguste Comte, who led the movement called Logical Positivism, the doctrine that states that the only genuine method of gaining knowledge is by scientific method through observation and experiment. It argues that the fullest and clearest version of an instrumentalist account of intentionality is that of Daniel Dennett's Content and Consciousness. It also chronicles W. V. O. Quine and the intentional vocabulary of psychology, Daniel Dennett and the intentional stance, realism, anti-realism, pragmatism, and reductivism.Less

George Eliot's Romola: Positivist or Joachimist?

Gould Warwick and Reeves Marjorie

in Joachim of Fiore

While declaring her approval of the Positivist science, George Eliot shows herself to be already pondering on the lessons of history and the relation of the historical stages of progress to the ... More

While declaring her approval of the Positivist science, George Eliot shows herself to be already pondering on the lessons of history and the relation of the historical stages of progress to the condition and needs of the present. In 1851, she became more closely involved with Positivism through John Chapman, the publisher, and George Lewes, whom she assisted in revising and proofreading his Comte's Philosophy of the Sciences. However, it was not until 1859, when she and Lewes became neighbours and friends of those enthusiastic Comteans Mr. and Mrs. Congreve, that she was drawn into a real involvement with the idea of the new ‘Religion of Humanity’. She was deeply impressed by Auguste Comte's Catéchisme positive. Comte had said that George Eliot's novel Romola should portray the progress of humanity. This chapter deals with Romola's slight but intriguing references to the ideas of Joachim of Fiore.Less

Ordinary Language and the Unordinary Philosophy of Peter Achinstein

Steven Gimbel and Jeffrey Maynes

in Philosophy of Science Matters: The Philosophy of Peter Achinstein

In 1959, Peter Achinstein left Harvard and his Logical Positivist-influenced teachers and spent a year working at Oxford during the heyday of ordinary language philosophy. In his writings on evidence ... More

In 1959, Peter Achinstein left Harvard and his Logical Positivist-influenced teachers and spent a year working at Oxford during the heyday of ordinary language philosophy. In his writings on evidence and explanation, we find competing influences from both. His explicative methodology and his rigorous approach show the deep influence of Rudolf Carnap and C. G. Hempel, while his historical contextualization and use of pragmatic machinery show his debt to J. L. Austin and Peter Strawson. Achinstein's work in the philosophy of science can be seen as the result of taking the competing views in a debate in the philosophy of language from the generation that preceded him and synthesizing them into something more fruitful.Less

Legal Realism and Legal Positivism Reconsidered *

BRIAN LEITER

in Naturalizing Jurisprudence: Essays on American Legal Realism and Naturalism in Legal Philosophy

This chapter challenges two widespread views about the relationship between the jurisprudential theories known as ‘Legal Realism’ and ‘Legal Positivism’. The first is that the two doctrines are ... More

This chapter challenges two widespread views about the relationship between the jurisprudential theories known as ‘Legal Realism’ and ‘Legal Positivism’. The first is that the two doctrines are essentially incompatible or opposed at the philosophical or conceptual level. The second is that Legal Realism is a jurisprudential joke, a tissue of philosophical confusions — confusions that the 20th century's leading Positivist, H. L. A. Hart, exposed more than thirty years ago in the famous Chapter VII (‘Formalism and Rule-Skepticism’) of The Concept of Law. The two views are connected in the following way: Hart, on this picture, sealed the tomb of Realism as a serious legal theory, and in so doing gave credence to the idea that Realism and Positivism were opposed doctrines. The chapter contests both these views through a careful re-examination of Hart's influential critique.Less

John Morley’s Impersonal Domesticity

Kevin A. Morrison

in Victorian Liberalism and Material Culture: Synergies of Thought and Place

Chapter three analyses John Morley’s suburban residences from 1886 to 1923 as reflections of his belief that the home should be inhabited in ways that nurture an optimal liberal life. Morley sought ... More

Chapter three analyses John Morley’s suburban residences from 1886 to 1923 as reflections of his belief that the home should be inhabited in ways that nurture an optimal liberal life. Morley sought to effect a highly controlled environment that, largely shorn of bric-a-brac, ensured mental serenity. This serenity was achieved through an arduous practice of impersonal domesticity.Less

The evolution of Spencerianism

Natalia Priego

in Positivism, Science and 'The Scientists' in Porfirian Mexico: The Philosophy of Herbert Spencer in the Historiography of Mexico

This chapter’s focus is upon the reception and assimilation of Spencerian philosophy in Mexico, underpinned by a discussion of the sources of information available to the Mexican positivists. It ... More

This chapter’s focus is upon the reception and assimilation of Spencerian philosophy in Mexico, underpinned by a discussion of the sources of information available to the Mexican positivists. It establishes that their fragmented understanding of his ideas was acquired primarily and indirectly from reviews of his works published in fashionable French journals which arrived in Mexico spasmodically. Thus, their apparent erudition was acquired, at best second-hand, and combined with their own traditional liberalism to produce an eclectic and contradictory discourse. Although many were comfortable with the French language (and, of course, Spanish), most did not read well English or German. Therefore, the ideas that originated in Britain, the United States, and Germany were less influential than French notions in the construction of the Positivism of Porfirian Mexico. However, Mexican intellectuals did what they could to absorb new philosophical currents in their quest to modernise Mexico, insisting that they had mastered science, the new truth that was replacing religion as the source of authority.Less

Leo Strauss on Philosophy as a Way of Life

Steven B. Smith

in Modernity and Its Discontents: Making and Unmaking the Bourgeois from Machiavelli to Bellow

More than anyone else, Leo Strauss inaugurated the revival of political philosophy from the dominance of positivism and behavioralism. Strauss insisted that recovering Plato and ancient philosophy ... More

More than anyone else, Leo Strauss inaugurated the revival of political philosophy from the dominance of positivism and behavioralism. Strauss insisted that recovering Plato and ancient philosophy could help prevent modernity’s slide into relativism and historicism. He saw the American Constitution as the closest modern approximation to the classical ideal of the mixed regime and the rule of an educated elite. In particular Strauss saw liberal education as an antidote to the rise of mass culture and mass democracy that he associated with the most dangerous tendencies of modernity. Yet Strauss was no reactionary. He thought of himself as a skeptic or a “zetetic” philosopher concerned more with raising questions than giving answers.Less

Nietzsche

Frank M. Turner

Richard A. Lofthouse (ed.)

in European Intellectual History from Rousseau to Nietzsche

This chapter discusses the thought of Friedrich Nietzsche, the most important voice in the revolt against Positivism and the radical critique of bourgeois culture of the nineteenth century. ... More

This chapter discusses the thought of Friedrich Nietzsche, the most important voice in the revolt against Positivism and the radical critique of bourgeois culture of the nineteenth century. Nietzsche's thought went through at least two stages of development. During the first, he stood closely aligned with the tradition of Romanticism and frequently seemed to praise the irrational. At this time he was closely associated with Wagner. The second stage of his thought brought him nearer to the Enlightenment as he championed criticism, cosmopolitanism, the concept of the good European, and criticized nationalism. Throughout both periods he was generally critical of liberalism and what he regarded as the philistinism of middle-class culture. Like so many German philosophers he used reason to challenge or to delimit the realm of reason.Less