Wallace Matson
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199812691
- eISBN:
- 9780199919420
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199812691.003.0015
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
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 ...
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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
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.
Steven Horst
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195317114
- eISBN:
- 9780199871520
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195317114.003.0004
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Mind
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 ...
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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
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.
Andrew Witmer
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- September 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195342536
- eISBN:
- 9780199867042
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195342536.003.0006
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
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 ...
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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
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.
Raymond Plant
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199281756
- eISBN:
- 9780191713040
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199281756.003.0002
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics, Political Theory
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 ...
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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
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.
Monika Baár
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- May 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199581184
- eISBN:
- 9780191722806
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199581184.003.0011
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
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 ...
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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
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.
Matthew H. Kramer
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199546138
- eISBN:
- 9780191705434
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199546138.003.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Philosophy of Law
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 ...
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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
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.
William Lyons
- Published in print:
- 1997
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198752226
- eISBN:
- 9780191695087
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198752226.003.0002
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Mind, Philosophy of Language
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 ...
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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
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.
Gould Warwick and Reeves Marjorie
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199242306
- eISBN:
- 9780191697081
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199242306.003.0006
- Subject:
- Religion, History of Christianity, Theology
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 ...
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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
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.
Matthew H. Kramer
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199546138
- eISBN:
- 9780191705434
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199546138.003.0002
- Subject:
- Law, Philosophy of Law
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 ...
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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
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.
Matthew H. Kramer
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199546138
- eISBN:
- 9780191705434
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199546138.003.0003
- Subject:
- Law, Philosophy of Law
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 ...
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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
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.
Matthew H. Kramer
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199546138
- eISBN:
- 9780191705434
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199546138.003.0004
- Subject:
- Law, Philosophy of Law
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 ...
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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
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.
Natalia Priego
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781781382561
- eISBN:
- 9781786945440
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9781781382561.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
This book is intended for not only students and academics who undertake research on the history of Mexico during the half-century prior to the onset in 1910 of the Mexican Revolution, but also the ...
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This book is intended for not only students and academics who undertake research on the history of Mexico during the half-century prior to the onset in 1910 of the Mexican Revolution, but also the parallel community of specialists on the history of ideas, philosophy and science throughout Latin America in this period. Its principal focus is to revisit the influential thesis of the Mexican philosopher Leopoldo Zea that the ideological group dubbed ‘the scientists’ by their opponents were guided by Positivism, particularly as interpreted by Herbert Spencer. It begins by reviewing previous research upon the formation and differentiation of ‘the scientists’, and the black legend which assumes that they legitimised the long dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz. Having established what Spencer himself believed and wrote, it analyses the prolific writings of two of the leading ‘scientists’, Francisco Bulnes and Justo Sierra. It explains the eclectic nature of their discourses, derived from the works of not only Spencer but also Charles Darwin, Auguste Comte and other European writers, which reached Mexico in a fragmented fashion. It concludes that, far from forming a homogeneous elite clearly committed to to a conservative insistence, derived from Spencerian Positivism, on political stability and modernisation, ‘the scientists’ had an ambivalent relationship with Díaz.Less
This book is intended for not only students and academics who undertake research on the history of Mexico during the half-century prior to the onset in 1910 of the Mexican Revolution, but also the parallel community of specialists on the history of ideas, philosophy and science throughout Latin America in this period. Its principal focus is to revisit the influential thesis of the Mexican philosopher Leopoldo Zea that the ideological group dubbed ‘the scientists’ by their opponents were guided by Positivism, particularly as interpreted by Herbert Spencer. It begins by reviewing previous research upon the formation and differentiation of ‘the scientists’, and the black legend which assumes that they legitimised the long dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz. Having established what Spencer himself believed and wrote, it analyses the prolific writings of two of the leading ‘scientists’, Francisco Bulnes and Justo Sierra. It explains the eclectic nature of their discourses, derived from the works of not only Spencer but also Charles Darwin, Auguste Comte and other European writers, which reached Mexico in a fragmented fashion. It concludes that, far from forming a homogeneous elite clearly committed to to a conservative insistence, derived from Spencerian Positivism, on political stability and modernisation, ‘the scientists’ had an ambivalent relationship with Díaz.
Edward Craig
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198236825
- eISBN:
- 9780191597244
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198236824.003.0003
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
In this chapter, Craig shows how the Image of God doctrine works as an interpretative tool. Applied to the philosophy of Hume, it helps to illuminate textual detail that would otherwise not be fully ...
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In this chapter, Craig shows how the Image of God doctrine works as an interpretative tool. Applied to the philosophy of Hume, it helps to illuminate textual detail that would otherwise not be fully intelligible, and it modifies, sometimes reverses, the received view of his philosophy. Craig argues that, in combining a sceptical epistemology with a thoroughgoing naturalism, Hume aimed at nothing less than the destruction of the doctrine of the image of God, and substituted for it an anthropology which looked not to the divine but to the natural world for its methods and results. This claim is supported by detailed analyses of Hume’s epistemology, ontology, and philosophy of mind.Less
In this chapter, Craig shows how the Image of God doctrine works as an interpretative tool. Applied to the philosophy of Hume, it helps to illuminate textual detail that would otherwise not be fully intelligible, and it modifies, sometimes reverses, the received view of his philosophy. Craig argues that, in combining a sceptical epistemology with a thoroughgoing naturalism, Hume aimed at nothing less than the destruction of the doctrine of the image of God, and substituted for it an anthropology which looked not to the divine but to the natural world for its methods and results. This claim is supported by detailed analyses of Hume’s epistemology, ontology, and philosophy of mind.
Steven Gimbel and Jeffrey Maynes
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- May 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199738625
- eISBN:
- 9780199894642
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199738625.003.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Science
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 ...
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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
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.
BRIAN LEITER
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199206490
- eISBN:
- 9780191715020
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199206490.003.0004
- Subject:
- Law, Philosophy of Law
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 ...
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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
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.
Jules L. Coleman (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198299080
- eISBN:
- 9780191685606
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198299080.001.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Philosophy of Law
Published posthumously, the second edition of The Concept of Law contains one important addition, namely a substantial Postscript, in which Hart reflects upon some of the central concerns that have ...
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Published posthumously, the second edition of The Concept of Law contains one important addition, namely a substantial Postscript, in which Hart reflects upon some of the central concerns that have been expressed about the book since its publication in 1961. The Postscript is especially noteworthy because it contains Hart's only sustained response to the objections pressed by his foremost critic, Ronald Dworkin, who succeeded him to the Chair of Jurisprudence at Oxford. The Postscript focuses on a range of issues covering both Hart's substantive view and his methodological commitments. In particular, Hart endorses Inclusive Legal Positivism, asserting that this is a methodology of descriptive jurisprudence which he contrasts with Dworkin's normative jurisprudence or interpretivism, while denying that his theory of law has a semantic underpinning. The chapters in this collection address each of these issues. The book contains discussions of Hart's semantic commitments, his rejection of a normative jurisprudence as well as the extent to which he can embrace Inclusive Legal Positivism in a way that is consistent with his other stated positions. The book's contributors include advocates of alternative schools of Positivist jurisprudence, contributors to the methodological disputes in jurisprudence and experts on the relationship of philosophy of language to jurisprudence.Less
Published posthumously, the second edition of The Concept of Law contains one important addition, namely a substantial Postscript, in which Hart reflects upon some of the central concerns that have been expressed about the book since its publication in 1961. The Postscript is especially noteworthy because it contains Hart's only sustained response to the objections pressed by his foremost critic, Ronald Dworkin, who succeeded him to the Chair of Jurisprudence at Oxford. The Postscript focuses on a range of issues covering both Hart's substantive view and his methodological commitments. In particular, Hart endorses Inclusive Legal Positivism, asserting that this is a methodology of descriptive jurisprudence which he contrasts with Dworkin's normative jurisprudence or interpretivism, while denying that his theory of law has a semantic underpinning. The chapters in this collection address each of these issues. The book contains discussions of Hart's semantic commitments, his rejection of a normative jurisprudence as well as the extent to which he can embrace Inclusive Legal Positivism in a way that is consistent with his other stated positions. The book's contributors include advocates of alternative schools of Positivist jurisprudence, contributors to the methodological disputes in jurisprudence and experts on the relationship of philosophy of language to jurisprudence.
Natalia Priego
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781781382561
- eISBN:
- 9781786945440
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9781781382561.003.0004
- Subject:
- History, Latin American History
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 ...
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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
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.
Steven B. Smith
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780300198393
- eISBN:
- 9780300220988
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300198393.003.0014
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
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 ...
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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
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.
Frank M. Turner
Richard A. Lofthouse (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- September 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780300207293
- eISBN:
- 9780300212914
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300207293.003.0015
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
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. ...
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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
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.
Martyn Hammersley
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781526124623
- eISBN:
- 9781526138996
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526124623.003.0002
- Subject:
- Sociology, Social Theory
The phenomenology of Alfred Schutz was a major influence on ethnomethodology, and on some other developments in sociology during the 1950s and 60s, notably the work of Cicourel and Berger and ...
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The phenomenology of Alfred Schutz was a major influence on ethnomethodology, and on some other developments in sociology during the 1950s and 60s, notably the work of Cicourel and Berger and Luckmann. The character and reception of Schutz’s work is examined, and it is suggested that there are significant respects in which it has been misinterpreted. The context in which he began his studies is documented, and in particular his relationship to Austrian economics. Schutz’s aim was to resolve a problem that had been at the heart of this economic tradition: the grounding of its basic theoretical principles. And he identified much the same gap in the interpretive sociology of Max Weber. Schutz drew on the work of Bergson and Husserl in an attempt to clarify the nature of the lifeworld that underpins social and economic action. Two key questions are addressed here: whether his work served as a fundamental challenge to the positivism of the dominant sociological tradition in the 1960s; and whether Schutz regarded his work as part of social science or of philosophy, and therefore whether he was, in fact, aiming to build a phenomenological sociology, as seems to have been assumed by Garfinkel and many others.Less
The phenomenology of Alfred Schutz was a major influence on ethnomethodology, and on some other developments in sociology during the 1950s and 60s, notably the work of Cicourel and Berger and Luckmann. The character and reception of Schutz’s work is examined, and it is suggested that there are significant respects in which it has been misinterpreted. The context in which he began his studies is documented, and in particular his relationship to Austrian economics. Schutz’s aim was to resolve a problem that had been at the heart of this economic tradition: the grounding of its basic theoretical principles. And he identified much the same gap in the interpretive sociology of Max Weber. Schutz drew on the work of Bergson and Husserl in an attempt to clarify the nature of the lifeworld that underpins social and economic action. Two key questions are addressed here: whether his work served as a fundamental challenge to the positivism of the dominant sociological tradition in the 1960s; and whether Schutz regarded his work as part of social science or of philosophy, and therefore whether he was, in fact, aiming to build a phenomenological sociology, as seems to have been assumed by Garfinkel and many others.
