What is the Scandal of Philosophy?

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 141-166
Author(s):  
Roberto Horácio de Sá Pereira
Keyword(s):  
External World ◽  
Central Question ◽  
Human Reason ◽  
The Real ◽  
External World Skepticism ◽  
Refutation Of Idealism ◽  
Realist View

The central question of this paper is: what has Kant’s Refutation of Idealism argument proven, if anything? What is the real scandal of philosophy and universal human reason? I argue that Kant’s Refutation argument can only be considered as sound if we assume that his target is what I call ‘metaphysical external-world skepticism’ (rather than traditional ‘epistemological external-world skepticism’). What is in question is not the ‘existence’ of outside things, but their very ‘nature’, that is, the claim that the thing outside us, which appears to us as persistent body in space, exists in itself as a substantia noumenon. Assuming the indirect-realist view that we only immediately know ideas and that their putative objects are known by inference, the metaphysical external-world skeptic doubts that the nature of things outside oneself is mind-independent.

scholarly journals The Appearance of Skepticism: Possibility, Conceivability and Infinite Ascent

2021 ◽  
Vol 51 (2) ◽  
pp. 94-107
Author(s):  
Sorin Bangu
Keyword(s):  
External World ◽  
Skeptical Argument ◽  
External World Skepticism ◽  
Novel Strategy

AbstractThe paper articulates a novel strategy against external world skepticism. It shows that a modal assumption of the skeptical argument cannot be justified.

scholarly journals Skeptical Arguments and Deep Disagreement

Erkenntnis ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Guido Melchior
Keyword(s):  
External World ◽  
Deep Disagreement ◽  
Different Types ◽  
External World Skepticism ◽  
Agrippa’S Trilemma

AbstractThis paper provides a reinterpretation of some of the most influential skeptical arguments, Agrippa’s trilemma, meta-regress arguments, and Cartesian external world skepticism. These skeptical arguments are reasonably regarded as unsound arguments about the extent of our knowledge. However, reinterpretations of these arguments tell us something significant about the preconditions and limits of persuasive argumentation. These results contribute to the ongoing debates about the nature and resolvability of deep disagreement. The variety of skeptical arguments shows that we must distinguish different types of deep disagreement. Moreover, the reinterpretation of skeptical arguments elucidates that deep disagreement cannot be resolved via argumentation.

Apriority, Metaphysics, and Empirical Content in Kant's Theory of Matter

2012 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 109-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sebastian Rand
Keyword(s):  
Natural Science ◽  
Empirical Content ◽  
Human Reason ◽  
Empirical Concept ◽  
The Real ◽  
Secondary Literature ◽  
Pure Intuition ◽  
Real Essence

AbstractThis paper addresses problems associated with the role of the empirical concept of matter in Kant's Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, offering an interpretation emphasizing two points consistently neglected in the secondary literature: the distinction between logical and real essence, and Kant's claim that motion must be represented in pure intuition by static geometrical figures. I conclude that special metaphysics cannot achieve its stated and systematically justified goal of discovering the real essence of matter, but that Kant requires this failure for his larger philosophical presentation of the dialectic that ‘irremediably attaches to human reason’ (A298/B354).

Skepticism and the Prediction Objection

2015 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 193-217
Author(s):  
Esben Petersen
Keyword(s):  
External World ◽  
Error Theory ◽  
External World Skepticism

It is an influential and often repeated objection to external world skepticism that skeptical theories lead to implausible predictions about the patterns of ordinary epistemic discourse and thought. Since skepticism entails that we know nothing, or only very little, about the external world, the skeptic seems unable to explain why competent speakers constantly ascribe such knowledge to both themselves and others. Uncontroversial facts about every day communication hence appear to present a strong reason to reject skeptical conditions on knowledge. In this paper, however, I argue that this objection to skepticism underestimates the means that a skeptic has available to account for people’s anti-skeptical assertions and judgments. A modest and highly plausible error theory enables the proponents of a familiar type of skeptical underdetermination principle to provide a compelling explanation of our linguistic and doxastic behavior. So there is a type of skepticism with a powerful response to the charge that skeptical theories lead to unacceptable predictions.

Philosophy through Computer Science

2019 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 141-153
Author(s):  
Daniel Lim ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Computer Science ◽  
External World ◽  
Teaching Philosophy ◽  
Existence Of God ◽  
External World Skepticism

In this paper I hope to show that the idea of teaching philosophy through teaching computer science is a project worth pursuing. In the first section I will sketch a variety of ways in which philosophy and computer science might interact. Then I will give a brief rationale for teaching philosophy through teaching computer science. Then I will introduce three philosophical issues (among others) that have pedagogically useful analogues in computer science: (i) external world skepticism, (ii) numerical vs. qualitative identity, and (iii) the existence of God.

scholarly journals Apprehension and Existence, Appearance and Reality: The Reception of Nafs al-amr Debates after the 13th Century

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-39
Author(s):  
Murat Kaş
Keyword(s):  
External World ◽  
Human Cognition ◽  
13Th Century ◽  
The Real ◽  
Human Understanding ◽  
The Absolute ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Muslim Scholars ◽  
The Way

The structure of human cognition and the means of apprehension is suitable only for partly and gradually conceiving reality. This limitation has led to a certain distance between appearance and reality. This means that there will always be a gap between the judgments of the mind about the external world and its contents, which are entities, cases, facts, and states. This partiality and partiteness of human understanding has produced the truth-maker problem with regard to mind judgments. Muslim scholars who admit the correlation between the structure of reality and the categories of the mind but reject the notion of the construction and the determination of reality by the mind refer to the realm that is independent of the mind’s personal judgments as nafs al-amr. This realm is concerned with the all degrees of reality, namely—from the existent to the non-existent, from the necessity to the contingency and impossibility, from the absolute to the relative, from the material to the non-physical, from the external to the mental, and from the real entities to the abstracted ones—which step into the shot of human cognition or not. Carrying the concept of nafs al-amr from the logical plane to the metaphysical realm that intersects epistemology and ontology has led to debates that pave the way for various treatments. In particular, Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī’s (d. 672/1274) nafs al-amr epistle that posited it to the cosmic sphere resulted in criticisms of this conception of nafs al-amr, and these criticisms are the same ones directed to the Avicennian theory of emanation and its epistemological implications. Scholars who use this concept free from any metaphysical presumption and implication argue against his leap from the logical to the cosmic sphere. During the following period, this tension occasioned debates that led to the approaches that refer to the various degrees of reality, i.e., to the cosmic spheres, the spiritual realms, and the divine realms. This work aims to create a map of treatments, arguments and problems with regard to the concept of nafs al-amr.

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