Archetypes of Wisdom

1
Archetypes of Wisdom

• Douglas J. Soccio
• Chapter 10
• The Skeptic
• place photo from pg 283 here

2
Learning Objectives
On completion of this chapter, you should be able
to answer the following questions

• What is skeptic?
• What is empiricism?
• What is the epistemological turn?
• What is the correspondence theory of truth?
• How do primary qualities differ from secondary
  qualities?
• What is idealism (immaterialism)?

• What is epistemological dualism?
• What is the difference between impressions and
  ideas?
• What is the empirical criterion of meaning?
• What is the bundle theory of the self?
• What is inductive reasoning?

3
Modern Skepticism

• A skeptic is a person who demands clear,
  observable, undoubtable evidence, based on
  experience, before accepting any knowledge claim
  as true.
• Skepticism (derived from the Greek skeptesthai,
  meaning to consider or examine ) refers to both
  a school of philosophy and a general attitude.
• Modern skepticism is primarily involved with
  epistemological issues.
• The study of the theory of knowledge,
  epistemology, is the branch of philosophy
  concerned with the origins, quality, nature, and
  reliability of knowledge.
• Since Descartes, modern philosophy has been
  dominated by epistemological inquiry.

4
Modern Empiricism

• Attempts to answer fundamental epistemological
  questions gave rise to the two major orientations
  of modern philosophy rationalism (Ch. 9) and
  empiricism (from the Greek root empeiria, meaning
  experience).
• Empiricists believe that all ideas can be traced
  back to sense data, and that reason is unable by
  itself to provide knowledge of reality (as
  rationalists claim) such knowledge can only be
  derived from experience.
• Because its three founding philosophers were all
  British, it has come to be called British
  empiricism.

5
John Locke

• The earliest of the three British empiricists,
  John Locke (1632-1704), was disturbed by the
  confusion surrounding seventeenth-century
  philosophy and theology.
• Educated as a physician, Locke was aware of the
  great changes and progress being generated by
  science. As a physician, he also realized that
  you cannot wait until you have reached
  mathematical certainty about the correct
  treatment before helping a patient. You have
  to observe and act based on what you perceive.
• In the winter of 1670, Locke had a series of
  philosophical discussions with friends, which
  convinced him that what was necessary first was
  to make clear the process of forming ideas and
  gaining knowledge.

6
Experience is the Origin of All Ideas

• Twenty years later, in 1690, with his An Essay
  Concerning Human Understanding. Locke attempted
  to find a firm basis for resolving disagreements.
  This book established the groundwork for
  empiricism as it is generally understood today.
• According to Locke, all ideas originate in
  sensation and reflection. Specifically, we can
  think about things only after we have experienced
  them. In other words, all ideas originate from
  sense data.
• Those of us who are sighted abstract the idea
  of color from specific sense data by reflecting
  on, say, red, green, yellow, and blue circles.

7
Copy Theory

• Locke argued that all ideas are copies of the
  things that caused the basic sensations on which
  they rest.
• This position is known as the copy theory.
• Your idea of a baseball, for example, is a copy
  of the set of sensations and impressions you have
  received from seeing and handling actual
  baseballs.
• It is also referred to as representation
  theory, or correspondence theory of truth
  (i.e., an idea is true if what it refers to
  corresponds to actually exists).

8
Lockes Rejection of Innate Ideas

• Recall that Descartes argues that all knowledge
  arises from a priori, innate ideas.
• For example, in the Meditations, he based a major
  part of his case for the certainty of reasonas
  well as for general reliability of the senses and
  knowledge of the existence of an external
  worldon the clarity and distinctness of the
  innate idea of God.
• Locke accused the rationalists of labeling their
  pet ideas innate in order to convince others to
  accept them secondhand, without question.
• He therefore rejected the theory of innate
  ideas.

9
Tabula Rasa

• Locke argued that without appealing to the
  ultimate test of experience, reason has no
  ground, or standard, for distinguishing truth
  from fantasy, and is prone to empty speculation.
• Locke suggested that the mind is better compared
  to an empty pantry, waiting to be stocked by
  experience.
• He most famously described the mind at birth as a
  completely blank tablet, or clean slate tabula
  rasa, to use the Latin equivalent which then
  becomes furnished with ideas through experience.

10
Substance in Locke

• Although Locke rejected Descartes theory of
  innate ideas, he did agree with Descartes that
  something substantial underlies and holds
  together the sensible qualities of experience.
• However, Locke argues that we have only an
  obscure idea of substance in general. He
  supposed, but unknown, support of those qualities
  we find existing, which we imagine cannot subsist
  . . . without something to support them.
• He reports that observation and experience reveal
  that certain sorts of simple ideas seem to
  cluster to together. From these clusters of
  simple ideas, we form ideas of a man, horse,
  gold, water, and so on.

11
Lockes Dualism

• According to Locke, the substance that holds
  extended things together is matter.
• The same thing happens with respect to the
  operations of the mind, thinking, reasoning,
  fearing, etc. That is, we identify a thinking
  substance or mind.
• Thus, although Locke rejects Descartes
  rationalism , he affirms the existence of two
  substances matter and mind.

12
Qualities

• Locke also distinguished between two kinds of
  qualities
• Primary qualities, such as shape, size, location,
  etc., are sensible qualities which exist
  independent of a perceiver and thus, are
  objective
• Secondary qualities, such as color, sound, taste,
  etc. are sensible qualities that depend on a
  perceiver and as such, are subjective.
• Lockes quality dualism is a particular way of
  distinguishing between the object as it is and
  the object as we know it, between the knower
  and the known.
• If primary qualities do not exist, then what
  possibility do we have of objective knowledge?
  What can we know of the existence of an
  independent reality?

13
Lockes Egocentric Predicament

• Epistemological dualism is the view that knowing
  has two distinct aspects knower and known.
• Such a dualism generates the egocentric
  predicament If all knowledge comes in the form
  of my own ideas, how can I verify the existence
  of anything external to them?
• Even if external objects exist, the process of
  perceiving sense data is a process of becoming
  aware of my ideas. I dont ever seem to be able
  to actually experience things- as they exist
  outside of my ideas of them.

14
Similarities to Descartes

• Locke tries to avoid the egocentric predicament
  by asserting that we somehow know that mental
  and physical substancesand an objective
  external realityexist.
• However, Locke never can explain how this is
  possible.
• In this respect, while he is able to demonstrate
  the importance of experience, he was unable, like
  Descartes to move from direct knowledge of his
  own ideas to direct knowledge of external reality.

15
George Berkeley

• George Berkeley (1685-1753) was an Anglican
  Bishop who posed one of the most quoted and least
  understood questions in the history of ideas
• Does a tree falling in the forest make a sound if
  no one is there to hear it?
• Berkeleys answer is no, and it is based on a
  clear sense of the predicament Lockes empiricism
  generated.
• If all we can be sure of is what we actually
  experience, our ideas, then only our experiences,
  our ideas, and mental states are certain.

16
Challenging the Copy Theory

• Berkeley challenged Lockes copy theory of truth
  by pointing out that the so-called objects Locke
  thought our ideas correspond to lack any fixed
  nature.
• He points out that the ideas in our mind of
  perceived objects are constantly changing. He
  then asks
• How then is it possible that things perpetually
  Fleeting and variable as our ideas should
  be copies or images of anything fixed and
  constant?

17
Immaterialism

• Thus, we can know things only in terms of some
  perception of them through the senses, or as
  ideas perceived by the mind. And this being so,
  Berkeley argued, we know only perceptionsnot
  things-in-themselves, only things as perceived.
• What diff erence does it make to insist that
  things exist independently of perceptions? If
  they do, we have no awareness of them, and they
  have no effect on us, so they are of no
  importance to us.
• Thus, Berkeley s modification of Lockes
  empiricism leads him to claim that the material
  world does not exist.
• This makes Berkeley an idealist, or
  immaterialist.

18
To Be Is To Be Perceived

• Thus Berkeley concludes that if we experience
  things only as ideas, we cannot talk of anything
  but them.
• This leads him to his famous saying
• Esse est percipi (To be is to be perceived).
• As for the falling tree, in Three Dialogues
  Between Hylas and Philonous (1713), Berkeley
  points out that there is no difference between
  sound as perceived by us and sound as it is in
  itself. We may define sound in terms of what is
  perceived sensations, atmospheric disturbances,
  decibels, waves, etc. but in all cases sound
  remains something that is perceived.

19
David Hume, The Scottish Skeptic

• The Scottish Skeptic, David Hume (1711-1776),
  stands out in the history of ideas for the
  fearless consistency of his reasoning.
• Born in Edinburgh, and raised under a strict
  Presbyterian regimen, he enrolled in the
  University of Edinburgh when he was twelve years
  old.
• After three years, he dropped out without a
  degree, planning to devote himself to philosophy
  and literature.
• A short time later, Hume admitted he had lost the
  faith of his childhood, writing that once he read
  Locke and other philosophers, he never again
  entertained any belief in religion.

20
The Skeptical Masterpiece

• In 1737, after studying with the Jesuits in
  France (at Descartes old college in La Flèche),
  Hume returned to England, hoping to publish the
  first two books of his powerful and disturbing
  Treatise of Human Nature.
• After objections from the publisher, a censored
  version was published anonymously, with
  compelling arguments against supernatural reality
  and personal immortality.
• The uncensored version reduces reason to the
  slave of the passions and alters the
  conventional picture of the nature of science by
  denying cause and effect as they are generally
  understood. This version understandably sparked
  a great deal of controversy which is arguably
  why it was not published until after Humes death.

21
Dialogues ConcerningNatural Religion

• In 1751, Hume wrote the most devastating, direct,
  and irreverent of his works, the Dialogues
  Concerning Natural Religion.
• In his Dialogues, Hume mounts an unrelenting
  attack on the argument from design and other
  attempts to demonstrate the existence of, or
  understand the nature of, God.
• Hume did not deny the existence of God a
  position known as atheism rather, he adopted the
  agnostic view that we do not know enough to
  assert or deny the existence of God.

22
A Happy Death

• In 1776, Hume became terminally ill with a
  disorder of the bowel.
• Only devout believers were supposed to be happy
  in the face of death, not the skeptical agnostic.
  Unrelenting even at the end, Boswell asked the
  dying but cheerful Hume if he did now finally
  believe in an afterlife. Hume answered, It is a
  most unreasonable fancy that we should exist
  forever.
• Asked if he didnt at least think the possibility
  of another plane of existence was desirable, the
  dying skeptic answered, Not at all it is a very
  gloomy thought. A small parade of women visited
  Hume, begging him to believe, but he distracted
  them with humor.

23
Humes Skeptical Empiricism

• Hume rejects the overly abstract, obscure
  speculations of metaphysics, arguing that such
  thinking was irrelevant to the lives of ordinary
  people.
• He thought such abstract speculation was useful
  only to individuals with some theological motive,
  who, being unable to defend their views on fair
  grounds, raise these entangling brambles to cover
  and protect their weaknesses.
• Humes empirical criterion of meaning holds that
  all meaningful ideas can be traced to sense
  experience (impressions).
• Beliefs that cannot be reduced to sense
  experience are technically not ideas at al, but
  meaningless utterances.

24
Humes Skeptical Empiricism

• Hume rejects the overly abstract, obscure
  speculations of metaphysics, arguing that such
  thinking was irrelevant to the lives of ordinary
  people.
• He thought such abstract speculation was useful
  only to individuals with some theological motive,
  who, being unable to defend their views on fair
  grounds, raise these entangling brambles to cover
  and protect their weaknesses.
• The only way to rid ourselves of these pointless
  excursions, he claimed, is to inquire seriously
  and thoroughly into the nature of human
  understanding, and show, from an exact analysis
  of its powers and capacity, that it is by no
  means fitted for such remote and abstruse
  subjects.

25
Impressions and ideas

• Humes epistemology starts with the distinction
  between impressions and ideas
• By the term impression, then, I mean all our
  more lively perceptions, when we hear, or see, or
  feel, or love, or hate, or desire, or will. And
  impressions are distinguished from ideas, which
  are the less lively perceptions, of which we are
  conscious, when we reflect on any of those
  sensations or movements above.
• In other words, all ideas can be traced to
  impressions and, thus, are derived from
  experience, even if they become so abstracted and
  diluted that they no longer resemble any
  identifiable impressions.

26
The Self

• Applying his empirical criterion of meaning, Hume
  argues that we do not have any idea of the self
  as it is commonly understood.
• That is, we have no impression of the self
  itself.
• For my part, when I enter most intimately into
  what I call myself, I always stumble on some
  particular perception or other, of heat or cold,
  light or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure.
  I never can catch myself at any time without a
  perception, and never ca n observe any thing but
  the perception. When my perceptions are removd
  for any time, as by sound sleep so long am I
  insensible of myself, and may truly be said not
  to exist.

27
The Bundle Theory of the Self

• If we have no impression of the self, what are
  we? Hume answers
• Setting aside some metaphysicians of this kind,
  I may venture to affirm of the rest of mankind,
  that they are nothing but a bundle or collection
  of different perceptions, which succeed each
  other with an inconceivable rapidity, and are in
  a perpetual flux and movement.
• According to Hume, if there is no underlying,
  constant thing to unite our sensory
  perceptions, then the self is nothing more than
  a bundle of such perceptions.
• While Humes bundle theory of the self is
  difficult for most of us to accept, it is also
  very hard to refute.

28
Identity and Continuity

• What is true of the self, is also true of other
  things. According to Hume, identity is not a
  property of things, but a mental act. Our minds
  confer identity on things we do not perceive it.
  Like the self, a thing is merely a habitual
  way of discussing certain perceptions.
• I assume that because my face looks the same
  this morning as yesterday morning, it has existed
  continuously all night and at other times when I
  had no perception of it.
• But his point is that we have no direct
  impression of cause and effect, the link between
  perceptions that would make our assumptions about
  identity and continuity certain.

29
Without Foundation

• In some respects, Hume agrees with Berkeley about
  the status of the external world
• The mind has never anything present to it but
  the perceptions, and cannot possibly reach any
  experience of their connexion with objects. The
  supposition of such a connexion . . . is,
  therefore, without any foundation in reasoning.
• If, as Hume thought, there is no rational
  evidence whatsoever for belief in an external
  reality, then why is the notion so popular?
• Hume suggests that the imagination accounts for
  the universal notion of the independent existence
  of an external world. It is the nature of the
  imagination to complete and fill in gaps between
  perceptions.

30
Why we Believe in the External World

• If we regularly experience very much the same
  perceptionssay, of the oak tree in the yard or
  our own facewe overlook the gaps between
  different perceptions. Hume says we feign or
  fabricate continuity.
• Further, our experiences tend to occur with a
  kind of pattern or regularity, which Hume refers
  to as coherence.
• According to Hume, this process explains our
  belief in an external world. This natural
  quality of the mind is much more powerful than
  logical reasoning.

31
The Limits of Reason

• If the mind creates the ideas of causality and
  necessity, then reason alone can never be our
  guide.
• Instead, Hume had another theory
• Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the
  passions, and can never pretend to any other
  office than to serve and obey them.
• Humes claim means that there are limits to
  reason which we have not acknowledged before.
• These limits have consequences for science,
  theology and ethics.

32
The Limits of Science

• Scientific reasoning rests on a pattern of
  inductive reasoning, which results in generalized
  rules or principles.
• Induction is a matter of reasoning from the
  particular to the general, from some to all.
• Scientists assume that inductive inferences are
  reliable because they identify causal patterns.
  Before Hume, cause and effect were defined in
  terms of a necessary connection. In other words,
  the mind creates the ideas of causality and
  necessity we do not observe them.
• If Humes epistemology is correct, we never
  perceive the actual connection, the causal
  relationship? Between A and B Strictly speaking,
  all we actually observe is A followed by B. After
  Hume, the best we can do is take for granted
  that the future will resemble the past, so there
  is no way to prove the certainty of our
  predictions.

33
The Limits of Theology

• Given his radical view of cause and effect, it is
  not surprising that Hume rejected all efforts to
  use causality to prove the existence of God.
• The cosmological argument and the argument from
  motion were meaningless for him.
• The ontological argument was meaningless as well,
  because the very qualities ascribed to God
  perfection, omniscience, omnipotence, and so
  forth do not correspond to specific
  impressions. They are empty noises.

34
Critique of the Design Argument

• In the Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion,
  Hume wrote perhaps the most devastating and
  complete critique of the argument from design,
  also known as the teleological argument (see
  Thomas Aquinass fifth way in Chapter 8).
• The core of the argument from design is the
  belief that all about us we see evidence of
  Gods handiwork.
• Hume argues that were this world ever so
  perfect a production, it must still remain
  uncertain, whether all the excellences of the
  work can justly be ascribed to the workman.

35
The Bungling Shipmaker

• He continues with his own counter-analogy
• If we survey a ship, what an exalted idea must
  we form of the ingenuity of the carpenter, who
  framed so complicated, useful, and beautiful a
  machine? And what surprise must we feel, when we
  find him a stupid mechanic, who imitated others,
  and copied an art, which, through a long
  succession of ages, after multiplied trials,
  mistakes, corrections, deliberations, and
  controversies, had gradually been improving? Many
  worlds might have been botched and bungled,
  throughout an eternity, ere this system was
  struck out Much labor lost Many fruitless
  trials made And a slow, but continued
  improvement carried on during infinite ages in
  the art of world-making. . . .

36
Condemn the Architect

• A more objective look at the world also
  undermines belief in a perfect designer
• Did I show you a house or palace, where there
  was not one apartment convenient or agreeable
  where the windows, doors, fires, passages,
  stairs, and the whole economy of the building
  were the source of noise, confusion, fatigue,
  darkness, and extremes of heat and cold you
  would certainly blame the contrivance, without
  any farther examination. . . . If you find many
  inconveniences and deformities in the building,
  you will always, without entering into any
  detail, condemn the architect.

37
Agnosticism

• Eventually the skeptical character in Humes
  dialogue draws an agnostic conclusion
• This is the topic on which I have all along
  insisted. I have still asserted that we have no
  data to establish any system of cosmogony theory
  of the origins of the universe. Our experience,
  so imperfect in itself, and so limited both in
  extent and duration, can afford us no probable
  conjecture concerning the whole of things.
• In a note added to the Dialogues just before his
  death, Hume stated that the cause or causes of
  order in the universe probably bear some remote
  analogy to human intelligence. But he insisted
  that this analogy does not suggest that God
  exits, at least not the God of Judeo-Christian-Isl
  amic religions.

38
The Limits of Ethics

• Hume insisted that morality is grounded in
  sentiment, not reason. But he did not deny that
  reason has a role to play in making moral
  judgments. That role, however, is secondary to
  sentiment, or the passions.
• Hume makes a crucial distinction between facts
  and values. Reason can tell us the facts what
  is the case. But only sentiment (feelings,
  emotions) can tell us what ought to be the case.
• In all cases of moral judgment, virtues are
  traits that we find agreeable (there can even be
  facts about such things). But moral virtue is
  always a matter of liking or approval, while
  moral vice is a matter of disliking or
  disapproval.
• Reason can only help us get what we want.

39
Disinterested Reactions

• What, then, is unique to that peculiar kind of
  sentiment that Hume calls moral?
• Hume says that moral sentiment is a disinterested
  reaction to character (motive).
• Moral virtue is disinterested approbation (liking
  or approval) of character or motive.
• Moral vice is disinterested disapprobation
  (disliking or disapproval) of character or
  motive.
• According to Hume, careful language analysis
  reveals that, as a matter of fact, moral
  judgments are disinterested judgments of
  character.

40
Non-Egoism

• By asserting that moral judgments are
  disinterested, Hume rejected egoism.
• He ridicules the complications implicit in the
  belief that our real motives are always some form
  of narrow self-interest. Consider, Hume suggests,
  feelings of grief. Which is more absurd to
  assume that all feelings of grief over the deaths
  of our loved ones are really disguised
  self-interest or to accept them as we experience
  them? Are we, Hume asks, ready to believe that
  our loving pets are really motivated solely by
  self-interest? Obviously not.

41
Post-Reading Reflections

• Take a moment to reconsider the Argument from
  Design (Ch. 8) and Humes critique of the
  Argument from Design.
• In light of modern-day horrors (such as chemical
  warfare, environmental disasters, AIDS, crack
  babies, crime rates, world hunger, and
  homelessness), could there exist a perfect
  designer? Do you think such examples refute the
  notion of intelligent design?
• How does Hume counter the common assertion that
  human action is selfishly motivated?

42
Chapter ReviewKey Concepts and Thinkers

• Skeptic
• Epistemology
• Empiricism
• Correspondence Theory of Truth
• A priori
• Innate ideas
• Tabula Rasa
• Primary qualities
• Secondary qualities

• Epistemological dualism
• Egocentric predicament
• Idealist/immaterialist
• Esse est percipi
• Empirical criterion of meaning
• Bundle theory of the self
• Inductive reasoning
• David Hume (1711-1776)
• John Locke (1623-1704)
• George Berkeley (1685-1753)

43
PHILOSOPHICAL QUERY

• Have you ever been angry or insulted when
  someone pressed you for evidence? Or has anyone
  ever gotten angry with you for asking for
  evidence? Why do you suppose that is? Is it rude
  to ask How do you know that? or Can you prove
  that? when people make claims about important,
  or even not so important, things? Analyze this
  question and see if you can justify not asking
  for evidence. (page 282)

44
PHILOSOPHICAL QUERY

• Who is a qualified expert in areas such as
  psychic phenomena, miracles, nutrition, or
  philosophy? What is the relationship between the
  reports of experts and your own experience? When
  the two conflict, which should you trust? Why?
  How do you know? (page 283)

45
PHILOSOPHICAL QUERY

• Reflect on the claim that ideas are copies of
  sensations by considering these ideas love, God,
  perfection, wisdom. Can you identify the precise
  sensations to which they correspond? (page 290)

46
PHILOSOPHICAL QUERY

• Think about the notion of mind as contrasted to
  the brain and brain states. It seems clear that
  our behavior, moods, and even thoughts can be
  influenced by factors we are unaware of. These
  might include fatigue, hunger, the effects of
  medication, allergies, neurological disorders,
  and so on. Could we also have ideas, motives, and
  emotions we are aware of? That is, could we have
  an unconscious mind? (page 291)

47
PHILOSOPHICAL QUERY

• Apply the empirical criterion of meaning to such
  concepts as God, love, creativity, and
  intelligence. What, in general, do you see as the
  strengths and weaknesses of this criterion? (page
  298)

48
PHILOSOPHICAL QUERY

• Where and what are you in the midst of some
  exciting experience that totally absorbs your
  consciousness? That is, what happens to your self
  when you are not aware of it? What exactly are
  you aware of when you are self-conscious? A
  self, or sweaty plans, an uncomfortable desk,
  or a boring lecture? Discuss. (page 300)

49
PHILOSOPHICAL QUERY

• Have you been able to take Humes strictest
  claims seriously? That is, have you seriously
  considered the possibility that we lack knowledge
  of the external world? Discuss some factors that
  make taking this idea seriously so difficult. Can
  you spot any errors in Humes reasoning ?(page
  302)

50
PHILOSOPHICAL QUERY

• Humes point here is very important. Dont rush
  by it. Take a moment and try to write a purely
  factual description of something you believe is
  immoral. Do you agree with Hume that the facts
  are value-neutral and that all moral judgments
  are reports of feelings associated with certain
  facts? Explain why or why not. (page 308)