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تاريخ التسجيل : 26/10/2009
وســــــــــام النشــــــــــــــاط : 6
 | |  : Some key forms and themes | |
And so too for those who favor NE: Naturalists join in rejecting one or more of the above features of traditional (non-naturalistic) epistemology. But different theories and theorists within NE reject—to varying extents, in different ways, and for different reasons—different combinations of these features, and so differ in how much distance is put between their specific view and traditional epistemologies.[2] The resulting variety among naturalistic theories is reflected in the various taxonomies that other commentators have offered. Thus, for example, Alvin Goldman (1994: 301–304) has distinguished between meta-epistemic, substantive andmethodological versions of NE:[3]Meta-epistemic NE: The meta-epistemological position that epistemic properties—in particular, those usually counted as “normative” or evaluative (see above)—are, or must be, appropriately related to “natural” properties. The major forms of such appropriate relations are commonly thought to be reduction and supervenience. (As Goldman notes (1994: 301–302), and we’ll see below, meta-epistemic NE may not as it stands be sufficient to distinguish between certain naturalistic and non-naturalistic views; and arguably, the motivation for it is as much methodological as it is metaphysical—see Section 3.2.)In terms of (a)-(d) above, meta-epistemic NE would constitute a denial of the autonomy of epistemology (b), at least as regards its fundamental ontology. If the relevant evaluative property cannot be appropriately related to natural ones, on this view, it is rejected as unreal—yieldingeliminativism or error theory—which would constitute a rejection of (c).Substantive NE: Some object-level thesis in the vein recommended by meta-epistemic NE—that is, an account of some epistemic phenomenon in terms of certain natural (non-normative) properties or relations. Examples here would include accounts of knowledge or justification in terms of causation (Goldman 1967), reliability (Armstrong 1968, Goldman 1979, Papineau 1993, Kornblith 2002), natural functions (Graham 2012, Millikan 1984), information theory (Dretske 1981), or some kind of nomic or counterfactual dependence (Nozick 1983). Such accounts tend to be “externalist” in character[4]—i.e., they do not require, for a subject to know or be justified in believing, that s/he be aware of that in virtue of which s/he knows or is justified.[5]Substantive NE too is a rejection of any very strong version of the autonomy of epistemology (b), understood as a claim about its subject matter. Further, some critics have contended that externalism is, as such, ill-equipped to provide useful guidance to epistemic agents, at least of the first-personal reason-guiding variety. In this way, it has been thought, substantive naturalistic views might run afoul of (c), understood as a claim about a specific type of normative guidance or improvement (see, e.g., Kaplan 1994, BonJour 1994). An important sub-theme within substantive NE, as Goldman notes, is “descriptive realism as opposed [to] idealization” (1994, p. 305), not merely for accuracy’s sake, but so as to ensure responsiveness to the principle that “ought implies can” (ibid.). For some, this is the primary motive for adopting a naturalistic approach: - اقتباس :
- The main reason that I believe that epistemology would have much to learn from psychology if psychologists knew more about belief formation is that I believe that in epistemology as in ethics ought implies can. Epistemic agents cannot and ought not be faulted on the grounds that they did not follow epistemic strategies which are not cognitively possible for them. (Grandy 1994: 343; cf., e.g., Cherniak 1986; Harman 1986, 1999; Bach 1984, 1985; Kornblith 2001)
Another manifestation of the aversion to overly-demanding or otherwise “unrealistic” epistemic theory is a tendency to treat - اقتباس :
- the question “How is knowledge possible?”…as an abbreviation for the question “How is knowledge possible for beings like us in the world as it is?” (Pacherie 2002: 306; cf. Papineau 1993, “Introduction”, and Kornblith 1994b)
The same “realistic” outlook is evident as well as in naturalists’ well-known and often-criticized disinclination to seriously engage with the traditional problem of philosophical skepticism (on which, more below).Last within Goldman’s typology is methodological NE, according to which epistemology - اقتباس :
- should either consist in empirical science, or should at least be informed and beholden to the results of scientific disciplines. (1994: 305)
If the former, we have what Feldman (2012) and others, following Kornblith (1994a: 3–4), refer to as replacement naturalism. On the latter, weaker reading, on which epistemology retains some of its essential (traditional) features and merely “needs help” from other disciplines (Goldman 1986: 9), we have what Feldman (2012) calls cooperative naturalism and what Goldman elsewhere (1999) dubs moderate naturalism (see Section 5.1 below).In his own work, Goldman (1999; 1986; 2005: 403) has emphasized the methodological form or dimension of NE; and it is foremost in the work of others as well, including Quine (1969b) and Kornblith (e.g., 2002, 2007). In terms of the features of TE described above, a commitment to methodological NE would see us either rejecting the a priori character of epistemology (a), as a prescriptive claim—and so too the methodological autonomy of epistemology (b)—or modulating it so as to allow the use of empirical methods and/or results obtained thereby to play a crucial role in epistemology.Having reviewed some general features of TE, and some of the major forms and themes of NE, we will next consider some important and influential recent versions of NE, using the above features and categories to clarify and facilitate discussion. This survey will center on recent epistemological developments. However, it bears emphasizing once again that NE per se is not itself a recent phenomenon: as briefly explained in the next (sub)section, various themes within NE are as much a part of our epistemological inheritance as are the usual features of TE. 1.3 NE: A brief note on the pre-Quinean historyWhile Cartesian epistemology offers an especially vivid instance of all of the features of TE discussed above, some of those same tendencies and concerns are, of course, present in varying degrees in the work of other figures in the epistemological canon. The assumption that epistemology trades in normative matters, and not just description (c), and an abiding concern with skepticism (d), for example, can be seen in much epistemology from Descartes through to the present.At the same time, however, many of the same figures’ works comfortably assume features of the naturalistic outlook. So naturalism is far from a recent invention; as Kornblith puts it, it has “a long and distinguished heritage” (1999: 158). As the subtitle of Hume’s most famous work, for example, makes clear—“An attempt to introduce the experimental method of reasoning into moral [i.e., human] subjects”—his intention was to apply the Newtonian “experimental method” to the human mind, avoiding “hypotheses” and trying to uncover the most general underlying principles. Only then, he thought, would we be in a position to get our epistemic position into proper perspective. Further, the inspiration Hume draws from sciences beyond “the science of man” (1739, “Introduction”) to which he intends his own work to be a contribution, is not merely methodological. He compares his principles of association to gravity, for example, “ideas and impressions” being the relevant domain of “objects” on which those “forces” operate (ibid., I.I.VI. para 6). Lastly, according to Barry Stroud, Hume’s “revolution in philosophy” was his using this empirical orientation to rein in and replace an overly rationalistic conception of cognitive agents: - اقتباس :
- There had traditionally been a largely inherited or a priori framework of thinking about human nature—in particular about man’s rationality—that Hume seeks both to discredit and to supplant. (Stroud 1977: 9)
On the face of it, the “skeptical” upshot of Hume’s study stands in stark contrast to the strong sense of enlightenment optimism with which the Treatise begins (compare the “Introduction” of the Treatise to its “Conclusion”). But Locke, for example, is more consistently optimistic. His discussion of the nature and extent of human knowledge is, like Hume’s, preceded and informed by psychological theorizing based—to the best of his ability—on good observational reasoning. Further, Locke insists that it is “[f]olly to expect demonstration in everything” (Locke 1690: IV.XI.10), and he defends the information of the senses as giving us “an assurance that deserves the name knowledge” (ibid., IV.XI.3), notwithstanding the theoretical possibility of our being deceived. This runs counter to Descartes’ infallibilism, of course. But it also illustrates the above-mentioned shift, characteristic of NE, away from perfectly general questions about the nature and possibility of knowledge to understanding human knowledge, given the facts of our powers and situation: - اقتباس :
- …our faculties being suited not to the full extent of being, nor to a perfect, clear, comprehensive knowledge of things free from all doubt and scruple; but to the preservation of us, in whom they are; and accommodated to the use of life: they serve to our purpose well enough, if they will but give us certain notice of those things, which are convenient or inconvenient to us…. (1690: IV.XI.8)
Similar themes, both methodological and epistemic, are at the forefront in Thomas Reid, who begins his first major work as follows: - اقتباس :
- Wise men now agree, or ought to agree, in this, that there is but one way to the knowledge of nature’s works—the way of observation and experiment….All that we know of the body, is owing to anatomical dissection and observation, and it must be by an anatomy of the mind that we can discover its powers and principles…. (1764: Chapter 1, Section 1)
As to his epistemology, Norman Daniels claims that Reid’s views can be seen as “a precursor to recent work in cognitive psychology and ‘naturalized epistemology’” (1989: 133). And Rysiew (2002) argues that Reid does not neatly separate psychological facts from epistemic norms.In general, then, if by “psychologism” we mean simply the view that psychology is of direct relevance to certain areas of philosophy—as opposed to its (usually pejorative) usage in denoting the identification of psychological and normative or logical matters—there is ample backing for Goldman’s claim that “[p]sychologistic epistemology…is in the mainstream of historical epistemology” (1986: 6).[6] It was Frege (in The Foundations of Arithmetic, 1884), and Husserl (in his “Prolegomena to Pure Logic”, in the Logical Investigations, 1900), with their trenchant critiques of psychologism in logic and mathematics, who were largely responsible for initiating the sharp turn away from this broadly naturalistic status quo (see Kusch 2014; see too Kitcher 1992, Goldman 1986, Kelly 2014, Anderson 2005, and Engel 1998). A key part of Frege’s and Husserl’s thinking here was that tying logic to psychology was incompatible with preserving its necessary character, and with its being knowable a priori. Following their lead, the logical positivists approached epistemology, as other areas, as a matter of a priori “rational reconstruction”, in Carnap’s (1928 [1967]) famous phrase. Such reconstruction “replace[d] rationally opaque processes with transparently rational definitions and inferences” (Richardson 2006: 682). Claims about ordinary objects were given “logical definitions” in a language that made reference only to experience (sense data); more complex such statements are defined in terms of the simpler, and logical relations between them were made explicit. In none of this was the goal to be faithful to actual psychology.The clean separation of psychology from epistemology was enshrined as well in Reichenbach’s famous distinction between the context of discovery and the context of justification, which he described as “a more convenient determination” of rational reconstruction (Reichenbach 1938: 6; cf. Richardson 2006: 683). Reichenbach writes: - اقتباس :
- Epistemology does not regard the processes of thinking in their actual occurrence; this task is entirely left to psychology. What epistemology intends is to construct thinking processes in a way in which they ought to occur if they are to be ranged in a consistent system; or to construct justifiable sets of operations which can be intercalated between the starting-point and the issue of thought-processes, replacing the real intermediate links. Epistemology thus considers a logical substitute rather than real processes. (Reichenbach 1938: 5)
While enthusiasm for the project of rational reconstruction faded, elements of the program—a disinterest in psychology, a preference for a formal-logical approach, and a concern with precise definition of key terms—were retained. It was in this period that “conceptual analysis”, for example, came to prominence. - اقتباس :
- The paradigms of epistemology became the logic of confirmation, the analysis of “S knows that p”, and the theory of justification or warrant, (Goldman 1986: 7)
to none of which was psychology, much less any other empirical science, thought to be relevant. | |
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