2. If by "normative judgment" one means such statements as "We ought always to try to produce as much good as we can," I agree with Thesis 2.

Portrays the lives of four influential philosophers and describes that their lives were lived in a quiet and reasonable manner.

Reissue from the classic Muirhead Library of Philosophy series (originally published between 1890s - 1970s).

First published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

First published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

First published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

First published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

First published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Like others who work in philosophy, I asked myself from time to time what I was trying to do in my philosophizing. The natural answer seemed to be that I was trying to understand the world, and to do so by taking any thing or event that puzzled me and pressing the question Why? till I arrived at the understanding I sought. And what does understanding anything mean? It means to explain it or to render it intelligible. And when does (...) it become intelligible? Only when it is seen in context, and seen as required by that context. This requirement is of various kinds. Sometimes it is causal, as when an attack of malaria is explained by the bite of the anopheles mosquito. Sometimes it is a means-end relation, as when the presence of a rudder is explained as a means of guiding a ship. Sometimes it is logical, as when the Pythagorean theorem is explained by showing that it follows necessarily from other accepted propositions of geometry. (shrink)

To some students this method was too uncompromising for human frailty. To others, while chastening almost to despair, it was immensely stimulating; and the writer of this notice, who had the privilege of working with him for three years, falls emphatically in the latter group. Joachim was a remark able teacher who had no use for the arts and devices of the teacher. He gained his effect through the purgative influence on his pupils of his rare singleness of mind. Frail (...) of body, shy, deficient in animal spirits, he was still so obviously and wholly interested in the truth of the matter, so scrupulous in scholarship, and so just in statement, so incapable of glossing over difficulties with rhetoric, so reverent of the great philosophers and so modest about himself, that one's hours with him were memorable lessons in the patience and the discipline of good work. Though the discipline was rigorous, one was given to feel that something of great price lay at the end, nothing less indeed than a vision of reality. Logic in his hands was no mere razor-honing, nor was it a manipulation of symbols according to rules, nor yet a rattling of semantical dry bones; it was a study of the nature and conditions of intelligibility. And since intelligibility reached its high point in philosophy, he chose to study logic by studying the ideals of understanding implicit in the great philosophers. For his own part, the test of any theory was its power to maintain itself in the light of reflectively ordered experience as a whole, and hence he would not have regarded his classical learning, his studies in German literature, or even his virtuosity on the violin as wholly alien to his thought. He belonged to the tradition in which philosophy, if not identical with wisdom, at least carried it as a corollary. (shrink)

They have given particular attention to the argument from difference, namely that since everything is different from everything else, and the relation of difference is internal, everything is internally related to everything else. Mr. Doney replies that "difference" has two senses; it may mean either numerical or qualitative difference. And he does not think my conclusion follows on either interpretation.

First published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

First published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.