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Thomas Reid
Edited by Chris Lindsay (University of Glasgow)
About this topic
| Summary | Thomas Reid (1710-1796) was a Scottish philosopher and key figure in the Scottish Common Sense School. He taught at Kings College Aberdeen before succeeding Adam Smith as Professor of Moral Philosophy at the University of Glasgow in 1764. Reid is primarily known for the epistemological theory he develops in response to the perceived failings of the 'way of ideas', the position associated with the likes of Descartes, Locke, Berkeley and Hume that claims that the immediate objects of perception are private mental items. Reid takes Hume as demonstrating that such a perceptual theory leads to a complete scepticism. As an alternative to this, Reid offers a direct realist account of perception and argues that all first principles of common sense stand on an equal footing – there is no reason to favour perception or reason over testimony or the belief in an external world, for example. One other aspect of Reid's Common Sense theory that continues to exert significant influence is his contra-casual account of human agency. |
| Key works | Reid's three major works represent two periods in his intellectual life: his first important work, An Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense (Reid 1997) was written during his time at Aberdeen; his Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man (Reid 2002) and Essays on the Active Powers of Man (Reid 1788) reflect his work at Glasgow. All three works were included in Sir William Hamilton’s The Works of Thomas Reid (Reid 1846), though this has been superseded by the Edinburgh Edition of Thomas Reid, a projected 10 volume series published by Edinburgh University Press and Pennsylvania State University Press. The Edinburgh edition of the Inquiry, Brookes 1997, is edited by Derek R. Brookes, the Intellectual Powers, Reid 2002, by Derek R. Brookes and Knud Haakonssen, and the Active Powers, Reid 1788, by Knud Haakonssen and James A. Harris. |
| Introductions | Lehrer 1989 is the only introductory text on Reid available at the present time, with an emphasis on Reid's epistemology. Wolterstorff 2001 provides an alternative, highly accessible discussion of his epistemological concerns. The papers in Cuneo & van Woudenberg 2004 cover a wider range of core themes from Reid’s writings, including his moral and aesthetic theories. Yaffe & Nichols 2009 is the best online overview. |
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Contents
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- In All Fairness to an Affirmative Thomas in an Age of Misguided Dishops and Doubting Davids: Some Comments on Thomas Reid's Forthright Quest for a Metaphysical Treasure Ready at Hand.Harvey Williams - unknown - Proceedings of the Heraclitean Society 17.Remove from this listExport citation
Bookmark - Thomas Reid, Common Sense, and Pragmatism.Peter Baumann - forthcoming - International Journal of Philosophical Studies:1-14.This paper deals with a less well-known connection between Thomas Reid’s conception of common sense and pragmatism. The paper starts with an exposition of the different principles of common sense one can find in Reid’s writings and a discussion of their epistemic status. The main focus of the paper is on what one may call ‘Reid’s dilemma of common sense’. I argue that Reid’s writings not only present us with a dilemma of common sense but that they also offer a (...)
- Active Powers of the Human Mind.Ruth Boeker - forthcoming - In Scottish Philosophy in the Eighteenth Century, vol. 2. Oxford:
- " Georgica animi": a Compendium of Thomas Reid's Lectures on the Culture of the Mind.Charles Stewart-Robertson - forthcoming - Rivista di Storia Della Filosofia.
- Réalisme, sens commun et langage ordinaire.Fabrice Pataut - 211 - In Sandra Laugiet & Christophe Al-Saleh (eds.), John L. Austin et la philosophie du langage ordinaire. Georg Holms Verlag.
- Radical Skepticism and Epistemic Intuition by Michael Bergmann. [REVIEW]Charles Goldhaber - 2023 - Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews.Michael Bergmann's Radical Skepticism and Epistemic Intuition develops a response to radical skepticism inspired by commonsense philosophers, such as Reid and Moore. Bergmann argues against radical skepticism on the grounds of its conflicting with strongly-held "epistemic intuitions" about the "epistemic value or goodness” of our particular perceptual, recollective, introspective and a priori beliefs. I press concerns about whether Bergmann's "intuitionist particularist" response can diagnose the source of skepticism, and argue that his methodology turns out to itself be strikingly skeptical.
- Thomas Reid’s Conception of Practical Ethics.Olga V. Artemyeva - 2022 - Russian Journal of Philosophical Sciences 64 (7):68-84.The article analyzes the concept of practical ethics in the moral philosophy of Thomas Reid. The significance of this study is determined by the fact that Reid, for the first time in the history of ethics, offers an internally differentiated conception of moral philosophy, which includes two parts: the theory of morality and practical ethics. The theory of morality studies the conditions for the possibility of morality. Practical ethics is normative, deals directly with the content of morality. Both parts of (...)
- Book Review: "Ethics, Society and Politics: Themes from the Philosophy of Peter Winch", eds. Michael Campbell and Lynette Reid. [REVIEW]Ondřej Beran - 2022 - Nordic Wittgenstein Review 10:163-166.
- Thomas Reid on Promises and Social Operations of the Human Mind.Ruth Boeker - 2022 - Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 103 (2):350-371.My paper offers a new interpretation of Reid’s account of social operations of the mind. I argue that it is important to acknowledge the counterpart structure of social operations. By this I mean that for Reid every social operation is paired with a counterpart operation. On the view that I ascribe to Reid, at least two intelligent beings take part in a social operation and the social operation does not come into existence until both the social operation and its counterpart (...)
- Book Review: The Indecent Theologies of Marcella Althaus-Reid: Voices From Asia and Latin America. [REVIEW]Megan Clay - 2022 - Feminist Theology 30 (3):367-368.
- The Concept of Active Power in the Philosophy of Thomas Reid.Zehra Eroğlu - 2022 - Entelekya Logico-Metaphysical Review 6 (1):21-35.The article focuses on the concept of active power as an ability that activates the agent, who is the implementer of common sense principles in Thomas Reid's philosophy. Reid argues that the use of active power in the process of realizing the principles of common sense in action is very important for the morality of the agent. While the correct use of active power ensures the emergence of honorable and moral actions, the wrong use of this power causes the emergence (...)
- Terence Cuneo, Thomas Reid on the Ethical Life.James J. S. Foster - 2022 - Journal of Scottish Philosophy 20 (1):77-80.
- Reid in the Nineteenth Century.Alexander Campbell Fraser - 2022 - Journal of Scottish Philosophy 20 (3):257-268.
- Reid’s Philosophy of Relative and Distinct Conceptions: Qualities, Aesthetics and Ethics.Adam Weiler Gur Arye - 2022 - Journal of Scottish Philosophy 20 (3):237-255.Reid's discernment between a ‘relative’ and a ‘distinct’ conception plays a significant role in his theory of secondary and primary qualities and in his postulations on ‘instinctive’ and ‘rational’ aesthetic perceptions. However, relative conceptions and, hence, the relative/distinct conception discernment, are absent from one model of aesthetic perception which Reid endorses, as well as from his theory of ‘moral approbation’. This paper aims (1) to explore the importance of Reid's relative/distinct discernment for the conception of qualities and aesthetic features and (...)
- Thomas Reid on Induction and Natural Kinds.Stephen Harrop - 2022 - Journal of Scottish Philosophy 20 (1):1-18.I examine the views of Thomas Reid with respect to a certain version of the problem of induction: Why are inductions using natural kinds successful, and what justifies them? I argue that while both Reid holds a kind of conventionalist view about natural kinds, this conventionalism has a realistic component which allows him to answer both questions.
- Book Review: Queer and Indecent: An Introduction to Marcella Althaus Reid. [REVIEW]Lisa Isherwood - 2022 - Feminist Theology 30 (3):365-365.
- A Reiding of Berkeley's Theory of Vision.Hannes Ole Matthiessen - 2022 - Journal of Scottish Philosophy 20 (1):19-40.George Berkeley argues that vision is a language of God, that the immediate objects of vision are arbitrary signs for tactile objects and that there is no necessary connection between what we see and what we touch. Thomas Reid, on the other hand, aims to establish a geometrical connection between visible and tactile figures. Consequently, although Reid and Berkeley's theories of vision share important elements, Reid explicitly rejects Berkeley's idea that visible figures are merely arbitrary signs for tangible bodies. But (...)
- Thomas Reid, the Internalist.Robert Weston Siscoe - 2022 - Journal of Modern Philosophy 4 (1):10.Philosophical orthodoxy holds that Thomas Reid is an externalist concerning epistemic justification, characterizing Reid as holding the key to an externalist response to internalism. These externalist accounts of Reid, however, have neglected his work on prejudice, a heretofore unexamined aspect of his epistemology. Reid’s work on prejudice reveals that he is far from an externalist. Despite the views Reid may have inspired, he exemplifies internalism in opting for an accessibility account of justification. For Reid, there are two normative statuses that (...)
- The Indecent Theologies of Marcella Althaus-Reid: Voices From Asia and Latin America.[author unknown] - 2021Remove from this listExport citation Bookmark
- Queer and Indecent: An Introduction to Marcella Althaus Reid.[author unknown] - 2021Remove from this listExport citation Bookmark
- Alvin Plantinga’s Reidian Particularism: An Overview of an Epistemological Project.Mark J. Boone - 2021 - Criswell Theological Review 19 (1).Plantinga’s God and Other Minds, Reformed Epistemology articles, and Warrant Trilogy are all part of the same epistemological project. Although the project develops in phases focusing progressively on anti-theism, evidentialism, and internalism, the epistemology is consistently a Reidian particularism. It follows Roderick Chisholm’s famous particularist strategy for finding an epistemic criterion, uses principles of common sense from Thomas Reid as clear cases of beliefs satisfying that criterion, and applies that criterion to belief in God in order to show that this (...)Remove from this listExport citation Bookmark
- Revisiting Reid on Religion.Todd Buras - 2021 - Journal of Scottish Philosophy 19 (3):261-274.This paper answers two interpretive questions surrounding belief in God in Thomas Reid’s philosophy, the status question and the detachability question. The former has to do with the type of justification Reid assigns to belief in God – immediate or mediate. The later question is whether anything philosophically significant depends on his belief in God. I argue that, for Reid, belief in God is immediately justified and integral to some parts of his system. Reid’s response to skepticism about God is (...)
- La libertad moral en Thomas Reid la cuestión Del método.María Elton - 2021 - Ideas Y Valores 70 (176):117-135.RESUMEN Precisamente en momentos en que el determinismo humeano de la voluntad estaba comenzando a tener fuerza de tradición, surge Thomas Reid con una filosofía de la voluntad libre que tiene los rasgos principales de la tradición clásica anterior a Hume, medieval y tempranamente moderna. Su método inductivo, sin embargo, está tomado de Newton y del sentido común. Desde esta metodología ilustrada, Reid afirma que la voluntad es una facultad metafísica. Ha tenido influencia en la agent-cause theory, que se ha (...)
- Ce que cela fait de voir et la science de la perception selon Thomas ReidWhat it is like to see and the science of perception according to Thomas Reid.Claire Etchegaray - 2021 - Astérion 25.
- Perception as a Multi-Stage Process: A Reidian Account.Marina Folescu - 2021 - Journal of Scottish Philosophy 19 (1):57-74.The starting point of this paper is Thomas Reid's anti-skepticism: our knowledge of the external world is justified. The justificatory process, in his view, starts with and relies upon one of the main faculties of the human mind: perception. Reid's theory of perception has been thoroughly studied, but there are some missing links in the explanatory chain offered by the secondary literature. In particular, I will argue that we do not have a complete picture of the mechanism of perception of (...)
- O Ceticismo de George Berkeley na Leitura de Thomas Reid.Vinícius França Freitas - 2021 - Philosophica: International Journal for the History of Philosophy 29 (57):5-19.The paper advances two hypotheses concerning Thomas Reid’s reading of George Berkeley’s immaterialist system. First, it is argued that, on Reid’s view, Berkeley is skeptic about the existence of the objects of the material world, not in virtue of a doubt about the senses but for his adoption of the principle that ideas are the immediate objects of the operations of mind. On Reid’s view, that principle is a skeptical principle by its own nature. Secondly, it is argued that Berkeley (...)
- Thomas Reid and the Ethical Life by Terence Cuneo.Gordon Graham - 2021 - Review of Metaphysics 74 (4):621-622.
- Thomas Reid épistémologue des sciences sociales.Laurent Jaffro & Vinícius França Freitas - 2021 - In Laurie Bréban, Séverine Denieul & Elise Sultan-Villet (eds.), La science des moeurs au siècle des Lumières: conception et expérimentations. Classiques Garnier.Remove from this listExport citation Bookmark
- Diderot, Reid e l’esperienza percettiva. Compensazioni sinestetiche, linguistiche ed estetiche.Maurizio Maione - 2021 - Itinera 22.Sensible qualities, not presumed abstract or pure aesthetic properties, are the main source for the Diderot’s and Reid’s aesthetic theories. Both authors work on the perceptual activity in normal situations and in blind people’s cognitive experience. This essay is aimed at emphasizing both the connections between perceptual activity and aesthetic experience and the role of aesthetic devices in the cognitive life. In Diderot sensible qualities are connected to emotions; in Reid they are the natural signs of emotions and mental properties. (...)
- Thomas Reid and the University.Thomas Reid & Paul Wood - 2021 - Edinburgh University Press.Reid's ideas on education are a direct development of his theory of the mind, and the writings in this volume form an integral part of his philosophy that has, until now, been ignored.
- Common Sense and Comparative Linguistics.Lucas Thorpe - 2021 - Revue Philosophique de la France Et de l'Etranger 146 (1):71-88.I discuss the role of translatability in philosophical justification. I begin by discussing and defending Thomas Reid’s account of the role that facts about comparative linguistics can play in philosophical justification. Reid believes that common sense offers a reliable but defeasible form of justification. We cannot know by introspection, however, which of our judgments belong to common sense. Judgments of common sense are universal, and so he argues that the strongest evidence that a judgment is a part of common sense (...)
- Thomas Reid on the Role of Conception and Belief in Perception and Memory.Lucas Thorpe - 2021 - History of Philosophy Quarterly 38 (4):357-374.Thomas Reid argues that both perception and memory involve a conception of an object and usually cause a corresponding belief. According to defenders of the constitutive interpretation, such as Rebecca Copenhaver, the belief is constitutive of acts of perception and memory. I instead argue for a causal interpretation: although in normal circumstances perceiving and remembering cause a corresponding belief, the belief is not constitutive of perception or memory. Copenhaver's strongest argument for the constitutive interpretation is that perception essentially represents objects (...)
- Heidegger's Moral Ontology by James Reid.Bruce Ballard - 2020 - Review of Metaphysics 73 (3):625-626.
- Thomas Reid, “Da Memória”.Pedro Galvão - 2020 - Philosophica: International Journal for the History of Philosophy 28 (55-56):43-53.
- Thomas Reid e l'anatomia della mente: i poteri dell'anima nella Scozia settecentesca.Sebastiano Gino - 2020 - Milano: Mimesis.
- Common sense and science from Aristotle to Reid.Benjamin W. Redekop - 2020 - London, UK: Anthem Press.Common Sense and Science from Aristotle to Reid reveals that thinkers have pondered the nature of common sense and its relationship to science and scientific thinking for a very long time. It demonstrates how a diverse array of neglected early modern thinkers turn out to have been on the right track for understanding how the mind makes sense of the world and how basic features of the human mind and cognition are related to scientific theory and practice. Drawing on a (...)
- Reid on intentionality and causation.James Van Cleve - 2020 - In Dominik Perler & Sebastian Bender (eds.), Causation and Cognition in Early Modern Philosophy. Routledge.Remove from this listExport citation Bookmark
- Thomas Reid's Common Sense Philosophy of Mind.Todd Buras - 2019 - In Rebecca Copenhaver (ed.), Philosophy of Mind in the Early Modern and Modern Ages: The History of the Philosophy of Mind, vol. 4. New York, NY, USA: pp. 298-317.Thomas Reid’s philosophy is a philosophy of mind—a Pneumatology in the idiom of 18th century Scotland. His overarching philosophical project is to construct an account of the nature and operations of the human mind, focusing on the two-way correspondence, in perception and action, between the thinking principle within and the material world without. Like his contemporaries, Reid’s treatment of these topics aimed to incorporate the lessons of the scientific revolution. What sets Reid’s philosophy of mind apart is his commitment to (...)
- Reid's Regress.Terence Cuneo & Randall Harp - 2019 - Philosophical Quarterly 69 (277):678-698.Thomas Reid's Essays on the Active Powers presents what is probably the most thoroughly developed version of agent-causal libertarianism in the modern canon. While commentators today often acknowledge Reid's contribution, they typically focus on what appears to be a serious problem for the view: Reid appears to commit himself to a position according to which acting freely would require an agent to engage in an infinite number of exertions of active power. In this essay, we maintain that, properly understood, Reid's (...)
- The Metaphysics of Free Will and Moral Freedom in Thomas Reid.María Elton - 2019 - Review of Metaphysics 73 (1):55-76.
- Os usos do senso comum na filosofia de Thomas Reid.Vinícius França Freitas - 2019 - Veritas – Revista de Filosofia da Pucrs 64 (3):e32795.Este artigo empreende a discussão dos papéis filosóficos do senso comum no pensamento de Thomas Reid. Argumento que, para o filósofo, não existe apenas uma forma de se apelar ao senso comum no campo teórico relativo à descoberta da verdade e à fundamentação do conhecimento. De acordo com minha leitura, Reid faz ao menos três usos distintos do senso comum: o uso fundacional, no qual o senso comum é tomado como o fundamento sobre o qual o conhecimento deve ser erigido; (...)
- Reid on Moral Sentimentalism.Camil Golub - 2019 - Res Philosophica 96 (4):431-444.In the Essays on the Active Powers of Man V. 7, Thomas Reid seeks to show “[t]hat moral approbation implies a real judgment,” contrasting this thesis with the view that moral approbation is no more than a feeling. Unfortunately, his criticism of moral sentimentalism systematically conflates two different metaethical views: non-cognitivism about moral thought and subjectivism about moral properties. However, if we properly disentangle the various parts of Reid's discussion, we can isolate pertinent arguments against each of these views. Some (...)
- Restoring Common Sense: Restorationism and Common Sense Epistemology.Blake McAllister - 2019 - In J. Caleb Clanton (ed.), Restoration & Philosophy. Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee Press. pp. 35-78.Alexander Campbell once declared “a solemn league and covenant” between philosophy and common sense. Campbell’s pronouncement is representative of a broader trend in the Restorationist movement to look favorably on the common sense response to skepticism—a response originating in the work of Scottish philosopher and former minister Thomas Reid. I recount the tumultuous history between philosophy and common sense followed by the efforts of Campbell and Reid to reunite them. Turning to the present, I argue that an epistemic principle known (...)
- La especie que somos. Thomas Reid como precursor de la coevolución genocultural.José Hernández Prado - 2019 - Tópicos: Revista de Filosofía 58:55-81.The Scottish philosopher of Enlightenment Thomas Reid outlined a rich and complete notion of human nature which concluded that this is quite especial. Althought it was possible that this nature had evolved in a biological and psychological way, being so peculiar, its evolution could have taken place in an especial way as well; one which plausibly propitiated the gene-culture coevolution so vindicated by contemporary researchers of human nature. Reid is, by all means, a definite forerunner of theories about such coevolution.
- Thomas Reid on the Improvement of Knowledge.Christopher A. Shrock - 2019 - Journal of Scottish Philosophy 17 (2):125-139.Thomas Reid often seems distant from other Scottish Enlightenment figures. While Hume, Hutcheson, Kames, and Smith wrestled with the nature of social progress, Reid was busy with natural philosophy and epistemology, stubbornly loyal to traditional religion and ethics, and out of touch with the heart of his own intellectual world. Or was he? I contend that Reid not only engaged the Scottish Enlightenment's concern for improvement, but, as a leading interpreter of Isaac Newton and Francis Bacon, he also developed a (...)
- Il paradosso della percezione.Paolo Spinicci - 2019 - Milano: Mimesis Edizioni.Che natura ha l'oggetto della percezione? E come dobbiamo pensare le proprietà che lo caratterizzano percettivamente? Sono questi i temi che vengono discussi in queste pagine che cercano di far luce sul concetto di percezione, riflettendo sulla filosofia di Locke, Berkeley, Reid e sulle diverse forme del realismo diretto.
- Reid and Berkeley on Scepticism, Representationalism, and Ideas.Peter West - 2019 - Journal of Scottish Philosophy 17 (3):191-210.Both Reid and Berkeley reject ‘representationalism’, an epistemological position whereby we perceive things in the world indirectly via ideas in our mind, on the grounds of anti-scepticism and common sense. My aim in this paper is to draw out the similarities between Reid and Berkeley's ‘anti-representationalist’ arguments, whilst also identifying the root of their disagreements on certain fundamental metaphysical issues. Reid famously rejects Berkeley's idealism, in which all that exists are ideas and minds, because it undermines the dictates of common (...)
- Reid on our mental constitution.Claire Etchegaray - 2018 - In Charles Bradford Bow (ed.), Common Sense in the Scottish Enlightenment. Oxford University Press.Remove from this listExport citation Bookmark
- Reid’s View of Memorial Conception.Marina Folescu - 2018 - Journal of Scottish Philosophy 16 (3):211-226.Thomas Reid believed that the human mind is well equipped, from infancy, to acquire knowledge of the external world, with all its objects, persons and events. There are three main faculties that are involved in the acquisition of knowledge: (original) perception, memory, and imagination. It is thought that we cannot understand how exactly perception works, unless we have a good grasp on Reid’s notion of perceptual conception (i.e., of the conception employed in perception). The present paper argues that the same (...)
- Was Reid a moral realist?Gordon Graham - 2018 - In Charles Bradford Bow (ed.), Common Sense in the Scottish Enlightenment. Oxford University Press.Remove from this listExport citation Bookmark
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