On the possibility of naturalistic and of pure epistemology
Synthese 118 (1):31-47 (1999)
Abstract
This paper deals with two opposite metaphilosophical doctrines concerning the nature of philosophy. More specifically, it is a study of the naturalistic view that philosophical, hence also epistemological, knowledge cannot be distinguished from empirical knowledge, and of the antinaturalistic view that philosophical, hence also epistemological, knowledge, is pure, that is, independent of empirical knowledge and particularly of the special sciences. The conditions of the possibility of naturalistic and of pure epistemology are studied in terms of phenomenological philosophy. It is concluded that pure epistemology is possible under relatively strong conditions but that the version of naturalistic epistemology which denies the pure basis leads to contradiction. That, however, does not shake the possibility of cognitive science. Following Husserl, we may argue that studies of human cognition are possible on the condition that a first basis is assumed which is not naturalized.Author's Profile
Reprint years
2004
DOI
10.1023/a:1005192826640
My notes
Similar books and articles
Evaluating need for cognition: A case study in naturalistic epistemic virtue theory.Reza Lahroodi - 2007 - Philosophical Psychology 20 (2):227 – 245.
Bertrand Russell's naturalistic epistemology.Richard F. Kitchener - 2007 - Philosophy 82 (1):115-146.
Naturalistic epistemology for eliminative materialists.Alex Rosenberg - 1999 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 59 (2):335-358.
A Euthyphronic Problem for Kitcher’s Epistemology of Science.Jeffrey W. Roland - 2009 - Southern Journal of Philosophy 47 (2):205-223.
Scientific Realism and Naturalistic Epistemology.Richard Boyd - 1980 - PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association 1980:613-662.
Epistemological Naturalism and the Normativity Objection or from Normativity to Constitutivity.Mikael Janvid - 2004 - Erkenntnis 60 (1):35-49.
Analytics
Added to PP
2009-01-28
Downloads
105 (#119,982)
6 months
1 (#451,971)
2009-01-28
Downloads
105 (#119,982)
6 months
1 (#451,971)
Historical graph of downloads
Author's Profile
Citations of this work
Just Do It: Schopenhauer and Peirce on the Immediacy of Agency.Marc Champagne - 2014 - Symposium 18 (2):209-232.
The place of description in phenomenology’s naturalization.Mark W. Brown - 2008 - Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences 7 (4):563-583.
Facts and Values After David Hume.Pentti Määttänen - 2023 - International Journal for the Semiotics of Law - Revue Internationale de Sémiotique Juridique 36 (1):17-29.
References found in this work
Why reason can't be naturalized.Hilary Putnam - 1985 - In Synthese. Cambridge University Press. pp. 3-24.