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71 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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What is Rationalism |
the view that knowledge results from the proper use of human reasoning abilities |
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Who was the "first" rationalist? |
Plato |
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Explain the idea "everything becomes, nothing is"
and name a supporter of the idea |
* Things are in a constant state of change
* Our senses mislead us to believethat things are constant * Heraclitus |
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Explain the idea "everything is, nothing becomes"
and name a supporter of the idea |
* There is a permanent reality* Senses mislead us to believe things are changing
Plato, Parmenides |
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What is epistemology? |
* Branch of philosophy concerned with the nature and scope of knowledge
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Explain Plato's allegory of the cave |
* Humans that believe in the world as their senses portrays it
* Prisoners in the cave can see only the shadows cast by objects passing in front of a fire behind them * they mistake appearance for reality |
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Explain Plato's beliefs |
* Rationalist
* Believed in a supernatural realm which contains the eternal and perfect forms of everything * Believed that this knowledge of the supernatural realm was lost at birth, but we are able to remember it using reason |
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What is Empiricism? |
* the view that knowledge is generated by our sensory capacities
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What is Tabula Rasa? |
* Believed humans were a blank slate at birth, possessing no knowledge
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Explain the difference between Aristotle and Plato |
Plato was a rationalist:
Aristotle was empiricist:
Dismissed Plato’s idea of the eternal realm- believed that essences were part of the natural world, therefore accessible by empirical inquiry |
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What is a syllogism? |
* a deductive argument that draws a conclusion from two related premises (e.g. all mammals have hair. Humans are have hair. Therefore humans are mammals)
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What is Deduction? |
* Moving from a universal law to a particular case
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What is Induction? |
* moving from a particular case to a universal law
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What is the problem with induction? |
* Universal laws cannot be obtained by observation of particular cases (no matter how many people with 2 ears there are, you cannot say all people have two ears)
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Who was copernicus? |
astronomer, proposed heliocentrism |
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Explain Bacon's relationship to the enlightenment |
* Provided outlined for new scientific method, however did not contribute directly to the scientific field
* Bacon said that truth comes from testimony of the senses, not authority |
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Explain Bacon's 4 idols |
* Idol of the Tribe:
* Tendency to jump to conclusions * Tendency to hold on to incorrect conclusions * Tendency for upbringing to influence our perception * Tendency to use abstract words * Tendency for dogmas/schools of thought to influence perceptions |
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Explain Hume's philosophy |
* Believed that we can never prove causality * only human nature that allows us to anticipate a cause/effect event, not evidence |
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Who said "reason is but a slave to the passions"? |
Hume |
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Where does Kant disagree with Hume? |
Kant believes that we can attain real knowledge Hume says we can never know anything |
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Explain Kant's 4 types of judgements |
* 1. Analytical: Subject contains the predicate (all bachelor’s are unmarried) and therefore provides no new information
* 2. Synthetic: Subject does not contain the predicate (this candle is red) * 3. A priori: A judgement independent of sensory experience * 4. A posteriori: A judgement dependent on sensory experience |
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What are synthetic a priori judgements? |
judgements made independent of sensory experience which also give knowledge about the world the only judgement through which we can gain knowledge of necessity/universality |
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What is the noumenal world and the phenomenal world? Who proposed these worlds? |
* Kant believes in the Noumenal (the world of things as they are in themselves) and Phenomenal (the world as we see it) world
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What is Positivism? |
* idea that the social sciences should be approached objectively, in the same manner as the physical sciences
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Describe Comte's 3 stages |
* 2. The Metaphysical Stage: the belief that objects have or are subject to abstract forces
* 3. The Positive Stage: The belief that only empirical observation and rational interpretation can provide causal explanations for phenomena |
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What did Comte believe science needed to be able do? |
Comte believed science needed to be able to make predictions |
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Describe Comte's Encyclopedic Formula |
* The idea that sciences should be ordered hierarchically in order of complexity
1. Mathematics 2. Astronomy 3. Physics 4. Chemistry 5. Biology 6. Sociology |
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Explain how positivists should study social phenomena |
* Use of a theory to determine what the potential causes of the phenomenon that the study must observe
* Gather lots of (quantitative) data in a uniform manner * Analyze this data (statistically) to find effects and patterns |
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Explain 3 problems with Positivism |
* Disregards the subjects motives, desires, feelings etc.
* Assumes that causes in actions are always uniform * Distances researcher from subjects |
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What is Hermeneutics |
* idea that in order to understand human behaviour one must understand human motivations, emotions etc.
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Who developed Hermeneutics? |
Wilhelm Dilthey |
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What is Methodological Dualism? |
* believed there must be two separate methods of scientific inquiry, one for the natural sciences, one for the social sciences
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What is Verstehen? |
* Interpretative understanding, the skill of empathizing with another
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Explain the Hermeneutic circle |
* First grasp —> Inspection of detail —> Global Inspection —> Deeper understanding
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What is the problem with Hermeneutics? |
* One can never objectively empathize with a subject because they will always be subject to their own thoughts/opinions etc.
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What was the Vienna Circle? |
* a Logical positivist movement
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Explain Popper's 3 theories of criteria of Demarcation. Which did Popper believe was the best |
* Verifiability: Too strong a demarcation since nothing can be verified
* Confirmation: Too weak a demarcation: A theory cannot be able to explain every possible explanation (otherwise it is pseudoscience) * Falsifiability: A theory must make predictions that are incompatible with certain possible results of observation |
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What is Falsifiability? |
Criteria of Demarcation that says a theory must make predictions that are incompatible with certain possible results of observation |
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Explain Popper's views on confirmation vs. corroboration |
Popper believed no theory can ever be verified (because of the problem with induction i.e. all white-swans don’t prove there will not be a black swan), theories can only be Corroborated: withstood attempts to be falsified |
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What is The Negative Road to truth? |
* The idea that, because humans are fallible, the best we can do is learn from mistakes
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What is a Trend? |
* A pattern predicted by the available data from statistical devices
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Explain the problems with Falsification |
* If the rationality principle has empirical content, then it is false and the principle should be falsified
* If it does not have empirical content (which would immunize itself against criticism) then it is inconsistent with Popper’s falsification theory * One should not necessarily discard an entire theory if one of the predictions that can follow from it is falsified * Pseudoscience often makes falsifiable claims |
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Compare Wittgensteins two theories of meaning |
* “God is good” is a meaningless statement because we cannot check a reference to the words “god” or “good”
* Later argued that Meaning is Use: meaning is derived from the way in which they are used by a group of people |
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What is a Language game? |
* The way in which words are used in a social context
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Explain Wittgenstein’s Private Language Argument |
* You must be able to determine illegitimate rules of a language game, therefore there can be no individual language games
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What is a Paradigm? |
* A scientific framework that provides scientists a perspective which determines relevant data, questions, problems, technologies
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What is Relativism? |
* Belief that the truth of a claim is relative to the framework in which is is placed
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Explain the relationship between language games, paradigms and relativism |
* The truth of scientific statements is relative to the paradigm it uses, the same way truth is determined by language games for Wittgenstein
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What is Theory-ladenness |
* Idea that human perception is affected by prior expectations and preconceptions, it is theory-laden
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What is Linguistic Relativity? |
* Idea that what one can think about and perceive is relative to the language one speaks
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Describe Kuhn's Patterns of Scientific Development |
* Prescientific Period: an initial period in which a scientific paradigm has not yet developed
* Normal Science: a period of scientific development that occurs within one single paradigm * Crisis: A period in which anomalies with the paradigm build up (it is either resolved or a paradigm shift occurs) * Scientific Revolution: A brief, abrupt moment in which a Paradigm Shift occurs |
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According to Kuhn, can scientific development occur? |
* Scientific progress can occurs within a paradigm but a paradigm shift is not scientific progress
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What is Incommensurability? |
* an incomparability of two paradigms
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What were Donal Davidson's arguments against incommensurability? |
* Total Incommensurability: If a language/paradigm were completely incommensurable we would not be able to identify it as a language/paradigm at all
* Partial Incommensurability: If a language is partially commensurable, there is not way to determine whether the untranslatable parts are incommensurable or simply a difference of opinion |
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Explain Sophisticated Falsificationism and who it was invented by |
Invented by Imre Lakatos * some of the new theory’s content is corroborated* the new theory explains the previous success of the last theory * the new theory has more evidence than the last theory * This means that theories will not be falsified solely on counter-evidence and Progression of theories is continuous, unlike the theory progression Kuhn suggested |
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Who coined the phrase "anything goes" |
Paul Feyerabend |
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Explain Feyerabend's views |
* Radical relativist
* Methodological anarchist * Argues that the scientific method is only one way to acquire knowledge * Proposes a Pluralistic methodology |
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What is the problem with Feyerabend's methodological anarchy? |
* If “anything goes” in terms of valid learning methods, unethical methods can be used as well (e.g. inhumane experiments)
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What was the sokal hoax? |
* Alan Sokal created a nonsensical paper that sounded appealing to postmodernist, deconstructionist theories, and managed to get it published in a prestigious sociological journal
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What is Scientific Realism? |
* the conviction that our best scientific theories tell us about the underlying, unobservable structures of the world
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What is Constructive Empiricism? |
* Idea that if theory is about unobservable phenomena, we cannot confirm the existence of unobservables but we can still assess whether this theory is empirically adequate by seeing if it’s predictions are corroborated
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What is Pragmatism? |
* a style of philosophy centred around the focus of inquiry and problem-solving
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What is Paper Doubt and what is Living Doubt? |
* Paper Doubt: doubting our knowledge but without truly feeling that we are doubting our knowledge
* Living Doubt: a true doubt that feels uncomfortable |
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What is Belief fixation? |
* attempt to achieve permanent reassured belief
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Explain Pierces 4 methods of Belief fixation |
* Tenacity: avoiding anything that can bring about doubt
* Authority: believing the information given by an authority figure * A priori: believing truth is a matter of taste, that your own thoughts, separate from the world’s truth, are true * Science: Inquiry under the assumption that there is an external permanency |
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What is the Pragmatic maxim? |
* Belief that our idea of anything is our idea of its sensible effects
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Summarize Pierce's pragmatism |
* Believed that what people believe is expressed by what they do or say
* The truth of someone’s beliefs will ultimately be determined by the scientific method * Science copies reality |
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What is the difference between Pierce and Dewey? |
* Pierce vs. Dewey = realist vs. instrumentalist
* Pierce: science copies reality * Dewey: science helps us cope in the world |
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What is the Two Images View? |
The view that there are two ways of looking at the world- the scientific image (which sees a chair as a collection of particles) and the manifest image (which sees a chair as a solid object to sit on) |
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What did pragmatists think of the two images view? |
Pragmatists believe that we should take only one view, which depends on what our goal is (to sit or to study molecules) |
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Where does James differ from Pierce and Dewey? |
* Differs from Pierce and Dewey in saying that: We are permitted to believe anything so long as it is not forbidden by science (when science does not explicitly dictate what to/not to believe, we can believe what we like)
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