display all the ideas for this combination of philosophers
1 idea
12112 | Metaphysics is just the oversubtle qualification of abstract names for phenomena [Comte] |
Full Idea: The development of positivism was caused by the concept of metaphysical agents gradually becoming so empty through oversubtle qualification that all right-minded persons considered them to be only the abstract names of the phenomena in question. | |
From: Auguste Comte (Intro to Positive Philosophy [1830], Ch.1) | |
A reaction: I have quite a lot of sympathy with this thesis, but not couched in this negative way. I take abstraction to be essential to scientific thought, and wisdom to occur amongst the higher reaches of the abstractions. |