display all the ideas for this combination of philosophers
9 ideas
| 5369 | It is rational to believe in reality, despite the lack of demonstrative reasons for it [Russell] |
| Full Idea: In the preceding chapter we agreed, though without being able to find demonstrative reasons, that it is rational to believe that our sense-data are signs of an independent reality. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (Problems of Philosophy [1912], Ch. 3) | |
| A reaction: I wonder if Russell was the first to grasp this essential distinction. I suspect that three hundred years (1600-1900) were wasted in philosophy because they thought that everything rational had to be demonstrable. E.g. Hume on induction. |
| 5375 | Knowledge of truths applies to judgements; knowledge by acquaintance applies to sensations and things [Russell] |
| Full Idea: The word 'know' has two senses: the first is 'knowledge of truths', which is opposed to error, applies to judgements, and is knowing that something; the second is 'acquaintance', and is knowledge of things, particularly of sense-data. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (Problems of Philosophy [1912], Ch. 4) | |
| A reaction: We can also add procedural knowledge ('knowing how'). The question for Russell is whether his 'knowledge by acquaintance' can ever qualify as knowledge on its own, without the intrusion of judgements. Does perception necessarily have content? |
| 21711 | Russell's 'multiple relations' theory says beliefs attach to ingredients, not to propositions [Russell, by Linsky,B] |
| Full Idea: The basic idea of Russell's new 'multiple relations' theory of belief was that belief does not relate an individual to a proposition composed of various individuals and universals, but rather relates the believer directly to those constituents. | |
| From: report of Bertrand Russell (Problems of Philosophy [1912], Ch.12) by Bernard Linsky - Russell's Metaphysical Logic 3.1 | |
| A reaction: Russell abandoned his commitment to propositions in 1908, and retained this new view until 1918. Wittgenstein gave Russell hell over this theory. This view made his 'congruence' account of the correspondence theory of truth possible. |
| 5427 | Truth is when a mental state corresponds to a complex unity of external constituents [Russell] |
| Full Idea: Judging or believing is a certain complex unity of which a mind is a constituent; if the remaining constituents, taken in the order which they have in the belief, form a complex unity, then the belief is true. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (Problems of Philosophy [1912], Ch.12) | |
| A reaction: The modern label of 'congruence' for this view of truth makes it clearer. We aim to get a complex unity of constituents in our minds which are in the same 'order' as the constituents in the world. It is a good proposal, but leaves 'facts' as a problem. |
| 6443 | Surprise is a criterion of error [Russell] |
| Full Idea: Surprise is a criterion of error. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (My Philosophical Development [1959], Ch.15) | |
| A reaction: Russell is not too precise about this, but it is a nice point. Surprise is thwarted expectation, which implies prior misjudgement. |
| 21542 | Do incorrect judgements have non-existent, or mental, or external objects? [Russell] |
| Full Idea: Correct judgements have a transcendent object; but with regard to incorrect judgements, it remains to examine whether 1) the object is immanent, 2) there is no object, or 3) the object is transcendent. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (Meinong on Complexes and Assumptions [1904], p.67) | |
| A reaction: Why is it that only Russell seems to have taken this problem seriously? Its solution gives the clearest possible indicator of how the mind relates to the world. |
| 22306 | To explain false belief we should take belief as relating to a proposition's parts, not to the whole thing [Russell] |
| Full Idea: To explain belief in what is false we shall have to regard what is called belief in a proposition as not a thought related to the proposition, but rather as a thought related to the constituents of the proposition. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (Papers of 1906 [1906], V.321), quoted by Michael Potter - The Rise of Analytic Philosophy 1879-1930 40 '1906' | |
| A reaction: Russell proposed a new theory of judgement, in order to explain erroneous judgements, given that true propositions are identical with facts. Of course there might be errors about the constituents, as well as about their structure. Othello is his example. |
| 5425 | In order to explain falsehood, a belief must involve several terms, not two [Russell] |
| Full Idea: The relation involved in judging or believing must, if falsehood is to be duly allowed for, be taken to be a relation between several terms, not between two. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (Problems of Philosophy [1912], Ch.12) | |
| A reaction: His point is that if a belief relates to one object ('D's love for C') it will always be true. Russell is trying to explain what goes wrong when we believe a falsehood. It is not clear how the judgement 'x exists' involves several terms. |
| 6097 | The theory of error seems to need the existence of the non-existent [Russell] |
| Full Idea: It is very difficult to deal with the theory of error without assuming the existence of the non-existent. | |
| From: Bertrand Russell (The Philosophy of Logical Atomism [1918], §IV.3) | |
| A reaction: This problem really bothered Russell (and Plato). I suspect that it was a self-inflicted problem because at this point Russell had ceased to believe in propositions. If we accept propositions as intentional objects, they can be as silly as you like. |