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3 ideas
8253 | Sense impressions already have conceptual content [McDowell] |
Full Idea: The world's impressions on our senses are already possessed of conceptual content. | |
From: John McDowell (Mind and World [1994], I.6) | |
A reaction: This is a key idea of McDowell's, which challenges most traditional empiricist views, and (maybe) offers a solution to the rationalist/empiricist debate. His commitment to the 'space of reasons' strikes me as an optional extra. |
8252 | Davidson believes experience is non-conceptual, and outside the space of reasons [Davidson, by McDowell] |
Full Idea: Davidson thinks that experience can be nothing but an extra-conceptual impact on sensibility. So he concludes that experience must be outside the space of reasons. | |
From: report of Donald Davidson (Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge [1983], I.6) by John McDowell - Mind and World I | |
A reaction: McDowell's challenge to the view that experience is extra-conceptual seems to be the key debate among modern empiricists. My only intuition in this area is that we should beware of all-or-nothing solutions to such problems. |
8255 | Davidson says the world influences us causally; I say it influences us rationally [McDowell on Davidson] |
Full Idea: Davidson urges that we should hold that the world exerts a merely causal influence on our thinking, but I am trying to describe a way in which the world exerts a rational influence on our thinking. | |
From: comment on Donald Davidson (Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge [1983]) by John McDowell - Mind and World II.5 | |
A reaction: McDowell seems to be fighting for the existence of 'pure' reason in a way that is hard to defend with a thoroughly materialist view of human brains. If the world is coherent, then maybe it is rational, and so has reasons to offer us? |