Notes in defense of rationalism against empiricism

Philosophical Books, 1980

sense perception. Both were informed about science; neither wanted to discourage scientific activity. Where they turn their attention to some account of scientific knowledge, their metaphysics of knowledge does not play much of a role. The subtitle to Professor Radner's book reminds us of Malebranche's Cartesian heritage. She gives a succinct account of "The Cartesian Framework" in her first chapter. Following chapters give us a clear, judicious account of the main features of Malebranche's philosophy : causality, vision in God, ways of knowledge, intelligible extension, ideas, and the will. Professor Radner does not go out of her way to discuss the many commentators on Malebranche, but she does from time to time point out and decide between competing interpretations of a doctrine. One recent study missing from her select bibliography, and from any mention, is the important work by Ferdinand AlquiC, Le CartAsianisme de Malebranche (1974). The contrast between these two works is striking. While AlquiC ranges deeply in doctrine and tradition, Professor Radner stays glued to Malebranche's text. One might have hoped for a bit more of Alquie's approach in Professor Radner's study. Nevertheless, in her compact study we have an accurate, useful gloss on Malebranche. I t is a study meticulous in its references and comprehensive in its coverage of the texts. Perhaps her study will arouse more serious interest in Malebranche among English readers. RUTGERS COLLEGE, RUTGERS UNIVERSITY JOHN W. YOLTON Pre-established Harmony versus Constant Conjunction. O.U.P., for the British Academy, I 978. 25 pp. & I paper.

Key Ideas in Linguistics and the Philosophy of …, 2009

QUESTION: On many occasions you have criticized philosophic and scientific empiricism; Can you state your objections more precisely? CHOMSKY: In a sense, empiricism has developed a kind of mind-body dualism, of a quite unacceptable type, just at the time when, from another point of view, it rejected such dualism. Within an empiricist framework, one approaches the study of the body as a topic in the natural sciences, concluding that the body is constructed of varied and specialized organs which are extremely complex and genetically determined in their basic character, and that these organs interact in a manner which is also determined by human biology. On the other hand, empiricism insists that the brain is a tabula rasa, empty, unstructured, uniform at least as far as cognitive structure is concerned. I don't see any reason to believe that; I don't see any reason to believe that the little finger is a more complex organ than those parts of the human brain involved in the higher mental faculties; on the contrary, it is not unlikely that these are among the most complex structures in the universe. There is no reason to believe that the higher mental faculties are in some manner dissociated from this complexity of organization.

Fordham University Press, 2021

Twenty-first-century philosophy has been drawn into a false opposition between speculation and critique. Nathan Brown shows that the key to overcoming this antinomy is a re-engagement with the relation between rationalism and empiricism. If Kant’s transcendental philosophy attempted to displace the opposing priorities of those orientations, any speculative critique of Kant will have to re-open and consider anew the conflict and complementarity of reason and experience. Rationalist Empiricism shows that the capacity of reason and experience to extend and yet delimit each other has always been at the core of philosophy and science. Coordinating their discrepant powers, Brown argues, is what enables speculation to move forward in concert with critique. Sweeping across ancient, modern, and contemporary philosophy, as well as political theory, science, and art, Brown engages with such major thinkers as Plato, Descartes, Hume, Hegel, Marx, Heidegger, Bachelard, Althusser, Badiou, and Meillassoux. He also shows how the concepts he develops illuminate recent projects in the science of measurement and experimental digital photography. With conceptual originality and argumentative precision, Rationalist Empiricism reconfigures the history and the future of philosophy, politics, and aesthetics.

Philosophical Papers, 2005

The paper is a critical study of Christopher Peacocke's book _The Realm of Reason_. The content of the paper is both exegetical and critical. In its latter capacity the paper is centrally concerned to correct Peacocke's understanding of Tyler Burge's version of rationalism; and to criticize Peacocke's position from this competing perspective.

Media (Jurnal Filsafat dan Teologi)

Artikel ini menganalisis beberapa implikasi epistemologis dari dua aliran epistemologi penting dalam zaman Modern – Rasionalisme dan Empirisme. Studi ini menemukan bahwa keduanya memberikan beberapa kontribusi konseptual terhadap Epistemologi dan menawarkan beberapa kemungkinan habitus atau keutamaan epistemik. Sumbangan-sumbangan tersebut meliputi baik struktur dan proses pembentukan pengetahuan, status kapasitas dari fakultas-fakultas kognitif, dasar metafisik pengetahuan, dan dua tipe penalaran, yakni: penalaran atau pengetahuan logis dan pengetahuan yang bersifat mungkin. Pada akhirnya, kontribusi-kontribusi ini lalu berimplikasi pada beberapa habitus atau keutamaan epistemologis yang bisa dipikirkan dalam rangka hidup sehari-hari, seperti: spirit untuk selalu memelihara keterjalinan dengan segala sesuatu yang dialami sebagai titik berangkat dan jaminan untuk pemahaman dan pengetahuan, memahami kodrat kerja dari kapasitas-kapasitas kognitif sebagai dasar untuk memahami kodrat p...

Empiricists claim that our knowledge is based on the sensory-perception experience.

Southern Journal of Philosophy, 1990

I suspect philosophers fall into two categories, thoss with a n overblown conception of our rationality, and those with a n 'underblown' conception of it. Representatives of the latter variety, the deflaters, are the ones who set the agenda in the following. Though they do not succeed in burying our claims to rationality, they do succeed in forcing us to come up with a more realistic appraisal and a better understanding of the ways in which we do measure up against these claims.

In the medieval Europe there arises a significant controversy regarding the source of the attainment of the object of knowledge. From there took birth two different philosophical theories, namely existentialism and rationalism. Now let me state about them in details.

Rationalism and empiricism are sources of knowledge, particularly the extent to which we depend on the experience of sense to get knowledge (Longworth, 2015). Descartes (2009) recognizes the difference between empiricism and rationalism and they are opposite of each other. He presents Rationalism as the belief in innate ideas and deduction while empiricism is the belief in sense perception and induction. He also interprets the essence of rationalism as the things that can exist without the benefit of anyone experiencing them such as number, shape and three dimensional form which we can know without ever having had sensory experience with them. Rationalists assert that there are important ways in which knowledge and concepts are acquired without sense experience while empiricists claim that sense experience is the ultimate source of all our knowledge and concepts. Descartes, Spinoza and Leibneiz are aligned as rationalists in opposition to Luke, Berkeley and Hume as empiricists (Markie, 2013). (Broadbent, 1990) recognizes that empiricism puts its confidence in the human experiences and senses. Rathore (2015) highlights Empiricism as mostly a British movement opposing rationalism. He clarifies that the Empiricist position was disputed by Descartes who assumes that our senses can be confused by illusions. So we cannot trust the evidence of our senses and must search for universal truths which could be reached by logical thinking. It is inspired from the scientific models of Newton and Galileo. Freestone (2000) views Empiricist paradigms as regressive utopian but Rationalist as progressive utopian. Empiricists tend to look at the present and the past for inspiration while Rationalists invent futures based on assumptions and proposals for new technologies and new ways of life In developing their paradigms, the Rationalists focused on ignoring problems they face in real life. Scholars have focused on urbanism, urban design and the city long time ago due to the significant concerns they face in their ambit. They have introduced diverse perspectives to understand the urban processes which incorporate various ways of thinking about the city and urban design (Rathore, 2015). This essay is made to understand the scholars of urban design from Neo Rationalism and New Empiricism approaches have seen the cities and the development of cities; urban design proposals; and major difference between the ideas, proposals of the representatives of Neo Rationalism and New Empiricism.