Rational choice is not between science and common sense; it is a choice of both, of science to master the universal, and of common sense to deal with the particular. -Bernard Lonergan
I have struggled for some time to find the thread that connects a number of divisions that I've brought up on this blog. For example, there is the division of the context of discovery from the context of justification. This anti-psychologistic position originates with Frege and is carried forward by Wittgenstein, the logical positivists, and … Continue reading Intellectualism or Conceptualism?
This post completes a series of posts in on the nature and moments of insight. Nominal and explanatory definition Lonergan's sixth observation concerns different kinds of definition. To begin with, he has nominal and explanatory definition in mind. As Euclid defined a straight line as a line lying evenly between its extremes, so he might … Continue reading Insight: Definitions and primitive terms
I have read this section of Insight many times. Each time I’ve tried to summarize, restate, or rephrase it, but have failed each time. Perhaps it’s because the content is an exposition of an example. Whatever the cause, know that much of what follows quotes whole passages of Lonergan's text. My previous post introduced Lonergan's … Continue reading Defining a circle
I get the sense that I have finally identified where my argument will start. Of course, I've written a prospectus, spent years reading and loosely organizing notes, but my recent discovery of Robert Henman's work on the implications of Lonergan's Generalized Empirical Method for neuroscience has provided me with a case study of sorts that … Continue reading Insight is pivotal for epistemology
Elsewhere, I have argued that it is both necessary and sufficient to articulate a theory of knowing by analyzing the consciously transparent processes and operations of the knower. I want to deepen that argument by referring to Robert Henman's work, in which he makes the argument that a more robustly articulated theory of cognition (i.e. … Continue reading Neuroscience cannot dispense with conscious mental acts
In a previous post, I referred to the distinction between regarding human knowers as subject or as object, along with the implications of this distinction for how we understand the relationship between commonsense and science. Here, I'd like to elaborate on what is meant by regarding the human knower as subject. Below is a sketch … Continue reading The human knower as subject
The centrality of humans as subjects to knowing I am a subject. You are a subject. We both view the world through a local instance of consciousness. That is our starting point. As a subject, I view the world as it relates to me. My ordinary, habitual, everyday experience requires me to solve a multitude … Continue reading Approaching commonsense and science
I am going to continue to record long, important passages from Michael H. McCarthy's The Crisis of Philosophy until I no longer need to do so. So there. Towards the beginning of his book, McCarthy introduces what he calls "The Matrix of Cognitive Meaning - An Orienting Map". This is meant to provide a series … Continue reading Matrix of cognitive meaning
In a previous post, I discussed the nature of the conflict between neopositivistic and naturalistic epistemology regarding the normative status of epistemology for science. Here, I present a compelling criticism of Quine's naturalized epistemology which suggests that shifting epistemology from philosophy to psychology does not accomplish everything Quine hoped it would. Quine's equivocation Harvey Siegel … Continue reading Quine was half right
Why cognitive psychology? It might not be immediately apparent why my study of the philosophy of science devotes so much time and space to cognitive psychology and neuroscience. Why am I bothering with Iain McGilchrist, Jonathan Haidt, Daniel Kahneman, and Jordan Peterson? How, exactly, does the study of human cognition link up with philosophy of … Continue reading Cognitive psychology and the philosophy of science
Dissertating Outloud 