Critical Realism: A Study of the Nature and Conditions of Knowledge (Classic Reprint) - Softcover

Montagu-Nathan, Montagu-Nathan Wood

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1440058113 ISBN 13: 9781440058110

Publisher: Forgotten Books, 2012

Synopsis

The present work is an attempt to state systematically the essential problems of epistemology. These problems are real; they can be stated clearly, and they can, I am convinced, be solved. What do we mean when we say that we know a thing? What are the conditions of such knowledge? These questions and the numerous other questions to which they lead are as empirical as any questions to be found in the special sciences and, so far as I can see, just as susceptible of being answered in a satisfactory way. But the individual thinker who approaches them must rid his mind of prejudices and be prepared to spend some time in a preliminary survey of the facts. He must, moreover, be willing to regard his conclusions as tentative and of the nature of hypotheses. Such is the spirit which I have tried to maintain throughout the present work. The positions which I am setting forth in the following pages are the summary of many years of teaching and of hard and pretty constant thinking, inside the class-room and without. As time passed, I found myself drifting ever more decidedly toward realism and naturalism. I became increasingly aware of the realistic structure of the individuals experience and noted those distinctions and meanings in which this structure was expressed. Whether these distinctions and meanings could be justified was the question uppermost in my mind. While the pressure of my reflection was evidently toward realism, I was dissatisfied with the customary realisms and felt that idealism had the better of the argument so far as generally accepted principles were concerned. It was at the very best a drawn battle between them. Every realist who wishes to justify the faith that is in him must meet the arguments of Berkeley, not only his more formal principle that to be for the sensible world is to be perceived, but also his argument from content that all objects
(Typographical errors above are due to OCR software and don't occur in the book.)

About this edition

• Publisher: Forgotten Books
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1440058113
• ISBN 13: 9781440058110
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 302