Philosophy Stack Exchange
Philosophy Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [empiricism]

Empiricism is the view that knowledge comes from sense experience.

Empiricism is the view that knowledge comes from sense experience.

Notable empiricist philosophers include Locke, Hume and Quine.

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What did David Hume mean when he said that "reason is a slave to the passions"?

I don't understand the meaning of this oft-quoted quotation of Hume's in On Reason, namely his saying that "reason is a slave to the passions." What exactly does he mean by that ? Is it simply that reason is subsequent to a deeper moral sense? Is…
Uticensis
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What is a straight line?

I am not a philosopher; I am an engineer with a reasonable grasp of mathematics. This question has been bothering me for a long time, and I have asked a variation of it to a mathematical community. While some people raised interesting points, others…
MGA
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Is geometry mathematical or empirical?

Is Euclidean geometry a mathematical theory, or is it a theory of empirical science? If taking it to be a mathematical theory would it be due to having alternative geometries? If so, is it in some way related to underdetermination? Alternatively,…
L.M. Student
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Is Hume's Fork self-refuting?

David Hume wrote: If we take in our hand any volume; of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance; let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter…
Ben
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Was Aristotle an Empiricist?

When I was taught about Aristotle and Plato, the picture I got was very much like this image from a Raphael fresco: Usually Plato is said to be pointing to the heavens, which represent abstract Forms, while Aristotle gestures to the Earth (or…
Jon 'links in bio' Ericson
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How empiricism and positivism is distinguished? What's their differences?

According to Wikipedia, Empiricism is a theory that states that knowledge comes only or primarily from sensory experience. One of several views of epistemology, the study of human knowledge, along with rationalism and skepticism, empiricism…
Sumit Roy
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How is Bonjour's coherence theory of justification not just a version of foundationalism?

In presenting his coherence theory of justification BonJour appeals to what he calls the “Observation Requirement.” Bonjour’s observation requirement is the notion that there are some kinds of justified beliefs that are spontaneous and come from our…
Kevin Davis
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What did Wittgenstein mean by saying that the belief in the causal nexus is a superstition?

In the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, Wittenstein says: 5.1361 The events of the future cannot be inferred from those of the present. Superstition is the belief in the causal nexus. I'm not quite sure what is meant by "superstition" in this…
k0pernikus
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Does philosophy belong to empirical science or formal science?

According to Wikipedia, science can be divided into empirical science (such as natural science and social science) and formal science (such as mathematics, logic, statistics). I was wondering if philosophy belongs to empirical science or formal…
Tim
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Is it possible that I see color differently?

Is it possible that I see color differently; for example what I call 'red' is 'blue' in your vision. Edited.. As we know the science of color, nothing is colored. Red is not "in" an apple. The surface of the apple is reflecting the wavelengths we…
KMan
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What are the most basic assumptions one has to make in order to conduct science?

I often wondered: What are the most basic assumptions I have to make before I can even start thinking about life, universe and the rest? So far I have boiled them down to three: There is a world, a reality. I am part of this world. My senses…
k0pernikus
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What is Quine's rebuttal to Grice and Strawson's In Defense of Dogma?

In response to Quine's rejection of the analytic-synthetic distinction, Strawson and Grice appear to reduce Quine's rejection (or skepticism) of synonymy to a rejection of meaning. What is/would be Quine's response?
nietsnegttiw
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Who said they were hiding in the woods?

In my undergraduate days, I remember reading someone occupying roughly a mental and historical space as David Hume (originally my thought was between Hume and Kuhn), and have a vaguely recalled passage that I would like to source. Though on first…
mfg
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Is there "empirical" distance without "mathematical" distance?

Mathematicians since antiquity have been thinking about length and angle, including doing things with straight-edges, rulers, compasses, and protractors. Fast-forward to modern physics, and you'll see everything from the Euclidean distance in…
Galen
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Does philosophy shed any light on how parties can fruitfully debate without an agreed source of truth?

A hallmark of recent political developments is extreme partisanship, where each side has near total distrust of the other. To exacerbate this situation there has been a breakdown in agreement over what constitutes the truth and even how one can…
Bob Tway
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