That Object of Obscure Desire
This essay looks at Thompson Clarke’s two published essays in the context of his doctoral dissertation. In the dissertation the topics of those essays fit into a general scheme. There is supposed to be a uniform form of “inquiry,” which, as Clarke sees it, is present in both the case for skepticism...
| Published in: | International journal for the study of skepticism |
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| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Brill
2014
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| In: |
International journal for the study of skepticism
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| Further subjects: | B
surface inquiry
sense-datum inquiry
rules
occasion-sensitivity
perception
Thompson Clarke
Harold Prichard
Gottlob Frege
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| Online Access: |
Volltext (Verlag) |
| Summary: | This essay looks at Thompson Clarke’s two published essays in the context of his doctoral dissertation. In the dissertation the topics of those essays fit into a general scheme. There is supposed to be a uniform form of “inquiry,” which, as Clarke sees it, is present in both the case for skepticism (a pessimistic view of the possibility of knowledge) and a supposed case for sense data. He uses the term ‘inquiry’ to stress that it is not an argument, but rather a particular way of raising the question, which makes both skepticism and sense data seem, where they do, inescapable. The essay, “Seeing Surfaces and Physical Objects,” is meant to be a simple example of an inquiry of the relevant type. The inquiry in the case of skepticism is carried out, or at least sketched in some detail, in the other published essay, “The Legacy of Skepticism,” which argues compellingly that that case collapses. The inquiry in the case of sense data was never spelled out, or at least in neither the essays nor the dissertation. The argument of the present essay is that there simply is no such inquiry. The idea of sense data does not parallel the idea of skepticism in such ways, which helps illuminate the difference between perceptual and cognitive awareness. |
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| ISSN: | 2210-5700 |
| Contains: | In: International journal for the study of skepticism
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1163/22105700-04031158 |