1. What does
Russell mean by "sense data" and why does he introduce
this notion?
Sense-data is in a way
pretty self-explicatory. It’s data we sense, meaning everything we see,
touch, smell, feel and hear. He introduces this notion since it’s an important
concept in modern philosophy. The Cartesian scepticism of Renée Descartes,
for example, relies heavily on sense-data. He claims everything we perceive
is sense-data, implying we cannot know anything, certainly – the sense-data
we take in might not be have a direct correlation with an object in the ‘real
world’. Furthermore, Descartes came to the conclusion that the only thing
one can be sure of actually existing, is oneself, and one’s mind. But
while this cannot be directly refuted, Russell claims that there’s no reason to
actually believe this, just because it’s a possibility. Only that it can’t
be ruled out. The existence of a table standing before us can be doubted,
but not the existence of the sense-data perceived.
“In fact, almost all philosophers seem to be agreed that there is
a real table: they almost all agree that, however much our
sense-data—colour, shape, smoothness, etc.—may depend upon us, yet their
occurrence is a sign of something existing independently of us, something
differing, perhaps, completely from our sense-data, and yet to be
regarded as causing those sense-data whenever we are in a suitable
relation to the real table”
2. What is the meaning of the terms "proposition" and "statement of fact"? How does propositions and statement of facts differ from other kinds of verbal expressions?The term “proposition” is, according to Russell, a carrier for ones beliefs about reality. It’s a derived belief about reality - regardless of whether it’s a true one, or an erroneous belief. A statement of fact is a proposition which has been validated and tested to be true, by a community. Russell gives the example that two and two equals four is more of a proposition than a statement of fact. But this is only a fact in our defined and accepted set of axioms ruling the field of mathematics, and would not be a fact in a different set of axioms.
3. In chapter 5 ("Knowledge by Acquaintance and Knowledge by Description") Russell introduces the notion "definite description". What does this notion mean?
The chapter begins with explaining the difference between “Knowledge by acquaintance” and “Knowledge by description”. Knowledge by acquaintance is where we experience something – we perceive the sense-data caused by a thing. “Knowledge of description”, on the other hand, is where we can know something by its description. Few of us are acquainted with Gandhi, but we still know of him and his doings, through historical knowledge and tales. The concept “Definite description” is a way to absolutely describe a single entity. A sort of one-to-one relation, if you will. It’s the difference between talking about “a man with an iron mask” and “the man with the iron mask”, where the latter is a definite description, since it only points to one single entity. The former, “a man with an iron mask”, is an “ambiguous description”, since it’s not directly related to a single entity, but could refer to many.
2. What is the meaning of the terms "proposition" and "statement of fact"? How does propositions and statement of facts differ from other kinds of verbal expressions?The term “proposition” is, according to Russell, a carrier for ones beliefs about reality. It’s a derived belief about reality - regardless of whether it’s a true one, or an erroneous belief. A statement of fact is a proposition which has been validated and tested to be true, by a community. Russell gives the example that two and two equals four is more of a proposition than a statement of fact. But this is only a fact in our defined and accepted set of axioms ruling the field of mathematics, and would not be a fact in a different set of axioms.
3. In chapter 5 ("Knowledge by Acquaintance and Knowledge by Description") Russell introduces the notion "definite description". What does this notion mean?
The chapter begins with explaining the difference between “Knowledge by acquaintance” and “Knowledge by description”. Knowledge by acquaintance is where we experience something – we perceive the sense-data caused by a thing. “Knowledge of description”, on the other hand, is where we can know something by its description. Few of us are acquainted with Gandhi, but we still know of him and his doings, through historical knowledge and tales. The concept “Definite description” is a way to absolutely describe a single entity. A sort of one-to-one relation, if you will. It’s the difference between talking about “a man with an iron mask” and “the man with the iron mask”, where the latter is a definite description, since it only points to one single entity. The former, “a man with an iron mask”, is an “ambiguous description”, since it’s not directly related to a single entity, but could refer to many.
4. In chapter 13
("Knowledge, Error and Probable Opinion") and in chapter 14
("The Limits of Philosophical Knowledge") Russell attacks
traditional problems in theory of knowledge (epistemology). What are the
main points in Russell's presentation?
In Russells
attempts to take on the problem with epistemology, he writes that a general
idea is that we know something if we have
a true belief about said thing. Russell continues, saying a problem with true
belief is that they does not constitute facts – since they are often as strong
as erroneous beliefs, there’s no satisfying way of knowing if your belief is
true or erroneous. Also – a true belief is not a fact, it does not constitute
knowledge, if the thought deduction process leading to the belief is a false
one.
Russell also discusses
the question and validity of intuitive knowledge and derivative knowledge, and
does a quite hefty attempt in arguing for
the validity in intuitive knowledge, but acknowledges the fact that this is undoubtedly
a gradual scale. Although we trust our sense-data telling us a horse is
trotting nearby by the sound its hooves make, the trust in the sound decreases as
the horse is further away, and ultimately dimishes totally, where we on the
other hand strongly trust that we don’t hear
the hooves.
Hej Alex, when I was reading through your blog posting, I could see that you had a clear understanding of Russell’s thoughts. The examples you used were easy to understand and showed that you grasp the topic pretty well. In your last paragraph you mentioned that we trust our sense-data and explained it with the sound of the hooves telling us that a horse is riding by. I was wondering, when the hooves wouldn’t make the actual sound that we hear, which is of course personal due to Russell and of course everyone would hear a different sound. But what, if we instead hear a dog belling every time a horse is riding by? I think we would still believe our sense-data, in that way that a dog bell (which we then might not perceive as a dog bell) is the actual sound of hooves. In this light, it seems that our perception can easily be manipulated and that the blind trust in our sense-data could cause a massive confusion or the breakdown of our reality. I don’t want to think further since this idea really horrifies me.
SvaraRaderaDrawing from the above comment in which Simon raises the point that our perception can be manipulated and our sense data is blindly trusted, is is not irrelevant what our actual sense data is from individual to individual? To me (as far as I understood) it does not matter if I hear a dog bell and you hear hooves; the fact of the matter is that we both associate the input from our own sense data with a learned association to a perceived object. My point is that we still blindly trust our sense data because it would be the learned association which would be wrong, not a sense!
SvaraRadera