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Russell and McTaggart

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 February 2009

Margaret Macdonald
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Extract

In his Introduction to McTaggart's Philosophical Studies, Dr. S. V. Keeling complains that in the interests of a prejudice in favour of science and scientific methods, Russell and his followers have denied the possibility of solving metaphysical problems without giving any philosophical reason for this proscription. And by “metaphysical problems,” Dr. Keeling seems to mean (as against Russell and in agreement with McTaggart) ethical problems about the amount of good and evil in the world, the nature of human beings and their destiny, the hopes of men about immortality, and hence the “ultimate analysis of Time,” etc. Science is not concerned with such problems, and moreover it is the business of philosophy to “justify” induction and cannot itself employ a scientific method. Dr. Keeling therefore urges a return to the rationalism of McTaggart and the attempt to solve such problems by the deductive method. I want to say why this seems to me impossible and why such problems are insoluble unless they can be interpreted empirically and left to the investigation of the special sciences. I shall refer first to the most important feature of present empirical philosophy, then discuss metaphysical and other deductive systems, and finally dispute McTaggart's claim that the Self must be known by acquaintance and not by description, which Dr. Keeling regards, mistakenly, as it seems to me, the final refutation of this part of “positivistic phenomenalism.“ By this procedure I do not intend to justify or defend analytic philosophy but merely to re-compare its method with that of McTaggart.

Type
Articles
Information
Philosophy , Volume 11 , Issue 43 , July 1936 , pp. 322 - 335
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1936

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References

page 322 note 1 Philosophical Studies, McTaggart (edited Keeling, S. V.), Arnold, 1934.Google Scholar

page 322 note 2 Op. cit, Introduction, pp. 11, 16.

page 322 note 3 I have not discussed “the problem of induction” or the question of “justifying” the methods of science. It seems to me a special problem of logic, and I cannot see how its solution can be advanced by recourse to metaphysical theories about the non-temporal nature of “ultimate reality” since temporal order is of the essence of causal connection and inductive generalization. It may be indeed that there is no “problem” here at all, but that as Ramsey thought (Foundations of Mathematics, p. 197) “induction is one of the ultimate sources of knowledge as memory is.” It is certainly difficult to see how induction can ever be “justified” by deduction, without ceasing to be induction.

page 323 note 1 Op. cit, pp. 17, 24.

page 323 note 2 Mysticism and Logic, Russell, B., p. 110Google Scholar, “On Scientific Method in Philosophy.” Russell distinguishes between a scientific and a philosophical problem by the fact that “A philosophical problem must be general.” It must not be limited in application to a particular set of events or objects in any particular portion of space and time.

page 323 note 3 Cf. writings of J. Wisdom, L. S. Stebbing, A. J. Ayer, etc.

page 323 note 4 Philosophical Studies, Introduction, p. 11.

page 324 note 1 It is perhaps needless to point out that this is an entirely different position from that which arises with scientific “imperceptibles.” That my table is composed of atoms and electrons is a statement which can be verified. It is a way of saying that if I put my table in such and such circumstances certain phenomena will result. The use of imperceptibles in science is a technique for dealing with change, i.e. for connecting, e.g. a square, brown object with a heap of ashes when my table has been burned. Such hypotheses cannot be used to deny the existence of bodies as ordinarily perceived without denying their own foundations. It is another linguistic trap that we express such a proposition as “This table is a collection of whirling atoms” as if it were of the same form as “This table is brown” and so convey the impression that the latter contradicts the former and expresses a continual misperception of it as the “real” scientific nature of the table. That such a view is mistaken we can discover only by considering how we do in fact use such propositions and what is their function in our language. We have seen that the function of the former is to enable us to predict what will happen when this table is brought into certain causal connections with other material objects, not to prove that it is not a material object at all. The function of the latter is to describe what is given us in immediate sensible experience. Or if it is a hypothesis (as the logical positivists sometimes affirm) it is one of entirely different type from the former. The snare of the metaphysical proposition “A table is a set of God's ideas” is that it looks like the scientific proposition but performs no such function of enabling us to predict future experience.

page 325 note 1 Op. cit., p. 273.

page 325 note 2 Ibidem., Introduction, p. 10.

page 327 note 1 For this view of the a priori, cf. Wittgenstein: Tractates Logico-Philosophicus, Paul, Kegan, 1922.Google Scholar Carnap: The Unity of Science (trans. M. Black), Psyche Miniatures, 1934, 2s. 6d. Carnap: Philosophy and Logical Syntax, Psyche Miniatures, 1935, and other writings of the Vienna School.

page 327 note 2 Cf. Stebbing, L. S., Proc. Aris. Soc., 1932 and 1933.Google Scholar

page 328 note 1 Cf. Op. cit., Essay XI, p. 273, et seq.

page 329 note 1 The relation of Determining Correspondence is such that sufficient descriptions of the primary parts of a substance A (which include descriptions of their relations to each other and to A) will determine sufficient descriptions of the parts of the parts of A throughout an infinite series. Cf. Op. cit., p. 279.

page 329 note 2 Op. cit., p. 283.

page 331 note 1 Op. cit., Essay III, on “Personality,” p. 69 et seq.

page 333 note 1 I owe this example to Dr. Wittgenstein's lectures.