FRINK Linked Data Fragments server

Matches in SemOpenAlex for { <https://semopenalex.org/work/W4312412643> ?p ?o ?g. }

• W4312412643 endingPage "502" @default.
• W4312412643 startingPage "499" @default.
• W4312412643 abstract "Was Aristotle an empiricist? From the start, Marc Gasser-Wingate makes it clear that the aim of his book “is not to defend the label,” but “to show that Aristotle had an interesting conception of perception’s role as a starting point for our learning, and of its relation to various more advanced forms of practical and theoretical knowledge” (xii). The author achieves this goal with distinction, advancing clear and compelling arguments, which combine careful discussions of specific passages with a broad view of the notion of perception within Aristotle’s work as a whole.The claim that Aristotle sees perception as a starting point for knowledge is not exactly controversial. In Posterior Analytics 2.19 (hereafter cited as APo), he describes it as a basic cognitive capacity that gives rise to other, superior forms of knowledge, including scientific understanding. However, this vague description is compatible with different epistemological doctrines. For instance, perception could be considered a starting point in a merely causal sense. Sensible experience would contribute to the acquisition of knowledge not as a proper source of justification, but as a psychological trigger for the exercise of our rational faculties, which would be the only true source of justification and epistemic value. Such a view is closer to rationalism than to empiricism. Alternatively, perception could be taken as a starting point in the sense of being the only true source of evidence for all epistemically valuable states. According to this radical form of empiricism, rational thought would not make us more reliable than perceptual experience already does. Gasser-Wingate helpfully distinguishes between these views and argues that Aristotle’s position differs from both (x–xi). On the one hand, perception works as a starting point for more advanced cognitive dispositions, being in itself an epistemically valuable state. Aristotle recognizes that sophisticated and reliable forms of knowledge can be achieved through perception independently of reason, as we find in nonrational animals. On the other hand, he also identifies forms of knowledge that are distinctly rational and human. While perceptual knowledge deals with particular objects and informs the perceiver’s interaction with them, theoretical knowledge is concerned with universal essences and causal connections between scientific truths and, for that reason, cannot be obtained only through sensible experience without the intervention of our rational faculties.Almost half of this book (chapters 1, 2, and 3) focuses on the relation between perception and scientific expertise. As the author emphasizes, Aristotle sees scientific knowledge as a holistic grasp of causal connections in a given body of truths. These connections are exhibited by demonstrations, syllogistic inferences in which the premises explain the conclusion. Ultimately, demonstrations proceed from immediate or indemonstrable premises, so that science has a foundationalist structure: scientific understanding of demonstrable truths (epistēmē apodeiktikē) depends on nondemonstrative knowledge of immediate premises, which Aristotle calls ‘intuition’ (noūs).Some interpreters argue that Aristotle’s foundationalism is a rationalist doctrine on epistemic justification. According to them, demonstrations are not only explanations but justificatory deductions. The first principles would be self-evident propositions that can be grasped as true in themselves by rational intuition, independently of any empirical evidence or their connections to other truths in the domain. If they are right, perception cannot be a starting point for the intuition of first principles in the sense of being a source of justification. Rather, it would play a merely causal role, initiating the psychological process that leads to the intuition of self-evident propositions without justifying our belief in their truth.Gasser-Wingate presents powerful arguments against this reading (chapter 1). He calls our attention to the fact that Aristotle distinguishes between two kinds of epistemic priority. A proposition p is prior to q “in account” or “by nature” if and only if p is (part of) the causal explanation of q, but not vice versa. However, for some other noncausal type of knowledge, our knowing p might depend on our perceiving q even if p explains q, which would make q prior to p “in perception” or “to us.” For instance, the planets being near the earth is the cause of their not-twinkling, but it is by perceiving the fact that they do not twinkle that we get to know that they are near (APo 1.13, 78a22–b4). As Gasser-Wingate argues, nowhere Aristotle suggests that the basic propositions from which the scientist explains the theorems in her domain of expertise must also be the premises from which she justifies her belief in those theorems. On the contrary, the author quotes several passages indicating that, for Aristotle, it is difficult to persuade a scientist that her principles are wrong through pure argumentation, but she must be willing give up on them if they turn out to be in conflict with empirical observation (33–39). If so, Aristotle believes that perception contributes to the acquisition of knowledge not only in a causal sense but as source of justification and evidence.Additional motivation to reject the rationalist interpretation emerges from a comparison between Aristotle and Plato (chapter 2). According to Plato’s epistemology in the middle dialogues, learning is recollecting our innate knowledge of the Forms. His theory of recollection states that particular objects instantiate universal concepts in an imperfect way and that perception, by making us aware of their shortcomings, prompts the intellect to recollect the Form these objects fall short of. As a result, perception is not a justificatory foundation insofar as it does not provide basic truths from which we could infer our knowledge of the Forms, but only causes us to recollect what we already know. Gasser-Wingate convincingly argues that Aristotle presents his view as an alternative to Plato’s innatism and recognizes perception as a source of evidence that contributes to the acquisition of higher forms of knowledge not because of its deficiencies but in virtue of an epistemic value of its own.The following chapter intends to explain how, for Aristotle, scientists come to know indemonstrable principles and discusses, in particular, the role of induction in this inquiry (chapter 3). Interpreters usually take intuition (noūs) to be a highly demanding form of cognition, which involves not only knowing that the principles are true, but also recognizing them as principles. If conceived just as the inference of universal conclusions from less general propositions, induction would not be sufficient to acquire proper intuition. At best, successful inductive reasoning would let us to know that the principles are true without necessarily grasping them as causally fundamental. Gasser-Wingate argues that Aristotle embraces a more robust notion of induction. First, by induction we move from the state of perceiving particular objects and their sensible properties to universal truths that we identify as explanations of our perceptions. Second, several inductions could provide us with an exhaustive body of scientific truths. If induction allows us to grasp all explanatory connections in a given domain, we would eventually be able to distinguish demonstrable truths from propositions that do not admit scientific explanations and, therefore, to recognize immediate principles as such. As a description of the scientist’s path from perception to noūs, this interpretation sounds promising and well supported by textual evidence. However, it remains unclear whether Aristotle would identify this complex cognitive route as “induction.” Despite the many virtues of this chapter, some readers might prefer to stick with the more conservative opinion that induction only contributes to the discovering of scientific principles without being identical to the process as a whole.Against Gasser-Wingate’s interpretation, one could argue that perception, for Aristotle, is primarily of sensible qualities (like colors or sounds) and only derivatively of concrete objects (Socrates or Callias) or propositions (perceiving that Socrates is white). After all, he seems to believe that, in order to perceive everyday objects or perceive that such and such is the case, we need conceptual resources and, therefore, the intervention of rational capacities. As a result, perception properly speaking would be too limited to play the role Gasser-Wingate attributes to it. A controversial but ultimately persuasive reply to that kind of objection is presented in chapter 4. The author maintains that, for Aristotle, perception has a broad scope, including not only things like whiteness but also things like Socrates or the fact that Socrates is white. This broad scope, he argues, belongs to perception independently of its cooperation with rational thought. Two main points are made in favor of this conclusion. First, he advances good reasons to resist the idea that perception, in human beings, not only can be enriched by reason but is in fact inherently rational in the sense of having its content necessarily transformed by our intellect. Next, the author offers a helpful discussion of Aristotle’s claim that perception is “of the universal” (APo 2.19, 100a16–b1). He argues against the common opinion that, for Aristotle, although we perceive particulars, the content of our perception involves the universals those particulars instantiate. Rather, we only perceive particulars, but to perceive them is to be responsive to effects caused by their universal essence. For instance, a lion perceives a particular buffalo, but nonetheless its perception is of the universal buffalo insofar as its “behavior is responsive to a range of features the buffalo displays qua buffalo” (144).The book ends with two chapters about the role of perception in animal and human behavior. Chapter 5 convincingly shows how Aristotle’s account of animal locomotion implies that sophisticated forms of knowledge can be obtained independently of the exercise of rational faculties. According to this account, the faculty of imagination (phantasia) allows even nonrational animals to associate past memories with present perceptions and gradually develop a sort of experience consisting in a set of dispositions to react appropriately in different circumstances. Chapter 6 discusses whether the role Aristotle ascribes to perception in virtuous actions commits him to a strong form of ethical particularism. The author concludes that Aristotle endorses a moderate form of particularism: in principle, universal ethical knowledge is possible, but practical wisdom requires the ability, only achievable through personal experience, to perceive what is relevant in different contexts of action.In general, Gasser-Wingate’s book is lucid and convincing. He accomplishes the difficult task of presenting a synoptic account of Aristotle’s notion of perceptual experience by integrating textual evidence from many different works, with different theoretical purposes. Experts will find his interpretation enlightening and stimulating. Nonexperts will be able to go through this book easily and end up with a fair understanding of Aristotle’s views on perception and cognition." @default.
• W4312412643 created "2023-01-04" @default.
• W4312412643 creator A5043301174 @default.
• W4312412643 date "2022-10-01" @default.
• W4312412643 modified "2023-10-01" @default.
• W4312412643 title "<i>Aristotle’s Empiricism</i>" @default.
• W4312412643 doi "https://doi.org/10.1215/00318108-10136843" @default.
• W4312412643 hasPublicationYear "2022" @default.
• W4312412643 type Work @default.
• W4312412643 citedByCount "0" @default.
• W4312412643 crossrefType "journal-article" @default.
• W4312412643 hasAuthorship W4312412643A5043301174 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConcept C111472728 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConcept C135646171 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConcept C138885662 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConcept C3019832315 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConcept C36790819 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConcept C522434184 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConceptScore W4312412643C111472728 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConceptScore W4312412643C135646171 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConceptScore W4312412643C138885662 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConceptScore W4312412643C3019832315 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConceptScore W4312412643C36790819 @default.
• W4312412643 hasConceptScore W4312412643C522434184 @default.
• W4312412643 hasIssue "4" @default.
• W4312412643 hasLocation W43124126431 @default.
• W4312412643 hasOpenAccess W4312412643 @default.
• W4312412643 hasPrimaryLocation W43124126431 @default.
• W4312412643 hasRelatedWork W2055890795 @default.
• W4312412643 hasRelatedWork W2063029295 @default.
• W4312412643 hasRelatedWork W2313715247 @default.
• W4312412643 hasRelatedWork W2368260361 @default.
• W4312412643 hasRelatedWork W2610142057 @default.
• W4312412643 hasRelatedWork W2731762993 @default.
• W4312412643 hasRelatedWork W2949128609 @default.
• W4312412643 hasRelatedWork W3134833962 @default.
• W4312412643 hasRelatedWork W3194634207 @default.
• W4312412643 hasRelatedWork W629449697 @default.
• W4312412643 hasVolume "131" @default.
• W4312412643 isParatext "false" @default.
• W4312412643 isRetracted "false" @default.
• W4312412643 workType "article" @default.