I'd say that the issue is that Moore holds that the existence of the
external world is completely certain only difficult (in the later version
perhaps impossible) to prove. But that is similar to how some religious
people feel about the existence of God. If something is so difficult to
prove, then one would say that there are rational reasons to doubt it.
"There is certainly an external world but I don't know it" may not be a
logical contradiction but it is an odd statement because the speaker's
ability to make it remains explained. (Somewhat akin to someone writing a
long sentence and adding in the end of it that he is illiterate)
That Russell was sitting down isn't much of an argument either, for I would
be sitting down just as well as in a dream. There is no particular reason
to assume that I should be acting differently in a dream world, even
knowing that it is a dream world, from the way I am acting now. (Since my
subjective feelings, sensations etc. would be the same as they are now.)
That is why Hume can conclude his skeptical examination cheerfully by
saying that he will go on acting just the same way as he did before. If
Hume could sit down without contradicting himself, so could Russell.
O.K.
On Mon, May 25, 2015 at 2:35 AM, Redacted sender Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx for
DMARC <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
In a message dated 5/24/2015 10:54:22 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx writes:
The first premise that here is a hand must be empirical, or else I dont
know what it could be. The second premise that a hand is a material thing
is
NOT empirical. ... We cannot accept subjective intuition in Moore's case.
Perhaps some context may be in order. Moore seems, like Grice, to defend an
'conceptual-analtyic' approach to philosophy (vide Ayer, "Moore and
Russell: the analtyical heritage), and Grice cites from Moore than from
any other
authors in his annals of analysis, "Way of Words".
So 'analysis' (of 'proof', 'material thing', etc.) may be what Moore is up
to.
In his British academy lecture Moore, we can say, sets himself the task of
doing what Kant had earlier set himself to do, namely providing a PROOF (if
not a transcendental one) of the existence of ‘material things’.
Moore uses, granted, the adjetive McEvoy seems to find a fascination for,
'external', in the Academy lecture and much of the lecture is devoted to
an
analysis of this tricky word "external". (Which is good of Moore: Chomsky
spent much of his time tallking of inner and outer without exposing his
analysis of either).
Moore claims that an external thing is one whose existence is not
dependent upon our experience.
So, he argues, if he can prove the existence of any such external thing,
he will have proved the existence of an ‘external world’, if not "the"
external world.
Moore then maintains that he can do this. It is good to quote Moore
verbatim here, as he lectures the prestigious audience of the British
Academy in
Cumberland House, London.
"How? By holding up my two hands, and saying, as I make a certain gesture
with the right hand, ‘Here is one hand’, and adding, as I make a certain
gesture with the left, ‘and here is another’"
Moore then GOES ON to argue that this demonstration of his hands is a
'perfectly rigorous’ proof of the existence of 'external' things.
For its premises certainly entail its conclusion and they are things which
he KNOWS to be true.
In his words, agan, verbatim:
"I knew that there was one hand in the place indicated by combining a
certain gesture with my first utterance of ‘here’ and that there was
another
in the different place indicated by combining a certain gesture with my
second utterance of ‘here’."
"How absurd," Moore adds, "it would be to suggest that I did not KNOW it,
but only BELIEVED it, and that perhaps it was not the case!"
And the use of 'absud' and the quotation of the exclamative mark is VERY
MOOREAN.
"You might as well suggest that I do not know that I am now standing up
and talking — that perhaps after all I'm not, and that it's not quite
certain
that I am!"
As you see, Moore's Academy lecture is full of "!"s. (Grice counted 28).
The significance of this performance has been debated among philosophers
ever since Moore set it out, as every philosophy tutor in Cambridge knows!
It is commonly supposed that Moore here sets himself to refute
philosophical scepticism; and that his performance, though intriguing, is
unsuccessful.
But this interpretation is mighty incorrect.
Moore's avowed aim is to prove the existence of the "external world", not
to prove his KNOWLEDGE of the existence of the "external world". So here
we
have the first analytic distinction.
Moore himself set this out clearly in a subsequent discussion of his
lecture:
"I have sometimes distinguished between two different propositions, each
of which has been made by some philosophers, namely"
(1) the proposition
"There are no material things"
and (2) the proposition:
"Nobody knows for certain that there are any material things".
"In my Academy lecture called ‘Proof of an External World’ I implied with
regard to the first of these propositions that it could be proved to be
false in such a way as this; namely, by holding up one of your hands and
saying ‘This hand is a material thing; therefore there is at least one
material
thing’. But with regard to the second of the two propositions I do not
think I have ever implied that it could be proved to be false in any such
simple way."
Setting aside any anti-sceptical intent therefore, what needs assessment
is the metaphysical or ontological significance of Moore's proof, as a
proof
of an ‘external world’, or 'the' external world, if you must.
Clearly, everything here depends on what is to count as ‘external’, i.e.
a conceptual analysis of 'external', as per necessary and sufficient
conditions, that will leave the idealist happy, and in in particular
whether
Moore's demonstration of the existence of his hands proves the existence of
things that are in no way at all dependent upon experience or thought.
It is obvious that it does not, alas, for all that Austin said that while
some like Witters, Moore's HIS man.
For that issue is one which depends on broader philosophical questions
about idealism which cannot possibly be settled that way, as Omar K. has
pointed out.
Moore's own distinction between questions of truth and "questions of
analysis" should be introduced here. Also his fine point that one thing is
to
know what a thing is, and another to know that the analysis of the thing
is.
Moore's ‘proof’ demonstrates the ‘empirical’ truth of a simple truism (a
"Moorian fact" in Lewis's funny idiom: "We know a lot of Mooreian facts),
that he has hands.
But it leaves entirely open the question of the "analysis" of this truism
or Moorian fact.
Yet, it is at the level of concdeptual analysis, we can grant, that the ‘
transcendental’ question of whether things such as hands are altogether
independent of experience and thought is to be answered.
Although Moore did not intend his ‘proof’ as a refutation of scepticism
(but rather idealism?) he did frequently argue against sceptical views.
Ihis early writings, despite the passage quoted just now, Moore does
sometimes give the impression that he thinks one can refute scepticism by
simply
bringing forward a straightforward case of knowledge, such as ‘I know that
this is a pencil’.
But, on examination it turns out that Moore's strategy here is far more
subtle -- almost Oxonian, almost Griceian.
Moore wants to argue that we get our understanding of KNOWLEDGE primarily
through straightforward cases of this kind, and thus that sceptical
arguments are self-undermining.
For, on the one hand, they rely on general principles about the LIMITS of
knowledge and thus assume some understanding of knowledge but, on the
other
hand, they undermine this understanding by implying that there are no such
straightforward cases of it.
The force of arguments of this kind is, however, disputable, since the
sceptic can always present his argument as a "reductio ad absurdum" of the
possibility of knowledge. (see my earlier remarks on Mooreian facts and
their
alleged privileged access and incorribigility)
And the same point applies to Moore's other attempts to convict the
sceptic of some kind of pragmatic incoherence (the use of 'know' versus
'belief',
for example.
In two of his writings, ‘Four Forms of Skepticism’ and ‘Certainty’,
Moore, dissatisfied with earlier arguments and with the misunderstanding
of his
‘proof’, now returns to the issue and set himself the challenge of
refuting Cartesian scepticism.
Notoriously, by the end of ‘Certainty’ Moore acknowledges defeat.
How?
Well, hving agreed that if he does not know that he is not dreaming (or
drunk), he does not know such things as that he is standing up and
talking,
he accepts (with reservations) that he can NOT know for certain that he is
not dreaming.
Most malicious commentators agree that Moore lost his way here.
But it is not clear where, since Moore makes no obvious mistake.
Nonetheless the viability of a ‘common sense’ response to scepticism
remains an important feature of later discussions of the topic, as Grice
testifies. Grice speaks of Oxonian dialectic as better than Atheinian
dialectic,
but his reverence for Moore should have his listing Cantabrigian dialectic
too.
The author of "Beyond the Fringe" knew this -- their skit -- "Apples in the
basket" -- and more importantly, knew that their sophisticated audience in
Edinburgh, KNEW about it.
Thus Moore is clearly right when, for example, he remarked that despite
Russell's frequent sceptical professions, Russell was nonetheless
perfectly
sure, without a shadow of doubt, on thousands of occasions, that he was
sitting down.
But what is difficult to achieve here is a formulation of the sceptical
dialectic which both shows the importance of Moore's ‘common sense’
affirmations of certainty and yet avoids a dogmatic insistence that
knowledge does
not need to be vindicated in the face of skeptical argument.
Cheers,
Speranza
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