common sense philosophy

For some time now, I’ve been interested in looking into the relationship between Thomas Reid and G. E. Moore and their thooughts on the task of philosophy and its duty to common sense. Here’s Reid:

Such principles [of common sense] are older, and of more authority, than Philosophy: she rests upon them as her basis, not they upon her. If she could overturn them, she must be buried in their ruins; but all the engines of philosophical subtlety are too weak for this purpose; and the attempt is no less ridiculous, than if a mechanic should contrive an axis in peritrochio to remove the earth out of its place. [Reid, Inquiry, ed. Derek Brookes (University Park, Pennsylvania: PSUP, 1997), 5: 21.]

Oh, to be able to write like that. Anyway, having recently begun a directed reading on early 20th century metaethics, beginning with Moore’s Principia Ethica, I decided to spend some free time today skimming through some of the exegetical stuff I’ve got on Moore. From the introduction of Brian Hutchinson’s G. E. Moore’s Ethical Theory (Cambridge: CUP, 2001):

Its being an expression of the thought that wisdom lies in accepting the simple, obvious truth makes Principia problematic to many philosophers. Most philosophers instinctively regard themselves as challengers rather than defenders of what all people, including philosophers, instinctively believe. It is thus difficult for them to avoid concluding that even if these beliefs are not simply jettisoned as terminally simpleminded, in the service of offering a revelation, it is their duty to make them over so thoroughly as to leave them unrecognizable. But it may just be that the greatest of iconoclastic acts is to renounce iconoclasm and to defend or, with the thought that it is not really defending that they need, just completely and confidently articulate the simple views that even philosophers hold when they forget they are philosophers: Moore is not afraid to be a lonely philosopher and stand with the crowd. (2)

. . . although he does not realize it, the deepest impulse of Moore’s philosophy is, as Wittgenstein’s is, the end philosophy. Moore’s great aim in ethics is to expose and expunge philosophy’s revisionary impulse in order to defend the things we know to be irreplaceable in any sane way of life. This requires a transformation of philosophy so profound as to be impossible for most philosophers to envisage: Some things philosophers must simply accept. (13)

Philosophy is good only as a means to the dissolution of intellectual clots that the wrong kind of philosophy creates. This would suggest that Moore pursues philosophy not because he finds it to be intrinsically interesting, but because he recognizes an obligation to help others dissolve the clots they suffer from. His long career is then an impressively patient and quiet on of self-sacrifice. (14)

Gotta admit: I find this all really compelling. I especially love this line: “Moore is not afraid to be a lonely philosopher and stand with the crowd.”

I’ll be presenting a paper at the fall meeting of the Georgia Philosophical Society next Saturday, November 12, 2005. Below is the schedule of the conference (and I’ve inserted my abstract).

9:00 Coffee and snacks

9:30 - 10:30 Len Olsen: A Defense of Nelson Goodman’s Theory of Notation

10:30-10:45 Break

10:45-11:45 Phillipa Lang: The Ranking of the Goods at Philebus 66a-67b

11:45 - 12:00 Business meeting — Election of New Program Chair

12 - 1:30 Lunch in Emory Village

1:30 - 2:30 Jim Sias: Supervenience, Moral Knowledge and Causal Efficacy

Abstract: Recent decades have seen a resurgence of naturalistic accounts of moral realism. Arguably the most popular of these accounts has been that of the “Cornell realists,” or “New Realists,” and their idea of the supervenience of moral properties upon subvenient base sets of natural facts and properites. This supervenience relationship, we are told, can be either weak or strong. In this paper, I explain this distinction and argue that (1) weak supervenience makes moral knowledge impossible, (2) strong supervenience may not be a desirable epistemological alternative, and (3) if moral supervenience of either sort holds, moral causation in unintelligible.

2:30 - 3:30 Sean Aas : Public Reason, Reciprocity and Reasonable Belief

The Philosophers’ Carnival has just turned 21 and can be found over at Prior Knowledge. I guess this means the Philosophers’ Carnival is no longer the all-time designated driver.

Hang on Notre Dame, hang on!

Edit: Damn

The deadline for submissions to the Georgia Philosophical Society’s November 12th meeting at Emory University has been extended from October 14 to October 21. Submissions should be sent electronically to rwertheim-at-juno-dot-com.

I hate when something like this happens. Makes procrastination and subsequent self-loathing all the harder. I guess this means I’ll have to submit something.

. . . the 20th Philosophers’ Carnival can be found here.

Welcome to common sense philosophy, a weblog devoted (primarily) to matters of philosophy in the analytic tradition. Contributions will be made by Jim Sias and Sean Martin, fellow beer aficionados and graduate students of philosophy at Georgia State University (see the “About us” page for more). So check back from time to time and feel free to leave a comment whenever the impulse strikes you. (Do note that comments will not appear until approved by one of us.)

Thanks for stoppin’ by.