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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 January 2009
1. Believing Enough to Think
The Scottish system of university education requires most aspirants to an Ordinary Degree to study some philosophy. Philosophers in Scottish Universities must therefore contend with enormous first-year classes, stocked with youngsters who have little real desire to be philosophers, or even to philosophize. Some years ago, at Glasgow, a question in the final exam was as follows: ‘“Philosophy is of no use, and so should not be studied.” Discuss’. A couple of hundred students answered, more or less fluently, that one should not assume that what was of no use should not be studied, since some things were worth studying in their own right, but that in any case the study of philosophy was useful since it helped one to question what authoritative figures said. No essayist, apparently, saw any paradox in this reply, which was, of course, taken word for word from the professor's lectures.
2 Berkeley, GeorgeAlciphron: Works, Luce, A. A. & Jessop, T. E. (eds) (Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson, 1948) vol. 3, 229 (Euphranor speaks)Google Scholar
3 Herbert, Edward, De Veritate, tr Carré, M. H. (Bristol: Arrowsmith, 1937), 72.Google Scholar Further on ‘opinions’, see my ‘How to Reason about Value Judgements’ in A. Phillips-Griffiths, (ed.), Key Themes in Philosophy (Cambridge University Press, 1989), 173–90.Google Scholar
4 Miles, Leland, John Colet and the Platonic Tradition (London: Allen and Unwin, 1961), 128, 141.Google Scholar
5 Philo, Legum Allegoriae 2.56 (Collected Works, tr. Colson, F. H., Whitaker, G. H. et al. , (London: Loeb Classical Library, Heinemann: 1929–1962), vol. 2, 259).Google Scholar See also Plotinus, Enneads 1.6.7, 5-7, and Rist, J. M.Plotinus: the Road to Reality (Cambridge University Press, 1967), 188–98.Google Scholar
6 Herbert op. cit., 120.
7 Herbert op. cit., 131.
8 Berkeley, , Sermon on Immorality: Works, op. cit. Vol. 7, p. 14.Google Scholar
9 Berkeley, Discourse to Magistrates: op. cit., vol. 6, 203f; see my ‘Berkeley's Philosophy of Religion’ in K. Winckler (ed.) Companion to Berkeley (Cambridge University Press, forthcoming).
10 Machen, Arthur ‘Psychology’ in Holy Terrors (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1946), 80.Google Scholar
11 Philo, , On Cherubim, 114f: op. cit., vol. 1, 77.Google Scholar
12 Philo, , Mut. 239f:Google Scholaribid., vol. V, 265f.
13 The Unnatural Nature of Science (London: Faber, 1952).Google Scholar
14 see Geach, P.Logic Matters (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972).Google Scholar
15 Galilei, GalileoDialogues concerning Two New Sciences, tr. Crewe, H. & De Salvo, A. (New York: Dover Publications, 1952; translated 1914; 1st published 1638) pp. 63fGoogle Scholar; see Feyerabend, P.Against Method (London: NLB, 1975), pp. 69ff, for further insight into Galileo's use of rhetorical argument.Google Scholar
16 I usually add that ‘you’ can see that Albert and Beth have red hats: this sentence was, accidentally, omitted from the paper presented to the Conference. In some ways its omission makes the problem harder; in others, easier.
17 Some of the following material was published as ‘The Teaching of Ethics’ in Humane Education Newsletter 1991, 2.1, 4—6.
18 One commentator on this paper responded, smugly, that it was ridiculous to suppose that theism could arise from argument: that is, exactly, the bare modern prejudice I most detest.
19 See my ‘Natural Integrity and Biotechnology’ in David Oderberg & Jacqueling Laing (eds) Human Lives (Macmillan, forthcoming)
20 Mackie, J. L.Ethics: Inventing the Difference Between Right and Wrong (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1976)Google Scholar; see my ‘Mackie and Moral Order’ in Philosophical Quarterly 39, 1989, 98–144.Google Scholar
21 See Donagan, Alan, The Theory of Morality (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1977) for a rejection, on moral grounds, of the law of karma.Google Scholar
22 Chesterton, G. K., A Short History of England (London: Chatto and Windus, 1917), 59.Google Scholar
23 In one way, leaving the information out makes the puzzle harder: people feel at sea, and may need to be nudged to ask what they might see. In another way, adding the information makes the puzzle harder: some people find it difficult to handle counter-factuals.
24 Berkeley, , Primary Visitation Charge (1734–1737): Works op. cit., vol. 7, 163.Google Scholar
25 Berkeley, , Letter to Sir John James (1741)Google Scholar: ibid., vol. 7, p. 145; see Alciphron: ibid., vol. 3, 226 (Euphranor speaks).
26 Berkeley, Siris 264: ibid, vol. 5, 124.