Condillac: Essay on the Origin of Human Knowledge

ISBN-13: 9780521585767 / Angielski / Miękka / 2001 / 276 str.

Etienne Bonnot De Condillac; Desmond M. Clarke; Hans Aarsleff

Opis

Condillac's Essay on the Origin of Human Knowledge, first published in French in 1746 and offered here in a new translation, represented in its time a radical departure from the dominant conception of the mind as a reservoir of innately given ideas. Descartes had held that knowledge must rest on ideas; Condillac turned this upside down by arguing that speech and words are the origin of mental life and knowledge. His work influenced many later philosophers, and also anticipated Wittgenstein's view of language and its relation to mind and thought.

Spis treści

Part I. The Materials of our Knowledge and Especially the Operations of the Soul: Section 1; Section 2. Analysis and generation of the operations of the soul; Section 3. Simple and complex ideas; Section 4; Section 5. Abstractions; Section 6. Some judgments that have been erroneously attributed to the mind, or the solution of a metaphysical problem; Part II. Language and Method: Section 1. The origin and progress of language; Section 2. Method.