Abstract
In this chapter, Mary Collins Swabey critiques G. E. Moore's discussion of sense data.
Marie Collins Swabey: Originally published in 1924 in The Monist, 34(3), 466–473.
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Notes
- 1.
Moore, G. E., Philosophical Studies (1922), Ch. V.
- 2.
Ibid., p. 186.
- 3.
Perky, C. W., American Journal of Psychology, Vol. 21, pp. 418–454.
- 4.
Moore, op. cit., p. 189.
- 5.
Ibid., p. 191.
- 6.
One of these is the view that would interpret each particular physical object as being the “cause” of the experience of certain sensibles. But exception may obviously be taken to this, on the ground of its involving hopeless complexity, since in the example of the half-crown, for instance, the events which happen between the half-crown and my eyes, as well as events in my eyes and optic nerves, are just as much causes of my experience of the sensibles as is the coin itself. If an endeavor be made to meet this objection by saying that the half-crown has a particular kind of causal relation to my experience of certain sensibles, being, in fact, their “source” (and a source either “spiritual” or “unknown” in its nature), still nothing is really gained by this, since the only possible sense in which the physical object can here be said to have qualities is in the last analysis that of the Pickwickian interpretation. Another possible view would be frankly to describe the “source” of our experience of sensibles themselves; these latter existing even when not experienced. Nevertheless, under the proper conditions these unexperienced sensibles would be the source of our experiencing certain sensibles, etc., but since this seems all their meaning we here recognize only another variation of the Pickwickian theme (pp. 192–194).
- 7.
If physical objects are subject to the laws of thought, they are certainly also subject to the principle of uniformity, since it would be nothing less than a denial of identity and the assertion that a thing need not be what it is to suppose that under the same conditions an object could behave in different ways.
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Swabey, M.C., Edited by., Katzav, J., Rogers, D. (2023). Mr. G. E. Moore’s Discussion of Sense Data. In: Katzav, J., Vaesen, K., Rogers, D. (eds) Knowledge, Mind and Reality: An Introduction by Early Twentieth-Century American Women Philosophers. Women in the History of Philosophy and Sciences, vol 18. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-24437-7_8
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