Reality and Its Appearance.
Title:
Reality and Its Appearance.
Author:
Rescher, Nicholas.
ISBN:
9781441164858
Personal Author:
Edition:
1st ed.
Physical Description:
1 online resource (140 pages)
Series:
Continuum Studies in American Philosophy
Contents:
Contents -- Preface -- Introduction -- Chapter 1: Reality vs. Appearance -- 1. Reality vs. Appearance -- 2. Real Existence Involves Mind-Transcendence -- 3. The Historical Perspective -- 4. True Thought is Coordinate with Reality -- 5. An Ontological Fallacy -- 6. The Impetus of Mind -- Chapter 2: How True Thought "Agrees" with Reality -- 1. Fact Outruns Language -- 2. The Perspective of Musical Chairs -- 3. The Vastness of Fact -- 4. Truth and Reality -- 5. Reality Involucrates Exactness -- 6. Reality Involucrates Completeness -- 7. The Lesson -- Chapter 3: Cognitive Access to Reality -- 1. Adaequatio Ad Rem: On the Conformity of Thought and Reality -- 2. On Our Knowledge of Reality -- 3. Reality and Our Knowledge of It -- 4. Cognitive Depth: The Complexity of the Real -- 5. The Impetus of Presumption -- 6. Controls of Cognitive Adequacy: The Rationale of Retrojustification -- 7. A Virtuous Circularity -- Chapter 4: Problems of Fallibilism -- 1. Specific vs. Indefinite Knowledge and Ignorance -- 2. Lessons of the Preface Paradox -- 3. Oversimplification as a Gateway to Error -- 4. Why Oversimplification? Scientific Progress and Cognitive Complexity -- 5. Cognitive Myopia: Confusion and Conflation and Their Consequences -- Chapter 5: Scientific Realism -- 1. A Different Sort of "Reality" -- 2. The Trouble with Scientific Realism -- 3. A Utopian Demand -- Chapter 6: The Rationale of Realism -- 1. Realism and Cognition -- 2. The Role of Realism in Informative Communication -- 3. Agreement is Not Essential -- 4. Our Presuppositional Commitment to Reality -- 5. The Rationale of Realism -- 6. A Pragmatic Foundation -- 7. Retrojustification: The Wisdom of Hindsight -- 8. Avoiding Circularity -- 9. A Review -- 10. The Aspect of Idealism -- Notes -- References -- Name Index.
Abstract:
In Reality and Its Appearance, Nicholas Rescher aims to address the conceptual and analytical question: how does the concept of reality function and how should we think with regard to the issue of reality's relations to appearances? Rescher argues that the distinction between reality and its appearance is not a substantive distinction between two types of being, but rather relates to different ways of understanding one selfsame mode of being. The book proposes that while realism is a sensible and tenable position, nevertheless there is something to be said for idealism as well. In the cognitive as in the moral life, perfection is beyond our human grasp and we have no choice but to rest content with the best that we can manage to achieve in practice. This perspective shifts the approach from a cognitive absolutism to a pragmatism that is prepared to come to terms with the limitations inherent in our situations. On this basis Rescher defends a substantive realism that itself rests on a justificatory rationale of a decidedly pragmatic orientation.
Local Note:
Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, 2017. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries.
Genre:
Electronic Access:
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