Fred Wilson
Biographic Data
| ID | 3672135 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Fred Wilson |
| GIVEN NAMES | Fred |
| FAMILY NAME | Wilson |
| SIGNATURE | WILSON F |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Toronto |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 32 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 28 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 32 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1968 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2013 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Body, Mind and Self in Hume's Critical Realism
This essay proposes that Hume’s non-substantialist bundle account of minds is basically correct. The concept of a person is not a metaphysical notion but a forensic one, that of a being who enters into the moral and normative relations of civil society. A person is a bundle but it is also a structured bundle. Hume’s metaphysics of relations is argued must be replaced by a more adequate one such as that of Russell, but beyond that Hume’s account i…
Artists' Portfolios (Color Plates)
Research Article| February 01 2011 Artists' Portfolios (Color Plates) Hank Willis Thomas, Hank Willis Thomas Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Fred Wilson, Fred Wilson Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Christopher Cozier Christopher Cozier Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Representations (2011) 113 (1): 72. https://doi.org/10.1…
Visual Art
Visual Art Fred Wilson Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 1. Detail of An Account of a Voyage to the Island Jamaica with the Un-Natural History of That Place by Fred Wilson. Installation view, The Institute of Jamaica Gallery, September 16, 2007–February 26, 2008. Photograph courtesy of Donnette I. Zacca © 2007 [End Page 1021] Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 2. Detail of An Account of a Voyage to the Island Jamaic…
The External World and Our Knowledge of It: Hume's Critical Realism, an Exposition and a Defence
Acquaintance, Ontology, and Knowledge: Collected Essays in Ontology
Acquaintance, Ontology and Knowledge Hume and Derrida on Language and Meaning Empiricism: Principles and Problems On the Hausmans' New Approach to Berkeley's Ideal Bradley's Account of Relations and its Impact on Empiricism Moore's Refutation of Idealism Bareness, as in 'bare particular': Its ubiquity Universals, Bare Particulars and Tropes The World and Reality in Tractatus Grossman on the Categorial Structure of the World Human Action and a Nat…
Reforming Philosophy: A Victorian Debate on Science and Society , by Laura J. Snyder
Reviewed by: Reforming Philosophy: A Victorian Debate on Science and Society Fred Wilson (bio) Reforming Philosophy: A Victorian Debate on Science and Society, by Laura J. Snyder; pp. x + 386. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2006, $45.00, £28.50. In roughly the first half of Victoria's reign, there was an ongoing debate between those who would preserve things more or less as they had been and those who sought radical change. …
Bosanquet on the Ontology of Logic and the Method of Scientific Inquiry
Are Faculty Strikes Unethical
Galileo's lunar observations: Do they imply the rejection of traditional lunar theory
Hume. Anthony Quinton
Some controversies about method in nineteenth-century psychology
Serving Institutions
On Hume’s Theory of Consciousness
Interviews with Sherrie Levine, Louise Lawler, and Fred Wilson
Buskirk: Duchamp is relevant to your recent work that makes specific references, and to your work in general. But let's start a bit earlier, with the shoe sale that you did in 1976, and the strategy of taking a found object into the gallery and selling it there. Levine: After I got out of school in the early seventies, I was teaching in California and I bought the shoes at a secondhand store in San Jose. When I moved to New York I brought one sui…
Public Purse, Public Purpose: Autonomy and Accountability in the Groves of Academe
Mill and Comte on the method of introspection
August Comte's criticisms of the introspective method in psychology and John Stuart Mill's replies are examined, and it is argued that Mill's response is largely correct. It is suggested that Comte never understood what the method aimed to do because his roots were, through Franz Joseph Gall, in the tradition of the Scots critics of associationism, rather than the tradition of David Hartley and James Mill and John Stuart Mill. The innatist theori…
Laws and Other Worlds: A Response to Martin
Robert Martin, in his review of my Laws and Other Worlds , has grasped the thrust of much of the argument. I would like to respond to three specific points that he makes, and to add a couple of more general comments that will bring out some other aspects of the structure of the argument that he misses, to try to show why I think the sort of enterprise the book attempts is worthwhile, more important than Martin's own pragmatic tendencies will perh…
Is Hume a Sceptic with Regard to the Senses
Is Hume a Sceptic with Regard to the Senses? FRED WILSON A PYRRHONISTARGUESthat every philosophical position can be shown to lead to contradiction and paradox. His point is that once this fact about philosophy is recognized, the mind will abandon philosophy, and content itself with custom and habit, and, in so doing it will, the Pyrrhonist holds, be content. Popkin' has argued that Hume is a radical Pyrrhonist who holds that not merely philosophy…
Wright's Enquiry Concerning Humean Understanding
From the time of Reid through Coleridge to T. H. Green, Hume was interpreted as a sceptic and as a wholly negative philosopher. And from their perspective such an interpretation no doubt makes some sense, given the vested interest in religion and the absolute of the idealists: from that perspective it is an essential part of a positive position that it take one beyond the realm of ordinary objects known by sense experience to a realm of entities …
Hume's Defence of Science
It is incorrect to construe Hume as a Pyrrhonian sceptic. Or so I have argued elsewhere. To the contrary, Hume in fact offers a detailed defence of the thesis that the norms of scientific inference, that is, the "rules by which to judge of causes and effects", arereasonablerules to follow in forming our beliefs. Conforming to these rules in its formation of causal beliefs is astrategythe understanding employs in order to satisfy the end of curios…
Explanation, Causation and Deduction
Dispositions Defined: Harré and Madden on Analyzing Disposition Concepts
If one proposes to analyze dispositions by means of statements involving only the ‘if-then’ of material implication–-that is, for example, to define ‘x is soluble’ by means of 'x is in water ⊃ x dissolves'–-then one faces the problem first raised by Carnap, the match which is never put in water and which therefore turns out to be not only soluble but also both soluble and insoluble. I have elsewhere argued that if one refers to appropriate laws, …
Hume's Defence of Causal Inference
As is well known, the Humean account of causal inference gives a central location to inferencehabits. Some of these habits one can discipline. Thus, one can so discipline oneself as to reason in accordance with the "rules by which to judge of causes and effects" (173ff.), that is, one can discipline oneself to think scientifically, rather than, say, in accordance with the rules of prejudice (146f.), or of superstition (271). All such judgments, e…
The Anatomy of Historical Knowledge
On Achinstein's Concepts of Science
This book is in the tradition that defines the philosophical center of contemporary philosophy of science, the tradition of Carnap, Hempel, and Nagel as supplemented by generous additions from Austin and an Oxfordized Wittgenstein in the style introduced by N. R. Hanson. This tradition has been criticized both from the philosophical left, by Sellars, and from the philosophical right, by Bergmann. Achinstein's work is so squarely in the center tha…
Hume's Defence of Causal Inference
As is well known, the Humean account of causal inference gives a central location to inferencehabits. Some of these habits one can discipline. Thus, one can so discipline oneself as to reason in accordance with the "rules by which to judge of causes and effects" (173ff.), that is, one can discipline oneself to think scientifically, rather than, say, in accordance with the rules of prejudice (146f.), or of superstition (271). All such judgments, e…
Explanation in Aristotle, Newton, and Toulmin
The claim that scientific explanation is deductive has been attacked on both systematic and historical grounds. This paper briefly defends the claim against the systematic attack. Essential to this defence is a distinction between perfect and imperfect explanation. This distinction is then used to illuminate the differences and similarities between Aristotelian (anthropomorphic) explanations of certain facts and those of classical mechanics. In p…
Interviews with Sherrie Levine, Louise Lawler, and Fred Wilson
Buskirk: Duchamp is relevant to your recent work that makes specific references, and to your work in general. But let's start a bit earlier, with the shoe sale that you did in 1976, and the strategy of taking a found object into the gallery and selling it there. Levine: After I got out of school in the early seventies, I was teaching in California and I bought the shoes at a secondhand store in San Jose. When I moved to New York I brought one sui…
Public Purse, Public Purpose: Autonomy and Accountability in the Groves of Academe
Hume's Defence of Science
It is incorrect to construe Hume as a Pyrrhonian sceptic. Or so I have argued elsewhere. To the contrary, Hume in fact offers a detailed defence of the thesis that the norms of scientific inference, that is, the "rules by which to judge of causes and effects", arereasonablerules to follow in forming our beliefs. Conforming to these rules in its formation of causal beliefs is astrategythe understanding employs in order to satisfy the end of curios…
Weinberg's Refutation of Nominalism
Professor Weinberg, in his recent Abstraction, Relation, and Induction, has critically discussed the nominalistic tradition stemming from Ockham and continuing in the work of Berkeley and Hume. In this tradition there is one fundamental principle, which however divides into two parts. The first is (α) Whatever is distinguishable is distinct, and conversely. The second is (β) Whatever is distinct is separable, and conversely. Weinberg argues that …
Artists' Portfolios (Color Plates)
Research Article| February 01 2011 Artists' Portfolios (Color Plates) Hank Willis Thomas, Hank Willis Thomas Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Fred Wilson, Fred Wilson Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Christopher Cozier Christopher Cozier Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Representations (2011) 113 (1): 72. https://doi.org/10.1…
Serving Institutions
Is Hume a Sceptic with Regard to the Senses
Is Hume a Sceptic with Regard to the Senses? FRED WILSON A PYRRHONISTARGUESthat every philosophical position can be shown to lead to contradiction and paradox. His point is that once this fact about philosophy is recognized, the mind will abandon philosophy, and content itself with custom and habit, and, in so doing it will, the Pyrrhonist holds, be content. Popkin' has argued that Hume is a radical Pyrrhonist who holds that not merely philosophy…
Wright's Enquiry Concerning Humean Understanding
From the time of Reid through Coleridge to T. H. Green, Hume was interpreted as a sceptic and as a wholly negative philosopher. And from their perspective such an interpretation no doubt makes some sense, given the vested interest in religion and the absolute of the idealists: from that perspective it is an essential part of a positive position that it take one beyond the realm of ordinary objects known by sense experience to a realm of entities …
Dispositions Defined: Harré and Madden on Analyzing Disposition Concepts
If one proposes to analyze dispositions by means of statements involving only the ‘if-then’ of material implication–-that is, for example, to define ‘x is soluble’ by means of 'x is in water ⊃ x dissolves'–-then one faces the problem first raised by Carnap, the match which is never put in water and which therefore turns out to be not only soluble but also both soluble and insoluble. I have elsewhere argued that if one refers to appropriate laws, …
Is operationism unjust to temperature
Definition and Discovery (I)
A Note on Operationism
Is operationism unjust to temperature
Definition and Discovery (II)
Definition and Discovery (I)
Explanation in Aristotle, Newton, and Toulmin
The claim that scientific explanation is deductive has been attacked on both systematic and historical grounds. This paper briefly defends the claim against the systematic attack. Essential to this defence is a distinction between perfect and imperfect explanation. This distinction is then used to illuminate the differences and similarities between Aristotelian (anthropomorphic) explanations of certain facts and those of classical mechanics. In p…
Explanation in Aristotle, Newton, and Toulmin: Part II
Weinberg's Refutation of Nominalism
Professor Weinberg, in his recent Abstraction, Relation, and Induction, has critically discussed the nominalistic tradition stemming from Ockham and continuing in the work of Berkeley and Hume. In this tradition there is one fundamental principle, which however divides into two parts. The first is (α) Whatever is distinguishable is distinct, and conversely. The second is (β) Whatever is distinct is separable, and conversely. Weinberg argues that …
On Achinstein's Concepts of Science
This book is in the tradition that defines the philosophical center of contemporary philosophy of science, the tradition of Carnap, Hempel, and Nagel as supplemented by generous additions from Austin and an Oxfordized Wittgenstein in the style introduced by N. R. Hanson. This tradition has been criticized both from the philosophical left, by Sellars, and from the philosophical right, by Bergmann. Achinstein's work is so squarely in the center tha…
The Anatomy of Historical Knowledge
Hume's Defence of Causal Inference
As is well known, the Humean account of causal inference gives a central location to inferencehabits. Some of these habits one can discipline. Thus, one can so discipline oneself as to reason in accordance with the "rules by which to judge of causes and effects" (173ff.), that is, one can discipline oneself to think scientifically, rather than, say, in accordance with the rules of prejudice (146f.), or of superstition (271). All such judgments, e…
Explanation, Causation and Deduction
Dispositions Defined: Harré and Madden on Analyzing Disposition Concepts
If one proposes to analyze dispositions by means of statements involving only the ‘if-then’ of material implication–-that is, for example, to define ‘x is soluble’ by means of 'x is in water ⊃ x dissolves'–-then one faces the problem first raised by Carnap, the match which is never put in water and which therefore turns out to be not only soluble but also both soluble and insoluble. I have elsewhere argued that if one refers to appropriate laws, …
Wright's Enquiry Concerning Humean Understanding
From the time of Reid through Coleridge to T. H. Green, Hume was interpreted as a sceptic and as a wholly negative philosopher. And from their perspective such an interpretation no doubt makes some sense, given the vested interest in religion and the absolute of the idealists: from that perspective it is an essential part of a positive position that it take one beyond the realm of ordinary objects known by sense experience to a realm of entities …
Hume's Defence of Science
It is incorrect to construe Hume as a Pyrrhonian sceptic. Or so I have argued elsewhere. To the contrary, Hume in fact offers a detailed defence of the thesis that the norms of scientific inference, that is, the "rules by which to judge of causes and effects", arereasonablerules to follow in forming our beliefs. Conforming to these rules in its formation of causal beliefs is astrategythe understanding employs in order to satisfy the end of curios…
Laws and Other Worlds: A Response to Martin
Robert Martin, in his review of my Laws and Other Worlds , has grasped the thrust of much of the argument. I would like to respond to three specific points that he makes, and to add a couple of more general comments that will bring out some other aspects of the structure of the argument that he misses, to try to show why I think the sort of enterprise the book attempts is worthwhile, more important than Martin's own pragmatic tendencies will perh…
Is Hume a Sceptic with Regard to the Senses
Is Hume a Sceptic with Regard to the Senses? FRED WILSON A PYRRHONISTARGUESthat every philosophical position can be shown to lead to contradiction and paradox. His point is that once this fact about philosophy is recognized, the mind will abandon philosophy, and content itself with custom and habit, and, in so doing it will, the Pyrrhonist holds, be content. Popkin' has argued that Hume is a radical Pyrrhonist who holds that not merely philosophy…
Mill and Comte on the method of introspection
August Comte's criticisms of the introspective method in psychology and John Stuart Mill's replies are examined, and it is argued that Mill's response is largely correct. It is suggested that Comte never understood what the method aimed to do because his roots were, through Franz Joseph Gall, in the tradition of the Scots critics of associationism, rather than the tradition of David Hartley and James Mill and John Stuart Mill. The innatist theori…
Public Purse, Public Purpose: Autonomy and Accountability in the Groves of Academe
Interviews with Sherrie Levine, Louise Lawler, and Fred Wilson
Buskirk: Duchamp is relevant to your recent work that makes specific references, and to your work in general. But let's start a bit earlier, with the shoe sale that you did in 1976, and the strategy of taking a found object into the gallery and selling it there. Levine: After I got out of school in the early seventies, I was teaching in California and I bought the shoes at a secondhand store in San Jose. When I moved to New York I brought one sui…
On Hume’s Theory of Consciousness
Serving Institutions
Some controversies about method in nineteenth-century psychology
Galileo's lunar observations: Do they imply the rejection of traditional lunar theory
Hume. Anthony Quinton
Are Faculty Strikes Unethical
Epistemology (22 works) · Philosophy (20 works) · Computer Science (11 works) · Sociology (9 works) · Law (7 works) · Philosophical Ethics and Theory (7 works) · Philosophy (7 works) · Political science (6 works) · Psychology (6 works) · Philosophy and History of Science (5 works)