The Paradox of Historical Knowledge

If there is a core problem, an essentially contested but inescapable issue in Western philosophy, it is surely the problem of universals and particulars. Questions of epistemology, value and truth, perception, ethics, language, metaphysics, aesthetics, history all these can be considered as functions of the question of universals. The traditional answers to this question which bear a startling family resemblance constitute the keys to the maps that have been drawn in our culture for distinguishing truth from error, beauty from ugliness, goodness from evil in short, all the modes of reality and illusion. Any first principle that purports to organize our world or worlds (even functionally or provisionally) constitutes a proposed claim about universals. By universals I mean simply any proposed constants or recurring invariants of experience. I am using the term in a broader sense than has generally been accorded it in Western philosophic thought. In the WVest, debate over the problem of universals has proceeded for the most part under two general restrictions. The first is that universals cannot be apprehended directly by the senses, but must in some way be constructed or inferred by the intellect, either from sense data or through some mode of intellectual intuition. The second, and more fundamental, restriction limits the characterization of universals (at least in principle) to a closed, static, stable set of finite entities, adaptable to functions of combination, permutation, and so forth. The first feature represents the metaphoric location of universals in the traditional view; the second feature represents the traditional view of the nature of universals as entities of a certain type. These commonly held features account for the family resemblance I mentioned. It should be noted that the traditional conception of universals represents only one possible view of universals; later I shall suggest an alternative view. For the moment. I shall suspend the questiom. of location as indifferent to my immediate purposes, and concentrate on the implications of the more fundamental of these traditional views that which concerns the nature of universals. Ultimately, as we shall see, our conception of the character or nature of universals determines our conception of the space in which we locate them

Epistemology · Historical Philosophy and Science · History · Philosophy · Philosophy, History, and Historiography · Study and Philosophy of Religion

• Sudden events

  Open Access•C S Ramage•Futures•1980

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