Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man
- Language:
- English
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~160,000 words · 778 passages
Cite this work
- APAThomas Reid. (n.d.). Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/thomas-reid/essays-on-the-intellectual-powers-of-man
- MLAThomas Reid. Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/thomas-reid/essays-on-the-intellectual-powers-of-man.
- ChicagoThomas Reid. Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/thomas-reid/essays-on-the-intellectual-powers-of-man.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
Reid's answer to Hume, of 1785: if an impeccable chain of reasoning ends by denying that we know anything of the world, perhaps the fault lies in a premise nobody had examined.
Context and history
The premise is what Reid calls the 'theory of ideas': the assumption, shared by Descartes, Locke, Berkeley and Hume, that what we directly perceive is not things but mental representations. Once that is granted, Reid says, scepticism is unavoidable, because there is no longer any way out of the inside of one's head. His alternative is that perception puts us in contact with the objects themselves, and that there are principles of common sense which are not proved because they are what every proof rests on. It is the principal text of the Scottish school, it dominated the teaching of philosophy in the United States for decades, and it has interested philosophers again over the last fifty years.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
Thofe that agree in certain attributes are thrown into one parcel, and have a general name given them, which belongs equally to every individual in that parcel. This common name mull therefore fignify thofe attributes which have been obferved to be common to every individual in that parcel, and nothing elfe. That fuch general words may anfwer their intention, all that is neceffary is, that thofe who ufe them fhould affix the fame meaning: or notion, that rs, the lame conception to them. The H ESSAY IV. The H ESSAY IV. C H A P.The common meaning is the ftandard by which I- fuch conceptions are formed, and they are faid ^^'^^^^ to be true or falfe, according as they agree or difagree with it. Thus, my conception of felony is true and juft, when it agrees with the meaning of that word in the laws relating to it, and in authors who underfland the law. The meaning of the word is the thing conceiv- ed ; and that meaning is the conception affixed to it by thofe who bed underfland the language.…