How does A.W. Moore define metaphysics?
Metaphysics is the most general attempt to make sense of things. It asks how reality as a whole hangs together, regardless of whether this inquiry is scientific, creative, or speculative.
Why does Moore think metaphysics is unavoidable?
Because there will always be some most general framework through which we interpret reality. Even denying metaphysics presupposes a metaphysical stance.
What is the empiricist attack on metaphysics?
The claim that knowledge comes only from experience, so metaphysical claims that go beyond experience are meaningless. Example: Hume’s scepticism about causation.
How does Hume challenge metaphysical necessity?
By arguing that claims like ‘every effect has a cause’ are not rationally justified but based on habit formed through experience.
What is logical positivism?
A 20th-century movement holding that statements are meaningful only if analytically true or empirically verifiable.
What is the verification principle?
The principle that a statement is meaningful only if it can be empirically verified or is analytically true.
Why do logical positivists think metaphysics is nonsense?
Because metaphysical claims are neither analytically true nor empirically verifiable. Example: claims about substance or God.
How does verificationism affect ethics?
It reduces ethical statements to expressions of emotion rather than truth-apt claims (the ‘boo/hoorah’ theory).
What is Moore’s deflationary response to positivism?
That positivists themselves make a metaphysical claim by asserting that science alone gives the most general account of reality.
Why does Kant take Hume’s scepticism seriously?
Because it threatens causality, necessity, and metaphysics as such, leading to materialism and fatalism.
What question structures Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason?
‘How is metaphysics, as a science, possible?’
What does Kant mean by ‘dogmatic’ metaphysics?
Metaphysics that speculates about reality in itself without examining the limits of reason.
What does Kant mean by ‘critical’ metaphysics?
A metaphysics that investigates the conditions and limits of human cognition before making metaphysical claims.
What are synthetic a priori judgments?
Judgments that are informative (synthetic) yet known independently of experience (a priori). Example: mathematical and metaphysical principles.
Why are synthetic a priori judgments crucial for Kant?
Because they allow metaphysics to be informative without relying on experience.
What is the Copernican Revolution in Kant?
The idea that objects conform to our mode of cognition, rather than cognition conforming to objects.
Why does Kant distinguish appearances from things-in-themselves?
To limit metaphysical knowledge to how reality appears to us, while leaving space for faith in God, freedom, and immortality.
What is a transcendental argument?
An argument that infers the necessary conditions of experience from the fact that experience occurs.
What is descriptive metaphysics (Strawson)?
The project of describing the actual structure of our conceptual scheme, rather than revising it.
Why might Kant’s metaphysics be called descriptive?
Because it aims to describe the necessary structures of experience for beings like us.
What is a criticism of Kant’s descriptive metaphysics?
It may lack novelty or creativity and leave metaphysical questions about reality itself unresolved.
What is Collingwood’s core idea about metaphysics?
Metaphysics is a historical inquiry into the absolute presuppositions of an age.
What is the ‘logic of question and answer’?
The idea that every statement answers a specific question, and understanding requires identifying that question.
What are absolute presuppositions?
Assumptions that cannot be questioned within a framework and make inquiry possible at all.
