Buridan’s theory of sentences with epistemic verbs (‘to know’, ‘to believe’, etc.) has received much attention in recent scholarship. Its originality with respect to Ockham’s approach, however, has been importantly overestimated. The present paper argues that both doctrines share crucial features and basically belong to the same family. This is done by comparing Buridan’s notion of the ‘appellation of reason’ with Ockham’s application to epistemic sentences of the general principle that a predicate always ‘appellates its form’.
Purchase
Buy instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):
Institutional Login
Log in with Open Athens, Shibboleth, or your institutional credentials
Personal login
Log in with your brill.com account
See for example C. Normore, “Buridan’s Ontology”, in How Things are. Studies in Predication and the History of Philosophy and Science, eds. J. Bogen and J. E. McGuire (Dordrecht, 1985), 189-203; G. Nuchelmans, “Some Remarks on the Role of Mental Sentences in Medieval Semantics”, Histoire Épistémologie Langage 14, fasc. 2 (1992), 47-59; R. Van der Lecq, “Confused Individuals and Moving Trees. John Buridan on the Knowledge of Particulars”, in John Buridan. A Master of Arts, eds. E. P. Bos and H. A. Krop (Nijmegen, 1993), 1-21; J. Spruyt, “Buridan on the Existence of Intelligible Species”, Medioevo 20 (1994), 179-203; G. Klima, John Buridan (Oxford, 2009). Even B. Patar, Le Traité de l’âme de Jean Buridan (De prima lectura) (Louvain-la-Neuve, 1991), who firmly rejects the application to Buridan’s thought of the label ‘nominalism’, discusses the point in relation with Ockham, his professed goal being to sharply dissociate Buridan from Ockham’s general approach; it should be noted, though, that Patar’s whole strategy in this matter is deeply misguided since his definition of what a nominalist is (“quelqu’un pour qui les noms sont des constructions purement arbitraires auxquelles ne correspondraient que des concepts inventés sans référence directe au réel”, 18*) hardly applies to Ockham either. In this article I will refer to the following editions of Ockham’s works (The Franciscan Institute, St. Bonaventure, N.Y.), using OPh for Opera philosophica and OTh for Opera theologica: Summa logicae, eds. P. Boehner, G. Gál and S. Brown (OPh I, 1974); Expositio in librum Perihermenias Aristotelis, eds. A. Gambatese and S. Brown (OPh II, 1978, 341-504); Expositio in librum Elenchorum, ed. F. Del Punta (OPh III, 1979); Quaestiones in librum secundum Sententiarum (Reportatio), eds. G. Gál and R. Wood (OTh V, 1981); (Ps?-) Ockham, Elementarium logicae, ed. E. M. Buytaert (OPh VII, 1988, 59-304).
Cf. L. M. de Rijk, “John Buridan on Universals”, Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale, 1/1992, 35-59.
See A. Prior, “Oratio obliqua”, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Suppl. vol. 37 (1963), 115-126; D. Davidson, “On Saying That” (1968), in D. Davidson, Inquiries into Truth and Interpretation (Oxford, 1984), 93-108. J. Searle, Intentionality. An Essay in the Philosophy of Mind (Cambridge, 1983), chap. 7. I myself proposed an approach of this type in C. Panaccio, “Belief-Sentences: Outline of a Nominalistic Approach”, in Québec Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol. II, eds. M. Marion and R. S. Cohen (Dordrecht, 1996), 265-277. For an interesting comparison between Buridan and Searle on epistemic sentences, see Nuchelmans, “Some Remarks on the Role of Mental Sentences in Medieval Semantics.”
See J. Biard, “Verbes cognitifs et appellation de la forme selon Albert de Saxe”, in Knowledge and the Sciences in Medieval Philosophy, eds. S. Knuuttila, R. Työrinoja, and S. Ebbesen (Helsinki, 1990), vol. II, 427-435.
See F. Goubier, “La teoria della supposizione e le sue cronologie semantiche”, Rivista di Filosofia Neo-scolastica 4, 501-532.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
---|---|---|---|
Abstract Views | 476 | 76 | 29 |
Full Text Views | 111 | 1 | 0 |
PDF Views & Downloads | 55 | 4 | 0 |
Buridan’s theory of sentences with epistemic verbs (‘to know’, ‘to believe’, etc.) has received much attention in recent scholarship. Its originality with respect to Ockham’s approach, however, has been importantly overestimated. The present paper argues that both doctrines share crucial features and basically belong to the same family. This is done by comparing Buridan’s notion of the ‘appellation of reason’ with Ockham’s application to epistemic sentences of the general principle that a predicate always ‘appellates its form’.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
---|---|---|---|
Abstract Views | 476 | 76 | 29 |
Full Text Views | 111 | 1 | 0 |
PDF Views & Downloads | 55 | 4 | 0 |