Using Conceptual Receptivity In Argument
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The Idea
The position that the subject, who is direct receipt of concepts from perceptual experience, is primary and must be taken as our starting point for philosophy seems to be incredibly powerful when dealing with standard philosophical positions and disputes (consider for example the way the problem of the unity of consciousness evaporates when one takes the subject’s conceptual experience as inarguable).
Given this power, it seems that it would be a good idea to develop a clear idea of when the subject-first strategy can and can’t be employed. A first step in this investigation must be to argue for the subject-first view (which I believe can be done by arguing that one cannot recover self-consciousness from any other starting point). Next, one would need to give an abstract account of exactly which argument strategies it is possible to make use of the subject-first viewpoint within. Finally, one would need to assess the validity of these uses.
- Another aspect of the use of this subject-first viewpoint is whether one is justified in moving from argumental uses that are purely reliant on its decriptive accuracy to those uses which are reliant on normative implications being made from this viewpoint. In particular, an investigation of Heidegger’s justification in moving from the descriptive accuracy of “throwness”, etc. to the normative implications of “authenticity”, etc. would likely be illuminating.
- {[green I think that’s a great topic. Although a huge one. The whole question of the relationship between the subject-first viewpoint and normativity is really interesting. Jason ]}
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