Q&A: Empiricism
Originally published:
This is an English translation (via GPT-5.4). Read the original Hebrew version.
Empiricism
Question
What led to empiricism was the claim that what a person thinks does not mean it is true about the world.
If so, why shouldn’t we say the same thing about perception? (Like Berkeley.)
And why did the empiricist view catch on if the same could be said about perception?
Answer
The assumption is that perception is grounded in contact with the world. To doubt that is just plain skepticism. But thinking takes place inside the head, and there is no reason to assume it is matched to what is happening in the world itself. So in that case this skepticism is called for.
By the way, I agree with that skepticism, and therefore in my view thinking too has a perceptual component. Without that, the skepticism really is called for.