Reply to My Critics

ABSTRACT

In this article, I engage with the queries, comments, and suggestions raised by my commentators. In response to Lähteenmäki, I focus on Descartes’ understanding of the role of prejudice in our pre-Meditation experiences to explain how an engagement with the Meditations can change the mind’s understanding of itself. In relation to Boeker, I highlight that for Locke expressions of esteem should ideally be based on insights afforded through the use of reason. I address Clay’s concerns by arguing that it would be reductive to conceive of Humean sympathy as a mere conversion process. In reply to Alweiss, I focus on Rousseau’s arguments from human nature and the tension arising from them when seen in relation to his understanding of male and female virtue. To engage Reichert’s concerns about Herder’s expansive conception of knowledge, I argue that for Herder coherence plays a crucial role in justifying sympathetically acquired beliefs. I finally re-examine Kant’s distinction between Wille and Willkür, and the causes he takes to be responsible for giving reason a special tendency, to respond to O’Shea’s questions about maxims.

KEYWORDS:

• human nature
• will
• agency
• virtue
• epistemology
• experience

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. References to Descartes are to Descartes (1964–76), Oeuvres de Descartes, ed. Charles Adam and Paul Tannery, 12 vols., hereafter cited in the text as ‘AT’ followed by volume and page number, and to Descartes (1984–91), The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, ed. and tr. John Cottingham, Robert Stoothoff, Dugald Murdoch (and Anthony Kenny, vol. 3), hereafter cited in the text as ‘CSM’ for vols. 1 and 2, ‘CSMK’ for vol. 3 followed by volume and page number. ‘C’ followed by page number refers to René Descartes and Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia (2007), The Correspondence Between Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia and René Descartes, ed. and trans. Lisa Shapiro.

2. ‘T’ refers to David Hume (2007), A Treatise of Human Nature, ed. David Fate Norton and Mary J. Norton, followed by book, part, section, and paragraph number. ‘SBN’ refers to the Selby-Bigge edition, followed by the page number.

3. References to Rousseau’s Emile are to Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1992), Emile or On Education, The Collected Writings of Rousseau, vol. 13, ed. and trans. Christopher Kelly and Allan Bloom, followed by page number.

4. See Gjesdal (2017) on this point.

5. Passages from Kant’s Groundwork are cited by giving first the universal reference to the Akademieausgabe (AA), followed by the page number of Practical Philosophy, The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant (1996), ed. Mary Gregor and Allen Wood.