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Full-Text Articles in History of Philosophy
Motivation And The Primacy Of Perception, Peter A. Antich
Motivation And The Primacy Of Perception, Peter A. Antich
Theses and Dissertations--Philosophy
In this dissertation, I provide an interpretation and defense of Merleau-Ponty's thesis of the primacy of perception, namely, the thesis that all knowledge is founded on perceptual experience. I take as an interpretative and argumentative key Merleau-Ponty's phenomenological conception of motivation. Whereas epistemology has traditionally accepted a dichotomy between reason and natural causality, I show that this dichotomy is not exhaustive of the forms of epistemic grounding. There is a third type of grounding, the one characteristic of the grounding relations found in perception: motivation. I argue that introducing motivation as a form of epistemic grounding allows us to see …
Transcendental Idealism’S Theory Of Selfhood: Fichte On The Relationship Between Knowing Oneself And Moral Deliberation, Caroline Ann Buchanan
Transcendental Idealism’S Theory Of Selfhood: Fichte On The Relationship Between Knowing Oneself And Moral Deliberation, Caroline Ann Buchanan
Theses and Dissertations--Philosophy
In this dissertation, I take on an exegetical project of understanding how Fichte’s theory of the self influences his account of moral deliberation, and specifically, his account of conscience. I argue that moral action can only be understood within Fichte’s system as possible on the basis of the individual’s own cognitive awareness that they are not only bound by the moral law, but that they are so in virtue of their essential nature as selves. In other words, the feeling of conscience in Fichte’s work, and the decision to abide it, requires that the acting individual recognize that the ought …