Russellian Acquaintance Revisited

Abstract

In Bertrand Russell's writings during the first two decades of the Twentieth Century there occur two rather different distinctions that involve his much-discussed, technical notion of acquaintance. The first is the distinction between knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge by description; the second, the distinction between knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge of truths. This article examines the nature and philosophical purpose of these two distinctions, while also tracing the evolution of Russell's notion of acquaintance in the first two decades of the twentieth century. It argues that, when he first expressly formulates his Principle of Acquaintance in 1903, Russell's chief concern is to appeal to the first distinction to argue against a certain tightly restrictive epistemology of understanding that he finds in the writings of William James. By contrast, when in 1911 he begins to place emphasis on the second distinction, his concern is to appeal to it in the course of defending his thesis that we are capable of having perfect knowledge (by acquaintance) of particulars. The defense is necessary because this thesis comes under attack from a certain argument Russell finds in the writings of the Monistic Idealists. Russell explicitly formulates distinction A for the first time in some study notes from 1903entitled "Points about Denoting" (hereafter cited as PAD). 6 These notes also contain his first explicit formulation of (some version of) the Principle of Acquaintance (hereafter cited as POA). Russell deploys distinctions A and B against two rather different targets. He appeals to distinction A-and to the thesis that we may know by description certain things with which we lack acquaintance-in the course of challenging the restrictive epistemology of understanding that is-or seems to be-espoused by James in his Principles of Psychology, and which James himself derives-or thinks he derives-from Locke. According to this epistemology, acquaintance-or in James's terminology "sensation"-is both an enabling condition of thought, and hence of knowledge, and the limiting condition of them. 9 In other words, for James we are able to think about anything with which we are-or can be-acquainted, but only about such things.Russell, I shall argue, seeks to replace James's epistemology of understanding with a view that resembles it insofar as it treats acquaintance as an enabling condition of thought and knowledge (of truths), but that also differs from it insofar as it denies that acquaintance sets limits to thought, and hence also to knowledge (of truths).The philosophical use to which Russell puts distinction B is altogether different. In the summer of 1911, in the course of writing POP, he formulates the doctrine that acquaintance with sense-data constitutes knowledge that is "perfect and complete" (POP, 46). He does so, I shall argue, not out of any attachment to a Cartesian version of foundationalism, but rather because he sees this thesis as a way to resist an argument for a certain holistic conception of kn...

Schlick on the Source of the ‘Great Errors in Philosophy’

“…In other cases we might use these constructions to ascribe a recognitional ability or an ability that presupposes and/or yields propositional knowledge (see Craig 1990: 148 and also Crane 2012: 193ff. and Proops 2014: 808). Thus, either Russell trades on an ambiguity of ‘know + direct object’ constructions or these constructions do not lend themselves to support Russell's view that there is knowledge of things.…”

Russell on Introspection and Self-Knowledge

“…The key (trivial) point is that a subject cannot in any way cognize something of which he or she has no knowledge whatsoever. 3 Proops (2014) suggests that Russell's key divergence from how James (1890James ( /1950 understands the distinction between knowledge of things and knowledge of truths is that he allows, whereas James does not, that subjects can have genuine knowledge of, and therefore be in a position to know about, objects outside of their acquaintance. While James grants that subjects can in some sense conceive of things beyond their experience, he insists that such conceptions are "hollow and inadequate" and generate a "false conceit of knowledge" (1890( /1950.…”

“…Through imagination, subjects can be acquainted with sense-data that need not be experienced as having occurred at any time whatsoever (TK, 59-63). 7 And through conceiving, subjects can be acquainted with abstract universals and general principles, including the objects and relations of logic (POP,81;TK,(97)(98)(99)(100)(101) When it comes to the relationship between knowing objects by acquaintance and knowing truths about them, there is compelling (though controversial) evidence that Russell endorses what Proops (2014) calls "the independence thesis. " 9 According to the independence thesis, a subject's possession of knowledge of something by acquaintance neither presupposes nor entails that the subject knows any truths about it.…”

Acquaintance

“…5 5 For recent discussions of what exactly Russell means by this, see Proops (2014) and Wishon (2017, 2018). …”