The medium of signs: nominalism, language and the philosophy of mind in the early thought of Dugald Stewart.
M D Eddy
Studies in history and philosophy of biological and biomedical sciences September 2006 DOI: 10.1016/j.shpsc.2006.06.013 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Historical analysis Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Philosophy of mind |
| Key points | Argues that Dugald Stewart's nominalism was central to his early philosophy of mind: Stewart held that qualities, ideas, and words are signs with no necessary relation to the external objects they represent, and that the 'operations of the mind' arrange these signs into systems of thought. The author suggests this view of words as signs likely arose from Stewart's ideas about language and medicine and extended to systems classifying the natural world. |
Abstract
In 1792 Dugald Stewart published Elements of the philosophy of the human mind. In its section on abstraction he declared himself to be a nominalist. Although a few scholars have made brief reference to this position, no sustained attention has been given to the central role that it played within Stewart's early philosophy of mind. It is therefore the purpose of this essay to unpack Stewart's nominalism and the intellectual context that fostered it. In the first three sections I aver that his nominalism emanated from his belief that objects of the mind--qualities, ideas and words--were signs that bore no necessary relation to the external objects that they were meant to represent. More specifically, it was these signs that were arranged into systems of thought by the 'operations of the mind'. The next three sections suggest that his treatment of words as signs most probably originated in his views on language and medicine and that his nominalistic philosophy of mind could also be extended to systems that sought to classify the natural world. I conclude by suggesting several avenues of enquiry that could be pursued by future scholars interested in excavating Stewart's thought.
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