Against the Idols of the AgeTransaction Publishers - 347 pages Little known outside his native Australia, David Stove was one of the most illuminating and brilliant philosophical essayists of the postwar era. A fearless attacker of intellectual and cultural orthodoxies, Stove left powerful critiques of scientific irrationalism, Darwinian theories of human behavior, and philosophical idealism. Stove's writing is both rigorous and immensely readable. It is, in the words of Roger Kimball, "an invigorating blend of analytic lucidity, mordant humor, and an amount of common sense too great to be called 'common.'" Whether the subject is race, feminism, the Enlightenment, or the demand for "non-coercive philosophy," Stove is on the mark with a battery of impressive arguments expressed in sharp, uncompromising prose. "Against the Idols of the Age" concludes with a generous sampling of his blistering attacks on Darwinism. |
Contents
The Jazz Age in the Philosophy of Science | 3 |
Sabotaging Logical Expressions | 33 |
Paralytic Epistemology Or The Soundless Scream | 71 |
The Central Claim of the Enlightenment | 81 |
Always apologize always explain Robert Nozicks War Wounds | 93 |
The Intellectual Capacity of Women | 113 |
Racial and Other Antagonisms | 137 |
A Victorian Horrorstory Part Two | 153 |
Darwinisms Dilemma | 205 |
Where Darwin First Went Wrong About Man | 225 |
Genetic Calvinism or Demons and Dawkins | 253 |
He Aint Heavy Hes my Brother or Altruism and Shared Genes | 283 |
Index | 339 |
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Common terms and phrases
actually animals answer authors believe biological capacity of women causal Cole Porter common course criticism Darwin Darwinian David Stove Dawkins Enlightenment entails Q equal equality-theorist Essay evidence evolution example existence fact false falsifying Feyerabend Gem argument genetic given q horror victorianorum human Hume idea idealists implies Imre Lakatos inclusive fitness theory inconsistent intellectual capacity intellectual performance irrefutable Jazz Age Kant Karl Popper kin altruism kind knowledge Kuhn Lakatos least logical expressions logical relation logical statement Malthus Malthus-Darwin principle means memes mind natural selection never Nozick obvious offspring organisms parental altruism philosophy of science population possible given premise problem proposition question racial antagonism rational readers reason refuted religion reproduction sabotage Scientific Discovery scientists Selfish Gene shared genes theory sibling altruism sociobiologists species Stove success-words suppose T. H. Huxley tautological theory of inclusive Thomas Kuhn tion true truth universal W. D. Hamilton words writing
Popular passages
Page 219 - Man scans with scrupulous care the character and pedigree of his horses, cattle, and dogs before he matches them; but when he comes to his own marriage he rarely, or never, takes any such care.
Page 180 - ... its being, which is not derived from and is not still relative to this source. When the experiment is made strictly, I can myself conceive of nothing else than the experienced. Anything, in no sense felt or perceived, becomes to me quite unmeaning. And as I cannot try to think of it without realizing either that I am not thinking at all, or that I am thinking of it against my will as being experienced, I am driven to the conclusion that for me experience is the same as reality.
Page 53 - Though the historian can always find men— Priestley, for instance— who were unreasonable to resist for as long as they did, he will not find a point at which resistance becomes illogical or unscientific.
Page 161 - The table I write on I say exists; that is, I see and feel it: and if I were out of my study I should say it existed; meaning thereby that if I was in my study I might perceive it, or that some other spirit actually does perceive it.
Page 159 - When we do our utmost to conceive the existence of external bodies, we are all the while only contemplating our own ideas. But the mind, taking no notice of itself, is deluded to think it can and does conceive bodies existing unthought of or without the mind, though at the same time they are apprehended by or exist in itself.
Page 159 - But, say you, surely there is nothing easier than for me to imagine trees, for instance, in a park, or books existing in a closet, and nobody by to perceive them. I answer, you may so, there is no difficulty in it ; but what is all this, I beseech you, more than framing in your mind certain ideas which you call books and trees, and at the same time omitting to frame the idea of any one that may perceive them ? But do not you yourself perceive or think of them all the while...
Page 56 - Any statement can be held true come what may, if we make drastic enough adjustments elsewhere in the system.