PHIL 100W Lecture Notes - Lecture 9: Reflectance, Public Philosophy
28 Mar 2017
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Document Summary
Russell was among the most important philosophers of the 20th century. He made enormous contributions to logic and the philosophy of language, among other subjects. He was a political activist and notorious atheist. He was a well-known public philosopher and wrote many books aimed at a non-academic audience. The problems of philosophy (1912) is russell"s attempt to set out, in a preliminary way, his own views on the most important traditional philosophical questions. But, much like descartes, russell notes that each of these beliefs and all others like it may reasonably be doubted. (8-9) A table appears smooth, but under a microscope, one would observe ridges and valleys and rough edges. An apple appears to have a certain pattern of color, with some patches more shiny than others, but one notices that the pattern changes as one changes one"s position relative to the apple.
