We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 December 2009
In The Descent of Man Charles Darwin made some remarks about ‘Reason.’ They begin
Of all the faculties of the human mind, it will, I presume, be admitted that Reason stands at the summit. Only a few persons now dispute that animals possess some power of reasoning. Animals may constantly be seen to pause, deliberate, and resolve. It is a significant fact, that the more the habits of any particular animal are studied by a naturalist, the more he attributes to reason and the less to unlearnt instincts. … (Darwin 1871, p. 75)
The passage continues with an astute commentary on the evolution of Reason in humans and animals.
The discussion initiated by Darwin has continued to this day. It has grown into a sophisticated discourse of considerable fascination, drawing on several disciplines. It has delved into animal reasoning in general and human rationality in particular. I have no special quarrel with the details of this extensive literature, to which I have contributed. Nevertheless, regarding the whole, I cannot help suspecting that something akin to a Ptolemaic blunder has been made. The larger order of things has been misconceived.
The original Ptolemaic blunder was rectified by the Copernican revolution, an event that has long intrigued methodologists of science. Ptolemy had the heavenly bodies orbiting a still earth. Centuries later, Copernicus changed the course of astronomy by taking the sun to be the central stillness instead. At the time there were no new observational findings to prompt the change. It was a matter of interpreting the same empirical data from a radically different standpoint. A number of subtle explanatory economies combined to support the heliocentric model.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.
