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Dictionary of Philosophy - Dagobert D. Runes Category: Language and Literature > Philosophy Date & country: 17/05/2009, UK Words: 2784

Relational Theory of Mind
The conception of mind as a relation between neutral entities (i.e. entities which are intrinsically neither mental nor physical) which was foreshadowed by Hume and developed by British and American New Realism. See C.W. Morris, Six Theories of Mind, Ch. III. See Neutral Monism. -- L.W.

Relative
A concept is relative if it is -- a word, if it denotes -- a polyadic propositional function, or relation, rather than a monadic propositional function. The term relative is applied especially to words which have been or might be thought to denote monadic propositional functions, but for some reason must be taken as denoting relations. Thus the wo...

Relativism, Epistemological
The theory that all human knowledge is relative to the knowing mind and to the conditions of the body and sense organs. Relativism is usually combined with a subjectivistic theory of knowledge (see Subjectivism) but, in recent epistemology, a realistic or objectivistic relativism has been advanced. See Objective Relativism. Ethical relativism. -- ...

Relativism, Psychological
The psychologies principle that the character of any present conscious content is relative to and influenced by past and contemporaneous experiences of the orginism. The law of psychological relativity was prominent in the psychology of Wundt, and has recently been emphasized by Gestalt Psychology. -- L.W.

Relativism
The view that truth is relative and may vary from individual to individual, from group to group, or from time to time, having no objective standard. See Ethical relativism. -- W.K.F.

Relativity of Knowledge
Sec Relativism, Epistemological.

Relativity, theory of
A mathematical theory of space-time (q.v.), of profound epistemological as well as physical importance, comprising the special theory of relativity (Einstein, 1905) and the general theory of relativity (Einstein, 1914-16). The name arises from the fact that certain things which the classical theory regarded as absolute -- e.g. , the simultaneity o...

Relevance or Relevancy
(Fr. relevant) Relation between concepts which are capable of combining to form meaningful propositions or between propositions belonging to the same 'universe of discourse.' -- L.W.

Religion, Philosophy of
The methodic or systematic investigation of the elements of religious consciousness, the theories it has evolved and their development and historic relationships in the cultural complex. It takes account of religious practices only as illustrations of the vitality of beliefs and the inseparableness of the psychological from thought reality in fait...

Religion, Promethean
An anarchistic piety which refrains from making past or present revolutionary doctrine the basis of new tyranny. (Montague). -- H.H.

Religious A Priori
A separate, innate category of the human consciousness, religious in that it issues certain insights and indisputable certainties concerning God or a Superhuman Presence. Man's religious nature rests upon the peculiar character of his mind. He possesses a native apprehension of the Divine. God's existence is guaranteed as an axiomatic truth. For E...

Religious Phenomenology
(in Max Scheler) The doctrine of the essential origin and forms of the religious, and of the essence of the divine, as well as of its revelation. -- P.A.S.

Renaissance
(Lat. re + nasci, to be born) Is a term used by historians to characterize various periods of intellectual revival, and especially that which took place in Italy and Europe during the 15th and 16th centuries. The term was coined by Michelet and developed into a historical concept by J. Burckhardt (1860) who considered individualism, the revival of...

Renouvier, Charles
(1818-1903) a thinker strongly influenced by Leibniz and Kant. His philosophy has been called 'phenomenological neo-criticism', and its peculiar feature is that it denies the existence of all transcendental entities, such as thing-in-itself, the absolute, and the noumenon. -- R.B.W. Main works: Uchronie, 1857, Philos. analytique de l'histoire, 4 v...

Representative Ideas, Theory of
Theory that the mind in perception, memory and other types of knowledge, does not know its objects directly but only through the mediation of ideas which represent them. The theory was advanced by Descartes and the expression, representative ideas, may have been suggested by his statement that our ideas more or less adequately 'represent' their or...

Representative Realism
The view that in the knowing process our ideas are representations or ambassadors of the real external world. (E.g. the view of John Locke.) -- V.F.

Res Cogitans
(Lat res, thing + cogitans from cogitare, to think) Descartes' designation for thinking substance which along with extended substance (res extensa) constitute his dualism. The term presumably designates not only the individual mind which thinks but also the substance which pervades all individual minds. -- L.W.

Retentiveness
(Lat. re + tendere, to hold) The mind's capacity to retain and subsequently revive earlier experiences. See Memory. -- L.W.

Revelation
The communication to man of the Divine Will. This communication has taken, in the history of religions, almost every conceivable form, e.g., the results of lot casting, oracular declarations, dreams, visions, ecstatic experiences (induced by whatever means, such as intoxicants), books, prophets, unusual characters, revered traditional practices, s...

Rhetoric
(Gr. Rhetor, public speaker) Art turned to the practical purpose of persuading and impressing. -- L.V.

Rhythm
(a) Harmonious correlation of parts in a work of art. (b) (Music) Systematic grouping of notes according to duration. -- L.V.

Rickert, Heinrich
(1863-1936) Believing that only in system philosophy achieves its ends, Rickert established under the influence of Fichte a transcendental idealism upon an epistemology which has nothing to do with searching for connections between thought and existence, but admits being only as a being in consciousness, and knowledge as an affirming or negating, ...

Right action
(a) Teleologicillv defined as action such that no alternative possible under the circumstances is better. Cf. G. E. Moore, Princ. Ethica. -- C.A.B. (b) Formalistically (or deontologically) regarded as not equivalent to the above, as perhaps, indefinable. For example, C. D. Broad holds that the rightness or wrongness of an action in a given situati...

Right Reason
(Gr. orthos logos; L. recta ratio) The law or order exhibited in the constitution of the world, to which, according to the Stoics human law and human action should conform; the Law of Nature. -- G.R.M.

Right
In an ethical sense an action conforming to the moral law. Also the correlative of duty. In a legal sense, any claim against others, recognized by law. Political rights, the capacity of exercizing certain functions in the formation and administration of government -- the right to vote, to be elected to public office, etc. Natural rights, as agains...

Rigorism
Any view according to which the ethicil life involves a rigorous treatment of the more natural or physical desires, feelings, and passions. -- W.K.F.

Ritschlianism
A celebrated school of 19th century Christian thought inaugurated by Albrecht Ritschl (1822-89). This school argued for God upon the basis of what is called the religious value-judgment. Two kinds of judgments are said to characterize man's reaction to his world of experience: (1) dependent or concomitant, those dependent upon perceived facts, suc...

Romanism
(Lat. Roma, Rome, the seat of Papal authority) The doctrines and practices of the Roman Catholic Church; tendencies in members of other churches to favor Catholicism. -- V.J.B.

Romantic art
(a) Artistic era between the end of the 18th and middle of the 19th centuries. (b) A form closer to and less independent of emotions than classic form. -- L.V.

Romanticism
As a general philosophical movement, romanticism is best understood as the initial phase of German Idealism, serving as a transition from Kant to Hegel, and flourishing chiefly between 1775 and 1815. It is associated primarily with the Schlegel brothers, Novalis, Fried, Schelling, and Schleiermacher, with Schelhng as its culmination and most typic...

Romero, Francisco
Born in 1891. Professor of Philosophy at the Universities of Buenos Aires, La Plata, and the National Institute for Teachers. Director of the Philosophical Library of the Losada Publishing House, and distinguished staff member of various cultural magazines and reviews in Latin America. Francisco Romero is one of the most important figures in the p...

Roscelin
(c. 1050-c 1120) born at Compiegne, France, probably studied in Soissons and Rheims. He taught as Canon of Compiene, and at Tours, Loches (where Abelard was his pupil) and Besancon. Noted in philosophy for his extremely nominalistic solution to the problem of universals. Theologically, he was accused of tritheism. No major works are extant and his...

Rosmini, Serbati (Antonio)
Born in Rovereto (Trento), March 24, 1797, died in Stresa (Milan), July 1, 1855. Ordained priest 1821. Founded the Institute for Charity. Influenced Italian Risorgimento, impelling Pope Pius IX towards liberalism. His philosophy is a fusion of idealism and scholasticism, adhering to human experience. He maintained there is a distinction between th...

Ross, (William) David
(1877-1940) Is principally known as an Aristotelian scholar. He served first as joint editor, later as editor of the Oxford translation of Aristotle. In this series he himself translated the Metaphysics and the Nicomachean Ethics. In addition he published critical texts with commentaries of the Metaphysics and the Physics, and also an edition of T...

Rousseau, Jean Jacques
(1712-1778), a native of Geneva, Switzerland, whose influence in France and throughout Europe was enormous for many a decade, thanks to his timely ideas and colorful and lucid style of writing. Particularly influential were his Emile, a book on education, and Social Contract, a work reviving an old political doctrine concerning the origin of human...

Royce, Josiah
(I855-1916) Bom in California, taught philosophy at Harvard. Neo-Hegelian idealist, conceives Reality as the career of an all-inclusive absolute mind, of which our minds are fragmentary manifestations. Nothing short of such a mind can terminate the quest of each finite consciousness for the true and final object of its experience, which is found a...

Rule of Faith
In general, an authoritative statement of belief. In historic Christianity such statements appeared out of existing formulae (e.g., the early baptismal confessions) or were formulated to meet existing heresies. In Catholic Christianity the Rule of Faith (Regula Fidei) includes the whole of apostolic teaching and its further elaborations. -- V.F.

Rule of inference
See logic, formal, §§ 1, 3, and logistic system.

Rule, ethical or moral
Any general ethical proposition enjoining a certain kind of action in a certain kind of situation, e.g., one who has made a promise should keep it. Rules figure especially in 'dogmatic' types of deontological or intuitionstic ethics, and teleological ethics is often described as emphasizing ends rather than rules. Even a teleologist may, however, ...

Russell, Bertrand A. W.
(1872-) Fellow Trinity College, Cambridge, 1895; lecturer in philosophy, University of Cambridge, 1910-1916. Author of: The Philosophy of Leibniz, 1900; The Principles of Mathematics, 1903; Principia Mathematica (in collaboration with A. N. Whitehead), 3 vols. 1910-13, (second edition, 1925-27); The Problems of Philosophy, 1912; Our Knowledge of t...

Saadia, ben Joseph
(Arabic Sa'id Al-Fayyumi) (892-942) Born and educated in Egypt, he left his native country in 915 and settled in Babylonia where he was appointed in 928 Gaon of the Academy of Sura. He translated the Bible into Arabic and wrote numerous works, both in Hebrew and Arabic, in the fields of philology, exegesis, Talmudics, polemics, Jewish history, and...

Sabda
(Skr.) Sound, an Indian metaphysical concept; word, particularly the cosmic or divine word (see vac), testimony, a valid source of knowledge in some philosophic systems. -- K.F.L.

Sabellianism
The view of Sabellius who taught in the first half of the third century the doctrine that there is one God but three (successive) modes or manifestations of God: as creator and governor God is Father, as redeemer God is the Son, as regenerator and sanctifier God is the Holy Spirit -- one and the same God. The view approximated the later orthodox T...

Sacerdotalism
(Lat sacerdotalis pertaining to a priest) A religious system revolving about a priestly order. The term, when employed in a derogatory sense, means the unwholesome preference for ecclesiastical and sacramental observances in contrast to the more valid personal and moral values. -- V.F.

Sadducee-ism
Both a party and a belief so named after the Zadokites, sons of Zadok, the family and temple hierarchy, advocates of the written Torah (teaching) in Judaism, the partv and attitude opposite to the Pharisees and scribes, who prized oral and developing thought as well as the Torah. In general, Sadducee-ism, holding the Law (Pentateuch) to be explici...

Saguna
(Skr.) 'possessed of qualities' (see guna), predicated of the Absolute from the exoteric point of view of the worshipper, according to Sankara (q.v.; see Nirguna). -- K.F.L.

Saint-Simon, Claude Henry, Count De
(1760-1825) French philosopher who fought with the French army during the American Revolution. He supported the French Revolution. He advocated what he termed a new science of society to do away with inequalities in the distribution of property, power and happiness. Love for the poor and the lowly was basic for the reform he urged. He greatly infl...

Sakti
(Skr.) Strength, might, of feminine gender, the word designates in Tantric (see Tantra) literature the female generative power of energy in the universe, worshipped by the religious as the wife of some deity or other, e.g., as Durga, wife of Shiva. See Shaktism. -- K.F.L.

Samanya
(Skr. similar, generic, etc.) Generality, universality, the universal in contrast to the particular. The universal is understood in the realist manner by the Nyaya- Vaisesika to be eternal and distinct from, yet inherent in the particular, in the nominalist manner, by the Buddhists, to have no intrinsic existence; in the manner of universalia in r...

Same and Other
One of the 'persistent problems' of philosophy which goes back at least to Parmenides and Heraclitus (q.v.). In its most general form it raises the question: Is reality explicable in terms of one principle, ultimately the same in all things (monism), or is reality ultimately heterogeneous, requiring a plurality of first principles (pluralism)? Pla...

Samnyasin
(Skr.) A wise man, philosopher. -- K.F.L.

Samsara
(Skr.) 'Going about', the passage of the soul in the cycle of births and deaths, the round of existence, transmigration, a universally accepted dogma in India, early justified philosophically on the basis of karma (q.v.). and the nature of atman (q.v.), but its modus operandi variously explained. It is the object of practically every Indian philos...

Samskara
(Skr. putting together) Mental impression, memory. Also the effects of karma (q.v.) as shaping one's life. -- K.F.L.

San cheng
The Three Rectifications, also called san t'ung, which means that in the scheme of macrocosmos -- microcosmos relationship between man and the universe, the vital force (ch'i) underlying the correspondence should be so directed and controlled that, first of all, the germination of things, its symbolic color, black, and all governmental and social ...

San chiao
The three systems, doctrines, philosophies, or religions of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism. -- W.T.C.

San kang
The Three Standards, i.e., the sovereign is the standard of the minister, the father the standard of the son, and the husband the standard of the wife, on the ground that the active or male cosmic principle of the universe (yang), to which the sovereign, the father, and the husband correspond, is the standard of the passive or female cosmic princi...

San piao
The three laws in reasoning and argumentation, namely, that 'there must be a basis or foundation' which can be 'found in a study of the experiences of the wisest men of the past,' that 'there must be a general survey' by 'examining (its compatibility with) the facts of the actual experience of the people,' and that 'there must be practical applica...

Sanction
A sanction is anything which serves to move (and, in this sense, to oblige) a man to observe or to refrain from a given mode of conduct, any source of motivation, and hence, on a hedonistic theory, any source of pleasure or pain. Gay and Bentham distinguished four such sanctions: the natural or physical sanction, i.e., the ordinary course of natu...

Sanga
(Skr. sticking to) Attachment, especially to material things, or entanglement in earthly cares, considered an impediment to spiritual attainment or moksa (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

Sankara
One of the greatest of Indian philosophers, defender of Brahamism, who died about 820 AD., after having led a manysided, partly legendary, life as peripatetic teacher and author of numerous treatises, the most influential of which is his commentary on the Vedanta (s.v.) in which he established the doctrine of advaita (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

Sankhya-karika
(Skr.) The earliest extant text of the Sankhya by Isvarakrsna; a famous commentary on it is that of Gaudeapada. -- K.F.L.

Sankhya
Perhaps the oldest of the major systems of Indian philosophy (q.v.), founded by Kapila. Originally not theistic, it is realistic in epistemology, dualistic in metaphysics, assuming two moving ultimates, spirit (purusa, q.v.) and matter (prakrti, q.v.) both eternal and uncaused. Prakrti possesses the three qualities or principles of sattva, rajas, ...

Santayana, George
For Santayana (1863-), one of the most eminent of contemporary naturalists, consciousness, instead of distorting the nature of Reality immediately reveals it. So revealed, Reality proclaims itself an infinity of essences (Platonic Ideas) subsisting in and by themselves, some of which are entertained by minds, and some of which are also enacted in ...

Sarva-darsana-sangraha
(Skr.) A work by Madhvavacarya, professing to be a collection (sangraha) of all (sarva) philosophic views (darsana) or schools. It includes systems which acknowledge and others which reject Vedic (s.v.) authority, such as the Carvaka, Buddhist and Jaina schools (which see). -- K.F.L.

Sarvakartrtva
(Skr.) 'All makingness', descriptive of the ultimate principle in the universe, conceived dynamically. -- K.F.L.

Sarvam khalv idam brahma
(Skr.) 'Indeed, all this is brahman', a famous dictum of Chan-dogya Upanishad 3.14.1, symptomatic of the monistic attitude later elaborated in Sankara's Vedanta (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

Sarvasti-vada
(Skr.) The doctrine (vada) of Hinayana Buddhism according to which 'all is' (sarvam asti), or all is real, that which was, currently is, and will be but now is, potentially. -- K.F.L.

Sastra
(Skr.) A Sanskrit textbook. -- K.F.L.

Sat-cit-ananda, saccidananda
(Skr.) 'Being-awareness-bliss', a Vedantic (s.v.) definition of the highest, all-inclusive reality, also of the atman (q.v.) insofar as it has attained its full realization. -- K.F.L.

Sat
(Skr.) Being, a metaphysical concept akin to Eleatic thinking, which a school of thinkers regards as fundamental, as in Chandogya Upanishad 6.2.1 'In the beginning . . . this world was just being, one only, without a second.' It refutes the theory of non-being. (See asat). -- K.F.L.

Satire
Art holding vice or folly up to ridicule, or lampooning individuals through the use of irony or sarcasm. -- L.V.

Sattva
(Skr. 'be-ness') Being, existence, reality, etc. Also one of the three gunas (q.v.) of the Sankhya (q.v.) and as such the quality of buoyancy, pleasure, and goodness of matter or prakrti (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

Satya
(Skr.) Actual, real, true, valid, truth, reality, the real. -- K.F.L.

Sautrantika
A Buddhist school of representationalism, same as Bahyanumeya-vada (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

Scepticism, Fourteenth Century
At the beginning of the 14th century, Duns Scotus adopted a position which is not formally sceptical, though his critical attitude to earlier scholasticism may contain the germs of the scepticism of his century. Among Scotistic pre-sceptical tendencies may be mentioned the stress on self-knowledge rather than the knowledge of extra-mental reality,...

Scepticism
(1) a proposition about the limitations of knowledge: that no knowledge at all or that no absolute, unquestionable, trustworthy, certain, complete, or perfect knowledge (or rationally justifiable belief) is attainable by man; or that such is not attainable by any knower, or that none of these kinds of knowledge, if attained, would be recognizable ...

Scheler, Max
(1874-1928) was originally a disciple of Rudolf Eucken, but joined early -- at the University of Munich -- the Husserl circle of phenomenologists, of which school he became one of the leading exponents. Moving from Kantianism and Eucken-personalism into phenomenology, he later espoused successively positions which may be called a synthesis between...

Schema
(Gr. schema) Figure, external form or structural plan, specifically, in Aristotle's logic, a syllogistic figure. -- G.R.M. In Kant's Critique of Pure Reason (Tr. Analytic): The procedure of the imagination by which the categories of the understanding are applied to the manifold of sensuous intuitions. Imagination, working with the pure form of tim...

Schiller, Ferdinand Canning Scott
(1864-1937), unwilling to accept the idealism current at Oxford in his day on grounds that it was 'absolutist', sought by a metaphysical pluralism not only to account for the unity and multiplicity of things, but also to furnish the basis for evolution theory. His developed philosophical position was generally known as 'personal idealism', or 'hum...

Schism
The withdrawal of a party from an established group and its inclination to form a new order. The term may also mean 'dissension.' The former meaning, however, is the usual one. Thus, the separation of the Greek and the Roman Catholic churches (culminating in 1054) is known as the ''Great Schism.' -- V.F.

Scholasticism
Scholasticism is both a method and system of thought. The name is derived from its proponents who were called doctores scholastici. This term, in turn, came from scholazein, which originally meant to have leisure or spare time but later, as in Xen. Cyr. 7. 5, 39, took the meaning to denote oneself to pupils or, conversely, to a master. The term Sk...

Schopenhauer, Arthur
(1738-1860) Brilliant, manysided philosopher, at times caustic, who attained posthumously even popular acclaim. His principal work, The World as Will and Idea starts with the thesis that the world is my idea, a primary fact of consciousness implying the inseparableness of subject and object (refutation of materialism and subjectivism). The object ...

Science of Science
The analysis and description of science from various points of view, including logic, methodology, sociology, and history of science. One of the chief tasks of the science of science is the ana1ysis of the language of science (see Semiotic). Scientific empiricism (q.v.) emphasizes the role of the science of science, and tries to clarify the differ...

Science, philosophy of
That philosophic discipline which is the systematic study of the nature of science, especially of its methods, its concepts and presuppositions, and its place in the general scheme of intellectual disciplines. No very precise definition of the term is possible since the discipline shades imperceptibly into science, on the one hand, and into philos...

Scotism
The philosophical and theological system named after John Duns Scotus (1266? -1308), Doctor Subtilis, a Franciscan student and later professor at Oxford and Paris and the most gifted of the opponents of the Thomist school. The name is almost synonymous with subtlety and the system generally is characterized by excessive criticism, due to Duns Scot...

Scottish philosophy
Name applied to the current of thought originated by the Scottish thinker, Thomas Reid (1710-1796), and disseminated by his followers as a reaction against the idealism of Berkeley and empiricism and skepticism of Hume. Its most salient characteristic is the doctrine of common sense, a natural instinct by virtue of which men are prompted to accept...

Secondary Qualities
Those sensible qualities which are 'nothing in the objects themselves, but powers to produce various sensations in us by their primary qualities.' This is the definition of John Locke. Such qualities (colors, sounds, tastes, smells) are distinguishable from primary in that they are highly variable, less constant. They appear in human consciousness...

Secunda Petri
Literally, the second of Peter, that is the second part of a work on logic, Institutiones Dialecticae, of Pierre de la Ramee, latinized Petrus Ramus (1515-1572), which treated of judgments, de iudicio. Hence a stupid person was said to be deficient in secunda Petri, or sound judgment. -- J.J.R.

Secundi adjacentis
Latin expression employed to describe a proposition which consists solely of a subject and a predicate without even a copula. -- J.J.R.

Secundum quid
(Lat.) Relatively, in some respect, in a qualified sense, contrasted with simpliciter, absolutely. -- V.J.B. Secundum quid, or more fully, a dicto simpliciter ad dictum secundum quid, is any fallacy arising from the use of a general proposition without attention to tacit qualifications which would invalidate the use made of it. -- A.C.

Selective Theories of Sensa
A selective in contrast to a creative theory, holds that sensa experienceable by any mind under all possible conditions of perception; preexists the act of sensing and that, consequently the function of the mind in relation to the sensa is selective rather than creative. The selective theory has been advanced by such contemporary Realists as B. Ru...

Self-Consciousness
The knowledge by the self of itself. The term is usually restricted to empirical self-consciousness. (See Empirical Ego) -- L.W.

Self-determination
a) In political theory the working out by a people or nation of its own problems and destiny, free from interference from without. It is often said that peoples and nations have a right to self-determination, at least under certain conditions b) In ethics the notion of self-determination is used by self-determimsts to solve the free-will problem. ...

Self-Evidence
That property of a proposition by which its truth is open to direct inspection and requires no appeal to other evidence. See Intuition. -- A.C.B.

Self-love
The term may be used to denote self-complacency or self-admiration (see Spinoza, Ethics, Book III, Prop. 55, note), but in ethical discussion it usually designates concern for one's own individual interest, advantage, or happiness. Taking the term in this latter sense philosophers have debated the question whether or not all of our actions, approv...

Self-Realization
A notion central to the ethics of recent Idealism, e.g., T. H. Green, F. H. Bradley, J. Seth, J. H. Muirhead. These writers hold that self-realization is the end, and that right action is action which conduces to self-realization.. -- W.K.F.

Self
1. Ego, subject, I, me, as opposed to the object or to the totality of objects; may be distinguished from 'not-me,' as in W. James' statement (Principles of Psychology, I, 289) 'One great splitting of the whole universe into two halves is made by each of us, and for each of us almost all of the interest attaches to one of the halves; but we all dr...

Selfhood
The unique individuality possessed by a self or person. -- L.W.

Selves, Knowledge of other
The knowledge by one self of another. See Intersubjective Intercourse. -- L.W.

Semantics
(1) 'The studv of the relation of signs to the objects to which the signs are applicable' (C. W. Morris). A department of semiotic. (2) The study of signs and symbolism. In this sense equivalent to semiotic (q.v.). -- M.B. The theory of the relation between the formulas of an interpreted logistic system (semantical system in Carnap's terminology) ...