第18章 「批評に対する若干の返答」その4_ 「心とは何か」07知覚の問題は昔から(ごく初期の時代から)哲学者を悩まして来た。私自身の信念は、この問題は科学の問題であって哲学の問題ではない、あるいはむしろ、もはや哲学の問題ではなくなっているということである。非常に多くの哲学的問題(哲学の問い)は、実際、科学がまだ扱う準備ができていない(ところの)科学の問題である。感覚及び知覚はどちらも(以前は)そういう部類の(=扱う準備のできていない)問題に属していたが、現在では、科学的な扱いが可能であり、科学がそれらの問題について言うことを無視しようとする者には実り多い対処ができない、と私は主張しなければならない。ライル教授は素朴実在論を主張する闘いにおいて苦境に立たされている(注:tie oneself in knots 混乱[苦境]に陥る、苦境に立たされる)。彼は円い皿を観察者に対して傾けると楕円形に見えるという事実をほぼ否定している。彼は言う。 理論的に物を考えない人は,「円い皿が楕円形に見えることもある」と言うのに何の躊躇(qualms)も感じない。また「円い皿が楕円形であるかのごとくに見える」と言うときにも何の躊躇も感じないであろう。しかし、私は丸い皿の楕円形の外見 (look) を見ていると言うべきだとの勧めに従うことには躊躇を感ずるであろう(同書 p.216)(訳注:)。
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Chapter 18,n.4: What is mind?, n.7The problem of perception has troubled philosophers from a very early date. My own belief is that the problem is scientific not philosophical, or, rather, no longer philosophical. A great many philosophical questions are, in fact, scientific questions with which science is not yet ready to deal. Both sensation and perception were in this class of problems, but are now, so I should contend, amenable to scientific treatment and not capable of being fruitfully handled by anyone who chooses to ignore what science has to say about them.Professor Ryle ties himself in knots in struggles to maintain naive realism. He almost denies that a round plate tilted away from the observer looks elliptical. He says: A person without a theory feels no qualms in saying that the round plate might look elliptical. Nor would he feel any qualms in saying that the round plate looks as if it were elliptical. But he would feel qualms in following the recommendation to say that he is seeing an elliptical look of a round plate (page 216).I cannot understand what, exactly, he is maintaining. In the case of the plate, you know that it is round because that is the way plates are made. But suppose it is an object in the sky which you cannot touch. You will be at a loss to know whether it is 'really' circular or elliptical, and you will be confined to saying what it 'looks like'. The essential point is that a given thing looks different from different points of view, and that differing things may look alike from different points of view, and, further, that what things look like is essential to our knowledge of what they ‘really' are, although, for the above reasons, it does not by itself afford conclusive evidence. It is quite unnecessary, in considering this problem, to bring in minds or sensations: the whole thing is physical. A number of cameras photographing a given object produce results which differ in just the same way as our visual perceptions do. |