Philosophies of common sense from Reid to experimentalists 1

In this paper I will first try to show that there is a long tradition of philosophers defending common sense; a tradition that links J. L. Austin and, nowadays, experimental philosophers back to Thomas Reid, all of whom use common sense as a norm that could appraise philosophical theories or methods; secondly, I will suggest that common sense, after all these years of philosophical use, has become a technical term that carries a certain philosophical burden, implying, at the very least, a pragmatic and naturalistic commitment. However, and this will be my conclusion, if theory enters common sense then it cannot deliver what it bargained for. Common sense supposedly derives its authority from all kinds of propositions we take for granted. If we impose philosophical views on it, it loses the authority that is claimed for it. To make a long story short, in this paper I will try to show that Reid, Austin and many experimentalists, all sound alike when defending common sense. I should note however, that I am not claiming that those philosophers are the only ones who defend common sense. American pragmatists, such as Peirce and Dewey, or Wittgenstein, among others, might fit a similar reading. However, Austin and today’s experimentalists very straightfowadly appeal to a Reidian sense of common sense and use this appeal to invite pragmatistic and naturalistic views. Their attempt to defend common sense can be used as an example of how common sense becomes a philosophical notion with certain connotations.


Introduction
In this paper I will first try to show that there is a long tradition of philosophers defending common sense; a tradition that links J. L. Austin and, nowadays, experimental philosophers back to Thomas Reid, all of whom use common sense as a norm that could appraise philosophical theories or methods; secondly, I will suggest that common sense, after all these years of philosophical use, has become a technical term that carries a certain philosophical burden, implying, at the very least, a pragmatic and naturalistic commitment.However, and this will be my conclusion, if theory enters common sense then it cannot deliver what it bargained for.Common sense supposedly derives its authority from all kinds of propositions we take for granted.If we impose philosophical views on it, it loses the authority that is claimed for it.
To make a long story short, in this paper I will try to show that Reid, Austin and many experimentalists, all sound alike when defending common sense.I should note however, that I am not claiming that those philosophers are the only ones who defend common sense.American pragmatists, such as Peirce and Dewey, or Wittgenstein, among others, might fit a similar reading.However, Austin and today's experimentalists very straightfowadly appeal to a Reidian sense of common sense and use this appeal to invite pragmatistic and naturalistic views.Their attempt to defend common sense can be used as an example of how common sense becomes a philosophical notion with certain connotations.

Philosophies of common sense
Often in the history of philosophy there have been attempts to ground theses or theories on some neutral principle.Neutral here means not philosophical.So, it should either be pre-philosophical or scientific or even theological.Common sense has been a strong candidate for such a principle because it describes our ordinary dispositions before philosophy influences them.
In the English empiricist tradition, philosophers often mention common sense: David Hume, John Locke, even George Berkley evoke common sense to verify their views.Their arguments and proposals are mere common sense, they say from time to time.
Thomas Reid writes within the same tradition.He, however, takes common sense to a different level: it is not just used to validate his arguments.For Reid common sense is a criterion by which philosophy is to be measured; it stands against certain doctrines; and it justifies his sarcastic remarks about philosophy, philosophers or the very act of philosophising. 2 a plain man, uninstructed in philosophy, has faith to receive its mysteries, how great must be his astonishment!He is brought into a new world, where everything he sees, tastes, or touches, is a ideaa fleeting kind of being which he can conjure into existence, or can annihilate in the twinkling of an eye.
After his mind is somewhat composed, it will be natural for him to ask his philosophical instructor: Pray sir, are there then no substantial and permanent beings called the sun and the moon, which continue to exist whether we think of them or not? 3 The philosopher no longer starts with wonder about the world.Now he wonders about philosophical suggestions.Philosophy is a technical and paradoxical construction that has lost all touch with reality.Hence it should be tested against common sense.
G.E. Moore brings the same attitude to twentieth-century philosophy.He recites a list of obvious beliefs that philosophers have denied: There exists at present a human body, which is my body … Among the things which have … formed part of its environment … have … been large numbers of other living humans bodies, each of which has, … (a) at some time been born (b) continued to exist for some time after birth (c) been at every moment of its life … , either in contact with or not far from the surface of the earth … 4 Moore goes on with his list of truism.These are all obvious truths that people in common hold.There is no need for further justification; these propositions represent native good judgment.According to Moore, the mere reminder of our certainties shows how absurd sceptical arguments are.And, even though Moore does not cite Reid, one can suspect he is under Reid's influence.After all, it was written around the time when A.D. Woozley was working on an edition of Thomas Reid's Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man, which was published in 1941. 5Just like Reid, Moore uses our everyday dispositions to attack the scepticism and idealism of his predecessors -in his case, Cambridge neo-Hegelians.
Appealing to common sense was not the only way out: Bertrand Russell turned to logico-linguistic analysis.The linguistic turn also influenced those who would eventually follow Moore, namely ordinary language philosophers.Ludwig Wittgenstein, in his later work, and especially on On Certainty, evoked our background certainties as some kind of criterion in order to explain meaning and understanding.His appeal to our rock bottom certainties is not a straightforward appeal to common sense; in fact, Wittgenstein claims philosophers cannot just defend commonsensical answers on philosophical problems.However they should offer such an analyses of our linguistic terms that would 'cure us from the temptation to attack common sense. 6ven though he challenges Moore's conception of common sense, he too suggests that philosophy should somehow affiliate with common sense. 7In fact Nicholas Wolterstorff argues that only in the light of On Certainty can one better understand Reid's appeal to common sense. 8hile Wittgenstein confronts certain aspects of Moore's defence of common sense, J.L. Austin explicitly claims Moore is his man. 9Austin is escpecially drawn 5 See K. Lehrer, Thomas Reid (London, 1989); J. Haldane, 'Introduction' (24 -44)

(b) Common sense will also regulate the philosophical use of language:
To say that an object which I see … makes an impression in my mind, is not … good English … (EIPM, 254) … it is quite plain that the philosophers' use of 'directly perceive', whatever it may be, is not the ordinary, or any familiar, use … (SS,19)

And finally (c) common sense will assess the reasoning patterns of philosophy and the legitimacy of philosophical investigation in general:
Men are often led into error by the love of simplicity, which disposes us to reduce things to few principles, and to conceive a greater simplicity in nature than there really is.(IHM, 470) … over-simplification, schematisation, and constant obsessive repetition of the same small range of jejune 'examples' are … far too common to be dismissed as an occasional weakness of philosophers.The fact is, … that our ordinary words are much subtler in their uses, and mark many more distinctions, than philosophers have realized … (SS, 3) Both Reid and Austin accompany their appeal to common sense with sarcasm against philosophy.For it is just absurd to deny common sense.Austin's appeal however is a renewed version because of the emphasis on language.The philosopher no longer evokes foggy commonsensical intuitions for he is able to point to more stable data: linguistic usage. 11Language provides a tool by which we can get to common sense.Commonsensical beliefs manifest themselves in ordinary language distinctions and descriptions.Language guides us all to say the appropriate thing in this or that context and thus can help the philosopher detect common sense, thus providing us with safer data.Today's 'experimentalists' build on Austin's ideas.They perform experiments in order to discover what the folk would really say in a given circumstance.They design questionnaires that describe some hypothetical story (a thought experiment).Using this story as a stimulator, they ask laypersons about knowledge, reference, free will, and so on.They claim this allows them to describe how plain people understand that very topic. 12They then use such studies to detect the philosophical errors of the past, and Austin is indeed mentioned as an ancestor of experimental philosophy, 13 since, after all, he proposed collecting 'experimental data' in philosophy (PP, 274). 14 am not going to get into the details of experiments here, nor debate their significance.But I need to note that experimental philosophy is not a homogeneous movement. 15I will try though, to limit myself to observations that do apply to most experimental studies.Besides, what interests me is the rationale behind their method.And most experimental studies, following Reid, Moore and Austin defend common sense against philosophy.For they use the same pattern: first they use a thought experiment to ask a question regarding a philosophical problem; then they set folk intuitions against philosophers' intuitions; finally they use the dispositions of the folk to criticise philosophers who thought otherwise.
They too believe that philosophers have misconceived the folk.A vast variety of experiments show exactly this: philosophers have supposed that a certain belief is intuitive (say, incompatibilism).However experimental studies show that it is not the case, for most folk are compatibilists and see no problem with ascribing blame or praise in a deterministic world. 16Such philosophical misconceptions are the source of philosophical problems, together with philosophers peculiar reasoning strategies.Thus one should first focus on common sense.After all, … a theory … that accords with those intuitions relevant to things we care about, … , has, all else being equal, a theoretical advantage over a theory that demands revision or elimination of such intuitions. 17 if a philosophical theory does turn out to be privileged by the endorsement of the folk, that would seem to position the burden of proof on the shoulders of those who argue contrary to folk intuitions. 18r … When we come to be instructed by philosophers, we must bring the old light of common sense along with us, and by it judge of the new light that the philosopher communicates to us.But when we are required to put out the old light altogether, that we may follow the new, we have reason to be on our guard.(EIPM, 224) Reid, Austin and many experimentalists seem to agree: when a theory accords with laypersons' intuitions, it is privileged.The burden of proof is always on the theory that contradicts common sense. 19The ordinary, the folk or the vulgar, as Reid writes -that is the pre-theoreticalis the criterion by which to measure philosophy.

The philosophical burden of common sense
So far I have tried to show that Reid, Austin and many of today's experimental philosophers defend common sense as a norm; a norm that can keep philosophy on the right track.Oddly enough, none of the above writers defines common sense sufficiently.Following Wolterstorff, I suggest that they all defend the vast variety of propositions, beliefs, practices & reasoning habits that normal adults take for granted.Such an understanding of common sense justifies why it is impossible to give a clear definition of the term; or even a complete list of commonsensical truisms.Most of the time we hardly ever think about the things we take for granted; they are never explicitly taught; sometimes not even realised. 20This also explains why the philosopher has to work hard to unravel 18 E. Nahmias, S. Morris, T. Nadelhoffer, and J. Turner, 'Surveying Freedom: Folk intuitions about free will and moral responsibility', Philosophical Psychology, 18:5 (2005), 561 -584 at 564. 19 See also Wolterstorff 2001, 247. 20Wolterstorff, Thomas Reid and the Story of Epistemology, 215 -50: his account incorporates the insights of both Gregory and Somerville, who argue that common sense refers to practical reasoning, to an adequate handling of the everyday-life situations (see Gregory, 'Philosophy and Common Sense', The Philosophical Review, 29:6 (1920), 530 -46), or to them.Wolterstorff analyses Reid's account of common sense and compares it with Wittgenstein's but suggests two major differences between them: first, Wittgenstein seems to focus on everyday practices that are taken for granted, while hesitating to speak of beliefs or propositions; and second, Wittgenstein is very reluctant to evoke human nature.None of these reservations can one find in Austin or the experimentalists.However, the question is whether philosophers' appeal to common sense is a true appeal to the pre-philosophical dispositions of the folk.Do philosophers just evoke the things we take for granted?I suggest that after all these centuries of evoking it, philosophers' common sense has become a technical term that carries certain meta-philosophical burden.Here I will limit myself to two very general meta-philosophical symptoms: pragmatism and naturalism.

Pragmatism
First, a pragmatistic element is apparent.Pragmatism holds that beliefs or theories are to be assessed by their functionality or their successful application within the existing social, historical and linguistic context.Any of these appeals to common sense involves a form of pragmatism.A philosophical theory should comply with the era's background.One cannot step outside of our dispositions and talk about truth, knowledge and so forth with absolute or general terms; such an endeavour would not even make sense.Thus, context becomes the yardstick.Whatever works within our current worldview is to be privileged.
The emphasis in the context is also apparent in Reid and Austin's view of language.Reid's social acts or Austin's speech acts associate language with our social practices. 21Experimentalists imply a similar view.They do the fieldwork Austin proposed: they describe a hypothetical circumstance and then ask the folk what they would say.Putting Austin's proposal in practice shows they also share the theory behind it.Experimentalists (or at least some of them) suggest that folk reports have some kind of uniformity (at least within a certain cultural group); 22 they suppose then, that there are some (uniform) background sane comprehension and the views of the plain man as opposed to those of the scientist's or the philosopher's (see Somerville, 'Reid's Conception of Common Sense', The Monist, 70 (1987), 418 -29). 21See Α. Burkhardt, Speech Acts, Meaning and Intentions (Berlin, 1990), 29 -31.According to him, Reid's social acts (some kinds of utterances such as promises, warnings etc) are the forefather of Austin's speech acts. 22S. Stich experiments in order to show that this is not the case for different cultural groups; different cultures share different norms.His attitude however, again shows certainties involved.And that the story described puts those background certainties to work and prescribes what to say.All experimental studies depend on how sufficient the story is, which is why they try many versions of the same thought experiment.The outcome is that context is again the yardstick.This view of language complies with the more general pragmatistic view that any theory or belief system fits its historical or cultural background.This is why common sense becomes a criterion in the first place.

Naturalism.
However, there is also a second metaphilosophical implication in common sense philosophies: naturalism.The first naturalistic element becomes apparent when we ask a question I've put off till now: why should we trust common sense?Where does its authority derive from?Reid will first answer: We trust common sense because it is the natural thing to do: Men need not be taught them [the principles of common sense] … the constitution of our nature leads us to believe them … (EIPM, 230) [the] Principles [of common sense] … irresistibly govern the belief and conduct of all mankind in the common concerns of life … Such principles are older and of more authority than philosophy: she rests upon them as her basis, not they upon her … (EIPM, 102) Here Austin picks up: … our common stock of words embodies all the distinctions men have found worth drawing, and the connexions they have found worth marking, in the lifetimes of many generations: these surely are likely to be more numerous, more sound, since they have stood up to the long test of the survival of the fittest, and more subtle, at least in all ordinary and reasonably practical matters, than any that you or I are likely to think up in our armchairs of an afternoon-the most favoured alternative method.(PP, 181 -2) confidence in the cultural context: within the same cultural context he expects some kind of uniformity.See S. Nichols, S. Stich and J. Weinberg, 'Metaskepticism: Meditations in ethno-Epistemology', in S. Luper (ed), The Skeptics: Contemporary Essays (Aldershot, 2003), 227 -47.These concepts will have evolved over a long time: that is, they will have faced the test of practical use, of continual hard cases better than their vanished rivals.(PP, 274) So, it starts out as a soft naturalism, to use Strawson's term. 23For Reid it is our nature that ties us down to certain beliefs; we cannot help it.But this soft naturalistic element gets much harder in Austin: in the quotes above he talks about the long test of the survival of the fittest, about evolution and vanished rivals.The terms Austin chooses clearly come from evolution theory. 24Many naturalists today appeal to our nature; and they use an evolutionary argument to defend our cognitive powers.In fact, the appeal to evolution is a strong cue for naturalism.D. Dennett, R. Millikan, H. Kornblith (among many) use versions of this argument to justify our reasoning skills. 25Roughly, they propose that our cognitive systems, sometimes including our linguistic capacities and usage, are the product of evolution, and, as such, they represent the world sufficiently, for we would not have survived if our representations were completely wrong.
In 1951 Austin produced a linguistic version of this argument.The commonsensical descriptions of ordinary language are adequate because they have survived the natural evolution test.Common sense is reliable; if it weren't reliable, it wouldn't have survived (and perhaps we too would have vanished together).This does not mean that common sense is incorrigible however; even Reid accepts we might be 'required to put out the old light altogether, that we may follow the new … ' (EIPM, 224).So there is always a chance that some commonsensical disposition might need revision.Experimentalists too admit that the folk are not always right.In fact, some of our beliefs and intuitions may need modification or even elimination.They explain why their project can help here too.Knobe and Nichols in their 'Experimental Philosophy Manifesto' propose that, in order to test or revise folk intuitions, one should get to know those intuitions first,26 as do Nahmias et al.: … certain theories … may require us to revise some, but not all, of our current concepts, beliefs, and practices … But in order to know whether a particular theory demands revision (or even elimination) of our concepts, beliefs, or practices, we have to know what these are. 27rtainly … ordinary language is not the last word: in principle it can everywhere be supplemented and improved upon and superseded.Only remember, it is the first word.(Austin, PP, 184) Now accepting the fallibility of our knowledge claims can also be regarded as a naturalistic cue.Austin too struggles with it at length.In his work this struggle is also accompanied with explicit scepticism about the analytic-synthetic distinction.In his 1940 paper, "The meaning of a word" (PP, 55 -76), he debates the definition of an analytic sentence: 'x is y' is said to be analytic if y is part of the meaning of x.This definition does not satisfy Austin: Clearly, we suppose, y must be either a part of the meaning of x, or not any part of it.And, if y is a part of the meaning of x, to say 'x is not y' will be self-contradictory: while if it is not a part of the meaning of x, to say 'x is not y' will present no difficulty -such a state of affairs will be readily 'conceivable'.This seems to be the merest common sense.And no doubt it would be the merest common sense if 'meanings' were things in some ordinary sense, which contained parts in some ordinary sense.But they are not.(PP, 61, Austin's italics) Austin denies that this is a helpful definition.He goes on arguing that it is impossible to give any adequate definition of either analytic or synthetic.One cannot classify any sentence as true or false based solely on its meaning (PP, 62 -69).When we talk about the analytic-synthetic distinction, we are, according to Austin, 'using an old working-model, which fails to fit the facts that we really wish to talk about' (PP, 63).A sentence makes sense or not, depending on its use in context (PP, 64 -5).All other ways of classifying and evaluating sentences are bogus.What is more, any change in the world or in our theories about the world can change what it makes sense to say (PP, 67), meaning that nothing is exempt from revision.
Austin clearly has trouble with the analytic-synthetic distinction.And this would imply that Austin sees philosophy as continuous with science.Indeed he seems to believe that science can help address philosophical problems: In the history of human inquiry philosophy has the place of an initial central sun … from time to time it throws off some portion of itself to take station as a science … This happened long ago at the birth of mathematics and again at the birth of physics … only in the last century we have witnessed the same process once again … in the birth of the science of mathematical logic … Is it not possible that the next century may see the birth, through the joined labours of philosophers, grammarians and numerous other students of language, of a true and comprehensive science of language?Then we shall have rid ourselves of one more part of philosophy … in the only way we ever get rid of philosophy, by kicking it upstairs.(PP, 232, Austin's italics) Science could take over and answer philosophical questions.Rather than sitting on our armchairs and fabricating principles then, we should go out and examine our common stock of words (PP, 182 -3).We will find out more about our cognition if we study our current ways of understanding.Scientific methodology will help.With this in mind, Austin proposes his 'laboratory philosophy'.This is a term used by J.O. Urmson (1967) who informed us that Austin had suggested a semi-scientific way to study language.His laboratory team would include native language speakers from different parts of the world.They would focus on a topic, gather all relevant expressions and study them, suggesting examples, distinctions and so on.This is similar to what Austin himself does in many of his Philosophical Papers, such as 'A Plea for Excuses' or 'Ifs and Cans'.Hence he proposes a future science of language and he insists on actual 'field work in philosophy' (PP, 183).
Austin proposed a scientific methodology for philosophy; today experimentalists practice it.Such a methodological proposal only makes sense if one sees philosophy as the study of our current cognitive skills.Description then equals prescription.Austin and experimentalists share this view and in a way so did Reid. 28Reid claimed that philosophy should describe common sense so that it does not fall into absurdity.Austin turns to language as a more adequate tool in order to collect commonsensical data.Today experimentalists use questionnaires and statistics for even harder data.Description is the key for the investigation and improvement of our cognition.We should not look for ideal epistemic principles; rather we should examine and refine of our everyday reasoning practices.This is one more naturalistic cue that we meet in the philosophies of common sense.

Conclusion
It seems then that philosophical theses have entered common sense.However, if common sense starts bringing philosophical connotations along with it, it cannot deliver what was bargained for.Common sense supposedly derives its authority from all kinds of propositions we take for granted.If we impose philosophical views on it, it loses such an authority.
One should admit that both pragmatism and naturalism are very vague terms.However, the ideas lying behind those appeals to common sense, whatever one may call them, are strong theoretical views about the accepted methods, the accepted questions and the accepted answers of philosophy.The plea for common sense emphasises our natural reasoning capacities.Such an idea is in line with the belief that there cannot be any absolute or general view of the world.Our natural, historical, cultural, social background becomes the angle by which we see the world.Our worldview is reliable, yet fallible.We must describe it in order to refine it.These are all philosophical claims.Here I have not tried to debate them.My only suggestion is this: the moment philosophy enters common sense, common sense, by definition, is no longer commonsensical.Common sense philosophies supposedly evoke the things common folk take for granted.This commonsensical cortex of beliefs is the privileged one; the natural one; the one that survived; the adequate, the subtle, the rich; the functional; the one that expresses our worldview; the one that puts the burden of proof to the opposing team.Thus we can set them against philosophy.
However, it is far from commonsensical to attach all these descriptions and all these expectations to the stuff we take for granted.When Reid chose common sense as a yardstick, certain metaphilosophical phantoms slipped in.And every such appeal made them stronger.At least some sort of pragmatism and some variety of naturalism is evident in Austin and the experimentalists and probably to most of today's appeals to common sense.After all theses years, the term no longer refers to the everyday beliefs and dispositions of the folk.Thus it cannot be used as a criterion that could judge philosophy from the outside.None of the implications it brings are simply commonsensical; nor can they be justified by appealing to common sense.Reid's vulgar; Austin's plain man; experimentalists' folk; none of them would hardly care about the methods, the questions or the theories of philosophy whatsoever.In fact, the very idea of looking for a criterion can in any case only be a theoretical proposal.Philosophers' use of common sense as a philosophical norm was paradoxical from the beginning because it gave rise to a philosophical construction of common sense.