The general philosophical basis of Russell’s theory of knowledge was made up of the ideas to which he came rejecting the speculative philosophy of German idealism. Russell himself characterized his position as scientific common sense (Russel 1997). This sense does not contrast science and ordinary knowledge, as well as knowledge and beliefs, since it recognizes that science basically tells the truth. People move to knowledge through opinion (belief), and the difference between the two is not so fundamental and is determined only by the degree of credibility.
In Russell’s theory of knowledge, an important role is played by the distinction between two types of knowledge: knowledge of things and knowledge of truths. These types correspond to two different meanings in which the word “know” can be used in general. First of all, it is applied in the sense in which we know “data supplied by our senses.” Another possible meaning refers to our opinions or beliefs – to what, according to Russell, is called judgment. First of all, Russell focuses in detail on the knowledge of things, distinguishing two types in it: knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge by description.
Russell emphasizes that knowledge of things through acquaintance is much simpler than any knowledge of truth and logically independent of it. The knowledge of things according to the description, on the contrary, always includes as a source and basis a certain knowledge of the ruth. A question arises: with what kind of “things” is a direct acquaintance possible, which does not need any logical conclusion or preliminary judgment? According to Russell, first of all, this is the data of our senses. For example, sitting at a desk, we directly perceive its color, shape, hardness, smoothness, etc., and namely these sensual data, which together constitute the perceived image of the table, constitute the essence of those “things” with which we are directly familiar (acquainted). However, this does not mean at all that by doing so we get a direct acquaintance with the table as a physical object. On the contrary, Russell describes the knowledge of the table as a physical object as a typical case of knowledge by description.
It is noteworthy that Russell does not limit the scope of objects of which knowledge of acquaintance is possible to only “specific existing things.” He claims that in addition to such things, we can also have a direct acquaintance with universals, that is, with general ideas, such as “distinction,” “brotherhood,” etc. Russell himself notes that, for example, when we see some kind of white spot, we always get acquainted with a specific spot. However, after repeatedly observing various white spots, we easily learn to distinguish, through abstraction the whiteness that is common to all of them and, thereby, we are getting to know whiteness itself (Russel 1997). Unfortunately, Russell does not dwell on the question of the nature of this abstraction, and this significantly weakens his argument.
According to Russell, physical objects as such, as well as the consciousness of other people, do not belong to those objects that can be known to us throa ugh direct acquaintance. Knowledge of such objects is possible only by description. Under the description, Russell means a definite portrayal while distinguishing between definite and indefinite descriptions. Moreover, the importance of knowledge by description is because it opens the possibility of going beyond the limits of personal experience. However, any description should in principle be removable, which finds expression in the following fundamental principle adopted by Russell: each statement that we can understand must consist entirely of constituents with which we are familiar (Russel 1997).
This reductionist principle, which states that any knowledge is ultimately reducible to the knowledge of the acquaintance, explains, among other things, why Russell had to allow the possibility of direct acquaintance with universals – after all, any statement necessarily contains at least one term that represents a general concept. Consequently, without the possibility of acquaintance with universals, complete reducibility to knowledge by acquaintance would be simply impossible.
In the theory of descriptions, Russell proposed a new analytical method that allows, wherever possible, instead of mentioning unknown objects, substitute constructions based on known objects. He sought to undermine the idea leading to idealism as if everything conceivable is correlated with one or another independent object. Russell considered the explanation of the field of non-existent entities (such as the “round square,” “golden mountain,” etc.) to be a significant result of the theory of notation as pseudo-designating expressions that really mean nothing. The difficulties of determining the status of non-existent objects (for example, Pegasus) were also overcome.
The most important logical discoveries of Russell, of course, are precisely the theory of descriptions and the theory of logical types. Both of them had deep philosophical meaning and significance. Russell’s concept of logic, which grew out of the philosophy of mathematics, was distinguished by extreme nominalism. The logic was identified with syntax, with the rules of meaningful word placement. Any symbol that goes beyond the simple naming of a single object, was interpreted as in fact not correspond to anything.
The theory of descriptions provided a rather effective and convenient logical apparatus for translating statements with unspecified content into a clearer form (for example, about empirically undetectable objects, about concepts with an empty class, etc.). Of course, this theory could not claim to be the only and best logical “tool” in resolving paradoxes. Yet it seriously influenced the subsequent development of analytical philosophy. The development of a detailed theory of logical analysis as a method of translating knowledge into a more accurate language is namely Russell’s great merit. The distinction made by Russell between the knowledge of things and the knowledge of truths (knowledge of facts) is now generally accepted and corresponds to the division of knowledge into objective (predicative) and propositional knowledge, which is characteristic of many analytical epistemological concept predictive.
References
Russel, Bertrand. 1997. The Problems of Philosophy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.