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(2022) Brentano and the positive philosophy of Comte and Mill, Berlin, de Gruyter.
Brentano’s view about natural science and methodological phenomenalism
a comparison with John Stuart Mill’s approach
Constantin Stoenescu
pp. 223-243
My aim in this research is to argue that, in his paper about Comte’s philosophy and in the first part of Psychology from an Empirical Standpoint, Brentano explicitly developed a theory of natural science based on an approach of physical objects and phenomena in the framework of methodological phenomenalism. The new science of psychology is designed in comparative terms, as a critical application of a research tradition which emerged from British empiricists and Kant. Therefore, he will understand empirical psychology as a science of mental phenomena. My thesis is that Brentano’s view is close to Mill’s theory about the so-called permanent possibilities of sensation as it was exposed in his book about Hamilton. Moreover, the two philosophers share the principle of knowledge relativity and abandon the quest for an absolute truth.
Publication details
DOI: 10.1515/9783110734645-009
Full citation:
Stoenescu, C. (2022)., Brentano’s view about natural science and methodological phenomenalism: a comparison with John Stuart Mill’s approach, in I. Tănăsescu, A. Bejinariu, S. Krantz Gabriel & C. Stoenescu (eds.), Brentano and the positive philosophy of Comte and Mill, Berlin, de Gruyter, pp. 223-243.
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