"But when, in the first setting out, he takes it for granted without proof, that distinctions found in the structure of all languages, have no foundation in nature; this surely is too fastidious a way of treating the common sense of mankind"
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Reid is doing something sly here: he turns “common sense” into a battering ram against philosophical overreach. The target is the kind of armchair theorist who begins by declaring, with tidy confidence, that the categories baked into language are arbitrary - mere habits of speech, unmoored from the way reality is. Reid’s complaint isn’t that skepticism exists; it’s that the skeptic has smuggled in a conclusion as a premise. “Takes it for granted without proof” is a procedural accusation: you don’t get to dethrone everyday distinctions by fiat and still claim intellectual rigor.
The subtext is an Enlightenment-era turf war over who gets to set the terms of knowledge. Reid, a central figure in Scottish Common Sense philosophy, is pushing back against the post-Locke, post-Hume impulse to treat the mind’s furniture (ideas, impressions, linguistic categories) as suspect intermediaries. If all linguistic distinctions are mere conventions, then “cause,” “person,” “object,” even “self” start to look like grammatical illusions. Reid sees that move as not just abstractly wrong but socially destabilizing: it licenses a skepticism so refined it becomes useless.
“Too fastidious” is a barbed word choice. He paints the philosopher as prissy, over-scrubbed, so obsessed with not being naive that he rejects the accumulated practical intelligence of “mankind.” Reid isn’t romanticizing the crowd; he’s pointing out an evidentiary asymmetry. If every culture carves experience along certain joints, you need a strong argument to say those joints are purely invented. Language, for Reid, is not a trap; it’s a record of what has proven durable enough to name.
The subtext is an Enlightenment-era turf war over who gets to set the terms of knowledge. Reid, a central figure in Scottish Common Sense philosophy, is pushing back against the post-Locke, post-Hume impulse to treat the mind’s furniture (ideas, impressions, linguistic categories) as suspect intermediaries. If all linguistic distinctions are mere conventions, then “cause,” “person,” “object,” even “self” start to look like grammatical illusions. Reid sees that move as not just abstractly wrong but socially destabilizing: it licenses a skepticism so refined it becomes useless.
“Too fastidious” is a barbed word choice. He paints the philosopher as prissy, over-scrubbed, so obsessed with not being naive that he rejects the accumulated practical intelligence of “mankind.” Reid isn’t romanticizing the crowd; he’s pointing out an evidentiary asymmetry. If every culture carves experience along certain joints, you need a strong argument to say those joints are purely invented. Language, for Reid, is not a trap; it’s a record of what has proven durable enough to name.
Quote Details
| Topic | Reason & Logic |
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