# Thomas Reid



## Backwoods Presbyterian (May 7, 2009)

For the Philosophy wonks out there I highly recommend picking up Thomas Reid's The Intellectual Powers of Man. Doug Kelly has an excellent little appendix in his Systematic Theology on Reid and his interaction with David Hume. Picked up a Reid book and love it. I have always been interested in Philosophy and wish I could spend more time with it.


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## yeutter (May 7, 2009)

Reid's epistomology undergirds the old Princeton thought of Archibald Alexander, Charles Hodge, Benjamin Warfield and John Gerstner.


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## Theogenes (May 14, 2009)

yeutter said:


> Reid's epistomology undergirds the old Princeton thought of Archibald Alexander, Charles Hodge, Benjamin Warfield and John Gerstner.



Yes! And therefore leads towards an empirical/evidential approach to apologetics instead of a presuppositional one.


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## rbcbob (May 14, 2009)

Thomas Reid, with other of the Scottish Common Sense philosophers influenced John Witherspoon away from historical Reformed epistemology, thus laying the seeds which would eventually take down old Princeton.

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## yeutter (May 14, 2009)

rbcbob said:


> Thomas Reid, with other of the Scottish Common Sense philosophers influenced John Witherspoon away from historical Reformed epistemology, thus laying the seeds which would eventually take down old Princeton.


Please provide an example of the "_*historical Reformed epistemology*_" that Reid and Witherspoon departed from.
Reid is a classical essentialist philosopher who interacts with the philosophy of Locke.


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## py3ak (May 14, 2009)

rbcbob said:


> Thomas Reid, with other of the Scottish Common Sense philosophers influenced John Witherspoon away from historical Reformed epistemology, thus laying the seeds which would eventually take down old Princeton.



Please see the "signature requirements" link in my signature, and update your profile accordingly. Thanks!


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## rbcbob (May 14, 2009)

Briefly, and in this I mean nothing offensive, you are correct to align the epistemology of Reid and Witherspoon with what today we call evidentialism, or foundationalism. These are two expressions of an epistemology which either tries to blend presuppositionalism with evidentialism or outright reject presuppositionalism. Classic Reformed epistemology is essentially that embraced by the Westminster divines and such theologians as John Calvin and John Owen. Warfield, beloved brother that he remains, adopted the evidential system that Witherspoon taught at the College of New Jersey, later Princeton University. 

p.s. I am new and not quite sure what is meant by 'Please see the "signature requirements" link in my signature, and update your profile accordingly.'
Bob
elder
Kentucky


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## yeutter (May 14, 2009)

rbcbob said:


> Briefly, and in this I mean nothing offensive, you are correct to align the epistemology of Reid and Witherspoon with what today we call evidentialism, or foundationalism. These are two expressions of an epistemology which either tries to blend presuppositionalism with evidentialism or outright reject presuppositionalism. Classic Reformed epistemology is essentially that embraced by the Westminster divines and such theologians as John Calvin and John Owen. Warfield, beloved brother that he remains, adopted the evidential system that Witherspoon taught at the College of New Jersey, later Princeton University.


I am not sure how the influence of Reid and President Witherspoon substantively changed the epistemology of Princeton from that held by founding President William Tennent or other President's of Princeton such as President Jonathan Edwards Sr. or President Aaron Burr Sr. All seem to have been evidentialists. Reid was influential in developing the philosophy so that it could be seen how his school of thought differed from Neo Thomists and from Locke.


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## MW (May 14, 2009)

Realism is the basis of foundationalism, which is essentially presuppositional. Empiricism is the methodology that common sense realism aimed to counteract. Old Princeton's downfall came as a result of being too confident in scientific progress and allowing it to influence the nature and message of the Bible, not because of its epistemic tradition.

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## ChristianTrader (May 14, 2009)

armourbearer said:


> Realism is the basis of foundationalism, which is essentially presuppositional. Empiricism is the methodology that common sense realism aimed to counteract. Old Princeton's downfall came as a result of being too confident in scientific progress and allowing it to influence the nature and message of the Bible, not because of its epistemic tradition.



Because it seeked to counteract it, does not imply that it did a good job doing so.

Secondly, asserting that it was their over confidence in scientific progress that was the issue, just pushing the question back to why were they so confident? It was because their epistemology told them to be confident in such.

CT


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## MW (May 14, 2009)

ChristianTrader said:


> Because it seeked to counteract it, does not imply that it did a good job doing so.
> 
> Secondly, asserting that it was their over confidence in scientific progress that was the issue, just pushing the question back to why were they so confident? It was because their epistemology told them to be confident in such.



Reformed epistemology today is still basically realist and it is regarded as doing a good job of counteracting empirical claims.

One cannot ignore the influence which the theory of "development" held over all schools of thought in the back end of the 19th century.

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## py3ak (May 14, 2009)

rbcbob said:


> p.s. I am new and not quite sure what is meant by 'Please see the "signature requirements" link in my signature, and update your profile accordingly.'
> Bob
> elder
> Kentucky



Hi Bob,

If you click on the link in my signature that says "Signature Requirements" it should explain itself pretty well. Your signature can be accessed through the "User CP" link which you'll find in the bar of links towards the top of the page.


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## rbcbob (May 14, 2009)

[
Hi Bob,

If you click on the link in my signature that says "Signature Requirements" it should explain itself pretty well. Your signature can be accessed through the "User CP" link which you'll find in the bar of links towards the top of the page.[/QUOTE]

I think/hope that I did that!


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## py3ak (May 14, 2009)

It still shows as blank. Did you click on "Edit Signature" after you got in to your User CP? And did you hit the save button at the bottom of the screen when you were done?

[By the way, these off-topic posts will be removed from the thread when the changes take effect, so don't let them interfere with discussion -El Tirano]


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