Problems with the Reality of Angel Dowgird

1. UNKNOWN AND IGNORED

(a few strokes to the historical background of Dowgird’s philosophy)

Engels Darashevich, a Belarusian historian of philosophy, emphasizes that Dowgird was a typical thinker of the Enlightenment era [1]. Indeed, if we consider him as a person who believed in reason and sought to develop a new—alternative to the “old,” i.e., scholastic—method of cognition, and was capable of assimilating philosophical ideas of the “modern era,” then one can agree with Darashevich’s thesis. However, Enlightenment philosophy was largely a liberating or even revolutionary project. De Fontenelle, Bayle, Lamettrie, Helvetius, Voltaire, and almost all encyclopedists were fierce fighters against the old regime in the broadest sense of the word, which for them meant not only monarchy or social inequality but also obscurantism, superstition, and backwardness (which were usually associated with Christian religion).

Angel Dowgird was neither a revolutionary nor a political thinker. Among his Enlightenment predecessors were rather “calm” philosophers, such as Étienne de Condillac, Christian Wolff, Thomas Reid, and Dowgird’s contemporary Joseph-Marie De Gérando [2]. Dowgird was most interested in a problem very similar to that which occupied Kant: how is knowledge possible? He attempted to solve the problem of the reality of human cognition (rzeczywistość poznania ludzkich) throughout his life, writing a number of important analytical works. Here is a list of some of them: “O logice, metafizyce i filozofii moralnej rozprawa, na skutek konkursu ogłoszonego przez Cesarski Uniwersytet Wileński roku 1820 dnia 1 marca do katedry rzeczonych przedmiotów, napisana przez x. Anioła Dowgirda, S. P. magistra św. teologii” (“Treatise on Logic, Metaphysics, and Moral Philosophy, written by Angel Dowgird, priest of the Piarist Order and master of sacred theology, March 1, 1820, for the competition of the chair of the aforementioned subjects, announced by the Imperial University in Vilnius”), published in Vilnius in 1821, “Wykład przyrodzonych myślenia prawideł, czyli logika teoretyczna i praktyczna przez x. Anioła Dowgirda zgromadzenia xx. Piarów doktora św. teologii, członka, korrespondenta królewsko-warszawskiego towarzystwa przyjaciół nauk, kapelana głównego seminaryum duchownego przy Cesarskim Uniwersytecie Wileńskim cz. I” (“Lectures on Natural Rules of Thinking, i.e., Theoretical and Practical Logic by Angel Dowgird of the Piarist Order, Doctor of Theology, Corresponding Member of the Royal Warsaw Society of Friends of Science, Chief Chaplain of the Spiritual Seminary at the Imperial University in Vilnius. Part I”), published in Polotsk in 1828, and “Rzeczywistość poznania ludzkich” (“The Reality of Human Cognition”), printed in the journal “Wizerunki i roztrząsania naukowe,” vol. 5, in 1839.

Yurkawshchyna of the Khislavichy district - the birthplace of Angel Dowgird

Dowgird, who was born in Belarus, wrote in Polish and taught in Belarusian and Lithuanian lands, is one of those who, like Copernicus or Kosciuszko, belongs to “everyone and no one.” He belongs to “everyone” (i.e., Poles, Belarusians, and Lithuanians) in the sense that representatives of all these nations have the right to consider his heritage part of their own national capital. However, at the same time, Dowgird “does not belong to anyone” in the sense that in his case it is hardly possible to speak of national consciousness. The idea of a national society was in its embryonic form on the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in the first half of the 19th century, and it is unlikely that Dowgird could have been influenced by this idea.

As for the reception of Dowgird’s intellectual heritage, it should be noted that in the case of Belarus it is quite meager. The aforementioned monograph by Darashevich (written in Russian) remains the only work about Dowgird and his contributions in Belarus to this day. Currently, none of Dowgird’s works have been translated into Belarusian, while the Lithuanians received an excellent translation of his main works two years ago [3] thanks to the renowned historian of philosophy Professor Romanas Plečkaitis. In studying Dowgird’s epistemological ideas, this translation served as my main source, as I did not have access to his original Polish books or manuscripts.

“Angel Dowgird — the unknown philosopher” is the title of a monograph written by S. Kaczmarek [4], a Polish researcher of Dowgird’s heritage. We can safely paraphrase this expression as follows: Dowgird is an unnoticed philosopher because he was highly valued in narrow circles of professional philosophers but was never popular among students or philosophy enthusiasts. This priest of the Piarist Order was “too cold” and “too dry” for the youth of Vilnius, as the youth of Vilnius sought “deep” and “passionate” ideas rather than meticulous analyses and scientific research. At the beginning of the 19th century, the atmosphere at the University of Vilnius (officially called the Imperial University) was one of a struggle for freedom and liberation.

Meanwhile, Józef Galuchowski, a talented young Polish philosopher, graduated from the university in Erlangen and gained fame for his work “Die Philosophie in ihrem Verhältniss zum Leben ganzer Völker und einzelner Menschen” (“Philosophy in its Relation to the Lives of Entire Nations and Individual People”), published in 1822. The very title of this treatise was attractive and even intriguing; it seemed to resonate with the inner aspirations of the educated youth from the territory of the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Polish Crown. In October 1823, Galuchowski began to lecture on philosophy at the University of Vilnius, which had unprecedented success. His lectures were open to all who wished to attend, and they gathered crowds of educated Vilnians. After Henryk Abicht, a very unpopular professor of philosophy who taught from 1804 to 1816, and Angel Dowgird, a “dry” and “too scientific” lecturer of philosophy who taught from 1818 to 1823, this new professor, with his ideas of “the spirit of the nation” and “human freedom,” was exactly what the generation of filomats and filarets had been waiting for. However, a few months later, the Russian authorities prohibited Galuchowski from delivering these lectures, and shortly thereafter, he was completely banned from teaching. As a result, Dowgird returned to the position of head of the philosophy department and continued to teach until the university’s closure in 1832. There is no doubt that for Dowgird this was a very uncomfortable situation. Plečkaitis describes this very well:

His situation was extremely complicated: an eloquent, famous, original, and popular professor among students and the public was replaced by a clumsy (according to witnesses and contemporaries) lecturer who drags out long sentences and aged too quickly [5].

This is, to a large extent, the reason why the “theorist of the Vilnius school of epistemology” (according to Plečkaitis’s formulation) was not only “little known” but also an ignored philosopher. However, from a temporal perspective, Dowgird’s contribution to philosophy and scientific methodology appears to be much more significant than the philosophy of Galuchowski and other representatives of “messianic philosophizing.” The philosophy of the latter was created more for the heart than for the mind, while Dowgird’s philosophy was primarily analytical and rationalistic. The first type of philosophy could be called a type of prophetic philosophy, while the second, represented by Dowgird, a type of scientific philosophy (here I apologize to those who are convinced that philosophy cannot be scientific).

2. MODEST SELF-CONFIDENCE OF DOWGIRD

The main goal of my philosophical research, the general content and general features of which are presented in this treatise, is to clarify two things. First, to reveal the true reasons why skeptics doubt the reality of our cognition, and idealists deny the very possibility of cognition. Second, I intend to show that our knowledge of things that exist outside our mind comes from certain innate rules of the mind, and that all arguments that seemingly justify our doubts about knowledge or even deny its possibility are completely senseless,

— writes Dowgird in the work “On Logic, Metaphysics, and Moral Philosophy…”.

So the task is clear: to prove the existence of a direct connection between our mind and things outside our mind. And here one cannot avoid polemics with a number of skeptics who have formed (and still form) a rather strong intellectual camp throughout the history of philosophy (Dowgird would say “sect”). But the Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment era also contributed to the formation of the camp of “new idealists”—an intellectual current that grew from both empiricism and rationalism. The radical empiricism of George Berkeley was the first serious premise for idealism. According to Berkeley, the world is reduced to the sphere of subjective representations (esse est percipi). It is noteworthy that this radically empiricist thesis strangely combined with a completely trans-empirical assertion that there exists a Great Observer, that is, the Absolute, which continuously sustains the existence of the world through its contemplation. And here only one step was needed to conclude that Berkeley’s Absolute is nothing other than the imaginative capacity of man, and that esse depends actually on imaginare!

The second resource of idealism was the critique of human cognition (“Critique of Pure Reason”) by Immanuel Kant. Kant himself never sympathized with idealism, much less supported the strategies of skeptics. But his analysis of human perception led to a number of compromises with both skeptics and idealists. The Königsberg philosopher compromised with skeptics by acknowledging that in the process of perception we can never be sure that we adequately understand things in themselves. “Things in themselves” (“Dinge an sich”) remain unknowable to us. Kant bows to the idealists by asserting that our mind and sensory organs are not passive in the process of cognition, but to a certain extent “form” and “transform” the information coming from the external world. And here only one step was needed to assert that the whole world is nothing other than the I. Kant’s “phenomena” are nothing other than MY internal subjective experiences (entities). Bolder thinkers like Hegel, Fichte, or Schelling went further: they made a number of “discoveries,” asserting that Kant’s “things in themselves” can still be revealed (for Hegel, for example, this “thing in itself” was the “Absolute Spirit”). If there is no access to objective reality as such, then there is no need to restrain oneself from constructing a completely arbitrary and personal world. “Anything goes!”—these words of Feyerabend could be attributed to a plethora of 19th-century idealists.

Angel Dowgird realized that idealistic or skeptical philosophies are a simple path to anarchism and arbitrariness in epistemology. As a result, he began to vigorously combat these “strange and disconnected” philosophies from a realistic position.

There are certain innate rules of thought that command us to treat the sensations we have as corresponding to reality outside of us [6],

— Dowgird incessantly repeats these words in his works like a refrain. The essence of realism was very aptly revealed by Crispin Wright, a contemporary analytical philosopher. According to him, realism is a certain mixture of modesty and self-confidence. Realism modestly asserts that humanity has a relationship with an objective world that exists independently of the subject that cognizes it, and has many characteristics that the subject may not notice. However, at the same time, realism self-confidently asserts that people are in some privileged position because they are given the ability to acquire knowledge about the world, and in a number of cases, adequate (true) knowledge [7].

Wright’s characterization of realism can be successfully used to interpret Dowgird’s views. Dowgird does not even feel the need to “justify” the thesis that there is a real world outside of us. Do you have any grounds to believe that the world exists independently of our mind? Yes, this is a generally accepted and obvious position—this is how Dowgird would respond.

A person who is guided by nothing but natural abilities to think trusts his sensory organs to such an extent that he would probably consider someone who claims that the material world arising through sensory experiences is only an illusion, a dream, or a fantasy [8] to be mentally ill.

The problem of the existence of the external world is characteristic of homo philosophans, while at the level of common sense, it is only a pseudo-problem. So let us not consider ourselves superior or wiser than common-sense people who are strongly convinced of the existence of things outside of intellect!—this could be interpreted as Dowgird’s position. It is a call: let us be modest!

Arguments based on common sense (“the argument from modesty”) could be accepted if it were not for a small problem. And the problem lies in the intuitiveness of this argument. Such arguments do not provide for verification/falsification procedures. Moreover, it seems that any attempts to invent such procedures will be unsuccessful, as the assertion “Every person who is guided by common sense is convinced that there is a world outside of him” contains a circulum vitiosum (vicious circle). For in the case that someone is found who does not believe in the existence of the world outside of intellect, it can always be said that this person is simply guided by “unhealthy” sense. In the search for possible “falsifiers,” I recalled my childhood. At that time, I sometimes faced a dilemma: does the world around me really exist, or is it just a world I imagined? Why am I me, and others are others? What does it mean to be “myself” and to be “another”? Is there any difference between the first and the second? Or is there even any difference at all? I want to assure you that the existence of a world outside of me was not at all obvious to me. (Later, when I began to study philosophy, I was very surprised to find out that many philosophers were seriously concerned with this question.) One of my friends once recounted that he had similar dilemmas in childhood. Here arises the question: can our childhood doubts function as falsifiers for the argument from common sense? I fear that the “common-sense” realist would respond that my friend and I had “unhealthy” delusions that are not worth worrying about. Arguments referring to common sense are merely intuitive assumptions, equivalent to the call “Let us be modest!”

While assertions of common sense can be recognized as entirely acceptable for solving the problem of the existence of the real world, the same method of solving the problem of “the reality of cognition” would be, if not naive, then at least dogmatic. It should be noted that skeptics accuse realists of two “sins”: 1) the latter do not distinguish between the content of the mind on the one hand and things in themselves on the other; 2) realists naively believe that the presence of this content is sufficient for a legitimate conviction that we have adequate knowledge regarding the things this knowledge pertains to. In both cases, realists appear as naive and/or dogmatic theorists.

Dowgird tries to avoid both dogmatism and naivety as much as possible. To this end, he conducts intricate reasoning, primarily using the epistemological views of Locke, Condillac, and De Gérando. I will now attempt to reconstruct his reasoning.

1. No one doubts that he/she has certain perceptions (sensibilitas, sensu, facultas sentiendi) [9].

It is clear that having sensory impressions does not mean having true knowledge. Skeptics agree that we have impressions, but assert that: 1) these impressions can be “poor witnesses,” and 2) there are no methods by which one could sufficiently reliably distinguish trustworthy “witnesses” from those that are untrustworthy. Realists—in this case, Dowgird—agree with the first part of this remark but do not agree with the second. In their opinion, there do exist methods by which one can distinguish “true” testimonies from “false” ones.

Dowgird argues as follows.

2. There are three types of errors: errors of sensory data (illusions), errors of imagination, and errors of the mind.

3. There are two ways to correct errors: a) experience; b) analysis.

First of all, let us clearly formulate the premise hidden behind (2), namely that there are three potential sources of knowledge: a) sensory organs, b) imagination, c) reason. And here arises a completely natural question: which source of knowledge is fundamental? Dowgird immediately rejects imagination, as it is the “place” of subjective modeling of the world, where reference to the real world may be absent [10]. Thus, only sensory organs and reason remain.

One might reasonably note that the question of sources of knowledge can be interpreted in different ways. First, it can be a question about the nature of our knowledge; second, it can concern the norms or rules that govern the process of cognition. In this regard, we can formulate four possible positions regarding the foundation of knowledge: 1) genetic empiricism (Locke); 2) methodological empiricism (Bacon); 3) genetic rationalism (Descartes); 4) methodological rationalism (Plato).

Regarding the nature of our knowledge, Dowgird wrote:

We have already seen that our thoughts are formed not only by sensory data but also by concepts related to sensory impressions, but which are not such impressions.

Later he notes that our knowledge of external objects is not only an image, distinct from sensory impressions, but also the result of judgments that arise in our intellect [11].

It can be noted here that Dowgird stands at the crossroads of empiricism and rationalism; for him, there are two fundamental sources of our knowledge: sensory impressions and a priori judgment (or judgments) of the intellect. But at the same time, he asserts that “thinking is the ability to unfold the later,” where “the later” refers to the antigenetic development of humans. “An infant is not capable of thinking, yet we cannot say that it has absolutely no knowledge.” This means that even if the “ability to think” is not yet developed, there is a possibility of acquiring at least partial knowledge.

For Descartes, as is well known, the only thing that cannot be doubted is thinking (unconditionally, in the first person: ego cogito — I think). However, in order to accept the existence of the external world, Descartes had to use the idea of God, thereby risking being accused of conceptual realism. Dowgird rejected such a strategy. Why? First, due to ontological nominalism: he was convinced that only individual things exist. General and abstract objects are merely mental entities; they do not exist in reality. Ontological nominalists could not share Descartes’ method for at least one reason: Descartes accepts the existence of God based on the existence of the concept of God in our intellect. Descartes mixed the mental order of things with the real, and this is the most significant charge that nominalists directed at rationalists like Descartes.

Secondly, the Cartesian approach leads to the conclusion that a realistic position can only be justified as a result of developed thinking. For Dowgird, this was a clear overreach; he was convinced that even a small child continuously acquires true knowledge about the world, and Descartes’ tricks are completely unnecessary here. The source of this knowledge is only sensory experiences (sensations).

It is true that sensory data can deceive us. And here Dowgird makes the following remark regarding sensory illusions:

Some of them can be excluded by experience, while others—through analysis or thinking. The first type of illusions arise under certain conditions, while the second type of illusions are characteristic of all kinds of humans (…) The first type of illusions can be uncovered and discarded many times, while the second type of illusions can only be revealed as a result of certain intellectual progress, for only one who is capable of thinking deeply and entering the sphere of super-sensory truths through thinking can uncover this [second type of illusions] [12].

Let me now quote a longer fragment from Dowgird’s work to show his tactics in the search for true knowledge:

We have already seen that every opinion [mniemanie, numanomas spręsmas] consists of a multitude of judgments. I would like to draw attention to the following two: first, there are judgments generated by real sensory impressions, for example, “I smell the scent of a melon” or “I feel a change in light”—such judgments are beyond rational doubt; we should not treat them merely as opinions. Let us look at another type of judgments, generated by certain imagined experiences, for example, “There is a melon in the room” or “A certain material body of a certain shape and a certain size is at a certain distance and is moving towards a certain point.” This second type of judgments is less certain and true [in the Lithuanian translation: “tikras,” which can be understood as “most probable,” “true,” and “genuine.” — P. R.], than the first, for it is actually merely an opinion. If we analyze this opinion, we will notice that it has not a simple, but a complex nature [13].

Judgments of the second type consist of a series of imagined information that spontaneously arise in our consciousness based on previous experience. We may feel a scent that resembles the scent of a melon, and immediately be inclined to think: there is a melon! Dowgird urges us not to rush to formulate conclusions. But what can we do? We need to seek additional data from experience that could confirm (or refute) our “first impressions”—such would largely be Dowgird’s response.

And here a vast field for maneuver opens up for the skeptic. When we seek other, additional experiential data (experiences) to verify our “first impressions,” we embark on a path that leads us not to truth, but to… infinite regress (regressus in infinitum)! According to the previously accepted logic, one can formulate any further impression only from the first person, provided, of course, that we want to remain at the level of judgments and not degrade to the level of opinions.

We might try to defend Dowgird using the approach of John Watkins, a contemporary philosopher of science. Statements like “I smell the scent of a melon” or “I feel a change in light” are what Watkins calls autopsychological reports, which can be treated as statements that need to be clarified (explananda) and form a category of zero-level statements (0-level sentences). The second type of statements, which were considered in the cited passage, such as “There is a melon in the room,” “A certain material body of a certain shape, a certain size is at a certain distance and directed towards a certain point,” will have the status of explanatory statements (explanans) and form a category of first-level statements (1-level sentences). (The next, “higher” levels are model and theory levels, which must be verified through lower-level statements, usually the first.) Thus, “There is a melon in the room” is as if a hypothetical explanation for the autopsychological report “I smell the scent of a melon.”

Watkins’ proposal is, however, not without problems. The well-known Polish methodologist Adam Grobler rightly noted that the epistemological status of “autopsychological reports” remains unclear. As psychology (Grobler here primarily refers to Fromm’s neo-psychoanalysis) and our own experience testify, adequately identifying what we actually feel is not always that simple. Moreover, it remains doubtful whether Dowgird himself would accept Watkins’ approach. Dowgird was convinced that statements like “There is a melon in the room” (Watkins’ 1-level sentences) have a more solid status than that of merely hypothetical explanations.

…What does Dowgird propose? From Locke and Hume, he learns that our sensory organs (seemingly the most fundamental) can deceive us (descriptions of optical illusions that circulated among intellectual circles could not fail to impress him). But from Condillac, Dowgird learns that there is at least one trustworthy sense—the sense of touch. On this sense, Dowgird bases his theory of cognition. The conclusion is this: tactile impressions remain in our intellect and transform into relatively stable concepts. And with the help of these “tactile copies” (touch-copies), we are able to “control” the functioning of the other sensory organs and, further, all cognitive activity.

There is no doubt that a skeptic could raise a number of new charges regarding this “tactile epistemology” of Dowgird. However, in order not to overly extend this article and not to abuse the patience of the reader who dared to read it, I will allow the skeptic to formulate only two general remarks. First: how do we know that these “tactile copies” [14] are not deformed in our intellect? Or perhaps these “copies,” instead of correcting possible errors, actually support and reinforce the errors generated by other sensory organs? Second: how can tactile impressions of one thing be related to another thing (or things of another kind) that is inaccessible to tactile perception?

So the problems remain. But to realize this, we do not even need a skeptic, for Dowgird himself, concluding a lengthy introduction to the book “On Natural Rules of Thinking…,” honestly admits:

As for this goal [referring to the precise study of the rules governing real cognition. — P. R.], I am not sure that I have achieved it satisfactorily, or rather, I am fully aware that my work has many shortcomings.

This is why I have called Dowgird’s realism a position of modest self-confidence.

3. CONCLUSIONS

Despite all these shortcomings, which Dowgird himself acknowledges in the introduction to his book, and despite the fact that certain of his ideas are now quite anachronistic, I believe that this scholar from Mahilyow prepared quite a decent scheme for the development of scientific rationality. The main elements of this scheme are: a) experience; b) intellectual analysis; c) the idea of truth.

By asserting that a certain conceptual scheme is inscribed in our intellect (partially innate, partially formed in the process of antigenetic development), Dowgird came very close to Kant (he even called him a “genius philosopher,” although he did not share his phenomenalism, nor did he accept his deconstruction of classical proofs of the existence of God). By analyzing our judgments regarding external reality and emphasizing (not without the influence of Locke, of course) that statements that seem simple are actually complex, Dowgird came very close to the idea of the theory-ladeness of facts (theory ladeness thesis), which will be explicitly formulated in methodological studies of the 20th century. By emphasizing the importance of imagination in the cognitive process, he simultaneously called for a methodical comparison of “imagined judgments” with data from our experience; one could say that Dowgird predestined the falsificationist doctrine. Dowgird, finally, clearly asserted that our opinions (that is, ungrounded, random beliefs) are both useful and inevitable. He explained that in the absence of more solid, grounded knowledge, our opinions can serve for survival (although after this, there usually sounds a call to replace opinions with solid, verified knowledge). I would like to remind you that later, in the 20th century, this view will become central to the so-called evolutionary epistemology.

I think that Dowgird’s case can be used to interpret the modern intellectual situation in Belarus. It should be noted that the current moment in Belarus is very similar to the situation of the Commonwealth in the 19th century, and the intellectual atmosphere in Belarus today strongly resembles the era of filomats from the first half of the 19th century. Authoritarianism, dependence on Russia, and other factors create a demand for “prophetic” philosophy (I describe this state as “the pursuit of spirits and ideas”). Hegelian idealism, nationalistic romanticism, and various utopian visions became the predominant type of “philosophy” (I mean non-Soviet) in the first half of the 1990s. This can be called an idealistic intellectual trend. In the second half of the 1990s, romantic idealism was displaced by new trends—postmodernism, neo-Marxism, various versions of relativism, and so on. This second trend (or rather: multitude of trends) I would call arrogant skepticism. (Akudovich’s book “I Am Not Here,” which emerged in the second half of the 1990s, is, in my opinion, a symbolic start of arrogant skepticism and its most representative example.)

This hybrid of romantic idealism and arrogant skepticism predominates in today’s Belarus. The tradition of meticulous research, conducted using logic and corresponding to modern methodological standards, has yet to form in this country in the fields of philosophical and humanitarian knowledge. What dominates in these fields is metaphysical tremor and post-metaphysical mockery. So perhaps Dowgird, this “clumsy” and “dry” scholar, will emerge as an archetypal “Other,” capable of introducing into Belarusian philosophy (and into the field of socio-humanitarian science) the principles of concise and analytical thinking.

Translated from English by Natallia Artyemienka

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• This text is a shortened version of the article “Angel Dowgird’s Problems with Reality,” published in the journal “Studies in Logic, Grammar, and Rhetoric.” No. 13 (26). 2008.

1. Darashevich E. Angel Dowgird — a thinker of the Enlightenment. Minsk, 1967.

2. Sources of the History of Lithuanian Philosophical Thought. Volume I. The Feudal Period. Vilnius, 1980.

3. Daugirdas A. Treatise on Logic, Metaphysics, and Moral Philosophy // Daugirdas A. Works, translated by R. Plečkaitis. Vilnius, 2006; Daugirdas A. Presentation of Natural Rules of Thinking, or Theoretical and Practical Logic. Part I // Daugirdas A. Works, translated by R. Plečkaitis. Vilnius, 2006; Daugirdas A. The Reality of Human Cognition // Daugirdas A. Works, translated by R. Plečkaitis. Vilnius, 2006.

4. Kaczmarek S. Angel Dowgird — an unknown philosopher. Poznań, 1963.

5. Plečkaitis R. Theorist of the Vilnius School of Epistemology // Daugirdas A. Works, translated by R. Plečkaitis, Vilnius, 2006.

6. Daugirdas A. The Reality of Human Cognition // Daugirdas A. Works, translated by R. Plečkaitis. Vilnius, 2006.

7. Wright C. Realism, Meaning and Truth. Oxford: Blackwell, 1987.

8. Daugirdas A. The Reality of Human Cognition // Daugirdas A. Works, translated by R. Plečkaitis. Vilnius, 2006.

9. Ibidem.

10. Nevertheless, Dowgird emphasizes the usefulness of imagination in a number of types of human activity, see: Daugirdas A. Presentation of Natural Rules of Thinking, or Theoretical and Practical Logic. Part I // Daugirdas A. Works, translated by R. Plečkaitis. Vilnius, 2006.

11. Daugirdas A. Treatise on Logic, Metaphysics, and Moral Philosophy // Daugirdas A. Works, translated by R. Plečkaitis. Vilnius, 2006.

12. Daugirdas A. The Reality of Human Cognition // Daugirdas A. Works, translated by R. Plečkaitis. Vilnius, 2006.

13. Ibidem.

14. In any case, I will note that the expression “tactile copies” (touch-copies) is my interpretation of Dowgird’s views; however, I believe that it adequately conveys Dowgird’s perspective on the functioning of touch in the cognitive process.

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