A Guide to Dorothy Sayers III

I've been conducting a review of the allusions that Dorothy Sayer introduced in her plan for a hypothetical poem. These are references drawn largely, though not entirely, from British history of the late 19th and early 20th century.  Let us continue:

the Lady with the Lamp, this is clearly a reference to Florence Nightingale (1820-1910), the founder of nursing as a profession.

the Lady-with-the-Lampshade-made-of-Human-Skin, The story arose out of Buchenwald originally, that the medical personnel were making human souvenirs for themselves and taking them home, and that among these were lampshades made out of human skin. The specifics can't be substantiated, but the "lampshade" story made it into a documentary re: Buchenwald made by director Billy Wilder.  Presumably the "lady" Sayers has in mind here was a hausfrau of one of those medical death-camp types.

Titus Oates (1649-1705) -- an Anglican priest who converted to Roman Catholicism in 1677, and thereafter told various tales about a supposed "popish plot" to assassinate King Charles II to which he had become privy. His accusations led to at least 15 executions. Eventually the government decided that Oates had been a perjurer, that the whole plot had been his invention, and he was imprisoned.

Captain Oates (1880 - 1912) -- An antarctic explorer.  He decided during a disastrous expedition that there weren't enough supplies for the group of four -- and he sacrified himself -- walking out of the tent into a blizzard and certain death.

Quisling -- a reference to Vidkun Quisling (1887-1945) a Norwegian politican who assisted Nazi Germany in the take-over of his country, and who was executed by firing squad soon after the fall of the collaborationist regime.

the Owner of 'Hermit', --  Hermit, a race horse, won the 1867 Epsom Derby, a race held in a snowstorm. His owner was Henry Chaplin (1840 - 1923), a Tory politician known for his advocacy of protectionist trade policies regarding agriculture.

the French Bluebeard -- Henri Désiré Landru (1869-1922), a serial killer convicted of and executed for the murder of ten women between 1915 and 1919.

Bacon -- Francis Bacon (1561-1626) -- English lawyer, statesman, and philosopher, known for his description of induction, which is still sometimes called the "Baconian method."

Roger Bacon (1214-1294) -- Franciscan friar, author of a work on the place of philosophy within theology, which he sent to Pope Clement in 1265. This Opus Majus also includes a notable discussion of the science of optics.

Roger Fry  (1866 - 1934), an art critic, and a member of the Bloomsbury group, stressed the formal properties of works of art at the expense of the "associated ideas."

the Claimant -- this may be a reference to Lambert Simnel (c. 1477 - c. 1525)  who as the dust was finally setling after the War of Roses claimed to be the Earl of Warwick, a claim that threatened to ignite the war again.

the Bishop of Zanzibar, Frank Weston (1871 - 1924)  the Anglican Bishop of Zanzibar (1908 - 1924) became involved in an intense dispute over whether Anglican clerics should administer sacraments to members of non-conforming Christian congregations such as Methodists, Presbyterians, etc.  Weston accused of heresy those who did want to admit the non-conformists.

Clarence Hatry, (1888-1965) a stock speculator who, to support a failing position in 1929, forged a series of municipal bonds. He was sentenced to 14 years in jail in 1930.

I hope to finish this up tomorrow.

Philosophic Musings

Empiricism: the view that knowledge of the world is a construct from the raw materials provided by the senses. Vision gives me "red here now." Touch tells me that what is in front of me is in a roughly spherical shape. Taking a bite adds taste to the impressions that this is an apple.

Voila! we've just constructing a datum, a bit of knowledge, "I am holding an apple," from the various senses. Empiricism says that (a) all knowledge is like that, although usually more complicated, and (b) knowledge obtained in this way is reliable, so we don't need any other source.

External-world skepticism undercuts this theory directly. It says, "My senses have been wrong about a lot of things. I see railroad tracks converging in the distance, for example, but they don't really converge at all -- they remain parallel. Maybe, then, my senses are wrong about everything, or at least about so much so often that nothing I think I know about the world outside my body -- about apples or pears, planets or stars, sound waves or ocean tides -- is at all reliable."

Hume's problem of induction undercuts empiricism somewhat more subtly. Induction is the form of reasoning that says, "every X that I've ever seen has attribute Y. I've seen enough of X to consider this a fair sample. Thus, I conclude that all Xs have Y." Every human in recorded history has proven mortal -- few have lived beyond 100 years, none that we can be sure of have ever lived beyond 150. So ... all men are mortal!

If classical empiricism is right, then induction is very important. Recognizing a single fruit's attributes, as in my apple example above, is one thing. But one might argue that impressive knowledge only comes about once we start talking about large classes of things. If we can't reliably make inductions, perhaps empiricism can't account for the more impressive sorts of knowledge at all.

So Hume's challenge: show, within the confines of empiricism, why induction is reliable!

Do you, dear reader, think empiricism can be defended from those two types of criticism? Can it best be defended by transforming itself into ... pragmatism?