Discipline: Cultural Studies
Philosophers since David Hume have been severely critical of metaphysics. Hume's analysis of experience tends to show that metaphysical presuppositions-especially, those on causality and substance-have no logical basis. Kant came to the conclusion that all we can know are phenomena ordered by the mind in Space and Time according to certain categories of conception. Logical Positivists used to contend that metaphysical propositions are meaningless, because, being putatively statements of fact, they are unverifiable, unconfirmable and unfalsifiable. Linguistic analysts, for their part, say that such statements result from some linguistic muddle or other, and that if language were brought back to its ordinary and natural use, these statements would be seen to be without real significance. Accor· ding to them, metaphysical problems would then simply disappear, Other philosophers regard metaphysics as essentially the expression of the philosopher's cultural, economic or psychological bias with very little, if any, objective validity. According to these philosophers, metaphysical and, for that matter, philosophical statements reflect the philosopher's subjective reality more than the truth about the external world.
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