Philosopher, born in North Attleboro, Massachusetts, USA. After earning a Harvard doctorate (1942), he taught philosophy at Brown University (from 1946), specializing in theory of knowledge and philosophy of science. His works include Perceiving: A Philosophical Study (1957).
Roderick M Chisholm (Seekonk, Massachusetts, 1916 -- Providence, Rhode Island, 1999) was an American philosopher, known for his work on epistemology, metaphysics, free will, and the philosophy of perception.
Chisholm's first major work was a textbook on epistemology called Theory of Knowledge. His masterwork was Person and Object, a title punning W. Chisholm, a metaphysical Platonist and rationalist in the tradition of G. His theory of knowledge was also famously "foundationalist" in character: all justified beliefs are either "directly evident" or supported by chains of justified beliefs that ultimately lead to beliefs that are directly evident. He developed a highly original theory of first person thought according to which the things we believe are properties, and believing them is a matter of self-attributing them. (A similar view was developed independently by David Kellogg Lewis, and enjoys considerable popularity, although it is now known mainly through Lewis's work.) Chisholm was also famous for defending the possibility of robust self-knowledge (against the skeptical arguments of David Hume), and an objective ethics of requirements similar to that of W. Chisholm's other books include The Problem of the Criterion, Perceiving, "The First Person" and A Realist Theory of the Categories, though his numerous journal articles are probably better known than any of these.
Chisholm read widely in the history of philosophy, and frequently referred to the work of Ancient, Medieval, Modern, and even Continental philosophers (although the use he made of this material has sometimes been challenged). Chisholm translated some work by Brentano and by Husserl, and contributed to the post-1970 renaissance of mereology.
Chisholm greatly influenced a number of his graduate students and colleagues, including Richard Taylor, Jaegwon Kim, Keith Lehrer, R.
User Comments Add a comment…