Scottish philosopher (1852?1902)
Robert Adamson
(19 January 1852 ? 5 February 1902) was a
Scottish
philosopher
and Professor of Logic at
Glasgow
.
[2]
Early life
[
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]
The philosopher Robert Adamson was born in
Kingsbarns
in Fife, Scotland.
[2]
His father Robert Adamson (d. 1855) was a Scottish solicitor, active in Dunbar, Coldstream, and later in Edinburgh. His mother Mary Agnes Buist (1809 - 11 February 1876) was the daughter of David Buist, factor to
George Baillie-Hamilton, 10th Earl of Haddington
(1802-1870). Robert Adamson and Mary Agnes Buist were married on 21 November 1843 at
Tyninghame
,
East Lothian
,
Haddingtonshire
, Scotland.
[3]
In 1855 Mrs. Adamson was left a
widow
with small means, and devoted herself entirely to the education of her six children (Helen, Ann, John, David, Robert, and Laurence). Of these, Robert was successful from the first. At the end of his school career he entered the
University of Edinburgh
at the age of fourteen, and four years later graduated with first-class honours in mental philosophy, with prizes in every department of the faculty of Arts. He completed his university successes by winning the Tyndall-Bruce scholarship, the Hamilton fellowship (1872), the Ferguson scholarship (1872) and the Shaw fellowship (1873).
After a short residence at
Heidelberg
(1871), where he began his study of
German philosophy
, he returned to Edinburgh as assistant first to
Henry Calderwood
(1830-1897) and later to
Alexander Campbell Fraser
(1819-1914). He joined the staff of the
Encyclopædia Britannica
(9th edition) (1874) and studied widely in the Advocates' Library.
[2]
Professorial appointments
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]
In 1876 he came to England as successor to
William Stanley Jevons
(1835-1882) in the chair of logic and philosophy, at
Owens College
, Manchester. In 1883 he received the honorary degree of
LL.D.
In 1893 he went to the
University of Aberdeen
, and finally in 1895 to the chair of logic at the
University of Glasgow
, which he held till his death.
[2]
Except during the first few years at Manchester, he delivered his lectures without manuscripts. In 1903, under the title
The Development of Modern Philosophy and Other Essays
, his more important lectures were published with a short biographical introduction by
William Ritchie Sorley
(1855-1935) of
Cambridge University
(see
Mind
, xiii. 1904, p. 73 foil.). Most of the matter is taken verbatim from the note-book of one of his students. Under the same editorship there appeared, three years later, his
Development of Greek Philosophy
.
In addition to his professional work, he did much administrative work for
Victoria University
and the University of Glasgow. In the organisation of Victoria University he took a foremost part, and, as chairman of the Board of Studies at Owens College, he presided over the general academical board of the Victoria University. At Glasgow he was soon elected one of the representatives on the court, and to him were due in large measure the extension of the academical session and the improved equipment of the university.
Throughout his lectures, Adamson pursued the critical and
historical method
without formulating a constructive theory of his own. He felt that any philosophical advance must be based on the
Kantian
methods. It was his habit to make straight for the ultimate issue, disregarding half-truths and declining compromise. He left a hypothesis to be worked out by others; this done, he would criticise with all the rigour of logic, and with a profound distrust of imagination, metaphor and the attitude known as the will-to-believe.
Philosophical views
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As he grew older his metaphysical optimism waned. He felt that the increase of knowledge must come in the domains of
physical science
. But this empirical tendency as regards science never modified his metaphysical outlook. He has been called Kantian and
neo-Kantian
,
realist
and
idealist
(by himself, for he held that appearance and reality are co-extensive and coincident).
At the same time, in his criticism of other views he was almost typical of
Hegelian idealism
. All processes of reasoning or judgment (i.e. all units of thought) are (i) analysable only by abstraction, and (2) are compound of deduction and induction, i.e. rational and empirical. An illustration of his empirical tendency is found in his attitude to the Absolute and the Self. The "Absolute" doctrines he regarded as a mere disguise of failure, a dishonest attempt to clothe ignorance in the pretentious garb of mystery. The Self as a primary, determining entity, he would not therefore admit. He represented an
empiricism
which, so far from refuting, was actually based on, idealism, and yet was alert to expose the fallacies of a particular idealist construction (see his essay in
Ethical Democracy
, edited by
Stanton Coit
).
Personal life
[
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]
Robert's wife Margaret "Daisy" Duncan
[5]
(1859-1935), a daughter of David Duncan
[6]
(1826-1871) (a Manchester linen merchant), was a woman of kindred tastes, and their union was entirely happy.
Their daughter,
Sarah Gough Adamson
was a highly regarded landscape artist.
[7]
Published writings
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It is matter for regret to the student that Adamson's active labours in the lecture room precluded him from systematic production. His writings consisted of short articles, of which many appeared in the Encyclopaedia and in
Mind
, a volume on
Kant
and another on
Fichte
. At the time of his death he was writing a
History of Psychology
, and had promised a work on Kant and the Modern Naturalists. Both in his life and in his writings he was remarkable for impartiality. It was his peculiar virtue that he could quote his opponents without warping their meaning. From this point of view he would have been perhaps the first historian of philosophy of his time, had his professional labours been less exacting.
- Bibliography
The following were published, either in his lifetime or posthumously.
[8]
- Contributions to the
Encyclopædia Britannica
Ninth Edition
- Contributions to the
Encyclopædia Britannica
Eleventh Edition
- Contributions to the
Dictionary of National Biography
References
[
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]
- ^
Gordon Graham (ed.),
Scottish Philosophy in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries
, Oxford University Press, 2015, ch. 6.3
- ^
a
b
c
d
Scotland (8 February 1902).
"University of Glasgow :: Story :: Biography of Robert Adamson"
.
Universitystory.gla.ac.uk
. Retrieved
28 July
2016
.
- ^
Their marriage notice appeared in the
Wigtownshire Free Press
.
- ^
Margaret Duncan (1859 - 5 March 1935) - She was the 5th child of 6 children born to David Duncan (1826-1871) and Sarah Anne Cooke (13 December 1820 - 28 December 1902). David and Sarah were married in 1848 in Salford, Lancashire. Margaret attended
Newnham College, Cambridge
in the late 1870s (residing in Norwich House in 1877-1878), then was employed as a teacher of botany at
Manchester High School for Girls
. In the summer of 1881 she married Robert Adamson in Chorlton, Lancashire, England. Margaret's sister Elizabeth Duncan (1855 - 14 April 1914) became widely known as
Lady Elizabeth Swann
after she married
Sir Charles Swann, 1st Baronet
(25 January 1844 - 13 July 1929).
- ^
David Duncan (1826 - August 1871) - A linen merchant in Manchester, England. He was born in
Magherafelt
,
County Londonderry
,
Ireland
, died in
Chorlton-cum-Hardy
,
Manchester
, Lancashire, England, and was buried in
Weaste Cemetery
(
Weaste
,
Metropolitan Borough of Salford
, Greater Manchester, England).
- ^
Sara Gray (2009).
The Dictionary of British Women Artists
. Casemate Publishers.
ISBN
978-0-7188-3084-7
.
- ^
"Robert Adamson"
.
Wikisource, The Free Library
. 1 March 2011
. Retrieved
3 September
2011
.
- ^
"Bacon, Francis"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
(11th ed.). 1911.
- ^
"Bacon, Roger"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
(11th ed.). 1911.
- ^
"Beneke, Friedrich Eduard"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 3 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 726?727.
- ^
"Berkeley, George"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 3 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 779?781.
- ^
"Bonaventura, Saint"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 4 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 197?198.
- ^
"Bruno, Giordano"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 4 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 686?687.
- ^
"Butler, Joseph"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 3 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 882?885.
- ^
"Category"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 5 (11th ed.). 1911. p. 509.
- ^
"Erigena, Johannes Scotus"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 9 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 742?744.
- ^
"Fichte, Johann Gottlieb"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 10 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 313?317.
- ^
"Fourier, Francois Charles Marie"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 10 (11th ed.). 1911.
- ^
"Gassendi, Pierre"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 11 (11th ed.). 1911.
- ^
"Hume, David"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 13 (11th ed.). 1911.
- ^
"Kant, Immanuel"
.
Encyclopædia Britannica
. Vol. 15 (11th ed.). 1911.
- Attribution
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