Understanding Russell’s Response to Newman

The revival of Newman’s (1928) objection to Russell’s Causal Theory of Perception by Demopoulous & Friedman (1985) has led to the widespread opinion that Russell’s view was an early form of Epistemic Structural Realism, against which Newman had provided a devastating objection. Russell’s letter to Newman soon after is taken to represent his complete capitulation, where, in a “classic Homer Simpson ‘Doh!’ moment” (French, 2014, 73), he realizes that his structuralist account of theoretical knowledge has been “demolished” (Linsky, 2013). But if this was really Russell’s understanding then how are we to explain the “nonchalant response to a devastating criticism” that follows (Linsky, 2013)? Why, then, did Russell never discuss Newman’s objection in print, while essentially restating the same theory in later work (Demopoulos & Friedman, 1985)? To remove this appearance of intellectual dishonesty on Russell’s part, I argue that Newman only pointed out an ambiguity in the formulation of Russell’s theory of perception in Analysis of Matter, which was easily remedied. Russell’s letter merely thanks Newman for pointing out this ambiguity, which was due to his incautious statements to the effect that “nothing is know about the physical world except its structure” (Russell, 1968, 259), while accepting Newman’s suggested reformulation of his view. This reformulation, ∗Provost’s Postdoctoral Scholar in the Humanities, University of Southern California, [email protected]. This is a draft; please do not cite without permission. This version of the paper was accepted for the Pacific APA, 2016 (which explains the strange format).