On What Is Entirely Hopeless
2018; Springer International Publishing; Linguagem: Inglês
10.1007/978-3-319-70815-7_5
ISSN2365-6425
Autores ResumoAccording to his own narrative, and totally unaware of Saint Augustine of Hippo’s as well as Nicholas of Cusa’s (aka Nicolaus Cusanus’) notion of learned ignorance (Latin: docta ignorantia), the Baronlearned ignorance Münchhausen pulled himself (and his horse) out of a mire by his own hair (Bürger, Münchhausen. Wunderbare Reisen zu Wasser und zu Lande, 1789, [88, Chap. 4]). (This story is not contained in Raspe’s earlier collections Raspe, The Travels and the Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen, 1877, [427].) In the following we shall be concerned with the question exactly why it is entirely hopeless to pursue the strategy suggested by the Baron Münchhausen; and why should one be concerned about this. More generally, is it (im)plausible to attempt to reach out into some external domain with purely intrinsic means; that is, by operational (from the point of view of intrinsic, embedded observers) capacities and means which cannot include any “extrinsic handle,” or Archimedean point?
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