02: Critical Realism: Personal Knowing and Agency

Question 1

How does N.T. Wright defines the positivist position?

Answer 1

• definite knowledge
• the Enlightenment’s idea of objectivity and empiricism
• a detached observer

Question 2

How does N.T. Wright defines phenomenalism?

Answer 2

• opposed to positivist

- the only thing we can be sure of is our sense-data

Question 3

What does N.T. Wright mean by critical realism?

Answer 3

A process of knowing that acknowledges the thing known as something different from the knower, at the same time that also acknowledges that the only access we have to this reality lies on appropriate dialogue between the knower and the thing known.