Solved PYQs 3-7 of 12: Empiricism (Modern Western Philosophy) | NTA-NET (UGC-NET) Philosophy (03) | PYQ 2023
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Question 3 (1 of 2 Based on Passage) | PYQ 2021MCQ: Read the question, then carefully choose the correct answer(s).
Passage
Read the passage and answer the following questions:-
In one sense it must be admitted that we can never prove the existence of things other than ourselves and our experiences. No logical absurdity results from the hypothesis that the world consists of myself and my thoughts and feelings and sensations, and that everything else is mere fancy. In dreams a very complicated world may seem to be present, and yet on waking we find it was a delusion; that is to say, we find that the sense-data in the dream do not appear to have corresponded with such physical objects as we should naturally infer from our sense-data. (It is true that, when the physical world is assumed, it is possible to find physical causes for the sense-data in dreams: a door banging, for instance, may cause us to dream of a naval engagement. But although, in this case, there is a physical cause for the sense-data, there is not a physical object corresponding to the sense-data in the way in which an actual naval battle would correspond.) There is no logical impossibility in the supposition that the whole of life is a dream, in which we ourselves create all the objects that come before us. But although this is not logically impossible, there is no reason whatever to suppose that it is true; and it is, in fact, a less simple hypothesis, viewed as a means of accounting for the facts of our own life, than the common-sense hypothesis that there really are objects independent of us, whose action on us causes our sensations.
The statement – “there is a physical cause for the sense-data” is compatible with which of the following philosophical position/s?
A. Naïve Realism
B. Representative Realism
C. Idealism
D. Solipsism
Choose the correct answer from the options given below:
Modern Western PhilosophyEmpiricism
Question 4 (2 of 2 Based on Passage) | PYQ 2021 MCQ: Read the question, then carefully choose the correct answer(s).
From the last sentence of the paragraph what could be possibly inferred about the overall philosophical position of the author?
Modern Western PhilosophyEmpiricism
Question 5 (1 of 3 Based on Passage) | PYQ 2023MCQ: Read the question, then carefully choose the correct answer(s).
Passage
Read the following passage and answer the questions that follow:
There is on the one hand the thing of which we are aware - say the colour of my table - and on the other hand the actual awareness itself, the mental act of apprehending a thing. The mental act is undoubtedly mental, but is there any reason to suppose that the thing apprehended is in any sense mental? … This question of the distinction between the act and the object in our apprehending of things is vitally important, since our whole power of acquiring knowledge is bound up with it. The faculty of being acquainted with things other than itself is the main characteristic of a mind. Acquaintance with objects essentially consists in a relation between the mind and something other than the mind; it is this that constitutes the mind՚s power of knowing things. If we say that the things known must be in the mind, we are either unduly limiting the mind՚s power of knowing, or we are uttering a mere tautology. We are uttering a mere tautology if we mean by ‘in the mind’ the same as by ‘before the mind’, i.e.. , if we mean merely being apprehended by the mind. But if we mean this, we shall have to admit that what, in this sense, is in the mind, may nevertheless be not mental … If I am acquainted with a thing which exists, my acquaintance gives me the knowledge that it exists. But it is not true that, conversely, whenever I can know that a thing of a certain sort exists, I or someone else must be acquainted with the thing.
The passage is extended to explore the nature of:
Modern Western PhilosophyEmpiricism
Question 6 (2 of 3 Based on Passage) | PYQ 2023 MCQ: Read the question, then carefully choose the correct answer(s).
Which philosophical position is best characterized by the statement – it is not true that whenever i can know that a thing of a certain sort exists, I or someone else must be acquainted with the things. ?
Modern Western PhilosophyEmpiricism
Question 7 (3 of 3 Based on Passage) | PYQ 2023 MCQ: Read the question, then carefully choose the correct answer(s).
According to the given passage, when one uses the idea of ‘Nature of things’ distinction between which of the following philosophical notion is overlooked?
Modern Western PhilosophyEmpiricism