‘An Open Revolt against the Authority of Reid’. Thomas Brown and the Developments of Common-Sense Philosophy

Sometimes defined as the last Common-Sense philosopher (see the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy), Brown is problematic figure in the Scottish school. Like Reid and Common-Sense philosophers, he did not put in question or attempt to prove the existence of the material world and the self, affirming that it is useless and impossible to inquire the origins of these beliefs and concluding that matter and mind are the permanent and unknown subject of physical qualities and mental affections. While these statements could be perfectly agreed by Reid's orthodox followers, he also emphasised the role of association of ideas – which he called suggestion – and used it to explain the 'intellectual states of the mind', such as abstraction and judgement, that were commonly defined distinct mental faculties.