Norman Malcolm

Norman Malcolm

Full name	Norman Malcolm
Born	11 June 1911(1911-06-11) Selden, Kansas, USA
Died	4 August 1990(1990-08-04) (aged 79)
Era	20th Century
Region	Western philosophy
School	Analytic Philosophy
Main interests	Philosophy of mind
Notable ideas	The memoir and legacy of Wittgenstein, criticism of common sense beliefs
Influenced by Ludwig Wittgenstein, Søren Kierkegaard, René Descartes
Influenced Oets Kolk (O.K.) Bouwsma

Part of a series on
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Early Philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein
Picture theory of language Truth tables · Truth conditions Truth functions · States of affairs Logical necessity
Later Philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein
Meaning is use · Language-games Private language argument Family resemblance · Rule following Forms of life · Grammar Anti-skepticism Wittgenstein's philosophy of mathematics
Movements
Analytic philosophy · Linguistic turn Ideal language philosophy Logical atomism · Logical positivism Ordinary language philosophy Wittgensteinian fideism · Quietism
Works
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus Some Remarks on Logical Form Blue and Brown Books · Philosophical Remarks Philosophical Investigations On Certainty · Culture and Value Remarks on Frazer's Golden Bough Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics Zettel · Remarks on Colour Lectures and Conversations on Aesthetics, Psychology, and Religious Belief
People
Bertrand Russell · G.E. Moore John Maynard Keynes · Paul Engelmann Friedrich Waismann · Moritz Schlick Rudolf Carnap · Francis Skinner Frank Ramsey · Vienna Circle G.E.M. Anscombe · Norman Malcolm Rush Rhees · Peter Winch Peter Geach · G.H. von Wright
Interpreters
Barry Stroud · Cora Diamond Peter Hacker · Terry Eagleton Stephen Toulmin · Saul Kripke Anthony Kenny · Crispin Wright Warren Goldfarb · James F. Conant Gordon Baker · Stanley Cavell D.Z. Phillips · Colin McGinn Jaakko Hintikka · Oswald Hanfling A.C. Grayling · Rupert Read
Other
Apostles · Moral Sciences Club Stonborough House
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Norman Malcolm (11 June 1911 – 4 August 1990) was an American philosopher, born in Selden, Kansas. He studied philosophy with O.K. Bouwsma at the University of Nebraska, then enrolled as a graduate student at Harvard University in 1933.

At Cambridge University in 1938/1939, he met G. E. Moore and Ludwig Wittgenstein. Malcolm attended Wittgenstein's lectures on the philosophical foundations of mathematics throughout 1939 and remained one of Wittgenstein's closest friends. Malcolm's memoir of his time with Wittgenstein, published in 1958, is widely acclaimed as one of the most captivating and most accurate portraits of Wittgenstein's remarkable personality.

After serving in the United States Navy from 1942 to 1945, Malcolm, with his wife, Leonida, and their son, Raymond Charles Malcolm, resided in Cambridge again in 1946-47. He saw a good deal of Wittgenstein during that time, and they continued to correspond frequently thereafter. In 1947, Malcolm joined the faculty at Cornell University, where he taught until his retirement. In 1949, Wittgenstein was a guest of the Malcolms in Ithaca, New York. In that year Malcolm introduced O.K. Bouwsma to Wittgenstein. Bouwsma remained close to Wittgenstein until Wittgenstein's death in 1951.

In 1959, his book Dreaming was published, in which he elaborated on Wittgenstein's question as to whether it really mattered if people who tell dreams "really had these images while they slept, or whether it merely seems so to them on waking". This work was also a response to Descartes' Meditations.[1]

Other than that he is known for propagating the view that common sense philosophy and ordinary language philosophy are the same. He was generally supportive of Moore's theory of knowledge and certitude, though he found Moore's style and method of arguing to be ineffective.^[1] His critique of Moore's articles on skepticism (and also on Moore's 'Here is a hand' argument) lay the foundation for the renewed interest in common sense philosophy and ordinary language philosophy.^[2]

Malcolm was also a defender of a modal version of the ontological argument. In 1960 he argued that the argument originally presented by Anselm of Canterbury in the second chapter of his Proslogion was just an inferior version of the argument propounded in chapter three.^[3] His argument is similar to those produced by Charles Hartshorne and Alvin Plantinga.

His works include:

• Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Memoir
• Moore and Ordinary Language
• Wittgenstein: A Religious Point Of View?
• Nothing Is Hidden: Wittgenstein's criticism of his early thought
• Problems of Mind: Descartes to Wittgenstein
• Knowledge and Certainty
• Consciousness and Causality (with D. M. Armstrong)
• Memory and Mind
• Dreaming and Skepticism
• Wittgenstein: The Relation of Language to Instinctive Behaviour (J.R.Jones Memorial Lecture) Publisher: University of Wales, Swansea (Dec 1981) ISBN 0860760243
• Thought and knowledge
• Wittgensteinian themes (edited by Georg Henrik von Wright) and Dreaming.

See also

"Norman Malcolm: A Memoir," Anthony Serafini, in the journal PHILOSOPHY, published by the Royal Institute of Philosophy, 68:265265, 309-324, Cambridge University Press, 1993.

References

1. ^ Norman Malcolm (1952), "Moore and Ordinary Language", The Philosophy of G. E. Moore
2. ^ Scott Soames (2003) "Philosophical Analysis in the Twentieth Century, Volume II: The Age of Meaning." Chapter 7
3. ^ Norman Malcolm (1960), "Anselm's Ontological Arguments," Philosophical Review, 69:41–62.

Persondata
Name	Malcolm, Norman
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	11 June 1911
Place of birth	Selden, Kansas, USA
Date of death	4 August 1990
Place of death