SIR, —Is not Mr. Taylor's interesting article much too light-hearted about
at least one fundamental problem—the nature of knowledge? After an orthodox account of scientific method as (t) accumulation and classification of facts, (2) formulation by induction of general propositions, (3) deduc- tion of further conclusions (which he wrongly calls facts), (4) testing of these conclusions by experiment, he goes on to say, " Strictly speaking, knowledge can be acquired in no other way than this." Kant directed his main enquiry at the problem of knowledge, and his conclusions are very different from Mr. Taylor's. Benedetto Croce, in an article written since his liberation, says, "Kant . for all time overthrew both empiricism and abstract intellectualism with his discovery of the a pricri synthesis and the new form of judgement which sets out that the category would be empty without intuition and intuition blind without the category." Later in his article Mr. Taylor says, " The truth is that knowledge of any kind is acquired only in one way—by generalisation from experience and by the deduction of particular conclusions from general propositions." He seems to think that this method is the same as the one at the beginning of his article, but it is very- different (and extremely unreliable), because it ignores experimental testing of the deductions, and is therefore no more scientific than were the scholastics.—Yours faithfully,
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