UC Irvine

This dissertation consists of three interpretative interventions in G.E. Moore scholarship. The first two chapters focus on Moore’s proof of an external world, specifically on two features that have long puzzled commentators. First, is the proof’s epistemic structure. It’s widely held that Moore’s proof is a failure because of its circular structure. Moore’s neglect of this issue has led commentators to conclude that he was either oblivious or manifestly indifferent to this concern. I challenge this consensus by providing the first scholarly account of Moore on circularity demonstrating that Moore deeply grappled with the nature of circular proof as early as 1928. Second, is the proof’s target. While many scholars interpret it as an anti-idealist proof, some commentators have suggested that it can also be read as an anti-monist proof. I show why this reading, though tempting, is textually unsupported and offer an alternative reading in its place. I then use the evidence for this reading to address some neglected aspects of Moore’s philosophy. The last chapter examines Moore’s common sense worldview and its influence on Susan Stebbing—a central, but forgotten, figure in the development of early analytic philosophy. Though Moore’s “common sense” influence on Stebbing has been widely acknowledged, recently it’s been argued that this influence is overstated. I show how given a less familiar conception of Moorean common sense, Stebbing and Moore were largely on the same page. I then develop a reading of common sense knowledge that Stebbing endorses but Moore rejects: common sense knowledge as probable knowledge.