The Criticism of Concepts and the Concept of Criticism

Abstract

I am grateful to Professor Wand for devoting so much space to my “conceptual apparatus.” I should have been more grateful if he had got it more nearly right. His criticism of my concepts, particularly of the central concept of powers, is so wide of the mark that one wonders about his concept of criticism. The puzzle is how he can pronounce with such assurance his “grave charges” that my thought is confused and misleading. The answer I shall suggest is partly (a) that he has not paid attention to my definitions, and partly (b) that he has tried to fit my argument into a conceptual framework – his own – which he assumes has some absolute validity. Perhaps (b) accounts for (a): he was perhaps unable to read what I wrote because it does not fit his conceptual scheme. Let me take in reverse order his criticisms of the three concepts he deals with.