DONALD MACKINNON'S METAPHYSICS OF FACT AND PROBLEMS OF VERIFICATIONISM

The article presents an original interpretation of verification as a sensible event proposed by Donald MacKinnon (1913-1994), a Scottish philosopher and theologian. Opposing both the phenomenalist position on the reduction of material objects statements to sense data statements, and the empiricist understanding of verification method as a criterion of the factual truth and scientific meaningfulness of statements, MacKinnon developed his own approach to verification based on a metaphysical interpretation of facts. The fact should be considered as something that is independent of an observation in the sense that the first is not explained by the second. For MacKinnon, verification is a sensible event, which, although partly linked to an observation, is not conditioned by it, because not every observation that establishes facts should be considered a verification. Observation is indeed an important cognitive tool, but it is far from being a necessary condition for verifying statements. Another noteworthy tool, at least in the field of theology, is faith. It is faith that allows us to interpret facts ontologically, thereby separating them from (empirical) observation, and at the same time not disputing their general epistemological import. Therefore, verification is impossible without the perception of metaphysically interpreted facts. Proponents of logical empiricism, relying on observable facts as a necessary condition for empirical verification of statements, did not understand this, and therefore the fact was devalued. They did not realize that a concept of fact is extremely important because it has a transcendent character and intelligible factual import. In the Russian philosophical tradition, Donald MacKinnon is virtually unknown, even though he significantly contributed to the development of the so-called analytic theology. He was a professor at the Universities of Aberdeen and Cambridge, president of the Aristotelian Society (1976-1977), president of the Society for the Study of Theology (1981-1982), a fellow of Scotland's National Academy of Science (since 1984). The proposed article is trying to remedy this.