David Armstrong

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Biography

DAVID MALET ARMSTRONG ^[1] (Armstrong-7576)

PARENTS. john Malet Armstsrong & Philippa Suzanne (Marett) Armstrong

BIRTH. 8 Jul 1926, Cambrai, Alma road, East St Kilda, Victoria, Australia

BIRTH. ARMSTRONG. - On the 8th July, at Cambrai, Alma road, to Phllippa, wife of Lieutenant J. M. Armstrong, Royal Australian Navy - a son.

WWII Service Record: 19 Apr 1945 - 13 Dec 1946:

Name ARMSTRONG, DAVID MALET

Service Royal Australian Navy

Service Number S/10325

Date of Birth 8 Jul 1926

Place of Birth MELBOURNE, VIC

Date of Enlistment 19 Apr 1945

Locality on Enlistment VAUCLUSE, NSW

Home Port/Port Division SYDNEY, NSW

Next of Kin ARMSTRONG, PHILLIPA

Date of Discharge 13 Dec 1946

Rank Able Seaman

Posting at Discharge HMAS Watson

WW2 Honours and Gallantry None for display

Prisoner of War No

MARRIAGE (1). 1950, location unknown

MARRIAGE (1). 1950, Madeleine Annette Haydon, daughter of ??

Children: Not known/No issue

DIVORCE. Bef. 1982

MARRIAGE (2). 1982, location unknown

MARRIAGE (2). 1982, Jenny Mary (de Bohun) Clark, daughter of ??

Children: No issue

DEATH. 13 May 2014,

His was a family of some distinction; his father rose to the rank of Commodore in the Royal Australian Navy, his mother belonged to an academic family from Jersey. One grandfather became Director-General of Public Health in NSW, while the other became Rector of Exeter College, Oxford. David particularly valued the Jersey connection, and in retirement he and his wife Jenny (de Bohun) were much given to genealogy

OBITUARY. DAVID MALET ARMSTRONG (8 July 1926 - 13 May 2014), Australasian Journal of Philosophy, by Keith Campbell, http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/00048402.2014.929611 In 1950 he married Madeleine Haydon. The marriage was dissolved and in 1982 he married, secondly, Jennifer Clark, who survives him with three stepchildren.

A great philosopher has died: David Malet Armstrong

1. 1 Postby Teuton » May 16, 2014 3:32 am

"ARMSTRONG, David Malet, AO. F.B.A 08.07.1926 - 13.05.2014 Died peacefully on Tuesday morning after a long illness endured with grace and dignity. Beloved husband of Jenny, brother to Philip and Suzanne. Devoted step-father, grandfather and great-grandfather. Friend, colleague and inspiration to many."

http://tributes.smh.com.au/obituaries/s ... =171020943

"David Malet Armstrong has a claim to being the greatest philosopher produced by the young and vast country of Australia. It is primarily through his work that Australian philosophy, and Australian metaphysics in particular, enjoys such a high reputation in the rest of the world."

(Mumford, Stephen. David Armstrong. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2007. p. vii)

"David Armstrong, Great Mind, Great Man: Death has claimed Australia's most distinguished philosopher, a loss felt all the more keenly at Quadrant, in whose cause the holder of the Challis Chair at Sydney University laboured with a passion to see preserved and grow. David Malet Armstrong, the philosopher, died on Tuesday 13 May, aged 87. He passed away peacefully during the night at the Ashfield nursing home in Sydney where he had been living since late 2013. He was Australia’s most distinguished philosopher and one of the most influential in his field around the world. As Andrew Irvine wrote in Quadrant in March this year to commemorate the 50th anniversary of David’s appointment to the University of Sydney’s fabled Challis Chair of Philosophy: “Without qualification, he was one of the twentieth century’s most influential thinkers.”…" https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2014/05/david-armstrong-great-philosopher-great-man/

RationalSkepticism.org: A great philosopher has died: David Malet Armstrong: http://www.rationalskepticism.org/philosophy/a-great-philosopher-has-died-david-malet-armstrong-t45244.html

David Armstrong, philosopher with an international reputation Date June 10, 2014

David Armstrong, affectionally known as DMA or Armo, was in an elite category of Australian intellectuals - a philosopher who developed an international reputation, perhaps the most considerable of any Australian philosopher.

[Kenneth Gee (left) and Professor David Armstrong, pictured at a press conference for The Friends Of Vietnam at the Rex ... [Kenneth Gee (left) and Professor David Armstrong, pictured at a press conference for The Friends Of Vietnam at the Rex Carlton Hotel, Sydney on 31 January 1973. Photo: Anton Cernak.]

DAVID ARMSTRONG, 1926-2014

David Armstrong, affectionally known as DMA or Armo, was in an elite category of Australian intellectuals – a philosopher who developed an international reputation, perhaps the most considerable of any Australian philosopher.

His main interests were the theory of knowledge and perception and the philosophy of mind and metaphysics. He developed the theory that mental states are nothing more than brain states, that consciousness is brain processing. This view is now known as ‘‘the identity theory of mind’’ or ‘‘Australian materialism’’.

Challis Chair of Philosophy at Sydney University, Professor David Armstrong, pictured at his Glebe home on 18 December 1991. Challis Chair of Philosophy at Sydney University, Professor David Armstrong, pictured at his Glebe home on 18 December 1991. Photo: Peter Solness. The UK- born philosopher Bernard Williams once quipped that Australia was not only the place where the theory that the mind is identical to the brain was invented but it was the only place where it is true.

David Malet Armstrong was born in Melbourne on July 8, 1926, and educated at the Dragon School, Oxford, and Geelong Grammar School. After service with the Royal Australian Navy in 1945 and 1946, he enrolled at the University of Sydney and graduated with a first-class honours degree in philosophy in 1950.

His philosophical studies continued at Exeter College, Oxford, and then he lectured at London University before returning to Australia in 1955 to take up a post as a lecturer in philosophy at the University of Melbourne. He became a senior lecturer in 1961. In 1964, Armstrong returned to the University of Sydney as the Challis Professor of Philosophy, replacing John Mackie. He held this position until retirement in 1991.

In 1972, the philosophy department split between on one side a Marxist and radical feminist department, and on the other side a mainstream, traditional philosophy department led by Armstrong. This led the American-born philosopher Paul Feyerabend, stung by a criticism by one of the Sydney Marxists, to muse that “Sydney has one opera house, one arts centre, one zoo, one harbour, but two philosophy departments”.

Armstrong was sometimes vilely abused and shunned by former colleagues and students from the rival department, but nevertheless sought to maintain civil relations with most of his persecutors. His razor-sharp, honest thinking led him to believe all his adversaries were capable of being ‘‘saved’’ from error, through robust argument.

Amid the turmoil, Armstrong, David Stove (1927-1994), and his other departmental colleagues, produced a stream of outstanding philosophical work. The Canadian philosopher Andrew Irvine regarded Armstrong as a major figure in advancing the ‘‘Sydney Line’’, “that brilliant combination of realism and empiricism, wedded with an unyielding resistance to moral, cultural and cognitive relativism”.

Armstrong’s principal publications were Berkeley’s Theory of Vision: A Critical Examination of Bishop Berkeley’s Essay Towards a New Theory of Vision (1960), Perception and the Physical World (1961), Bodily Sensations (1962), A Materialist Theory of the Mind (1968), Belief, Truth and Knowledge (1973), Universals and Scientific Realism in two volumes: Nominalism and Realism and A Theory of Universals (1978), The Nature of Mind and Other Essays (1980), What is a Law of Nature? (1983), Consciousness and Causality (1984), Universals: An Opinionated Introduction (1989), A Combinatorial Theory of Possibility (1989, A World of States of Affairs (1997), The Mind-body Problem (1999), and Truth and Truthmakers (2004).

Armstrong’s influence through these and other publications was immense – in epistemology, realism and materialism. One reviewer, summing up What is a Law of Nature?, stated that “all future work ... starts here”. Several full-length books considered his ideas, of which the most noteworthy is Ontology, Causality and Mind. Essays in Honour of D.M. Armstrong (1993) (edited by John Bacon, Keith Campbell and Lloyd Reinhardt).

Armstrong readily gave his time to many students, potential and current philosophers. More importantly, he cajoled, encouraged and persuaded all he knew to think freshly and critically.

He was made an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) in 1993 and received a Centenary Medal in 2001.

Beyond philosophy Armstrong was a politically engaged intellectual and active in the Australian Association for Cultural Freedom (AACF), the anti-totalitarian political and cultural organisation. In that context Armstrong was founder and for many years chairman of the Sydney University Association for Cultural Freedom, which organised lunchtime talks at the university on political and cultural matters.

He was also for many years a member of the editorial board of, and contributor to, Quadrant magazine, the main publication of the AACF. He was active in support of the causes of Soviet dissidents, and of a non-communist South Vietnam during the years of the war in south-east Asia.

David Armstrong is survived by his wife Jenny (nee de Bohun Clark), former wife Madeleine (nee Haydon) and sister Suzanne. A brother, Philip, died before him.

The University of Sydney will host a memorial for David Armstrong in the Great Hall at 2pm on July 16. RSVP by July 7 to Elia Mamprin, 9351 5658 or elia.mamprin@sydney.edu.au.

Michael Easson

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/comment/obituaries/david-armstrong-philosopher-with-an-international-reputation-20140606-zs006.html#ixzz43nuSD3Ve

Sources

1. ↑ David Malet Armstrong (8 July 1926 – 13 May 2014): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Malet_Armstrong

• Birth Notice: The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957) Sat 10 Jul 1926, Page 17: http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/3794574

• WWII Service Record: http://www.ww2roll.gov.au/Veteran.aspx?serviceId=N&veteranId=1081400