Frisch, Mathias - Inconsistency, Asymmetry, and Non-Locality: A Philosophical Investigation of Classical Electrodynamics

I have two main aims in this book. The first is within the philosophy of physics: I want to investigate certain aspects of the conceptual structure of classical electrodynamics. This theory has been largely ignored by philosophers of science, probably at least partly due to the mistaken view that it is conceptually unproblematic. For much of the history of the philosophy of physics, philosophers have been interested mainly in quantum physics and, to a somewhat lesser extent, the theory of relativity. While there are good reasons for this narrow focus, it has come at a cost in that it has led to somewhat of a caricature view of classical physics, part of which is the belief that classical physics is philosophically uninteresting. Thus, when philosophers mention classical electrodynamics at all, it usually is as the paradigm of a causal and deterministic classical theory. As I will argue, this perception of the theory as satisfying all the conditions on the methodologist's wish list, as it were, is wide of the mark. In fact, the most common theoretical approach to modeling the interactions between charged particles and electromagnetic fields is mathematically inconsistent despite the fact that it is strikingly successful.

Brewer, Bill - Perception and Reason

The problem of perception has been a central focus in philosophy throughout its history. Its continual transformation during what I regard as a crucial phase of its historical development shapes the topics and orientation of this book. My own central concern with the role of perceptual experiences in the acquisition of empirical knowledge is therefore best introduced by a brief, and inevitably rather dogmatic, presentation of this historical-epistemological context.

Bishop, Michael A. & Trout, J. D. - Epistemology and the Psychology of Human Judgment

The first three chapters of the book introduce the basic building blocks of our epistemological approach and of our epistemological theory. Chapter 1 introduces the basic motives and methods of our epistemology. The goal is to give the reader a clear conception of our overall project. As a result, the opening chapter is not weighed down with arguments and qualifications—that comes later.

Mates, Benson - The Philosophy of Leibniz: Metaphysics and Language

In recent years there has been a remarkable rebirth of interest in the philosophy of Leibniz. This is due to several mutually reinforcing factors. Logicians and philosophers of logic have found that his views on some of the matters that concern them most, such as identity, truth, and necessity, were well thought out, systematic, and, when considered together with the reasons behind them, deeply intuitive. Philosophers of language have become aware that his writings are a mine of sophisticated and valuable ideas in that area. Metaphysicians, especially those of nominalistic bent, have been interested to see how this great mind attempted to cope with the obvious problems involved in nominalism and nominalistic reductions. And epistemologists and philosophers of science are finding that he discusses, in a very modern way, a wide variety of issues that are central to their interests, too.

Bennett, Jonathan - A Philosophical Guide to Conditionals

'If the American ambassador had understood her instructions, Iraq would not have invaded Kuwait.' 'If Shackleton had known how to ski, then he would have reached the South Pole in 1909.' 'If rabbits had not been deliberately introduced into New Zealand, there would be none there today.' These are probably all true, and we can hear, think, and say such things without intellectual discomfort.

Barker, Stephen J. - Renewing Meaning: A Speech-Act Theoretic Approach

The theoretical framework that currently informs most thinking about linguistic meaning is one whose roots lie with Frege. Frege invented modern logic—quantification theory—originally to understand mathematical language, but his invention was soon bent to the task of constructing semantic theories of natural languages. The central goal of natural-language semantics is the systematic account of sentence-meanings and semantic contents—the content that results from the application of a sentence's linguistic meaning to a context. The framework Frege instigated, the Frege model, analyses semantic content in terms of mapping relations between words and world-parts—objects, properties, relations, and so on—employing as an integral part of such mappings the structures of quantification.

Bar-On, Dorit - Speaking My Mind: Expression and Self-Knowledge

"I have a terrible headache," I mutter, rubbing my temples.
"I am so tired," you say, as you stretch out on the couch.
A gloomy child says to her caregiver, "I hope Mommy is coming soon."
Looking at the sky, your friend says, "I'm wondering whether it's going to rain."
At the sight of a mean-looking pit bull, you say, "I am scared of that dog."
Staring at the newest painting by one of my favorite artists, I say, "I'm finding this painting utterly puzzling."

Boghossian, Paul & Peacocke, Christopher (eds.) - New Essays on the A Priori

An a priori proposition is one which can be known to be true without any justification from the character of the subject's experience. This is a brief, pre-theoretical characterization that needs some refinement; but it captures the core of what many philosophers have meant by the notion. Under this intuitive characterization, propositions which are plausibly a priori include the following: the axioms, inference rules, and theorems of logic; the axioms and theorems of arithmetic, and likewise the axioms and theorems of other parts of mathematics and other sciences of the abstract; the principles of the probability calculus; principles of colour incompatibility and implication; some definitions; and perhaps some truths of philosophy itself.

McGinn, Colin - Minds and Bodies: Philosophers and Their Ideas

Writing a philosophy book is an arduous and exacting task. One does not emerge from the experience unscathed. The mental burden lies mainly in the necessity of keeping a complex argument, or set of arguments, in one's head for a long period of time, constantly repeating and refining them, day and night--until they come to seem either like gibberish or platitudes or both. Bertrand Russell wrote somewhere that the problems of logic are so inhumanly abstract that the philosophical logician only manages really to think about them for five minutes a year. Russellian exaggeration, no doubt, but it gives some idea of the feat of mental contortion needed to sustain the abstracted state of mind required to complete a substantial work of philosophy. It is actually rather amazing that it happens as often as it does (ballet dancing perhaps provides a distant analogy). And then there is the unpleasant sense of insecurity that comes with it--the feeling of being constitutionally inadequate to the task.

McGinn, Colin - The Subjective View: Secondary Qualities and Indexical Thoughts

There are various ways in which the mind represents the world. It is legitimate to enquire, of any way in which the world is mentally represented, whether that way is subjective or objective in nature: that is, to enquire whether the world is so represented because of the specific constitution of the representing mind or because the world as it is independently of the mind contains a feature which demands representation. Which aspects of our view of reality have their source in our subjective make-up and which reflect reality as it is in itself? This question lies at the intersection of metaphysics and the philosophy of mind; to answer it would be to learn something both about how the mind is (or must be) and about how the world is objectively constituted. Once we have a demarcation of subjective and objective ways of representing the world, we can ask the further question of what is distinctive of each and precisely how they are related. Are there any general principles governing subjective and objective modes of representation? Is one more basic than the other? Is either eliminable in some way? Does one possess greater verisimilitude than the other?

Cartwright, Nancy - Nature’s Capacities and Their Measurement

Science is measurement; capacities can be measured; and science cannot be understood without them. These are the three major theses of this book.

Bellinger, Charles K. - The Genealogy of Violence: Reflections on Creation, Freedom, and Evil

The past century has been very violent. The Nazis formulated and carried out a plan to kill as many Jews as they possibly could. Stalin's regime brought about the deaths of millions of Soviet citizens. The Khmer Rouge executed or starved to death approximately two million people in Cambodia during the late 1970s. The Hutus in Rwanda slaughtered Tutsis by the hundreds of thousands more recently, despite the “success” of Christian missions there, which has led to the majority of both tribal groups identifying themselves as Christian. Many other similar historical examples could be cited, but the issue has been sufficiently brought forward. From time to time throughout human history large- scale eruptions of violence have resulted in the deaths of thousands, hundreds of thousands, and millions. In this study, I ask one basic question: Why?

Wall, John - Moral Creativity: Paul Ricoeur and the Poetics of Possibility

Michelangelo's painting “The Creation of Adam,” on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican, portrays humanity and God as almost mirror images of one another. God floats through the clouds with a host of angels at his side and stretches out his finger to meet the half-raised finger of a reclined and naked Adam on earth. The two gaze into each other's eyes almost as if at their own shining reflections. Possibly Adam is not fully aware of the gift he is about to receive (or just has?). His face is somewhat empty, and his body is relaxed and unmoving. But God himself (let us return later to the question of gender) is highly anthropomorphic, not only in his appearance and dress but also in his apparent anxiety and desire to bring this divine-human encounter about. Not only is Adam a reflection of his Creator, but the Creator itself is also a reflection in some sense of Adam, so that the two share a certain mirrored likeness.

McIntyre, Lee C. - Laws and Explanation in the Social Sciences: Defending a Science of Human Behavior

It has long been debated whether we can use the same method of inquiry in social science that has been used in natural science. Central to this debate has been the question of the role of laws in the explanation of human behavior. Many philosophers and social scientists alike have felt that the social sciences g sciences that fruitful inquiry requires a kind of methodological independence.¹

Heine, Steven & Wright, Dale S. - Zen Classics: Formative Texts in the History of Zen Buddhism

Zen Classics is a sequel to The Zen Canon, published by 0xford University Press, in which we began to explore the variety of influential texts in the history of Zen Buddhism. In Zen Classics we continue that exploration by shifting our primary focus from the Chinese origins of Zen to the other East Asian cultures where the Zen tradition came to fruition in subsequent eras. Here we invite scholars doing original research on Chinese, Korean, and Japanese Zen literature to survey a single work or genre of works that, because of its power and influence, has helped shape the Zen tradition and cause it to be what it is today.

Heine, Steven & Wright, Dale S. (eds.) - The Zen Canon: Understanding the Classic Texts

This volume is a sequel or companion volume to The Kōan: Texts and Contexts in Zen Buddhism.¹ It examines a rich variety of texts in various genres that are crucial to an understanding of the history and thought of the Zen (C. Chan) Buddhist tradition in East Asia. These texts form a major part of the Zen canon, the acknowledged core of Zen Buddhist sacred literature.

Nagel, Ernest & Newman, James R. - Gödel’s Proof

In 1931 there appeared in a German scientific periodical a relatively short paper with the forbidding title “Über formal unentscheidbare Sätze der Principia Mathematica und verwandter Systeme” (“On Formally Undecidable Propositions of Principia Mathematica and Related Systems”). Its author was Kurt Gödel, then a young mathematician of 25 at the University of Vienna and since 1938 a permanent member of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton. The paper is a milestone in the history of logic and mathematics. When Harvard University awarded Gödel an honorary degree in 1952, the citation described the work as one of the most important advances in logic in modern times.

Lowe, E. Jonathan - The Four-Category Ontology: A Metaphysical Foundation for Natural Science

There is a widespread assumption amongst non-philosophers, which is shared by a good many practising philosophers too, that ‘progress’ is never really made in philosophy, and above all in metaphysics. In this respect, philosophy is often compared, for the most part unfavourably, with the empirical sciences, and especially the natural sciences, such as physics, chemistry and biology.

Noxon, James - Hume's Philosophical Development: A Study of his Methods

Hume began his Treatise of Human Nature in his twenty-third year, having already in the previous three years 'scribled many a Quire of Paper' (L I 16). After spending three years in France in this first 'Attempt to introduce the experimental Method of Reasoning into Moral Subjects', Hume came to London with the first draft of his book. After another eighteen months of revising, he published in 1739 the first two volumes, 'Of the Understanding' and 'Of the Passions', and in the following year the third, 'Of Morals'.

O’Connor, Timothy - Persons and Causes: The Metaphysics of Free Will

A moment before I began typing these words, I paused to consider how I should spend this afternoon. Shall I join my children on the floor, and await instructions about my role in their pretend play? Shall I return to my work instead? I am anxious to get started on this chapter, and I have planned an ambitious agenda of writing for the next few months. Or shall I go to the campus to retrieve my mail, thereby delaying a decision on how I shall spend the remainder of the day? I am dimly aware of some other possibilities, but these three are the options I'm taking seriously. After just a brief moment, I settle down to type at my computer. I would describe how making this decision seemed to me as follows: each of the options I considered (and perhaps some others) was open to me, such that I could have chosen it, just then.

Lewis, David - Philosophical Papers Volume I

Argle. I believe in nothing but concrete material objects.
Bargle. There are many of your opinions I applaud; but one of your less pleasing characteristics is your fondness for the doctrines of nominalism and materialism. Every time you get started on any such topic, I know we are in for a long argument. Where shall we start this time : numbers, colors, lengths, sets, force-fields, sensations, or what?
Argle. Fictions all! I've thought hard about every one of them.
Bargle. A long evening's work. Before we start, let me find you a snack. Will you have some crackers and cheese?
Argle. Thank you. What splendid Gruyère!
Bargle. You know, there are remarkably many holes in this piece.
Argle. There are.
Bargle. Got you!

Pears, David - Hume's System: An Examination of the First Book of his Treatise

The point from which I shall start is a point made in the Preface: Hume's theory of mind is intended to help us towards answers to two distinct questions: 'What ideas may we legitimately have?' and 'What may we legitimately believe?' The first of these two questions is concerned with the origin of our ideas, and the second is concerned with the connections between our ideas and the various ways in which we combine them in thinking, and especially in belief.

Davidson, Donald - Truth and Predication

As a pre-teen scholar I was taught how to diagram a sentence. At the top was the sentence, immediately below which were displayed thick roots (subject and predicate perhaps), which in turn thinned and multiplied as one descended until the smallest parts (usually words) were reached. The whole was like a picture of the descendants of the mother of us all.

Davidson, Donald - Subjective, Intersubjective, Objective

When a speaker avers that he has a belief, hope, desire or intention, there is a presumption that he is not mistaken, a presumption that does not attach to his ascriptions of similar mental states to others. Why should there be this asymmetry between attributions of attitudes to our present selves and attributions of the same attitudes to other selves? What accounts for the authority accorded first person present tense claims of this sort, and denied second or third person claims?

Pietroski, Paul M. - Causing Actions

On 13 April 1865, John Wilkes Booth shot Abraham Lincoln. It happened in a theatre near the White House, at about 10. 13 p.m. Booth wanted to kill Lincoln in retaliation for his treatment of the South during the civil war. So upon learning that the President would attend a play that night, Booth (an actor who knew the layout of the theatre) decided to hide near the President's box and wait for an opportunity to get inside. At some point, the Secret Service guard left his station to get a better view of the stage. Booth saw his chance, got into position, and fired his pistol.

Davidson, Donald - Problems of Rationality

Starting with Descartes, most philosophers have assumed that all knowledge is based on data immediately given to the individual mind. For Descartes, the starting point was clear beliefs he found it impossible to question; for the British empiricists it was non-propositional presentations such as percepts, impressions, sense-data, sensations, the uninterpreted given of experience. What empiricists share with Descartes is the conviction, or assumption, that only what is in, or immediately before, the mind is known directly and without inference. Whatever other knowledge we pretend to have must be based on what is certain and immediate, the subjective and personal.

Davidson, Donald - Inquiries into truth and interpretation

Philosophers are fond of making claims concerning the properties a language must have if it is to be, even in principle, learnable. The point of these claims has generally been to bolster or to undermine some philosophical doctrine, epistemological, metaphysical, ontological, or ethical. But if the arguments are good they must have implications for the empirical science of concept formation, if only by way of saying what the limits of the empirical are.

Davidson, Donald - Essays on Actions and Events

What is the relation between a reason and an action when the reason explains the action by giving the agent's reason for doing what he did? We may call such explanations rationalizations, and say that the reason rationalizes the action.

Popper, K.R. - The Poverty of Historicism

Scientific interest in social and political questions is only slightly younger than scientific interest in cosmology and physics; and there were periods in antiquity (I have Plato's political theory in mind, and Aristotle's collection of constitutions) when the science of society might have seemed to have advanced further than the science of nature. But with Galileo and Newton, physics became successful beyond expectation, far surpassing all other sciences; and since the time of Pasteur, the Galileo of biology, the biological sciences have been almost equally successful. But the social sciences do not as yet seem to have found their Galileo.

Popper, Karl - Unended Quest: An Intellectual Autobiography

When I was twenty I became apprenticed to an old master cabinetmaker in Vienna whose name was Adalbert Pösch, and I worked with him from 1922 to 1924, not long after the First World War. He looked exactly like Georges Clemenceau, but he was a very mild and kind man. After I had gained his confidence he would often, when we were alone in his workshop, give me the benefit of his inexhaustible store of knowledge.

Robinson, Jenefer - Deeper than Reason: Emotion and its Role in Literature, Music, and Art

For thousands of years people have assumed that that there is some special deep connection between emotion and the arts. In the Republic Plato famously complained that one reason why poetry often has such a bad moral influence on people is that it appeals to their emotions rather than to their reason, the 'highest' part of the soul. The idea that the emotions are intimately connected to the arts was taken up by Aristotle and given a more sympathetic twist. Almost ever since, there has been a widespread conviction among Western thinkers that there is some special relationship between the arts and the emotions.¹

Goldie, Peter - The Emotions: A Philosophical Exploration

This book is a philosophical essay about emotion. However, in some respects it is, I suppose, not typical of a philosophical monograph. I do not put forward a single, central claim and then seek to defend it against opposing positions. The book proceeds, rather, on a more extended front. It does so in two senses. First, it aims to deepen our everyday commonsense discourse about the phenomena, drawing where relevant both on literature and the empirical sciences. Secondly, it takes as the phenomena not just the emotions, but looks more widely to related phenomena such as consciousness, thought, feeling, imagination, interpretation of action out of emotion and of expression of emotion, moods, and traits of character; emotion cannot be considered in isolation from these other topics.

Bennett, Jonathan - Locke, Berkeley Hume: Central Themes

Someone may utter words and mean nothing by them, or hear words and understand nothing by them: communication involves not just uttering and hearing, but also meaning and understanding. What is it to attach a meaning to an utterance? Or, to take plainly related questions, what is it for a type of utterance to have a meaning, or for a system of such types to constitute a language? I intend these as questions about the meaning of 'mean', 'language' and so on, not about what else goes on when someone speaks with meaning, hears with understanding or the like.