Idealism

Idealism
Author: Tyron Goldschmidt
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 314
Release: 2017
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0198746970

Idealism is a family of metaphysical views each of which gives priority to the mental. The best-known forms of idealism in Western philosophy are Berkeleyan idealism, which gives ontological priority to the mental (minds and ideas) over the physical (bodies), and Kantian idealism, which gives a kind of explanatory priority to the mental (the structure of the understanding) over the physical (the structure of the empirical world). Although idealism was once a dominant view in Western philosophy, it has suffered almost total neglect over the last several decades. This book rectifies this situation by bringing together seventeen essays by leading philosophers on the topic of metaphysical idealism. The various essays explain, attack, or defend a variety of idealistic theories, including not only Berkeleyan and Kantian idealisms but also those developed in traditions less familiar to analytic philosophers, including Buddhism and Hassidic Judaism. Although a number of the articles draw on historical sources, all will be of interest to philosophers working in contemporary metaphysics. This volume aims to spark a revival of serious philosophical interest in metaphysical idealism.

Non-Being

Non-Being
Author: Sara Bernstein
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 346
Release: 2021
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0198846223

Nonexistence is ubiquitous, yet mysterious. This volume explores some of the most puzzling questions about non-being and nonexistence, and offers answers from diverse philosophical perspectives. The contributors draw on analytic, continental, Buddhist, and Jewish philosophical traditions, and the topics range from metaphysics to ethics, from philosophy of science to philosophy of language, and beyond.

Metaphysics and the Philosophy of Science

Metaphysics and the Philosophy of Science
Author: Matthew Slater
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 273
Release: 2017-02-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0199363226

The question of the proper role of metaphysics in philosophy of science is both significant and contentious. The last few decades have seen considerable engagement with philosophical projects aptly described as "the metaphysics of science:" inquiries into natural laws and properties, natural kinds, causal relations, and dispositions. At the same time, many metaphysicians have begun moving in the direction of more scientifically-informed ("scientistic" or "naturalistic") metaphysics. And yet many philosophers of science retain a deep suspicion about the significance of metaphysical investigations into science. This volume of new essays explores a broadly methodological question: what role should metaphysics play in our philosophizing about science? These new essays, written by leading philosophers of science, address this question both through ground-level investigations of particular issues in the metaphysics of science and by more general methodological inquiry.

Metametaphysics

Metametaphysics
Author: David Chalmers
Publisher: Oxford University Press on Demand
Total Pages: 540
Release: 2009-02-19
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0199546045

Metaphysics asks questions about existence: for example, do numbers really exist? Metametaphysics asksquestions about metaphysics: for example, do its questions have determinate answers? If so, are these answers deep and important, or are they merely a matter of how we use words? What is the proper methodology for their resolution? These questions have received a heightened degree of attention lately with new varieties of ontological deflationism and pluralism challenging the kind of realism that has become orthodoxy in contemporary analytic metaphysics.This volume concerns the status and ambitions of metaphysics as a discipline. It brings together many of the central figures in the debate with their most recent work on the semantics, epistemology, and methodology of metaphysics.

The Metaphysics and Ethics of Death

The Metaphysics and Ethics of Death
Author: James Stacey Taylor
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 286
Release: 2013-11
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0199751137

The Metaphysics and Ethics of Death brings together original essays that both address the fundamental questions of the metaphysics of death and explore the relationship between those questions and some of the areas of applied ethics in which they play a central role.

From Truth to Reality

From Truth to Reality
Author: Heather Dyke
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2009-06-02
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1135246912

Questions about truth and questions about reality are intimately connected. One can ask whether numbers exist by asking "Are there numbers?" But one can also ask what arguably amounts to the same question by asking "Is the sentence 'There are numbers' true?" Such semantic ascent implies that reality can be investigated by investigating our true sentences. This line of thought was dominant in twentieth century philosophy, but is now beginning to be called into question. In From Truth to Reality, Heather Dyke brings together some of the foremost metaphysicians to examine approaches to truth, reality, and the connections between the two. This collection features new and previously unpublished material by JC Beall, Mark Colyvan, Michael Devitt, John Heil, Frank Jackson, Fred Kroon, D. H. Mellor, Luca Moretti, Alan Musgrave, Robert Nola, J. J. C. Smart, Paul Snowdon, and Daniel Stoljar.

Reason, Metaphysics, and Mind

Reason, Metaphysics, and Mind
Author: Kelly James Clark
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 240
Release: 2012-02-09
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0190208724

In May 2010, philosophers, family and friends gathered at the University of Notre Dame to celebrate the career and retirement of Alvin Plantinga, widely recognized as one of the world's leading figures in metaphysics, epistemology, and the philosophy of religion. Plantinga has earned particular respect within the community of Christian philosophers for the pivotal role that he played in the recent renewal and development of philosophy of religion and philosophical theology. Each of the essays in this volume engages with some particular aspect of Plantinga's views on metaphysics, epistemology, or philosophy of religion. Contributors include Michael Bergman, Ernest Sosa, Trenton Merricks, Richard Otte, Peter VanInwagen, Thomas P. Flint, Eleonore Stump, Dean Zimmerman and Nicholas Wolterstorff. The volume also includes responses to each essay by Bas van Fraassen, Stephen Wykstra, David VanderLaan, Robin Collins, Raymond VanArragon, E. J. Coffman, Thomas Crisp, and Donald Smith.

New Essays on Tarski and Philosophy

New Essays on Tarski and Philosophy
Author: Douglas Patterson
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Total Pages: 442
Release: 2008-09-18
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0191608831

New Essays on Tarski and Philosophy aims to show the way to a proper understanding of the philosophical legacy of the great logician, mathematician, and philosopher Alfred Tarski (1902-1983). The contributors are an international group of scholars, some expert in the historical background and context of Tarski's work, others specializing in aspects of his philosophical development, others more interested in understanding Tarski in the light of contemporary thought. The essays can be seen as addressing Tarski's seminal treatment of four basic questions about logical consequence. (1) How are we to understand truth, one of the notions in terms of which logical consequence is explained? What is it that is preserved in valid inference, or that such inference allows us to discover new claims to have on the basis of old? (2) Among what kinds of things does the relation of logical consequence hold? (3) Given answers to the first two questions, what is involved in the consequence relationship itself? What is the preservation at work in 'truth preservation'? (4) Finally, what do truth and consequence so construed have to do with meaning?

Making Sense of the World

Making Sense of the World
Author: Stephen Robert Grimm
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 273
Release: 2018
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0190469862

Making Sense of the World offers original work on the nature of understanding by a range of distinguished philosophers. Although some of the essays are by scholars well known for their work on understanding, many of the essays bring entirely new figures to the discussion. The main purpose of the volume is twofold: to advance debates in epistemology and the philosophy of science, where work on understanding has recently flourished, and to jumpstart new questions and debates about understanding in other areas of philosophy, such as aesthetics, ethics, and the philosophy of religion.

Jesus and Philosophy

Jesus and Philosophy
Author: Paul K. Moser
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 236
Release: 2008-10-13
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1139474278

What, if anything, does Jesus of Nazareth have to do with philosophy? This question motivates this collection of essays from leading theologians, philosophers, and biblical scholars. Part I portrays Jesus in his first-century intellectual and historical context, attending to intellectual influences and contributions and contemporaneous similar patterns of thought. Part II examines how Jesus influenced two of the most prominent medieval philosophers. It considers the seeming conceptual shift from Hebraic categories of thought to distinctively Greco-Roman ones in later Christian philosophers. Part III considers the significance of Jesus for some prominent contemporary philosophical topics, including epistemology and the meaning of life. The focus is not so much on how 'Christianity' figures in such topics as on how Jesus makes distinctive contributions to them.