This paper proposes a new dialetheic logic, a Dialetheic Logic with Exclusive Assumptions and Conclusions ), including classical logic as a particular case. In \, exclusivity is expressed via the speech acts of assuming and concluding. In the paper we adopt the semantics of the logic of paradox extended with a generalized notion of model and we modify its proof theory by refining the notions of assumption and conclusion. The paper starts with an explanation of the adopted philosophical perspective, then (...) we propose our \ logic. Finally, we show how \ supports the dialetheic solution of the liar paradox. (shrink)

While the contemporary problem of the criterion raises similar epistemological issues as Agrippa’s Trilemma in ancient Pyrrhonian skepticism, the consideration of such epistemological questions has served two different purposes. On one hand, there is the purely practical purpose of Pyrrhonism, in which such questions are a means to reach suspension of judgment, and on the other hand, there is the theoretical purpose of contemporary epistemologists, in which these issues raise theoretical problems that drive the search for theoretical resolution. In classical (...) India, similar issues arise in Nāgārjuna’s Vigrahavyāvartanī, but it is not entirely clear what Nāgārjuna’s purpose is. Contrary to the theoretical interpretations of several recent scholars such as Jan Westerhoff according to which Nāgārjuna is proffering a contextualist epistemological theory, I argue that Nāgārjuna as well as the later Madhyamaka Candrakīrti, much like Pyrrhonian skeptics, employed concerns about epistemic criteria in service of purely practical purposes. There is no positive epistemological theory to be found in Nāgārjuna’s Vigrahavyāvartanī and Candrakīrti’s Prasannapadā; furthermore a putative thesis of universal emptiness is self-undermining, a conclusion which itself can be seen as part of a therapeutic program. Nonetheless, the historical persistence of these epistemological issues shows that they ought to continue to be areas of theoretical inquiry for epistemologists today. I end with reflections on the wider relevance of my conclusions, particularly with regard to demonstrating the value of philosophy. (shrink)

In Saving Truth from Paradox, Hartry Field presents and defends a theory of truth with a new conditional. In this paper, I present two criticisms of this theory, one concerning its assessments of validity and one concerning its treatment of truth-preservation claims. One way of adjusting the theory adequately responds to the truth-preservation criticism, at the cost of making the validity criticism worse. I show that in a restricted setting, Field has a way to respond to the validity criticism. I (...) close with some general considerations on the use of revision-theoretic methods in theories of truth. (shrink)

Approaches to truth and the Liar paradox seem invariably to face a dilemma: either appeal to some sort of hierarchy, or declare apparently perfectly coherent concepts incoherent. But since both options lead to severe expressive restrictions, neither seems satisfactory. The aim of this paper is a new approach, which avoids the dilemma and the resulting expressive restrictions. Previous approaches tend to appeal to some new sort of semantic value for the truth predicate to take. I argue that such approaches inevitably (...) lead to the dilemma in question. In contrast, the present proposal sticks with classical semantic values, but allows the compositional rules associated with these to admit of exceptions. I show how such an approach can be developed systematically. (shrink)

Recent discussions in cognitive science and the philosophy of mind have defended a theory according to which we live in a virtual world akin to a computer simulation, generated by our brain. It is argued that our brain creates a model world from a variety of stimuli; this model is perceived as if it was external and perception-independent, even though it is neither of the two. The view of the mind, brain, and world, entailed by this theory has some peculiar (...) consequences which have rarely been explored in detail. This paper sets out virtual world theory and relates it to various central philosophical problems, the role of the perceiver and the problem of the existence of the external world ). The second part suggests three interpretations of virtual world theory, two familiar ones and a somewhat less familiar one. The remainder of the paper argues that the irrealist interpretation is the one we should adopt. (shrink)

A number of contemporary philosophers think that the unqualified statement “X is unspeakable” faces the danger of self-referential absurdity: if this statement is true, it must simultaneously be false, given that X is speakable by the predicate word “unspeakable.” This predicament is in this chapter formulated as an argument that I term the “ineffability paradox.” After examining the Buddhist semantic theory of apoha (exclusion) and an apoha solution to the issue, I resort to a few Chinese Buddhist and Hindu philosophical (...) materials to rationally reconstruct a strategy for resolving the paradox. By introducing the mode of expression termed “indication,” together with the relevant notions of superimposition and of gesturing beyond the horizon, I show that expressing the ineffable does not necessarily involve irresoluble contradiction. It is also suggested that philosophers may need to acknowledge the relevance of the notion of ineffability for contemporary philosophizing. (shrink)

The sciences occasionally generate discoveries that undermine their own assumptions. Two such discoveries are characterized here: the discovery of apophenia by cognitive psychology and the discovery that physical systems cannot be locally bounded within quantum theory. It is shown that such discoveries have a common structure and that this common structure is an instance of Priest’s well-known Inclosure Schema. This demonstrates that science itself is dialetheic: it generates limit paradoxes. How science proceeds despite this fact is briefly discussed, as is (...) the connection between our results and the realism-antirealism debate. We conclude by suggesting a position of epistemic modesty. (shrink)

For Jizang (549−623), a prominent philosophical exponent of Chinese Madhyamaka, all things are empty of determinate form or nature. Given anything X, no linguistic item can truly and conclusively be applied to X in the sense of positing a determinate form or nature therein. This philosophy of ontic indeterminacy is connected closely with his notion of the Way (dao), which seems to indicate a kind of ineffable principle of reality. However, Jizang also equates the Way with nonacquisition as a conscious (...) state of freedom from any attachment and definite understanding whatsoever. The issue then becomes pressing as to how we are to understand Jizang's notion of the Way. Does it indicate some metaphysical principle or reality? Is it actually a skilful expedient to lead one to the consummate state of complete spiritual freedom? How is this issue related to Jizang's conception of ontic indeterminacy? In this book chapter, I examine Jizang's key writings in an attempt to clarify his ontological position. (shrink)

The state of affairs of some things falling under a predicate is supposedly a single entity that collects these things as its constituents. But whether we think of a state of affairs as a fact, a proposition or a possibility, problems will arise if we adopt a plural logic. For plural logic says that any plurality include themselves, so whenever there are some things, the state of affairs of their plural self-inclusion should be a single thing that collects them all. (...) This leads to paradoxes analogous to those that afflict naïve set theory. Here I suggest that they are the very same paradoxes, because sets can be reduced to states of affairs. However, to obtain a consistent theoretical reduction we must restrict the usual axiom scheme of Comprehension for plural logic to ‘stratified’ formulas, to avoid viciously circular definitions. I prove that with this modification to the background plural logic, the theory of states of affairs is consistent; moreover, it yields the axioms of the familiar set theory NFU. (shrink)

For Sengzhao (374−414 CE), a leading Sanlun philosopher of Chinese Buddhism, things in the world are ontologically indeterminate in that they are devoid of any determinate form or nature. In his view, we should understand and use words provisionally, so that they are not taken to connote the determinacy of their referents. To echo the notion of ontic indeterminacy and indicate the provisionality of language, his main work, the Zhaolun, abounds in paradoxical expressions. In this essay, I offer a philosophical (...) analysis and rational reconstruction of Sengzhao’s linguistic thought, with a view to exploring the rationale for and purpose of his use of paradoxical language. (shrink)

Graham Priest 2002 argues that all logical paradoxes that include set-theoretic paradoxes and semantic paradoxes share a common structure, the Inclosure Schema, so they should be treated as one family. Through a discussion of Berry's Paradox and the semantic notion ?definable?, I argue that (i) the Inclosure Schema is not fine-grained enough to capture the essential features of semantic paradoxes, and (ii) the traditional separation of the two groups of logical paradoxes should be retained.

True contradictions are taken increasingly seriously by philosophers and logicians. Yet, the belief that contradictions are always false remains deeply intuitive. This paper confronts this belief head-on by explaining in detail how one specific contradiction is true. The contradiction in question derives from Priest's reworking of Berkeley's argument for idealism. However, technical aspects of the explanation offered here differ considerably from Priest's derivation. The explanation uses novel formal and epistemological tools to guide the reader through a valid argument with, not (...) just true, but eminently acceptable premises, to an admittedly unusual conclusion: a true contradiction. The novel formal and epistemological tools concern points of view and changes in points of view. The result is an understanding of why the contradiction is true. (shrink)

Apophaticism -- the view that God is both indescribable and inconceivable -- is one of the great medieval traditions of philosophical thought about God, but it is largely overlooked by analytic philosophers of religion. This paper attempts to rehabilitate apophaticism as a serious philosophical option. We provide a clear formulation of the position, examine what could appropriately be said and thought about God if apophaticism is true, and consider ways to address the charge that apophaticism is self-defeating. In so doing (...) we draw on recent work in the philosophy of language, touching on issues such as the nature of negation, category mistakes, fictionalism, and reductionism. (shrink)

I have two main objectives. The first is to get a better understanding of what is at issue between friends and foes of higher-order quantification, and of what it would mean to extend a Boolos-style treatment of second-order quantification to third- and higherorder quantification. The second objective is to argue that in the presence of absolutely general quantification, proper semantic theorizing is essentially unstable: it is impossible to provide a suitably general semantics for a given language in a language of (...) the same logical type. I claim that this leads to a trilemma: one must choose between giving up absolutely general quantification, settling for the view that adequate semantic theorizing about certain languages is essentially beyond our reach, and countenancing an open-ended hierarchy of languages of ever ascending logical type. I conclude by suggesting that the hierarchy may be the least unattractive of the options on the table. (shrink)

The cognitive sciences tell us that the self is a construct. The visual arts illustrate this fact. Mathematics give it full expression, abstracting the self to a Grothendieck site. This self is a haecceity, an ephemeral this-ness and now-ness. We make up our minds and our histories. That our acts are public, that they communicate effectively, becomes a dialetheic paradox, a deep paradox for our times.

There appears to be few, if any, limits on what sorts of logical connectives can be added to a given logic. One source of potential limitations is the motivating ideology associated with a logic. While extraneous to the logic, the motivating ideology is often important for the development of formal and philosophical work on that logic, as is the case with intuitionistic logic. One family of logics for which the philosophical ideology is important is the family of relevant logics. In (...) this paper, I explore the limits of what a relevant connective is, showing how some basic criteria motivated by the ideology of relevant logicians provide robust limits on potential connectives. These criteria provide some plausible necessary conditions on being a relevant connective. (shrink)

Since Peirce defined the first operators for three-valued logic, it is usually assumed that he rejected the principle of bivalence. However, I argue that, because bivalence is a principle, the strategy used by Peirce to defend logical principles can be used to defend bivalence. Construing logic as the study of substitutions of equivalent representations, Peirce showed that some patterns of substitution get realized in the very act of questioning them. While I recognize that we can devise non-classical notations, I argue (...) that, when we make claims about those notations, we inevitably get saddled with bivalent commitments. I present several simple inferences to show this. The argument that results from those examples is ‘pragmatic’, because the inevitability of the principle is revealed in use (not mention); and it is ‘semiotic’, because this revelation happens in the use of signs. (shrink)

PLEASE NOTE: This is the corrected 2nd eBook edition, 2021. ●●●●● _Critique of Impure Reason_ has now also been published in a printed edition. To reduce the otherwise high price of this scholarly, technical book of nearly 900 pages and make it more widely available beyond university libraries to individual readers, the non-profit publisher and the author have agreed to issue the printed edition at cost. ●●●●● The printed edition was released on September 1, 2021 and is now available through (...) all booksellers, including Barnes & Noble, Amazon, and brick-and-mortar bookstores under ISBN 978-0-578-88646-6. ●●●●● In light of the length of this book, readers who would like to have a more detailed description of the book's objectives and method may find it helpful to read the detailed and clearly written Wikipedia entry about this work: From the Wikipedia search page, use the search phrase "Critique of Impure Reason". At least at the time of this writing (11/29/2021), the Wikipedia entry is well-researched and accurate. ●●●●● In addition, a "Primer on Bartlett's CRITIQUE OF IMPURE REASON" has been made available by the author. It is available under its title through PhilPapers and other philosophy online archives. ●●●●● COMMENDATIONS OF THIS WORK, from the back cover of the published edition: ●●●●● “I admire its range of philosophical vision.” – Nicholas Rescher, Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh, author of more than 100 books. ●●●●● “Bartlett’s _Critique of Impure Reason_ is an impressive, bold, and ambitious work. Careful scholarship is balanced by original analyses that lead the reader to recognize the limits of meaning, knowledge, and conceptual possibility. The work addresses a host of traditional philosophical problems, among them the nature of space, time, causality, consciousness, the self, other minds, ontology, free will and determinism, and others. The book culminates in a fascinating and profound new understanding of relativity physics and quantum theory.” – Gerhard Preyer, Professor of Philosophy, Goethe-University, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, author of many books including _Concepts of Meaning_, _Beyond Semantics and Pragmatics_, _Intention and Practical Thought_, and _Contextualism in Philosophy_. ●●●●● “[This work’s] goal is of a unique and difficult species: Dr. Bartlett seeks to develop a formal logical calculus on the basis of transcendental philosophical arguments; in fact, he hopes that this calculus will be the formal expression of the transcendental foundation of knowledge.... I consider Dr. Bartlett’s work soundly conceived and executed with great skill.” – C. F. von Weizsäcker, philosopher and physicist, former Director, Max-Planck-Institute, Starnberg, Germany. ●●●●● “Bartlett has written an American “Prolegomena to All Future Metaphysics.” He aims rigorously to eliminate meaningless assertions, reach bedrock, and place philosophy on a firm foundation that will enable it, like science and mathematics, to produce lasting results that generations to come can build on. This is a great book, the fruit of a lifetime of research and reflection, and it deserves serious attention.” — Martin X. Moleski, former Professor, Canisius College, Buffalo, NY, studies of scientific method, the presuppositions of thought, and the self-referential nature of epistemology. ●●●●● “Bartlett has written a book on what might be called the underpinnings of philosophy. It has fascinating depth and breadth, and is all the more striking due to its unifying perspective based on the concepts of reference and self-reference.” – Don Perlis, Professor of Computer Science, University of Maryland, author of numerous publications on self-adjusting autonomous systems and philosophical issues concerning self-reference, mind, and consciousness. ●●●●● ●●●●● The _Critique of Impure Reason: Horizons of Possibility and Meaning_ comprises a major and important contribution to philosophy. Thanks to the generosity of its publisher, this massive 885-page volume has been published as a free open access eBook (3.75MB) as well as an open access printed edition. It inaugurates a revolutionary paradigm shift in philosophical thought by providing compelling and long-sought-for solutions to a wide range of philosophical problems. In the process, the work fundamentally transforms the way in which the concepts of reference, meaning, and possibility are understood. The book includes a Foreword by the celebrated German philosopher and physicist Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker. ●●●●● In Kant’s _Critique of Pure Reason_ we find an analysis of the preconditions of experience and of knowledge. In contrast, but yet in parallel, the new _Critique_ focuses upon the ways—unfortunately very widespread and often unselfconsciously habitual—in which many of the concepts that we employ _conflict_ with the very preconditions of meaning and of knowledge. ●●●●● This is a book about the boundaries of frameworks and about the unrecognized conceptual confusions in which we become entangled when we attempt to transgress beyond the limits of the possible and meaningful. We tend either not to recognize or not to accept that we all-too-often attempt to trespass beyond the boundaries of the frameworks that make knowledge possible and the world meaningful. ●●●●● The _Critique of Impure Reason_ proposes a bold, ground-breaking, and startling thesis: that a great many of the major philosophical problems of the past can be solved through the recognition of a viciously deceptive form of thinking to which philosophers as well as non-philosophers commonly fall victim. For the first time, the book advances and justifies the criticism that a substantial number of the questions that have occupied philosophers fall into the category of “impure reason,” violating the very conditions of their possible meaningfulness. ●●●●● The purpose of the study is twofold: first, to enable us to recognize the boundaries of what is referentially forbidden—the limits beyond which reference becomes meaningless—and second, to avoid falling victims to a certain broad class of conceptual confusions that lie at the heart of many major philosophical problems. As a consequence, the boundaries of _possible meaning_ are determined. ●●●●● Bartlett, the author or editor of more than 20 books, is responsible for identifying this widespread and delusion-inducing variety of error, _metalogical projection_. It is a previously unrecognized and insidious form of erroneous thinking that undermines its own possibility of meaning. It comes about as a result of the pervasive human compulsion to seek to transcend the limits of possible reference and meaning. ●●●●● Based on original research and rigorous analysis combined with extensive scholarship, the _Critique of Impure Reason_ develops a self-validating method that makes it possible to recognize, correct, and eliminate this major and pervasive form of fallacious thinking. In so doing, the book provides at last provable and constructive solutions to a wide range of major philosophical problems. ●●●●● CONTENTS AT A GLANCE ▪▪▪▪▪ Preface ▪▪▪▪▪ Foreword by Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker ▪▪▪▪▪ Acknowledgments ▪▪▪▪▪ Avant-propos: A philosopher’s rallying call ▪▪▪▪▪ Introduction ▪▪▪▪▪ A note to the reader ▪▪▪▪▪ A note on conventions ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ PART I ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ WHY PHILOSOPHY HAS MADE NO PROGRESS AND HOW IT CAN ▪▪▪▪▪ 1 Philosophical-psychological prelude ▪▪▪▪▪ 2 Putting belief in its place: Its psychology and a needed polemic ▪▪▪▪▪ 3 Turning away from the linguistic turn: From theory of reference to metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 4 The stepladder to maximum theoretical generality ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ PART II ▪▪▪▪▪ THE METALOGIC OF REFERENCE ▪▪▪▪▪ A New Approach to Deductive, Transcendental Philosophy ▪▪▪▪▪ 5 Reference, identity, and identification ▪▪▪▪▪ 6 Self-referential argument and the metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 7 Possibility theory ▪▪▪▪▪ 8 Presupposition logic, reference, and identification ▪▪▪▪▪ 9 Transcendental argumentation and the metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 10 Framework relativity ▪▪▪▪▪ 11 The metalogic of meaning ▪▪▪▪▪ 12 The problem of putative meaning and the logic of meaninglessness ▪▪▪▪▪ 13 Projection ▪▪▪▪▪ 14 Horizons ▪▪▪▪▪ 15 De-projection ▪▪▪▪▪ 16 Self-validation ▪▪▪▪▪ 17 Rationality: Rules of admissibility ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ PART III ▪▪▪▪▪ PHILOSOPHICAL APPLICATIONS OF THE METALOGIC OF REFERENCE ▪▪▪▪▪ Major Problems and Questions of Philosophy and the Philosophy of Science ▪▪▪▪▪ 18 Ontology and the metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 19 Discovery or invention in general problem-solving, mathematics, and physics ▪▪▪▪▪ 20 The conceptually unreachable: “The far side” ▪▪▪▪▪ 21 The projections of the external world, things-in-themselves, other minds, realism, and idealism ▪▪▪▪▪ 22 The projections of time, space, and space-time ▪▪▪▪▪ 23 The projections of causality, determinism, and free will ▪▪▪▪▪ 24 Projections of the self and of solipsism ▪▪▪▪▪ 25 Non-relational, agentless reference and referential fields ▪▪▪▪▪ 26 Relativity physics as seen through the lens of the metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 27 Quantum theory as seen through the lens of the metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 28 Epistemological lessons learned from and applicable to relativity physics and quantum theory ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ PART IV ▪▪▪▪▪ HORIZONS ▪▪▪▪▪ 29 Beyond belief ▪▪▪▪▪ 30 _Critique of Impure Reason_: Its results in retrospect ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ SUPPLEMENT ▪▪▪▪▪ The Formal Structure of the Metalogic of Reference ▪▪▪▪▪ APPENDIX I ▪▪▪▪▪ The Concept of Horizon in the Work of Other Philosophers ▪▪▪▪▪ APPENDIX II ▪▪▪▪▪ Epistemological Intelligence ▪▪▪▪▪ References ▪▪▪▪▪ Index ▪▪▪▪▪ About the author. 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ABSTRACT Our goal in this paper is to extend counterfactual accounts of scientific explanation to mathematics. Our focus, in particular, is on intra-mathematical explanations: explanations of one mathematical fact in terms of another. We offer a basic counterfactual theory of intra-mathematical explanations, before modelling the explanatory structure of a test case using counterfactual machinery. We finish by considering the application of counterpossibles to mathematical explanation, and explore a second test case along these lines.

This book is in honour of Professor Anna-Sofia Maurin on her 50th birthday. It consists of eighteen essays on metaphysical issues written by Swedish and international scholars.

Call an explanation in which a non-mathematical fact is explained—in part or in whole—by mathematical facts: an extra-mathematical explanation. Such explanations have attracted a great deal of interest recently in arguments over mathematical realism. In this article, a theory of extra-mathematical explanation is developed. The theory is modelled on a deductive-nomological theory of scientific explanation. A basic DN account of extra-mathematical explanation is proposed and then redeveloped in the light of two difficulties that the basic theory faces. The final view (...) appeals to relevance logic and uses resources in information theory to understand the explanatory relationship between mathematical and physical facts. 1Introduction2Anchoring3The Basic Deductive-Mathematical Account4The Genuineness Problem5Irrelevance6Relevance and Information7Objections and Replies 7.1Against relevance logic7.2Too epistemic7.3Informational containment8Conclusion. (shrink)

Mathematics appears to play a genuine explanatory role in science. But how do mathematical explanations work? Recently, a counterfactual approach to mathematical explanation has been suggested. I argue that such a view fails to differentiate the explanatory uses of mathematics within science from the non-explanatory uses. I go on to offer a solution to this problem by combining elements of the counterfactual theory of explanation with elements of a unification theory of explanation. The result is a theory according to which (...) a counterfactual is explanatory when it is an instance of a generalized counterfactual scheme. (shrink)

Tim travels back in time and tries to kill his grandfather before his father was born. Tim fails. But why? Lewis's response was to cite "coincidences": Tim is the unlucky subject of gun jammings, banana peels, sudden changes of heart, and so on. A number of challenges have been raised against Lewis's response. The latest of these focuses on explanation. This paper diagnoses the source of this new disgruntlement and offers an alternative explanation for Tim's failure, one that Lewis would (...) not have liked. The explanation is an obvious one but controversial, so it is defended against all the objections that can be mustered. (shrink)

According to the iterative conception of set, each set is a collection of sets formed prior to it. The notion of priority here plays an essential role in explanations of why contradiction-inducing sets, such as the Russell set, do not exist. Consequently, these explanations are successful only to the extent that a satisfactory priority relation is made out. I argue that attempts to do this have fallen short: understanding priority in a straightforwardly constructivist sense threatens the coherence of the empty (...) set and raises serious epistemological concerns; but the leading realist interpretations---ontological and modal interpretations of priority---are deeply problematic as well. I conclude that the purported explanatory virtues of the iterative conception are, at present, unfounded. (shrink)

This essay offers an account of Kierkegaard’s view of the limits of thought and of what makes this view distinctive. With primary reference to Philosophical Fragments, and its putative representation of Christianity as unthinkable, I situate Kierkegaard’s engagement with the problem of the limits of thought, especially with respect to the views of Kant and Hegel. I argue that Kierkegaard builds in this regard on Hegel’s critique of Kant but that, against Hegel, he develops a radical distinction between two types (...) of thinking and inquiry: the ‘aesthetic-intellectual’ and the ‘ethico-religious’. I clarify this distinction and show how it guides Kierkegaard’s conception of a form of philosophical practice that involves drawing limits to the proper sphere of disinterested contemplation. With reference to two rival interpretations of Kierkegaard’s approach to the limits of thought—which I call ‘bullet-biting’ and ‘relativizing’—I further show how my ‘disambiguating’ account can better explain how, and why, his work courts a form of self-referential incoherence, in which it appears that certain limits of thought are at once affirmed and violated. (shrink)

Advocates of political liberalism hold it as a superior alternative to perfectionism on the grounds that it avoids superfluous and/or controversial claims in favor of a maximally-inclusive approach undergirded by a "free-standing" justification for the ideology. These assertions prove difficult to defend: political interpretations of liberalism tend to be implicitly ethnocentric; they often rely upon a number of controversial, and even empirically falsified, assumptions about rationality--and in many ways prove more parochial than their perfectionist cousins. It is possible to reform (...) political liberalism to address these challenges, but generally at the expense of the supposed normative force and universality of the liberal project. However, this para-liberal approach is much better in keeping with contemporary findings in sociology, psychology and cognitive science--and can much more effectively accommodate the illiberal challenge. (shrink)

In this paper we explain our pretense account of truth-talk and apply it in a diagnosis and treatment of the Liar Paradox. We begin by assuming that some form of deflationism is the correct approach to the topic of truth. We then briefly motivate the idea that all T-deflationists should endorse a fictionalist view of truth-talk, and, after distinguishing pretense-involving fictionalism (PIF) from error- theoretic fictionalism (ETF), explain the merits of the former over the latter. After presenting the basic framework (...) of our PIF account of truth-talk, we demonstrate a few advantages it offers over T-deflationist accounts that do not explicitly acknowledge pretense at work in the discourse. In turning to the Liar Paradox, we explain how the quasi-anaphoric functioning that our account attributes to truth-talk provides a diagnosis of the Liar Paradox (and other instances of semantic pathology) as having no content—in the sense of not specifying any of what we call M-conditions. At the same time, however, we vindicate the intuition that we can understand liar sentences, thereby avoiding one standard objection to “meaningless strategy” responses to the Liar Paradox. With this diagnosis in place, we then, by way of treatment, introduce a new predicate, ‘semantically defective’, and show how the explanation we give for its application allows for a consistent, yet revenge-immune, (dis)solution of the Liar Paradox, and semantic pathology generally. (shrink)

Many science teachers are presented with the challenge of characterizing science as a dynamic, human endeavour. Perspectivism, as a hermeneutic philosophy of science, has the potential to be a learning tool for teachers as they elucidate the complex nature of science. Developed earlier by Nietzsche and others, perspectivism has recently re-emerged in the context of the philosophy of science in the work of Ronald Giere. Giere presents a compelling case that scientific theories and scientific observation are perspectival by using science (...) itself. There are many tangible examples already present in science textbooks which, when approached in a certain way, offer an exciting opportunity for a realistic incorporation of philosophy of science into the classroom. Furthermore, introducing perspectivism to students necessitates an engagement with notions such as truth, reality, perception and experimentation, through a familiar medium, while painting a nuanced conception of the nature of science. (shrink)

According to Johansson (2009: 22) an infinite regress is vicious just in case “what comes first [in the regress-order] is for its definition dependent on what comes afterwards.” Given a few qualifications (to be spelled out below (section 3)), I agree. Again according to Johansson (ibid.), one of the consequences of accepting this way of distinguishing vicious from benign regresses is that the so-called Russellian Resemblance Regress (RRR), if generated in a one-category trope-theoretical framework, is vicious and that, therefore, the (...) existence of tropes only makes sense if trope-theory is understood (minimally) as a two-category theory which accepts, besides the existence of tropes, also the existence of at least one universal: resemblance.1 I disagree. But how can that be? How can Johansson and I agree about what distinguishes a vicious from a benign regress, yet disagree about which regresses are vicious and which are benign? In this paper I attempt to answer that question by first setting out and defending the sense of viciousness which both Johansson and I accept, only to then argue that to be able to determine if a particular regress is vicious in this sense, more than features intrinsic to the regress itself must be taken into account. This is why, although the RRR as originally set out by Russell is vicious, the seemingly identical resemblance regress which ensues in a one-category (standard) trope-theoretical context is not (provided, that is, that we accept certain views about how the nature of tropes relates to the resemblance between tropes, and given that we set our theory in a truthmaker theoretical framework – all of which are standard assumptions for proponents of (the standard-version of) the trope-theory).2. (shrink)

The work is the presentation of a logical theory - Logic in Reality (LIR) - and of applications of that theory in natural science and philosophy, including ...

In Beyond the Limits of Thought [2002], Graham Priest argues that logical and semantic paradoxes have the same underlying structure (which he calls the Inclosure Schema ). He also argues that, in conjunction with the Principle of Uniform Solution (same kind of paradox, same kind of solution), this is sufficient to 'sink virtually all orthodox solutions to the paradoxes', because the orthodox solutions to the paradoxes are not uniform. I argue that Priest fails to provide a non-question-begging method to 'sink (...) virtually all orthodox solutions', and that the Inclosure Schema cannot be the structure that underlies the Liar paradox. Moreover, Ramsey was right in thinking that logical and semantic paradoxes are paradoxes of different kinds. (shrink)

This anthology of the very latest research on truth features the work of recognized luminaries in the field, put together following a rigorous refereeing process. Along with an introduction outlining the central issues in the field, it provides a unique and unrivaled view of contemporary work on the nature of truth, with papers selected from key conferences in 2011 such as Truth Be Told, Truth at Work, Paradoxes of Truth and Denotation and Axiomatic Theories of Truth. Studying the nature of (...) the concept of ‘truth’ has always been a core role of philosophy, but recent years have been a boom time in the topic. With a wealth of recent conferences examining the subject from various angles, this collection of essays recognizes the pressing need for a volume that brings scholars up to date on the arguments. Offering academics and graduate students alike a much-needed repository of today’s cutting-edge work in this vital topic of philosophy, the volume is required reading for anyone needing to keep abreast of developments, and is certain to act as a catalyst for further innovation and research. (shrink)

Although idealism was widely defended in the history of philosophy, it is nowadays almost universally considered a non-starter. This holds in particular for a strong form of idealism, which asserts that not just minds or the mental in general, but our human minds in particular are metaphysically central to reality. Such a view seems to be excessively anthropocentric and contrary to what we by now know about our place in the universe. Nonetheless, there is reason to think that such a (...) strong form of idealism is indeed correct. In this paper, I will present an argument for idealism of this kind through considerations about a harmony between our thought and reality. The central argument in favour of idealism will come from a possibly unexpected source: we can see that a strong form of idealism is true simply from considerations about our language alone. I shall argue that thinking about how we represent reality allows us to conclude that idealism is true, and thus that reality must be a certain way. But no argument of this kind seems to allow for a metaphysical conclusion like idealism, since considerations about our language alone only show how we represent reality, not how reality is. And thus idealism can’t possibly follow, since it concerns how reality is, not just how we represent it to be. A good part of the second half of the paper is devoted to showing how such an argument is possible after all, and that it really does establish idealism. (shrink)

This paper explores early Australasian philosophy in some detail. Two approaches have dominated Western philosophy in Australia: idealism and materialism. Idealism was prevalent between the 1880s and the 1930s, but dissipated thereafter. Idealism in Australia often reflected Kantian themes, but it also reflected the revival of interest in Hegel through the work of ‘absolute idealists’ such as T. H. Green, F. H. Bradley, and Henry Jones. A number of the early New Zealand philosophers were also educated in the idealist tradition (...) and were influential in their communities, but produced relatively little. In Australia, materialism gained prominence through the work of John Anderson, who arrived in Australia in 1927, and continues to be influential. John Anderson had been a student of Henry Jones, who might therefore be said to have influenced both main strands of Australian philosophical thought. (shrink)

The article looks at the structure of impossible worlds, and their deployment in the analysis of some intentional notions. In particular, it is argued that one can, in fact, conceive anything, whether or not it is impossible. Thus a semantics of conceivability requires impossible worlds.

It is a commonplace of set theory to say that there is no set of all well-orderings nor a set of all sets. We are implored to accept this due to the threat of paradox and the ensuing descent into unintelligibility. In the absence of promising alternatives, we tend to take up a conservative stance and tow the line: there is no universe. In this paper, I am going to challenge this claim by taking seriously the idea that we can (...) talk about the collection of all the sets and many more collections beyond that. A method of articulating this idea is offered through an indefinitely extending hierarchy of set theories. It is argued that this approach provides a natural extension to ordinary set theory and leaves ordinary mathematical practice untouched. (shrink)

The book begins with a reconstruction of Aristotle's syllogistic as viewed by some of the well-known logicians of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, that is, as expanded to include singular p...

Semantic and soritical paradoxes display remarkable family resemblances. For one thing, several non-classical logics have been independently applied to both kinds of paradoxes. For another, revenge paradoxes and higher-order vagueness—among the most serious problems targeting solutions to semantic and soritical paradoxes—exhibit a rather similar dynamics. Some authors have taken these facts to suggest that truth and vagueness require a unified logical framework, or perhaps that the truth predicate is itself vague. However, a common core of semantic and soritical paradoxes has (...) not been identified yet, and no explanation of their relationships has been provided. Here we aim at filling this lacuna, in the framework of many-valued logics. We provide a unified diagnosis of semantic and soritical paradoxes, identifying their source in a general form of indiscernibility. We then develop our diagnosis into a theory of paradoxicality, which formalizes both semantic and soritical paradoxes as arguments involving specific instances of our generalized indiscernibility principle, and correctly predicts which logics can non-trivially solve them. (shrink)

This paper is a contribution to the emerging field of comparative metaethics, which aims to analyse the metaethical views of philosophical traditions outside the Western mainstream. It argues that the metaethical views implicit in the mediaeval Chinese school of Tiantai Buddhism can be reconstructed in contemporary terms in order to develop two novel views. These views are moral dialetheism and moral trivialism. The taxonomy of contemporary metaethical views, in epistemic terms, is exhausted by either partial success, or complete error, theories. (...) They claim, respectively, either that some moral judgments are true (and some false) or that all moral judgments are false. There are also noncognitivist and nonfactualist views, claiming that all moral judgments are technically neither true nor false. In opposition to this moral truth gap, moral dialetheism and moral trivialism offer a moral truth glut. These views say, respectively, that some moral judgments and their negations are true and that all moral judgments and their negations are true. The upshot of this metaethical reconstruction of Tiantai Buddhism is that it allows us to complete the contemporary metaethical taxonomy, and to contribute to the therapeutic goal of finding ways to utilize metaethical reflection for the sake of release from the pathologies of morality. (shrink)

Dialetheism is the view that some contradictions are true. Resorting to either metaphysical dialetheism or semantic dialetheism may seem like an appropriate resolve to certain theological contradictions. At least for those who concede to theological contradictions, and take dialetheism seriously. However, I demonstrate that neither of these types of dialetheism would serve to be amenable in resolving an Islamic theological contradiction. This is a theological contradiction that I refer to as ‘the paradox of an unknowable and ineffable God’. As a (...) result of this, I propose an alternative type of dialetheism which aims to resolve the paradox of an unknowable and ineffable God. I call this type of dialetheism, ‘mystical dialetheism’. (shrink)

This book contains a selection of the papers presented at the Logic, Reasoning and Rationality 2010 conference in Ghent. The conference aimed at stimulating the use of formal frameworks to explicate concrete cases of human reasoning, and conversely, to challenge scholars in formal studies by presenting them with interesting new cases of actual reasoning. According to the members of the Wiener Kreis, there was a strong connection between logic, reasoning, and rationality and that human reasoning is rational in so far (...) as it is based on logic. Later, this belief came under attack and logic was deemed inadequate to explicate actual cases of human reasoning. Today, there is a growing interest in reconnecting logic, reasoning and rationality. A central motor for this change was the development of non-classical logics and non-classical formal frameworks. The book contains contributions in various non-classical formal frameworks, case studies that enhance our apprehension of concrete reasoning patterns, and studies of the philosophical implications for our understanding of the notions of rationality. (shrink)

There is an eminent tradition of thought that sees in the phenomenon of time something contradictory. This tradition has been recently revived by some contemporary proponents of dialethism – the view that there are true contradictions. In this paper, I will contribute to this line of thinking by tracing the first steps of a dialethic account of time-consciousness. In particular, I will argue that the experiential flow of time can be accounted for in the framework of an intentionalist approach to (...) temporal perception if we conceive of time-consciousness as a quasi-multiplicity, i.e., a multiplicity of non-self-identical parts, hence the embrace of dialethism. Section 1 introduces dialethism, discusses Priest's dialethic theory of motion and time, and motivates the project of a dialethic account of time-consciousness. Section 2 introduces the intentionalist approach to time-consciousness and distinguishes pure intentionalism from sense-data intentionalism; both subscribes to a certain Principle of Simultaneous Awareness but interprets it differently. In Sect. 3, I offer an in-depth analysis of this principle and identify its core as the requirement of self-unification, i.e., the requirement that time-consciousness unifies itself in flowing without any higher-order act of unification. Section 4 then argues that pure intentionalism can satisfy this requirement by embracing dialethism. I conclude by noting how the dialethic account of time-consciousness incorporates a central extensionalist insight within an intentionalist outlook. (shrink)

This paper portrays the later Wittgenstein’s conception of contradictions and his therapeutic approach to them. I will focus on and give relevance to the Lectures on the Foundations of Mathematics, plus the Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics. First, I will explain why Wittgenstein’s attitude towards contradictions is rooted in: a rejection of the debate about realism and anti-realism in mathematics; and Wittgenstein’s endorsement of logical pluralism. Then, I will explain Wittgenstein’s therapeutic approach towards contradictions, and why it means that (...) a contradiction is not a problem for logic and mathematics. Rather, contradictions are problematic when we do not know what to infer from them. Once a meaning is established through a new rule of inference, the contradiction becomes a usable expression like many others in our inferential apparatus. Thus, the apparent problem is dissolved. Finally, I will take three examples of dissolved contradictions from Wittgenstein to clarify further his notion. I will conclude considering why his position on contradictions led him to clash with Alan Turing, and whether the latter was convinced by the Wittgensteinian proposal. (shrink)

Jamie Tappenden was one of the first authors to entertain the possibility of a common treatment for the Liar and the Sorites paradoxes. In order to deal with these two paradoxes he proposed using the Strong Kleene semantic scheme. This strategy left unexplained our tendency to regard as true certain sentences which, according to this semantic scheme, should lack truth value. Tappenden tried to solve this problem by using a new speech act, articulation. Unlike assertion, which implies truth, articulation only (...) implies non-falsity. In this paper I argue that Tappenden’s strategy cannot be successfully applied to truth and the Liar. (shrink)

A prized property of theories of all kinds is that of generality, of applicability or least relevance to a wide range of circumstances and situations. The purpose of this article is to present a pair of distinctions that suggest that three kinds of generality are to be found in mathematics and logics, not only at some particular period but especially in developments that take place over time: ‘omnipresent’ and ‘multipresent’ theories, and ‘ubiquitous’ notions that form dependent parts, or moments, of (...) theories. The category of ‘facets’ is also introduced, primarily to assess the roles of diagrams and notations in these two disciplines. Various consequences are explored, starting with means of developing applied mathematics, and then reconsidering several established ways of elaborating or appraising theories, such as analogising, revolutions, abstraction, unification, reduction and axiomatisation. The influence of theories already in place upon theory-building is emphasised. The roles in both mathematics and logics of set theory, abstract algebras, metamathematics, and model theory are assessed, along with the different relationships between the two disciplines adopted in algebraic logic and in mathematical logic. Finally, the issue of monism versus pluralism in these two disciplines is rehearsed, and some suggestions are made about the special character of mathematical and logical knowledge, and also the differences between them. Since the article is basically an exercise in historiography, historical examples and case studies are described or noted throughout. (shrink)

Buddhist schools of thought share two fundamental assumptions about language. On the one hand, language is identified with conceptual thinking, which according to the Buddhist doctrine separates us from the momentary and fleeting nature of reality. Language is comprised of generally applicable forms, which fuel the reificatory proclivity for clinging to the distorted – and ultimately fictious – belief in substantial existence. On the other hand, the distrust of language is mitigated by the doctrine of ineffability, which although asserts that (...) reality is beyond the scope of linguistic description, submits that philosophical analyses of key Buddhist concepts is a means of overcoming the limitations that language imposes on our experience and facilitating insight into the nature of reality. This paper provides an overview of Buddhist philosophy of language, with an emphasis on the dialectical view of language as indispensable but ultimately insufficient for contemplation. The Buddhist discussions of ineffability are explicated and compared with its treatment in modern Occidental thought, specifically the similarities and differences with Wittgenstein’s philosophy of language. (shrink)