In the course of the discussion, Professor Quine pinpoints the difficulties involved in translation, brings to light the anomalies and conflicts implicit in our ...

Janaway provides a detailed and critical account of Schopenhauer's central philosophical achievement: his account of the self and its relation to the world of objects. The author's approach to this theme is historical, yet is designed to show the philosophical interest of such an approach. He explores in unusual depth Schopenhauer's often ambivalent relation to Kant, and highlights the influence of Schopenhauer's view of self and world on Wittgenstein and Nietzsche, as well as tracing the many points of contact between (...) Schopenhauer's thought and current philosophical debates about the self. (shrink)

My topic is personal identity, or rather,ouridentity. There is general, but not, of course, unanimous, agreement that it is wrong to give an account of what is involved in, and essential to, our persistence over time which requires the existence of immaterial entities, but, it seems to me, there is no consensus about how, within, what might be called this naturalistic framework, we should best procede. This lack of consensus, no doubt, reflects the difficulty, which must strike anyone who has (...) considered the issue, of achieving, just in one's own thinking, a reflective equilibrium. The theory of personal identity, I feel, provides a curious contrast. On the one side, it seems highly important to know what sort of thing we are, but, on the other, it is hard to find any answer which has a ‘solid’ feel. (shrink)

Much as we would like to conceive empirical thought as rationally grounded in experience, pitfalls await anyone who tries to articulate this position, and ...

First published in 1987. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

First published in 1987. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

In this book John Campbell shows that the general structural features of human thought can be seen as having their source in the distinctive ways in which we...

First Published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Consideration of the counting and reidentification of particulars leads naturally enough to the orthodox doctrine that, “on pain of indefiniteness,” an identity statement in some way involves or presupposes a general term or “covering concept”: i.e., that the principium individuationis or criterion of identity implied depends upon the kind of thing in question. Thus it is said that an auditor understands the question whether A is the same as B only in so far as he knows, however informally or implicitly, (...) the answer to the supplementary question, “The same what?”. (shrink)

Since its publication in 1959, Individuals has become a modern philosophical classic. Bold in scope and ambition, it continues to influence debates in metaphysics, philosophy of logic and language, and epistemology. Peter Strawson's most famous work, it sets out to describe nothing less than the basic subject matter of our thought. It contains Strawson's now famous argument for descriptive metaphysics and his repudiation of revisionary metaphysics, in which reality is something beyond the world of appearances. Throughout, Individuals advances some highly (...) influential and controversial ideas, such as 'non-solipsistic consciousness' and the concept of a person a 'primitive concept'. (shrink)

How do rational minds make contact with the world? The empiricist tradition sees a gap between mind and world, and takes sensory experience, fallible as it is, to provide our only bridge across that gap. In its crudest form, for example, the traditional idea is that our minds consult an inner realm of sensory experience, which provides us with evidence about the nature of external reality. Notoriously, however, it turns out to be far from clear that there is any viable (...) conception of experience which allows it to do the job. The original problem is to show that thought is rationally constrained by external reality. If sensory experience is to provide the solution--in particular, if it is to provide the answer to sceptical challenges--it must therefore meet two criteria. First, it must itself be `receptive'--i.e., appropriately constrained by external reality. Second, it must be the kind of thing that can enter into a logical or rational relationship with belief--it must already be `conceptual,' in other words. In arguing against the idea that anything could serve both roles, Wilfred Sellars termed this conception of experience "the Myth of the Given.". (shrink)

In this book, Eli Hirsch focuses on identity through time, first with respect to ordinary bodies, then underlying matter, and eventually persons.

Volumes I and II provide a completely new translation of the philosophical works of Descartes, based on the best available Latin and French texts. Volume III contains 207 of Descartes' letters, over half of which have not been translated into English before. It incorporates, in its entirety, Anthony Kenny's celebrated translation of selected philosophical letters, first published in 1970. In conjunction with Volumes I and II it is designed to meet the widespread demand for a comprehensive, accurate and authoritative edition (...) of Descartes' philosophical writings in clear and readable modern English. (shrink)