Finland is internationally known as one of the leading centers of twentieth century analytic philosophy. This volume offers for the first time an overall survey of the Finnish analytic school. The rise of this trend is illustrated by original articles of Edward Westermarck, Eino Kaila, Georg Henrik von Wright, and Jaakko Hintikka. Contributions of Finnish philosophers are then systematically discussed in the fields of logic, philosophy of language, philosophy of science, history of philosophy, ethics and social philosophy. Metaphilosophical reflections on the nature of philosophy are highlighted by the Finnish dialogue between analytic philosophy, phenomenology, pragmatism, and critical theory.
Learn how to think well, avoid biases and fallacies, and understand what philosophy is really about! This book covers all the main branches of philosophy (epistemology, metaphysics, ethics), explains the basics of the philosophy of science, famous thought experiments, and more. The book was written as part of a project to create YouTube lectures for the course, and include links to those videos, as well as links to other videos, websites, and articles not related to the project.
Contemporary philosopher—analytic as well as continental tend to feel uneasy about Ernst Tugendhat, who, though he positions himself in the analytic field, poses questions in the Heideggerian style. Tugendhat was one of Martin Heidegger's last pupils and his least obedient, pursuing a new and controversial critical technique. Tugendhat took Heidegger's destruction of Being as presence and developed it in analytic philosophy, more specifically in semantics. Only formal semantics, according to Tugendhat, could answer the questions left open by Heidegger. Yet in doing this, Tugendhat discovered the latent "hermeneutic nature of analytic philosophy" its post-metaphysical dimension—in which "there are no facts, but only true propositions." What Tugendhat seeks to answer is this: What is the meaning of thought following the linguistic turn? Because of the rift between analytic and continental philosophers, very few studies have been written on Tugendhat, and he has been omitted altogether from several histories of philosophy. Now that these two schools have begun to reconcile, Tugendhat has become an example of a philosopher who, in the words of Richard Rorty, "built bridges between continents and between centuries." Tugendhat is known more for his philosophical turn than for his phenomenological studies or for his position within analytic philosophy, and this creates some confusion regarding his philosophical propensities. Is Tugendhat analytic or continental? Is he a follower of Wittgenstein or Heidegger? Does he belong in the culture of analysis or in that of tradition? Santiago Zabala presents Tugendhat as an example of merged horizons, promoting a philosophical historiography that is concerned more with dialogue and less with classification. In doing so, he places us squarely within a dialogic culture of the future and proves that any such labels impoverish philosophical research.
The essays collected in this volume and authored by Sami Pihlström emphasize that our relation to the world we live in and seek to represent and get to know better through our practices of conceptualization and inquiry is irreducibly valuational. There is no way of even approaching, let alone resolving, the philosophical issue of realism without drawing due attention to the ways in which human values are inextricably entangled with even the most purely “factual” projects of inquiry we engage in. This entanglement of the factual and the normative is, as explicitly argued in Chapter 7 but implicitly suggested in all the other chapters as well, both pragmatic (practice-embedded and practice-involving) and transcendental (operating at the level of the necessary conditions for the possibility of our representing and cognizing the world in general). The author claims we need to carefully examine the complex relations of realism, value, and transcendental arguments at the intersection of pragmatism and analytic philosophy. This book does so by offering case-studies of various important neopragmatists and philosophers close to the pragmatist tradition, including Hilary Putnam, Nicholas Rescher, Joseph Margolis, and Ludwig Wittgenstein. It appeals to scholars and advanced graduate students focusing on pragmatism and analytic philosophy.
Solving the problem of the negative impact of science and technology on society and the environment is indeed the greatest challenge of our time. To date, this challenge has been taken up by few professional philosophers of science, making this volume a welcome contribution to the general debate. Agazzi’s treatment involves viewing modern science and technology as each constituting systems. Against the background of this approach, he provides a penetrating analysis of science, technology and ethics, and their interrelations. Agazzi sees the solution to the problem as lying in the moral sphere and including a multilateral assumption of responsibility on the part of decision makers both within and outside of science.
This volume compares the western ideas of knowledge with the African. It aims at creating a mirror through which the western knowledge culture can look at itself through an unusual and interesting angle. The culture of Sub-Saharan Africa is the substance from which we, in this book, have tried to construe an epistemological mirror.
This edited volume is a comprehensive presentation of views on the relations between metaphysics and logic from Aristotle through twentieth century philosophers who contributed to the return of metaphysics in the analytic tradition. The collection combines interest in logic and its history with interest in analytical metaphysics and the history of metaphysical thought. By so doing, it adds both to the historical understanding of metaphysical problems and to contemporary research in the field. Throughout the volume, essays focus on metaphysica generalis, or the systematic study of the most general categories of being. Beginning with Aristotle and his Categories , the volume goes on to trace metaphyscis and logic through the late ancient and Arabic traditions, examining the views of Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus, and William Ockham. Moving into the early modern period, contributors engage with Leibniz's metaphysics, Kant's critique of metaphysics, the relation between logic and ontology in Hegel, and Bolzano's views. Subsequent chapters address: Charles S. Peirce's logic and metaphysics; the relevance of set-theory to metaphysics; Meinong's theory of objects; Husserl's formal ontology; early analytic philosophy; C.I. Lewis and his relation to Russell; and the relations between Frege, Carnap, and Heidegger. Surveying metaphysics through to the contemporary age, essays explore W.V. Quine's attitude towards metaphysics; Wilfrid Sellars's relation to antidescriptivism as it connects to Kripke's; the views of Putnam and Kaplan; Peter F. Strawson's and David M. Armstrong's metaphysics; Trope theory; and its relation to Popper's conception of three worlds. The volume ends with a chapter on transcendental philosophy as ontology. In each chapter, contributors approach their topics not merely in an historical and exegetical fashion, but also engage critically with the thought of the philosophers whose work they discuss, offering synthesis and original philosophical thought in the volume, in addition to very extensive and well-informed analysis and interpretation of important philosophical texts. The volume will serve as an essential reference for scholars of metaphysics and logic.
This collection addresses metaphysical issues at the intersection between philosophy and science. A unique feature is the way in which it is guided both by history of philosophy, by interaction between philosophy and science, and by methodological awareness. In asking how metaphysics is possible in an age of science, the contributors draw on philosophical tools provided by three great thinkers who were fully conversant with and actively engaged with the sciences of their day: Kant, Husserl, and Frege. Part I sets out frameworks for scientifically informed metaphysics in accordance with the meta-metaphysics outlined by these three self-reflective philosophers. Part II explores the domain for co-existent metaphysics and science. Constraints on ambitious critical metaphysics are laid down in close consideration of logic, meta-theory, and specific conditions for science. Part III exemplifies the role of language and science in contemporary metaphysics. Quine’s pursuit of truth is analysed; Cantor’s absolute infinitude is reconstrued in modal terms; and sense is made of Weyl’s take on the relationship between mathematics and empirical aspects of physics. With chapters by leading scholars, Metametaphysics and the Sciences is an in-depth resource for researchers and advanced students working within metaphysics, philosophy of science, and the history of philosophy.
This collection examines the instrumental role of intersubjectivity in Husserl’s philosophy and explores the potential for developing novel ways of addressing and resolving contemporary philosophical issues on that basis. This is the first time Iso Kern offers an extensive overview of this rich field of inquiry for an English-speaking audience. Guided by his overview, the remaining articles present new approaches to a range of topics and problems that go to the heart of its core theme of intersubjectivity and methodology. Specific topics covered include intersubjectivity and empathy, intersubjectivity in meaning and communication, intersubjectivity pertaining to collective forms of intentionality and extended forms of embodiment, intersubjectivity as constitutive of normality, and, finally, the central role of intersubjectivity in the sciences. The authors’ perspectives are strongly influenced by Husserl’s own methodological concerns and problem awareness and are formed with a view to applicability in current debates – be it within general epistemology, analytic philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, meta-ethics or philosophy of science. With contributions written by leading Husserl scholars from across the Analytic and Continental traditions, Husserl’s Phenomenology of Intersubjectivity is a clear and accessible resource for scholars and advanced students interested in Husserl’s phenomenology and the relevance of intersubjectivity to philosophy, sociology, and psychology.
The aim of this book is to present essays centered upon the subjects of Formal Ontology and Logical Philosophy. The idea of investigating philosophical problems by means of logical methods was intensively promoted in Torun by the Department of Logic of Nicolaus Copernicus University during last decade. Another aim of this book is to present to the philosophical and logical audience the activities of the Torunian Department of Logic during this decade. The papers in this volume contain the results concerning Logic and Logical Philosophy, obtained within the confines of the projects initiated by the Department of Logic and other research projects in which the Torunian Department of Logic took part.
