Fulke Greville speaks of the will as inevitably divided between reason and passion. Shakespeare takes such a division seriously but, through Hamlet, he recognizes the possibility of reason and passion being united in a man's will and purpose.

People sometimes ask whether their lives are meaningful or not, whether or not their lives add up to anything. Sometimes they also ask whether life as such is meaningful or not. These are not unconnected questions. Still they are not questions which everyone asks himself. Nor do we always readily recognise what one who asks these questions wants to know. There are some people who will not even find such questions sensible. Some will regard them not as questions but simply (...) as symptoms of something having gone wrong somewhere. Thus in the Diary of the Student Kostya Ryabtsev we find the following words. (shrink)

This is a reply to nielsen's discussion in "philosophical investigations" (vol. 3, No. 4, Fall 1980) of my two papers 'wisdom's philosophy of religion' ("c. J. P." dec. 1975). In it I attempt to correct some misunderstandings and reply to some criticisms regarding what I said in my papers about 'religious transcendence', 'the relation between religion and life', 'religious truth', 'religion and myth', 'experience of god', And 'philosophy and religious belief'.

Professor Phillips′s short paper ‘Ten Questions for Psycho-Analysis’ goes back a long time to 1964 or 65. The questions were originally directed to me after a paper I read to the Philosophical Society in Swansea. I have answered some of these questions in my books on Freud, though perhaps not to Phillips′s satisfaction. Here I shall try to do so again, however briefly.

This book is a discussion of Heidegger's, Sartre's and Marcel's rejection of Cartesian epistemology, the scepticism to which it leads and its objectivist conception of human existence. It compares this rejection with Wittgenstein's rejection of these conceptions of man, his relation to the knowledge of what belongs to the world in which he lives. It concentrates on the existentialist critiques of consciousness as a substance and of the self as such a substance, of each person's body as something external to (...) which he is causally related, and of others as at best indirectly accessible to us. It discusses Sartre's positive views on these questions and the way he falls into a form of solipsism himself. It then considers Sartre's rejection of determinism and his conception of freedom as our capacity for choice. In a concluding chapter the book sketches a non-objectivist account of the self, its development, its 'bad faith', its capacity to emerge from it, and its knowledge of itself, free from the objections considered earlier. It then considers some new objections directed at its own account. Contents: Man in the World; Man's Way of Being: Existential Dualism; The Personal Dimension: Emotions and Value Judgements; Sartre and our Identity as Individuals; Mind and Body: Rejection of Cartesian Dualism; Sartre on the Self and the Other: Rejection of Cartesian Solipsism; Human Separateness and the Possibility of Communion: Marcel's Rejection of Sartrean Solipsism; Sartre: Freedom as Something to which Man is Condemned; Self, Self-Knowledge and Self-Change: A Non-Objectivist View and its Defense. (shrink)

Writing clearly and avoiding jargon, Dilman investigates Wittgenstein's understanding of the relation between language and reality - i.e. between "the realities" we refer to, speak about and try to understand. Dilman discusses this topic in depth and at the same time covers a broad ground. He appreciates the following different aspects: philosophical skepticism about the existence of the various categories of things and our knowledge of them, about the reality of the logic of the language we speak and (...) of the forms of our reasoning, philosophy's contribution to our understanding of the world and of ourselves, and the contributions of the arts to such an understanding. (shrink)

It is sometimes said that a human being has a soul, whereas animals and lifeless things do not. The distinction made is of significance probably for most religions. Although it sets man apart and places him in a unique category, it should not be taken to imply that there is no difference between what is alive and has sentience, apart from man, and what is lifeless and unconscious. This was Descartes' error. For he ran together several distinctions and equated the (...) soul with consciousness. (shrink)

This article is concerned to say something about what the study of logic meant to wittgenstein. It is concerned to bring out why the kind of questions wittgenstein raised about logic and mathematics cannot be pursued in a purely formal and abstract manner-As russell pursued them to a very large extent. It tries to understand the prominence wittgenstein gave to a study of these questions in his philosophical investigations and to appreciate the sense in which he regarded a study of (...) logic to be fundamental in philosophy. Part I is largely about the sense in which russell's study of logic is philosophical in character though it differs very considerably, In both style and conception, From wittgenstein's study of it. Part ii is concerned to indicate wittgenstein's dissatisfaction with russell's view that mathematics are indistinguishable from logic and to say something about why he thought that russell's formal proof, Even if valid, Did not establish the philosophical thesis for which he argued. Part iii is concerned to indicate wittgenstein's dissatisfaction with russell's approach to the contradictions in the foundations of mathematics and to say something about his very different treatment of this question. (shrink)

Ilham Dilman; III*—Universals: Bambrough on Wittgenstein, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 79, Issue 1, 1 June 1979, Pages 35–58, https://doi.org.

İlham Dilman; III—The Freedom of Man, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 62, Issue 1, 1 June 1962, Pages 39–62, https://doi.org/10.1093/aristotelia.

İlham Dilman; III—The Freedom of Man, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 62, Issue 1, 1 June 1962, Pages 39–62, https://doi.org/10.1093/aristotelia.

The way an individual's psychology is intertwined with their morality is the subject of this fascinating book from the pen of the late Ilham Dilman. Dilman convincingly argues that evil, though it cannot be reduced to psychological terms is explicable in terms of an individual person's psychology. Goodness, by contrast, comes from the person and not their psychology. Philosophers the world over will want to read this book and see how Dilman skilfully defends his arguments.

The way an individual's psychology is intertwined with their morality is the subject of this fascinating book from the pen of the late Ilham Dilman. Dilman convincingly argues that evil, though it cannot be reduced to psychological terms is explicable in terms of an individual person's psychology. Goodness, by contrast, comes from the person and not their psychology. Philosophers the world over will want to read this book and see how Dilman skilfully defends his arguments.

It is sometimes said that a human being has a soul, whereas animals and lifeless things do not. The distinction made is of significance probably for most religions. Although it sets man apart and places him in a unique category, it should not be taken to imply that there is no difference between what is alive and has sentience, apart from man, and what is lifeless and unconscious. This was Descartes' error. For he ran together several distinctions and equated the (...) soul with consciousness. (shrink)

Sometimes when artists talk about painting one finds what they have to say interesting: because they are talking about something they have lived with, something in which they find meaning. At other times one feels that it would be better for them to paint rather than talk about painting.

John Wisdom studied ‘moral sciences’ in Cambridge under G. E. Moore and C. D. Broad. His first post as a teacher of philosophy was at St Andrew's University under F. G. Stout. His early books Interpretation and Analysis and Problems of Mind and Matter and a series of articles on ‘Logical Constructions’ in Mind 1931-33, later published as a book, belong to this time.

There is a difficulty about past emotions, motives, etc., especially if they are in the distant past and I have forgotten what I then felt like, or if I was not aware of my feelings at the time. In the case of physical objects or events in the past I need not be the only witness; but in the case of past mental phenomena the corroboration of the supporting evidence is characteristically different. No doubt, here too we can have the (...) evidence of diaries and of other people's testimony; but the subject's report today plays a peculiar role, this peculiarity varying according to the case in question. E.g., I remember now that I was in love with Mary in my youth. I can see now, for the first time, that as a baby I felt envious of my mother for what she could give. The difficulty in grasping properly the detail that is brought together in talking about other people's past unconscious phantasies, the difficulty in grasping how we distinguish between the case of a person finally assenting to such an interpretation because he has genuinely remembered and that of a person who assents under suggestion, have led some people to say that in these cases we only seem to remember, and what we experience belongs solely to the present. (shrink)

In a lecture on ‘Science and Psychology’ Dr Drury distinguishes between ‘a psychology which has insight into individual characters’ and ‘a psychology which is concerned with the scientific study of universal types’, one which comprises ‘those subjects that are studied in a university faculty of psychology’. The former, and not the latter, he says, is psychology in ‘the original meaning of the word’. ‘We might say of a great novelist such as Tolstoy or George Eliot that they show profound psychological (...) insight into the characters they depict … In general, it is the great novelists, dramatists, biographers, historians, that are the real psychologists.’. (shrink)

In a lecture on ‘Science and Psychology’ Dr Drury distinguishes between ‘a psychology which has insight into individual characters’ and ‘a psychology which is concerned with the scientific study of universal types’, one which comprises ‘those subjects that are studied in a university faculty of psychology’. The former, and not the latter, he says, is psychology in ‘the original meaning of the word’. ‘We might say of a great novelist such as Tolstoy or George Eliot that they show profound psychological (...) insight into the characters they depict … In general, it is the great novelists, dramatists, biographers, historians, that are the real psychologists.’. (shrink)

This book is a discussion of Heidegger's, Sartre's and Marcel's rejection of Cartesian epistemology, the scepticism to which it leads and its objectivist conception of human existence. It compares this rejection with Wittgenstein's rejection of these conceptions of man, his relation to the knowledge of what belongs to the world in which he lives. It concentrates on the existentialist critiques of consciousness as a substance and of the self as such a substance, of each person's body as something external to (...) which he is causally related, and of others as at best indirectly accessible to us. It discusses Sartre's positive views on these questions and the way he falls into a form of solipsism himself. It then considers Sartre's rejection of determinism and his conception of freedom as our capacity for choice. In a concluding chapter the book sketches a non-objectivist account of the self, its development, its 'bad faith', its capacity to emerge from it, and its knowledge of itself, free from the objections considered earlier. It then considers some new objections directed at its own account. Contents: Man in the World; Man's Way of Being: Existential Dualism; The Personal Dimension: Emotions and Value Judgements; Sartre and our Identity as Individuals; Mind and Body: Rejection of Cartesian Dualism; Sartre on the Self and the Other: Rejection of Cartesian Solipsism; Human Separateness and the Possibility of Communion: Marcel's Rejection of Sartrean Solipsism; Sartre: Freedom as Something to which Man is Condemned; Self, Self-Knowledge and Self-Change: A Non-Objectivist View and its Defense. (shrink)