The ability to focus on relevant information is central to human cognition. It is therefore hardly unsurprising that the notion of relevance appears across a range of different dis- ciplines. As well as its central role in relevance-theoretic pragmatics, for example, rele- vance is also a core concept in the affective sciences, where there is consensus that for a particular object or event to elicit an emotional state, that object or event needs to be relevant to the person in whom (...) that state is elicited. Despite this, although some affective scientists have carefully considered what emotional relevance might mean, surprisingly little research has been dedicated to providing a definition. Since, by contrast, the relevance-theoretic notion of relevance is carefully defined, our primary aim is to compare relevance as it exists in affective science and in relevance theory, A further aim is to redress what we perceive to be an imbalance: Affective scientists have made great strides in understanding the processes of emotion elicitation/responses etc., but despite the fact that among humans the communication of information about emotional states is ubiquitous, pragmatists have tended to ignore it. We conclude, therefore, that affective science and relevance theory have much to learn from each other. (shrink)

Historically, interjections have been treated in two different ways: as part of language, or as non-words signifying feelings or states of mind. In this paper, I assess the relative strengths and weaknesses of two contemporary approaches that reflect the historical dichotomy, and suggest a new analysis which preserves the insights of both. Interjections have a natural and a coded element, and are better analysed as falling at various points along a continuum between ‘showing’ and ‘saying’. These two notions are characterised (...) in theoretical terms, and some implications of the proposed approach are considered. (shrink)

Historically, interjections have been treated in two different ways: as part of language, or as non-words signifying feelings or states of mind. In this paper, I assess the relative strengths and weaknesses of two contemporary approaches that reflect the historical dichotomy, and suggest a new analysis which preserves the insights of both. Interjections have a natural and a coded element, and are better analysed as falling at various points along a continuum between `showing' and `saying'. These two notions are characterised (...) in theoretical terms, and some implications of the proposed approach are considered. (shrink)

Grice (1957) drew a distinction between natural(N) and non–natural(NN) meaning, and showed how the latter might be characterised in terms of intentions and the recognition of intentions. Focussing on the role of natural signs and natural behaviours in communication, this paper makes two main points. First, verbal communication often involves a mixture of natural and non–natural meaning and there is a continuum of cases between showing and meaningNN. This suggests that pragmatics is best seen as a theory of intentional verbal (...) communication rather than a theory of meaningNN. Second, some natural behaviours have a signalling function: they are, in effect, natural codes. Such behaviours do not fit easily into Grice's distinction between natural and non–natural meaning, which suggests it is not exhaustive. (shrink)

Grice (1957) drew a distinction between natural(N) and non–natural(NN) meaning, and showed how the latter might be characterised in terms of intentions and the recognition of intentions. Focussing on the role of natural signs and natural behaviours in communication, this paper makes two main points. First, verbal communication often involves a mixture of natural and non–natural meaning and there is a continuum of cases between showing and meaningNN. This suggests that pragmatics is best seen as a theory of intentional verbal (...) communication rather than a theory of meaningNN. Second, some natural behaviours have a signalling function: they are, in effect, natural codes. Such behaviours do not fit easily into Grice's distinction between natural and non–natural meaning, which suggests it is not exhaustive. (shrink)

Deirdre Wilson provides a reflective overview of a volume devoted to the historic application of relevance-theoretic ideas to literary studies. She maintains a view argued elsewhere that the putative non-propositional nature of literary effects are an illusion, a view which dates to Sperber and Wilson : “If you look at [non-propositional] affective effects through the microscope of relevance theory, you see a wide array of minute cognitive [i.e., propositional] effects.” This paper suggests an alternative, that modern-day humans have two apparently (...) different modes of expressing and interpreting information: one of these is a system in which propositional, cognitive effects dominate; the other involves direct, non-propositional effects. The paper concludes by describing two ways such affects might be assimilated into relevance theory. The first, to accept that humans are much more than merely cognitive organisms; the second, to rethink quite radically what we mean by cognition. (shrink)

A central diagnostic and anecdotal feature ofautismis difficulty with socialcommunication. We take the position that communication is a two-way,intersubjectivephenomenon—as described by thedouble empathy problem—and offer uprelevance theory(a cognitive account of utterance interpretation) as a means of explaining such communication difficulties. Based on a set of proposed heuristics for successful and rapid interpretation of intended meaning, relevance theory positions communication as contingent on shared—and, importantly,mutuallyrecognized—“relevance.” Given that autistic and non-autistic people may have sometimes markedly different embodied experiences of the world, we (...) argue that what is most salient to each interlocutor may be mismatched. Relevance theory would predict that where this salient information is not (mutually) recognized or adjusted for, mutual understanding may be more effortful to achieve. This paper presents the findings from a small-scale, linguistic ethnographic study of autistic communication featuring eight core autistic participants. Each core autistic participant engaged in three naturalistic conversations around the topic of loneliness with: (1) a familiar, chosen conversation partner; (2) a non-autistic stranger and (3) an autistic stranger. Relevance theory is utilized as a frame for the linguistic analysis of the interactions. Mutual understanding was unexpectedly high across all types of conversation pairings. In conversations involving two autistic participants, flow, rapport and intersubjective attunement were significantly increased and in three instances, autistic interlocutors appeared to experience improvements in their individual communicative competence contrasted with their other conversations. The findings have the potential to guide future thinking about how, in practical terms, communication between autistic and non-autistic people in both personal and public settings might be improved. (shrink)

Detlef Dürr was a remarkable figure in many different ways. I recall some adventures we had with him in Abu Dhabi.

A modest proposal concerning laws, counterfactuals, and explanations - - Why be Humean? -- Suggestions from physics for deep metaphysics -- On the passing of time -- Causation, counterfactuals, and the third factor -- The whole ball of wax -- Epilogue : a remark on the method of metaphysics.

Sense-perception—the awareness or apprehension of things by sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste—has long been a preoccupation of philosophers. One pervasive and traditional problem, sometimes called “the problem of perception”, is created by the phenomena of perceptual illusion and hallucination: if these kinds of error are possible, how can perception be what it intuitively seems to be, a direct and immediate access to reality? The present entry is about how these possibilities of error challenge the intelligibility of the phenomenon of (...) perception, and how the major theories of perception in the last century are best understood as responses to this challenge. (shrink)

This concise book introduces nonphysicists to the core philosophical issues surrounding the nature and structure of space and time, and is also an ideal resource for physicists interested in the conceptual foundations of space-time theory. Tim Maudlin's broad historical overview examines Aristotelian and Newtonian accounts of space and time, and traces how Galileo's conceptions of relativity and space-time led to Einstein's special and general theories of relativity. Maudlin explains special relativity using a geometrical approach, emphasizing intrinsic space-time structure rather than (...) coordinate systems or reference frames. He gives readers enough detail about special relativity to solve concrete physical problems while presenting general relativity in a more qualitative way, with an informative discussion of the geometrization of gravity, the bending of light, and black holes. Additional topics include the Twins Paradox, the physical aspects of the Lorentz-FitzGerald contraction, the constancy of the speed of light, time travel, the direction of time, and more.Introduces nonphysicists to the philosophical foundations of space-time theory Provides a broad historical overview, from Aristotle to Einstein Explains special relativity geometrically, emphasizing the intrinsic structure of space-time Covers the Twins Paradox, Galilean relativity, time travel, and more Requires only basic algebra and no formal knowledge of physics. (shrink)

Explanation does not exist in a metaphysical vacuum. Conceptions of the structure of a phenomenon play an important role in guiding attempts to explain it, and erroneous conceptions of a phenomenon may direct investigation in misleading directions. I believe that there is a case to be made for thinking that much work on the neural underpinnings of consciousness—what is often called the neural correlates of consciousness—is driven by an erroneous conception of the structure of consciousness. The aim of this paper (...) is lay bare some connections between the explanation of consciousness and the structure of consciousness, and to argue for a conception of the structure of consciousness that is more adequate than that which currently drives much research into the neural correlates of consciousness. (shrink)

From climate change forecasts and pandemic maps to Lego sets and Ancestry algorithms, models encompass our world and our lives. In her thought-provoking new book, Annabel Wharton begins with a definition drawn from the quantitative sciences and the philosophy of science but holds that history and critical cultural theory are essential to a fuller understanding of modeling. Considering changes in the medical body model and the architectural model, from the Middle Ages to the twenty-first century, Wharton demonstrates the (...) ways in which all models are historical and political.0Examining how cadavers have been described, exhibited, and visually rendered, she highlights the historical dimension of the modified body and its depictions. Analyzing the varied reworkings of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem-including by monumental commanderies of the Knights Templar, Alberti's Rucellai Tomb in Florence, Franciscans' olive wood replicas, and video game renderings-she foregrounds the political force of architectural representations. And considering black boxes-instruments whose inputs we control and whose outputs we interpret, but whose inner workings are beyond our comprehension-she surveys the threats posed by such opaque computational models, warning of the dangers that models pose when humans lose control of the means by which they are generated and understood. Engaging and wide-ranging, 'Models and World Making' conjures new ways of seeing and critically evaluating how we make and remake the world in which we live. (shrink)

Quantum Non-Locality and Relativity is recognized as the premier philosophical study of Bell's Theorem and its implication for the relativistic account of space and time. Previous editions have been praised for the remarkable clarity of Maudlin's descriptions of both Bell's theorem and his examination of the potential conflict between the theorem and relativity. The third edition of this text has been carefully updated to reflect significant developments, including a new chapter covering important recent work in the foundations of physics. Foremost (...) among these is Roderich Tumiulka's explicit, relativistic theory that can reproduce the quantum mechanical violation of Bell's inequality. The "Free Will Theorem" of John Conway and Simon Kochen is also discussed, as is the status of locality in the Many Worlds interpretation of quantum theory. The book has also been updated to reflect recent results in information theory. The book introduces philosophers to the relevant physics and demonstrates how philosophical analysis can help to resolve some of the problems, and requires no technical background in Physics. All of the physics is presented from first principles, and as much as possible is presented pictorially"--Provided by publisher. (shrink)

John McDowell's contribution to philosophy has ranged across Greek philosophy, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, metaphysics and ethics. His writings have drawn on the works of, amongst others, Aristotle, Kant, Hegel, Frege, Russell, Wittgenstein, Sellars, and Davidson. His contributions have made him one of the most widely read, discussed and challenging philosophers writing today. This book provides a careful account of the main claims that McDowell advances in a number of different areas of philosophy. The interconnections between the different (...) arguments are highlighted and Tim Thornton shows how these individual projects are unified in a post-Kantian framework that articulates the preconditions of thought and language. Thornton sets out the differing strands of McDowell's work prior to, and leading up to, their combination in the broader philosophical vision revealed in "Mind and World" and provides an interpretative and critical framework that will help shape ongoing debates surrounding McDowell's work. An underlying theme of the book is whether McDowell's therapeutic approach to philosophy, which owes much to the later Wittgenstein, is consistent with the substance of McDowell's discussion of nature that uses the vocabulary of other philosophers including, centrally, Kant. (shrink)

Neural organoids are laboratory-generated entities that replicate certain structural and functional features of the human brain. Most neural organoids are disembodied—completely decoupled from sensory input and motor output. As such, questions about their potential capacity for consciousness are exceptionally difficult to answer. While not disputing the need for caution regarding certain neural organoid types, this paper appeals to two broad constraints on any adequate theory of consciousness—the first involving the dependence of consciousness on embodiment; the second involving the dependence of (...) consciousness on representations—to argue that disembodied neural organoids are not plausible candidates for consciousness. (shrink)

I argue that Norton & Earman's hole argument, despite its historical association with General Relativity, turns upon very general features of any linguistic system that can represent substances by names. After exploring various means by which mathematical objects can be interpreted as representing physical possibilities, I suggest that a form of essentialism can solve the hole dilemma without abandoning either determinism or substantivalism. Finally, I identify the basic tenets of such an essentialism in Newton's writings and consider how they can (...) be updated to apply to the case provided by General Relativity. (shrink)

Universals are putative objects like wisdom, morality, redness, etc. Although we believe in properties (which, we argue, are not a kind of object), we do not believe in universals. However, a number of ordinary, natural language constructions seem to commit us to their existence. In this paper, we provide a fictionalist theory of universals, which allows us to speak as if universals existed, whilst denying that any really do.

Abstract The only biologically respectable notion of human nature is an extremely permissive one that names the reliable dispositions of the human species as a whole. This conception offers no ethical guidance in debates over enhancement, and indeed it has the result that alterations to human nature have been commonplace in the history of our species. Aristotelian conceptions of species natures, which are currently fashionable in meta-ethics and applied ethics, have no basis in biological fact. Moreover, because our folk psychology (...) finds this misleading Aristotelian conception highly tempting, we are in fact better off if we refrain from mentioning human nature altogether in debates over enhancement. Content Type Journal Article Category Special Issue Pages 1-16 DOI 10.1007/s13347-012-0063-x Authors Tim Lewens, Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge, Free School Lane, Cambridge, CB2 3RH UK Journal Philosophy & Technology Online ISSN 2210-5441 Print ISSN 2210-5433. (shrink)

Hilary Putnam once suggested that “the actual existence of sets as ‘intangible objects’ suffers… from a generalization of a problem first pointed out by Paul Benacerraf… are sets a kind of function or are functions a sort of set?” Sadly, he did not elaborate; my aim, here, is to do so on his behalf. There are well-known methods for treating sets as functions and functions as sets. But these do not raise any obvious philosophical or foundational puzzles. For that, we (...) first need to provide a full-fledged function theory. I supply such a theory: it axiomatizes the iterative notion of function in exactly the same sense that ZF axiomatizes the iterative notion of set. Indeed, this function theory is synonymous with ZF. It might seem that set theory and function theory present us with rival foundations for mathematics, since they postulate different ontologies. But appearances are deceptive. Set theory and function theory provide the very same judicial foundation for mathematics. They do not supply rival metaphysical foundations; indeed, if they supply metaphysical foundations at all, then they supply the very same metaphysical foundations. (shrink)

A 2015 experiment by Hanson and Delft colleagues provided further confirmation that the quantum world violates the Bell inequalities, being the first Bell test to close two known experimental loopholes simultaneously. The experiment was also taken to provide new evidence of ‘spooky action at a distance’. Here we argue for caution about the latter claim. The Delft experiment relies on entanglement swapping, and our main claim is that this geometry introduces an additional loophole in the argument from violation of the (...) Bell inequalities to action at a distance: the apparent action at a distance may be an artifact of ‘collider bias’. In the absence of retrocausality, the sensitivity of such experiments to this ‘Collider Loophole’ depends on the temporal relation between the entanglement swapping measurement C and the two measurements A and B between which we seek to infer a causal connection. CL looms large if the C is in the future of A and B, but not if C is in the past. The Delft experiment itself is the intermediate case, in which the separation is spacelike. We argue that this leaves it vulnerable to CL, unable to establish conclusively that it avoids it. (shrink)

Against transmission -- For attention -- Education in the minor key -- Anthropology, art and the university.

Workplace AI is transforming labor but decisions on which AI applications are developed or implemented are made with little to no input from workers themselves. In this piece for AI & Society, I argue for nationalization as a strategy for democratizing AI.

Consider a variant of the usual story about the iterative conception of sets. As usual, at every stage, you find all the (bland) sets of objects which you found earlier. But you also find the result of tapping any earlier-found object with any magic wand (from a given stock of magic wands). -/- By varying the number and behaviour of the wands, we can flesh out this idea in many different ways. This paper's main Theorem is that any loosely constructive (...) way of fleshing out this idea is synonymous with a ZF-like theory. -/- This Theorem has rich applications; it realizes John Conway's (1976) Mathematicians' Liberation Movement; and it connects with a lovely idea due to Alonzo Church (1974). (shrink)

This essay highlights a methodological weakness in Foucault’s genealogy of neoliberalism often mistaken for a biographical shift in his philosophy. Naissance de la biopolitique is sometimes interpreted as evidence for Foucault’s conversion to neoliberalism, whereas its lack of critical acuity stems rather from its methodological limitations. Through a discussion of the “neoliberal conversion”-thesis, I highlight those limitations. Though Foucault’s appreciative tone in his neoliberalism lectures is surprising, his aim is mainly to defamiliarize readers from the dominant mode of neoliberal rationality (...) so that they can affirm the creative potential to foster new conducts, new identities, and new rationalities. Foucault did not convert to neoliberalism, but sought to destabilise it by revealing its historical contingency. However, as Foucault’s surprisingly positive tone shows, this strategy is insufficient for combatting neoliberalism. There is an elective affinity between Foucault’s own politics of creative self-reinvention and neoliberalism’s promise of a non-invasive, post-disciplinary government by indirect economic incentives alone. Foucault’s libertine stance toward subjectivity hence seems easily integrated into a neoliberal conduct of conducts. I propose to supplement Foucault’s genealogical method as he deploys it in Naissance de la biopolitique with an immanent critique of neoliberalism from the perspective of the governed. Rather than investigating neoliberal rationality as a promising endeavour for the future, we can study the real-life implementations of neoliberalism and their effects on subjective conducts. Neoliberal rationality is involved in a permanent struggle to shape the conduct of conducts along entrepreneurial and competitive lines, but subjects are refractory living beings whose conducts are not so simply transformed. Neoliberalism has had to give up its post-disciplinary aspirations and turn to the power of discipline and abandonment to enforce neoliberal norms of conduct. Neoliberalism has transformed into a negative biopolitics that sacrifices the lives of unproductive subjects as collateral damage to the overall welfare of the population. Immanent critique thereby reveals how subjects are pushed beyond their limits until neoliberal norms of conduct become unbearable. This intolerability of neoliberalism cannot be directly deduced from the writings of Becker, Friedman, or Hayek.111 It becomes manifest in the confrontation between neoliberal rationality and the material living bodies of finite human beings unable to be stretched in the ways neoliberalism requires. (shrink)

It is common to distinguish between conscious mental episodes and standing mental states — those mental features like beliefs, desires or intentions, which a subject can have even if she is not conscious, or when her consciousness is occupied with something else. This paper presents a view of standing mental states according to which these states are less real than episodes of consciousness. It starts from the usual view that states like beliefs and desires are not directly present to the (...) mind, but are posited to explain thought and behaviour. Ascriptions of these states are attempts to model a subject’s “Worldview”: the totality of their cognitive, conative and affective dispositions. When ascribing standing states, we often significantly simplify the complexity of the Worldview. This simplification is a feature of models in general. The Worldview is also distinguished from the “Habitus” — the totality of dispositions that are associated with character traits. As with the Worldview, modelling the Habitus should be treated as a useful simplification of a very complex reality. It is argued that although these models have some similarities with fictions, these similarities are outweighed by the dissimilarities. (shrink)

Adventures in cutting-edge ideas about consciousness, from bestselling non-fiction writer Tim Parks. Hardly a day goes by without some discussion about whether computers can be conscious, whether our universe is some kind of simulation, whether mind is a unique quality of human beings or spread out across the universe like butter on bread. Most philosophers believe that our experience is locked inside our skulls, an unreliable representation of a quite different reality outside. Colour, smell and sound, they tell us, occur (...) only in our heads. Yet when neuroscientists look inside our brains to see what's going on, they find only billions of neurons exchanging electrical impulses and releasing chemical substances. Five years ago, in a chance conversation, Tim Parks came across a radical new theory of consciousness that undercut this interpretation. This set him off on a quest to discover more about this fascinating topic and also led him to observe his own experience with immense attention. Out of My Head tells the gripping, highly personal, often surprisingly funny, story of Tim Parks' quest to discover more about this fascinating topic. It frames complex metaphysical considerations and technical laboratory experiments in terms we can all understand. Above all, it invites us to see space, time, colour and smell, sounds and sensations in an entirely new way. The world will feel more real after reading it. (shrink)

John McDowell is one of the most widely read philosophers in recent years. His engagement with a philosophy of language, mind and ethics and with philosophers ranging from Aristotle and Wittgenstein to Hegel and Gadamer make him one of the most original and outstanding philosophical thinkers of the post-war period. In this clear and engaging book Tim Thornton introduces and examines the full range of McDowell's thought. After a helpful introduction setting out McDowell's general view of philosophy Thornton introduces and (...) explains the following topics: • Wittgenstein on philosophy, normativity and understanding • value judgements • theories of meaning and sense • singular thought and Cartesianism • experience, knowledge and openness to the world • Mind and World and idealism • action and the debate with Hubert Dreyfus on conceptual content and skilled coping. This second edition has been significantly revised and expanded to include new sections on: McDowell's work on disjunctivism and criticisms of it; a new chapter on McDowell's modification of his account of perceptual experience and conceptual content and criticisms by Charles Travis; and a new chapter on action and McDowell's engagement with Hubert Dreyfus and the debate concerning skilled coping and mindedness. The addition of a glossary makes John McDowell, second edition essential reading for those studying McDowell, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, ethics and epistemology, as well as for students of the recent history of analytical philosophy generally. Tim Thornton is Professor of Philosophy and Mental Health at University of Central Lancashire, UK. He is author of Essential Philosophy of Psychiatry (2007), Wittgenstein on Language and Thought (1998), co-author of the Oxford Textbook of Philosophy and Psychiatry (2006), and Tacit Knowledge (2013) and co-editor of the Oxford Handbook of Philosophy and Psychiatry (2013). (shrink)

What does imagination do for our perception of the world? Why should reality be broken off from our imagining of it? It was not always thus, and in these essays, Tim Ingold sets out to heal the break between reality and imagination at the heart of modern thought and science. Imagining for Real joins with a lifeworld ever in creation, attending to its formative processes, corresponding with the lives of its human and nonhuman inhabitants. Building on his two previous essay (...) collections, The Perception of the Environment and Being Alive, this book rounds off the extraordinary intellectual project of one of the world's most renowned anthropologists. Offering hope in troubled times, these essays speak to coming generations in a language that surpasses disciplinary divisions. They will be essential reading not only to for anthropologists but also for students in fields ranging from art, aesthetics, architecture and archaeology to philosophy, psychology, human geography, comparative literature and theology. (shrink)

The Meno is one of the foundational dialogues of the Platonic tradition - it initiates a series of investigations into subjects which lie at the heart of philosophy: What is virtue? How is it acquired?This edition of Taylor's revision of Sydenham's translation adds three introductory essays by Tim Addley and an extract from Procclus' commentary on The Republic on Virtue.

The premise of The Diversity of Darkness and Shameful Behaviors is to emphasize the need for enlightened, rational thinking as a paradigm of thought as the culture of shamelessness continues to grow and cast its repulsive dark shadow over those who embrace enlightened reason and basic human rights for all. This unique book utilizes evidence-based approaches in the examination of human behaviors in society that have become increasingly shameful and tolerated among a growing number of enablers. Key features include a (...) combination of academic analysis that draws on numerous and specific examples of the diversity of darkness that encompasses the world along with a balanced practical, everyday-life approach to the study of the socio-political world we live in through the use of contemporary culture references and featured popular culture boxes. Social scientists, social thinkers and the general audience alike will be intrigued and perhaps dismayed by the diversity of shamefully hateful and shamefully deadly topics covered. We should realize that humanity has the intellect to accomplish great feats but heed the growing culture of shamelessness, irrationality and the diversity of darkness. (shrink)

Can a person be harmed or wronged by being brought into existence? Can a person be benefited by being brought into existence? Following David Heyd, I refer to these questions as “genethical questions”. This chapter examines three broad approaches to genethics: the no-faults model, the dual-benchmark model, and the parity model. The no-faults model holds that coming into existence is not properly subject to moral evaluation, at least so far as the interests of the person that is to be brought (...) into existence are concerned. The dual benchmark model allows that coming into existence can be subject to moral evaluation, but holds that our judgments about the kinds of lives worth starting ought not be aligned with our judgments about the kinds of lives worth sustaining. I argue against both the no-faults and dual benchmark models. In their place, I argue for a parity approach to genethics, according to which our judgments about the conditions under which life is worth creating ought to be constrained by our judgments about the conditions under which life is worth continuing. (shrink)

Which systems/organisms are conscious? New tests for consciousness (‘C-tests’) are urgently needed. There is persisting uncertainty about when consciousness arises in human development, when it is lost due to neurological disorders and brain injury, and how it is distributed in nonhuman species. This need is amplified by recent and rapid developments in artificial intelligence (AI), neural organoids, and xenobot technology. Although a number of C-tests have been proposed in recent years, most are of limited use, and currently we have no (...) C-tests for many of the populations for which they are most critical. Here, we identify challenges facing any attempt to develop C-tests, propose a multidimensional classification of such tests, and identify strategies that might be used to validate them. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Limits for Uncommunicative Partners How Much Does a Particle Need to Know? Evaluation of Results Simulators Does Nature Simulate?

Philosophy and model theory frequently meet one another. Philosophy and Model Theory aims to understand their interactions -/- Model theory is used in every ‘theoretical’ branch of analytic philosophy: in philosophy of mathematics, in philosophy of science, in philosophy of language, in philosophical logic, and in metaphysics. But these wide-ranging appeals to model theory have created a highly fragmented literature. On the one hand, many philosophically significant mathematical results are found only in mathematics textbooks: these are aimed squarely at mathematicians; (...) they typically presuppose that the reader has a significant background in mathematics; and little clue is given as to their philosophical significance. On the other hand, the philosophical applications of these results are then scattered across disconnected pockets of papers, separated by decades or more. -/- The first aim of Philosophy and Model Theory, then, is to consider the philosophical uses of model theory. On a technical level, we try to show how philosophically significant results connect to one another, and also to state the best version of a result for philosophical purposes. On a philosophical level, we show how similar dialectical situations arise repeatedly, across fragmented debates in varied philosophical areas. -/- The second aim of Philosophy and Model Theory, though, is to consider the philosophy of model theory. Model theory itself is rarely taken as the subject matter of philosophising (contrast this, say, with the philosophy of biology, or the philosophy of set theory). But model theory is a beautiful part of pure mathematics, and worthy of philosophical study in its own right. (shrink)

A renowned anthropologist's profound and personal correspondences with the world we live in.

A new theory of aesthetics and music, grounded in the collision between language and the body. In this book, Tim Hodgkinson proposes a theory of aesthetics and music grounded in the boundary between nature and culture within the human being. His analysis discards the conventional idea of the human being as an integrated whole in favor of a rich and complex field in which incompatible kinds of information—biological and cultural—collide. It is only when we acknowledge the clash of body and (...) language within human identity that we can understand how art brings forth the special form of subjectivity potentially present in aesthetic experiences. As a young musician, Hodgkinson realized that music was, in some mysterious way, “of itself”—not isolated from life, but not entirely continuous with it, either. Drawing on his experiences as a musician, composer, and anthropologist, Hodgkinson shows how when we listen to music a new subjectivity comes to life in ourselves. The normal mode of agency is suspended, and the subjectivity inscribed in the music comes toward us as a formative “other” to engage with. But this is not our reproduction of the composer's own subjectivation; when we perform our listening of the music, we are sharing the formative risks taken by its maker. To examine this in practice, Hodgkinson looks at the work of three composers who have each claimed to stimulate a new way of listening: Pierre Schaeffer, John Cage, and Helmut Lachenmann. (shrink)

Shadow pictures radically changed the modern understanding of pictorial concepts. Tim Otto Roth’s broadly based cultural history traces the consequences of this revolution of methods of vision and image production in the sciences and the arts. By means of abundant image and text sources he develops a picture theory based on physics and projective geometry. This definitive book comprising 500 pages provides a generally understandable and vivid insight in the history of shadowgraphs from the 19th century until the present age. (...) A crucial role play scientific processes as the X-ray technique, but also the artistic examination of space and body. (shrink)

Pt. I. Wittgenstein. Introduction -- Short biography -- Pt. II. Philosophy. Wittgenstein and philosophy -- Wittgenstein's later philosophy -- Pt. III. Theology. Wittgenstein and theology -- Wittgenstein and the theologian -- Wittgenstein in theological practice -- Explanations, doubt and redemption.

Philosophical commentaries on the difficult task of forming a deep, respectful relationship with the land.