welcomed by a new generation of students and scholars in all branches of learning.

The Nature of God explores a perennial problem in the philosophy of religion.

Given Heidegger’s inflammatory remarks about the intellectual poverty of modern logic, it may come as a surprise to be told that he has something to contribute to the philosophy of logic. One of the rewards of Daniel Dahlstrom’s Heidegger’s Concept of Truth is its argument that Heidegger can illuminate such issues in the philosophy of logic as the character of propositions, the nature of bivalence, and the concept of truth. Dahlstrom focuses on Heidegger’s work in the years immediately before and (...) after the publication of Being and Time, with particular emphasis on the lecture courses from this period, especially the one published as Logik: Die Frage nach der Wahrheit. (shrink)

The_ Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy_ is the most ambitious international philosophy project in many years. Edited by Edward Craig and assisted by thirty specialist subject editors, the REP consists of ten volumes of the world's most eminent philosophers writing for the needs of students and teachers of philosophy internationally. The REP is a project on an unparalleled scale: Over 2000 entries ranging from 500 to 15,000 words in length - thematic, biographical and national 10 volumes consisting of over 5 (...) million words of text plus considerable bibliographic material A Chief Editor and thirty specialist Subject Editors from across the world Over 1200 authors from all over the world. The importance of the REP is not to be found just in the sheer size of the project but also in its breadth of subject matter. It covers: The core of most Anglo-American philosophy - the metaphysical, epistemological and logical questions The usual menu of ethics, political philosophy and the history of philosophy The philosophy of other cultures - from Chinese, Arabic and Jewish philosophy to the philosophy of Africa and Latin America The most impressive range of authors have been gathered together on this unique project: William Alston, Roderick Chisolm, Fred Dretske, Joel Feinberg, Sandra Harding, Larry Laudan, Martha Nussbaum, Richard Popkin, Richard Rorty, Alan Ryan, Gyatri Chakravorty Spivak, Stephen Stich, Patrick Suppes and Bernard Williams, to name just a few. Also available online: www.rep.routledge.com. (shrink)

Omniscience is the divine attribute of possessing complete or unlimited knowledge. This article examines motivations for taking such a property to be a divine attribute, attempts to define or analyse omniscience, possible limitations on the extent of divine knowledge, and, finally, objections either to the coherence of the concept or to its compatibility with other divine attributes or with widely accepted claims.

Do we invent our moral absolutes in order to make society workable? Or are these enduring principles expressed to us by some transcendent or Godlike authority? Efforts to resolve this conundrum have perplexed, sometimes inflamed, our best minds for centuries, but the natural sciences are telling us more and more about the choices we make and our reasons for making them.

In this powerful new study Edward Baring sheds fresh light on Jacques Derrida, one of the most influential yet controversial intellectuals of the twentieth century. Reading Derrida from a historical perspective and drawing on new archival sources, The Young Derrida and French Philosophy shows how Derrida's thought arose in the closely contested space of post-war French intellectual life, developing in response to Sartrian existentialism, religious philosophy and the structuralism that found its base at the École Normale Supe;rieure. In a (...) history of the philosophical movements and academic institutions of post-war France, Baring paints a portrait of a community caught between humanism and anti-humanism, providing a radically new interpretation of the genesis of deconstruction and of one of the most vibrant intellectual moments of modern times. (shrink)

This paper identifies three positions on the relationship between language and experience, the third of which I was not acquainted with before from my reading. It seems absurd.

Post-foundational politics and democracy -- Agonism and democracy -- A typology of agonistic democracy -- Agonistic democracy and the question of institutions -- Agonistic democracy and the limits of popular participation -- Populism, representation, and the popular will -- Political liberalism, contingency and agonistic pluralism -- Liberalism, agonism, and democracy.

This paper develops an interpretation of the doctrine of the Trinity, drawn from Augustine and the Athanasian Creed. Such a doctrine includes divinity claims (the persons are divine), diversity claims (the persons are distinct), and a uniqueness claim (there is only one God). I propose and defend an interpretation of these theses according to which they are neither logically incompatible nor do they do entail that there are three (or four) gods.

The sciences may be conceptualized as a hierarchy ranked by level of organization (e.g., many‐body physics ranks above particle physics). Each science serves as an antidiscipline for the science above it; that is, between each pair, tense but creative interplay is inevitable. Biology has advanced through such tension between its subdisciplines and now can serve as an antidiscipline for the social sciences—for anthropology, for example, by examining the connection between cultural and biological evolution; for psychology, by addressing the nature of (...) learning and the structure of the unconscious; for economics, by examining economically irrational behavior and by comparing economic activity in humans and other species. Sociology, concerned mainly with advanced literate societies, is relatively remote from the genetic basis of human social behavior. However, moving between biological and social levels of organization generates richness and points to new and unexpected principles. (shrink)

Frege and Heidegger appear to appear to have diametrically opposed attitudes towards logic. Frege thinks logic must govern any investigation whatsoever, whereas Heidegger (in "What is Metaphysics?") apparently wants to dismantle logic. But when they try to explicate the nature of judgment, a striking similarity emerges. For while their accounts of judgment are radically different, each finds his account to be, by his own lights, _inexpressible<D>. This paper shows how Heidegger and Frege arrive at their respective accounts of judgment, explains (...) why they regard the status of their accounts as problematic, and explores and evaluates their responses to their parallel predicaments. (shrink)

One of the strongest arguments for the incompatibility of divine foreknowledge and human free action appeals to the apparent fixity or necessity of the past. Two leading responses to the argument—Ockhamism, which denies a premiss of the argument, and the so-called “eternity solution”, which holds that strictly speaking God does not have foreknowledge—have both come under attack on similar grounds. Neither response, it is alleged, is adequate to the case of divine prophecy. In this paper I shall first state the (...) argument in question and the two responses to it. I shall then consider objections to these responses, focusing primarily on how they deal with prophecy. (shrink)

Scholars have known for some time that Plotinus' treatment of memory forms an important part of his philosophy; and while there are various points of view from which his doctrine can be approached, one seems singularly important. His analysis of memory boldly contrasts conscious and unconscious behaviour in human beings and so materially advances our knowledge of his concept of conscious experience.

I discuss conditions for the validity of proxy consent to treatment on behalf of an incompetent person. I distinguish those incompetents who, when previously competent, expressed an opinion on the treatment in question from those who were never competent or who, though previously competent, never expressed an opinion on the proposed treatment. In the former case valid proxy consent usually requires respecting the stated wishes of the patient. The latter case is more difficult. I consider a widely-held principle which appeals (...) to the counterfactual wishes of the incompetent person. I argue that it is unacceptable and propose in its place a principle having to do with the best interests of the patient. Keywords: proxy consent, informed consent, competence, hypothetical wishes, substituted judgment, counterfactual wishes CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)

Willard Van Orman Quine's work revolutionized the fields of epistemology, semantics and ontology. At the heart of his philosophy are several interconnected doctrines: his rejection of conventionalism and of the linguistic doctrine of logical and mathematical truth, his rejection of the analytic/synthetic distinction, his thesis of the indeterminacy of translation and his thesis of the inscrutability of reference. In this book Edward Becker sets out to interpret and explain these doctrines. He offers detailed analyses of the relevant texts, discusses (...) Quine's views on meaning, reference and knowledge, and shows how Quine's views developed over the years. He also proposes a new version of the linguistic doctrine of logical truth, and a new way of rehabilitating analyticity. His rich exploration of Quine's thought will interest all those seeking to understand and evaluate the work of one of the most important philosophers of the second half of the twentieth century. (shrink)

It seems impossible that organisms selected to maximize their genetic legacy could also be moral agents in a world in which taking risks for strangers is sometimes morally laudable. Brian Zamulinski argues that it is possible if morality is an evolutionary by-product rather than an adaptation.Evolutionary Intuitionism presents a new evolutionary theory of human morality. Zamulinski explains the evolution of foundational attitudes, whose relationships to acts constitute moral facts. With foundational attitudes and the resulting moral facts in place, he shows (...) how they ground a plausible normative morality, give answers to meta-ethical questions, and provide an account of moral motivation. He explains the nature of moral intuitions and, thus, of our access to the moral facts. He shows that the theory makes confirmed empirical predictions, including the observable variation in moral views. The combination of intuitionism and evolutionary ethics enables Zamulinski to overcome the standard objections to both.Evolutionary Intuitionism is a unified theory of human morality that explains how an objective morality could develop naturally in a physical world like ours, among organisms like us. (shrink)

Scholars have known for some time that Plotinus' treatment of memory forms an important part of his philosophy; and while there are various points of view from which his doctrine can be approached, one seems singularly important. His analysis of memory boldly contrasts conscious and unconscious behaviour in human beings and so materially advances our knowledge of his concept of conscious experience.

This essay is a reflection on how ethical violations continue to have an impact across generations within families of vulnerable populations that have experienced significant breaches in biomedical research. The focus is on the surviving family members of the United States Public Health Service Syphilis Study at Tuskegee (USPHS). Emphasis will be on responsible ethical practices in research and the use of an unique approach narrative storytelling to address the needs of family descendents who have been impacted by the USPHS (...) Syphilis Study. (shrink)

A unique and much needed book exploring the debt Deleuze owes to Kantian arguments and principles.