Download or read book Assertion and Conditionals written by Anthony Appiah and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1985-09-19 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book develops in detail the simple idea that assertion is the expression of belief. In it the author puts forward a version of 'probabilistic semantics' which acknowledges that we are not perfectly rational, and which offers a significant advance in generality on theories of meaning couched in terms of truth conditions. It promises to challenge a number of entrenched and widespread views about the relations of language and mind. Part I presents a functionalist account of belief, worked through a modified form of decision theory. In Part II the author generates a theory of meaning in terms of 'assertibility conditions', whereby to know the meaning of an assertion is to know the belief it expresses.
Download or read book Assertion and Conditionals written by Anthony Appiah and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2011-10-07 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book develops in detail the simple idea that assertion is the expression of belief. In it the author puts forward a version of 'probabilistic semantics' which acknowledges that we are not perfectly rational, and which offers a significant advance in generality on theories of meaning couched in terms of truth conditions. It promises to challenge a number of entrenched and widespread views about the relations of language and mind. Part I presents a functionalist account of belief, worked through a modified form of decision theory. In Part II the author generates a theory of meaning in terms of 'assertibility conditions', whereby to know the meaning of an assertion is to know the belief it expresses.
Download or read book Knowledge and Conditionals written by Robert C. Stalnaker and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2019-06-27 with total page 395 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Robert C. Stalnaker presents a set of essays on the structure of inquiry. In the first part he focuses on the concepts of knowledge, belief, and partial belief, and on the rules and procedures we use - or ought to use - to determine what to believe, and what to claim that we know. In the second part he examines conditional statements and conditional beliefs, their role in epistemology, and their relations to causal and explanatory concepts, such as dispositions, objective chance, relations of dependence, and independence. A central concern of the book is the interaction of different cognitive perspectives - the ways in which the attitudes of rational agents are or should be influenced by critical reflection on their present cognitive situation, on their own cognitive situations at other times, and on the cognitive situations of others with whom they interact. The general picture that is developed is naturalistic, following Hume in rejecting a substantive role for pure reason in the defense of inductive rules, and in giving causal concepts a central role in the description and explanation of our cognitive practices. However, Stalnaker rejects the side of Hume that aims to reduce concepts involving natural necessity to more basic descriptive concepts. Instead, he argues that the development of inductive rules and practices takes place in interaction with the development of concepts for giving a theoretical description of the world.
Download or read book Suppose and Tell written by Timothy Williamson and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2020 with total page 287 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What does 'if' mean? Timothy Williamson presents a controversial new approach to understanding conditional thinking, which is central to human cognitive life. He argues that in using 'if' we rely on psychological heuristics, fast and frugal methods which can lead us to trust faulty data and prematurely reject simple theories.
Download or read book Conditionals written by Michael Woods and published by Clarendon Press. This book was released on 1997-05-22 with total page 166 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Conditionals has at its centre an extended essay on this problematic and much-debated subject in the philosophy of language and logic, which the widely respected Oxford philosopher Michael Woods had been preparing for publication at the time of his death in 1993. Woods discusses the distinction between different kinds of conditionals, and then goes on to cover a range of topics, including assertibility, conditional probability, possible-worlds theories, and conditional commands and questions. He ends up sketching a new theory of counterfactual conditionals. This essay is edited for publication by Wood's friend and colleague David Wiggins, and accompanied by a commentary specially written by a leading expert on the topic, Dorothy Edgington. The masterful and original treatment of conditionals presented in this book will demand the attention of all philosophers working in this area.
Download or read book Conditionals Information and Inference written by Gabriele Kern-Isberner and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2005-05-18 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed postproceedings of the International Workshop on Conditionals, Information, and Inference, WCII 2002, held in Hagen, Germany in May 2002. The 9 revised full papers presented together with 3 invited papers by leading researchers in the area were carefully selected during iterated rounds of reviewing and improvement. The papers address all current issues of research on conditionals, ranging from foundational, theoretical, and methodological aspects to applications in various contexts of knowledge representation.
Download or read book Cognition and Conditionals written by Mike Oaksford and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2010 with total page 420 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The conditional, if...then, is probably the most important term in natural language and forms the core of systems of logic and mental representation. Cognition and Conditionals is the first volume for over 20 years that brings together recent developments in the cognitive science and psychology of conditional reasoning.
Download or read book Conditional Reasoning written by Raymond S. Nickerson and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2015 with total page 473 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book reviews the work of prominent psychologists and philosophers on conditional reasoning. It provides empirical research on how people deal with conditional arguments and examines how conditional statements are used and interpreted in everyday communication. It also includes philosophical and theoretical treatments of the mental processes that support conditional reasoning, making it an ideal resource for students, teachers, and researchers with a focus in cognition across disciplines.
Download or read book Meaning and Argument written by Ernest Lepore and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2012-09-14 with total page 350 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Meaning and Argument is a popular introduction to philosophy of logic and philosophy of language. Offers a distinctive philosophical, rather than mathematical, approach to logic Concentrates on symbolization and works out all the technical logic with truth tables instead of derivations Incorporates the insights of half a century's work in philosophy and linguistics on anaphora by Peter Geach, Gareth Evans, Hans Kamp, and Irene Heim among others Contains numerous exercises and a corresponding answer key An extensive appendix allows readers to explore subjects that go beyond what is usually covered in an introductory logic course Updated edition includes over a dozen new problem sets and revisions throughout Features an accompanying website at http://ruccs.rutgers.edu/~logic/MeaningArgument.html
Download or read book Meaning in Dialogue written by James Trafford and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-10-24 with total page 238 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book argues for a view in which processes of dialogue and interaction are taken to be foundational to reasoning, logic, and meaning. This is both a continuation, and a substantial modification, of an inferentialist approach to logic. As such, the book not only provides a critical introduction to the inferentialist view, but it also provides an argument that this shift in perspective has deep and foundational consequences for how we understand the nature of logic and its relationship with meaning and reasoning. This has been upheld by several technical results, including, for example a novel approach to logical paradox and logical revision, and an account of the internal justification of logical rules. The book shows that inferentialism is greatly strengthened, such that it can answer the most stringent criticisms of the view. This leads to a view of logic that emphasizes the dynamics of reasoning, provides a novel account of the justification and normativity of logical rules, thus leading to a new, attractive approach to the foundations of logic. The book addresses readers interested in philosophy of language, philosophical and mathematical logic, theories of reasoning, and also those who actively engage in current debates involving, for example, logical revision, and the relationship between logic and reasoning, from advanced undergraduates, to professional philosophers, mathematicians, and linguists.
Download or read book On the Logic of Ordinary Conditionals written by Robert N. McLaughlin and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 1990-07-05 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On the Logic of Ordinary Conditionals offers a formal treatment of the logic of a type of conditional found in natural speech which differs substantially from the material conditional of propositional logic and from the conditionals afforded by theories of possible worlds. Conventional and necessary conditionals are studied as well as factual ones.
Download or read book If P Then Q written by David Sanford and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2011-02-25 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This new edition includes three new chapters, updating the book to take into account developments in the field over the past fifteen years.
Download or read book Frege written by Michael Dummett and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 1981 with total page 756 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: No one has figured more prominently in the study of German philosopher Gottlob Frege than Michael Dummett. This highly acclaimed book is a major contribution to the philosophy of language as well as a systematic interpretation of Frege, indisputably the father of analytic philosophy. Frege: Philosophy of Language remains indispensable for an understanding of contemporary philosophy. Harvard University Press is pleased to reissue this classic book in paperback.
Download or read book Conditionals Paradox and Probability written by Lee Walters and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2021-02-11 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Conditionals, Paradox, and Probability brings together fifteen original essays by experts in philosophy and linguistics. These specially written chapters draw on themes from the work of Dorothy Edgington, the first woman to hold a chair in philosophy at the University of Oxford. The contributors to this volume focus on the key topics to which Edgington has made many important contributions, including conditionals, vagueness, the paradox of knowability, and probability. Their insights will be of interest to philosophers, linguists, and psychologists working in philosophical logic, natural language semantics, and reasoning.
Download or read book A Mathematics Sampler written by William P. Berlinghoff and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2001 with total page 672 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now in its fifth edition, A Mathematics Sampler presents mathematics as both science and art, focusing on the historical role of mathematics in our culture. It uses selected topics from modern mathematics--including computers, perfect numbers, and four-dimensional geometry--to exemplify the distinctive features of mathematics as an intellectual endeavor, a problem-solving tool, and a way of thinking about the rapidly changing world in which we live. A Mathematics Sampler also includes unique LINK sections throughout the book, each of which connects mathematical concepts with areas of interest throughout the humanities. The original course on which this text is based was cited as an innovative approach to liberal arts mathematics in Lynne Cheney's report, "50 HOURS: A Core Curriculum for College Students", published by the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Download or read book Conditionals and Prediction written by Barbara Dancygier and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1999-01-13 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers a new and in-depth analysis of English conditional sentences. In a wide-ranging discussion, Dancygier classifies conditional constructions according to time-reference and modality. She shows how the basic meaning parameters of conditionality correlate to formal parameters of the linguistic constructions which are used to express them. Dancygier suggests that the function of prediction is central to the definition of conditionality, and that conditional sentences display certain formal features which correlate to aspects of interpretation. Although the analysis is based primarily on English, it provides a theoretical framework that can be extended cross-linguistically to a broad range of grammatical phenomena. It will be essential reading for scholars and students concerned with the role of conditionals in English and many other languages.
Download or read book Thinking It Through written by Kwame Anthony Appiah and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2003-03-06 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Thinking it Through is a thorough, vividly written introduction to contemporary philosophy and some of the most crucial questions of human existence, including the nature of mind and knowledge, the status of moral claims, the existence of God, the role of science, and the mysteries of language. Noted philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah shows us what it means to "do" philosophy in our time and why it should matter to anyone who wishes to live a more thoughtful life. Opposing the common misconceptions that being a philosopher means espousing a set of philosophical beliefs--or being a follower of a particular thinker--Appiah argues that "the result of philosophical exploration is not the end of inquiry in a settled opinion, but a mind resting more comfortably among many possibilities, or else the reframing of the question, and a new inquiry." Ideal for introductory philosophy courses, Thinking It Through is organized around eight central topics--mind, knowledge, language, science, morality, politics, law, and metaphysics. It traces how philosophers in the past have considered each subject (how Hobbes, Wittgenstein, and Frege, for example, approached the problem of language) and then explores some of the major questions that still engage philosophers today. More importantly, Appiah not only explains what philosophers have thought but how they think, giving students examples that they can use in their own attempts to navigate the complex issues confronting any reflective person in the twenty-first century. Filled with concrete examples of how philosophers work, Thinking it Through guides students through the process of philosophical reflection and enlarges their understanding of the central questions of human life.
