Download or read book Infinite Regress Arguments written by Claude Gratton and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2009-12-15 with total page 219 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Infinite regress arguments are part of a philosopher's tool kit of argumentation. But how sharp or strong is this tool? How effectively is it used? The typical presentation of infinite regress arguments throughout history is so succinct and has so many gaps that it is often unclear how an infinite regress is derived, and why an infinite regress is logically problematic, and as a result, it is often difficult to evaluate infinite regress arguments. These consequences of our customary way of using this tool indicate that there is a need for a theory to re-orient our practice. My general approach to contribute to such a theory, consists of collecting and evaluating as many infinite regress arguments as possible, comparing and contrasting many of the formal and non-formal properties, looking for recurring patterns, and identifying the properties that appeared essential to those patterns. Two very general questions guided this work: (1) How are infinite regresses generated in infinite regress arguments? (2) How do infinite regresses logically function as premises in an argument? In answering these questions I clarify the notion of an infinite regress; identify different logical forms of infinite regresses; describe different kinds of infinite regress arguments; distinguish the rhetoric from the logic in infinite regress arguments; and suggest ways of improving our discussion and our practice of constructing and evaluating these arguments.
Download or read book Infinite Regress Arguments written by Jan Willem Wieland and published by Springer Science & Business. This book was released on 2014-04-26 with total page 73 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book on infinite regress arguments provides (i) an up-to-date overview of the literature on the topic, (ii) ready-to-use insights for all domains of philosophy, and (iii) two case studies to illustrate these insights in some detail. Infinite regress arguments play an important role in all domains of philosophy. There are infinite regresses of reasons, obligations, rules, and disputes, and all are supposed to have their own moral. Yet most of them are involved in controversy. Hence the question is: what exactly is an infinite regress argument, and when is such an argument a good one?
Download or read book The Kalam Cosmological Argument Volume 1 written by Paul Copan and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2017-11-16 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Did the universe begin to exist? If so, did it have a cause? Or could it have come into existence uncaused, from nothing? These questions are taken up by the medieval-though recently-revived-kalam cosmological argument, which has arguably been the most discussed philosophical argument for God's existence in recent decades. The kalam's line of reasoning maintains that the series of past events cannot be infinite but rather is finite. Since the universe could not have come into being uncaused, there must be a transcendent cause of the universe's beginning, a conclusion supportive of theism. This anthology on the philosophical arguments for the finitude of the past asks: Is an infinite series of past events metaphysically possible? Should actual infinites be restricted to theoretical mathematics, or can an actual infinite exist in the concrete world? These essays by kalam proponents and detractors engage in lively debate about the nature of infinity and its conundrums; about frequently-used kalam argument paradoxes of Tristram Shandy, the Grim Reaper, and Hilbert's Hotel; and about the infinity of the future.
Download or read book Brentano s Mind written by Markus Textor and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mark Textor presents a critical study of the work of one of the most important thinkers of the 19th century. How is the mental distinct from the physical? What must awareness of seeing, hearing, etc. be like to be infallible? What does the unity of a conscious mental life consist in? Textor shows how Brentano helps us to answer these questions
Download or read book Theism and Ultimate Explanation written by Timothy O'Connor and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2012-02-20 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An expansive, yet succinct, analysis of the Philosophy of Religion – from metaphysics through theology. Organized into two sections, the text first examines truths concerning what is possible and what is necessary. These chapters lay the foundation for the book’s second part – the search for a metaphysical framework that permits the possibility of an ultimate explanation that is correct and complete. A cutting-edge scholarly work which engages with the traditional metaphysician’s quest for a true ultimate explanation of the most general features of the world we inhabit Develops an original view concerning the epistemology and metaphysics of modality, or truths concerning what is possible or necessary Applies this framework to a re-examination of the cosmological argument for theism Defends a novel version of the Leibnizian cosmological argument
Download or read book Epistemology and the Regress Problem written by Scott Aikin and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-11-23 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the last decade, the familiar problem of the regress of reasons has returned to prominent consideration in epistemology. And with the return of the problem, evaluation of the options available for its solution is begun anew. Reason’s regress problem, roughly put, is that if one has good reasons to believe something, one must have good reason to hold those reasons are good. And for those reasons, one must have further reasons to hold they are good, and so a regress of reasons looms. In this new study, Aikin presents a full case for infinitism as a response to the problem of the regress of reasons. Infinitism is the view that one must have a non-terminating chain of reasons in order to be justified. The most defensible form of infinitism, he argues, is that of a mixed theory – that is, epistemic infinitism must be consistent with and integrate other solutions to the regress problem.
Download or read book Plato s Parmenides written by Samuel Scolnicov and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2003-07-08 with total page 207 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Of all Plato’s dialogues, the Parmenides is notoriously the most difficult to interpret. Scholars of all periods have disagreed about its aims and subject matter. The interpretations have ranged from reading the dialogue as an introduction to the whole of Platonic metaphysics to seeing it as a collection of sophisticated tricks, or even as an elaborate joke. This work presents an illuminating new translation of the dialogue together with an extensive introduction and running commentary, giving a unified explanation of the Parmenides and integrating it firmly within the context of Plato's metaphysics and methodology. Scolnicov shows that in the Parmenides Plato addresses the most serious challenge to his own philosophy: the monism of Parmenides and the Eleatics. In addition to providing a serious rebuttal to Parmenides, Plato here re-formulates his own theory of forms and participation, arguments that are central to the whole of Platonic thought, and provides these concepts with a rigorous logical and philosophical foundation. In Scolnicov's analysis, the Parmenides emerges as an extension of ideas from Plato's middle dialogues and as an opening to the later dialogues. Scolnicov’s analysis is crisp and lucid, offering a persuasive approach to a complicated dialogue. This translation follows the Greek closely, and the commentary affords the Greekless reader a clear understanding of how Scolnicov’s interpretation emerges from the text. This volume will provide a valuable introduction and framework for understanding a dialogue that continues to generate lively discussion today.
Download or read book Approaching Infinity written by M. Huemer and published by Palgrave Macmillan. This book was released on 2016-03-14 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Approaching Infinity addresses seventeen paradoxes of the infinite, most of which have no generally accepted solutions. The book addresses these paradoxes using a new theory of infinity, which entails that an infinite series is uncompletable when it requires something to possess an infinite intensive magnitude. Along the way, the author addresses the nature of numbers, sets, geometric points, and related matters. The book addresses the need for a theory of infinity, and reviews both old and new theories of infinity. It discussing the purposes of studying infinity and the troubles with traditional approaches to the problem, and concludes by offering a solution to some existing paradoxes.
Download or read book All Or Nothing written by Paul W. Franks and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2005-10-30 with total page 462 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Interest in German Idealism--not just Kant, but Fichte and Hegel as well--has recently developed within analytic philosophy, which traditionally defined itself in opposition to the Idealist tradition. Yet one obstacle remains especially intractable: the Idealists' longstanding claim that philosophy must be systematic. In this work, the first overview of the German Idealism that is both conceptual and methodological, Paul W. Franks offers a philosophical reconstruction that is true to the movement's own times and resources and, at the same time, deeply relevant to contemporary thought. At the center of the book are some neglected but critical questions about German Idealism: Why do Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel think that philosophy's main task is the construction of a system? Why do they think that every part of this system must derive from a single, immanent and absolute principle? Why, in short, must it be all or nothing? Through close examination of the major Idealists as well as the overlooked figures who influenced their reading of Kant, Franks explores the common ground and divergences between the philosophical problems that motivated Kant and those that, in turn, motivated the Idealists. The result is a characterization of German Idealism that reveals its sources as well as its pertinence--and its challenge--to contemporary philosophical naturalism.
Download or read book The Puzzle of Existence written by Tyron Goldschmidt and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-02-05 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This groundbreaking volume investigates the most fundamental question of all: Why is there something rather than nothing? The question is explored from diverse and radical perspectives: religious, naturalistic, platonistic and skeptical. Does science answer the question? Or does theology? Does everything need an explanation? Or can there be brute, inexplicable facts? Could there have been nothing whatsoever? Or is there any being that could not have failed to exist? Is the question meaningful after all? The volume advances cutting-edge debates in metaphysics, philosophy of cosmology and philosophy of religion, and will intrigue and challenge readers interested in any of these subjects.
Download or read book Philosophical Reasoning written by John Arthur Passmore and published by . This book was released on 1961 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book New Proofs for the Existence of God written by Robert J. Spitzer and published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. This book was released on 2010-04-15 with total page 334 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Responding to contemporary popular atheism, Robert J. Spitzer's New Proofs for the Existence of God examines the considerable evidence for God and creation that has come to light from physics and philosophy during the last forty years. --from publisher description.
Download or read book Five Modes of Scepticism written by Stefan Sienkiewicz and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2019-03-28 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Five Modes of Scepticism examines the argument forms that lie at the heart of Pyrrhonian scepticism as expressed in the writings of Sextus Empiricus. These are the Agrippan modes of disagreement, hypothesis, infinite regression, reciprocity and relativity; modes which are supposed to bring about that quintessentially sceptical mental state of suspended judgement. Stefan Sienkiewicz analyses how the modes are supposed to do this, both individually and collectively, and from two perspectives. On the one hand there is the perspective of the sceptic's dogmatic opponent and on the other there is the perspective of the sceptic himself. Epistemically speaking, the dogmatist and the sceptic are two different creatures with two different viewpoints. The book elucidates the corresponding differences in the argumentative structure of the modes depending on which of these perspectives is adopted. Previous treatments of the modes have interpreted them from a dogmatic perspective; one of the tasks of the present work is to reorient the way in which scholars have traditionally engaged with the modes. Sienkiewicz advocates moving away from the perspective of the sceptic's opponent - the dogmatist - towards the perspective of the sceptic and trying to make sense of how the sceptic can come to suspend judgement on the basis of the Agrippan modes.
Download or read book On Ideas written by Gail Fine and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1993 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the first book on Aristotle's important but neglected essay Peri ideon, 'On Ideas', to be published in English. Gail Fine explores the philosophical merits of Aristotle's criticisms of Plato, and relates their views to current debates about universals, properties, meaning, and knowledge. The full, annotated text of Peri ideon is included, with translation.
Download or read book Fading Foundations written by David Atkinson and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-06-26 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is open access under a CC BY 4.0 license.This book addresses the age-old problem of infinite regresses in epistemology. How can we ever come to know something if knowing requires having good reasons, and reasons can only be good if they are backed by good reasons in turn? The problem has puzzled philosophers ever since antiquity, giving rise to what is often called Agrippa's Trilemma. The current volume approaches the old problem in a provocative and thoroughly contemporary way. Taking seriously the idea that good reasons are typically probabilistic in character, it develops and defends a new solution that challenges venerable philosophical intuitions and explains why they were mistakenly held. Key to the new solution is the phenomenon of fading foundations, according to which distant reasons are less important than those that are nearby. The phenomenon takes the sting out of Agrippa's Trilemma; moreover, since the theory that describes it is general and abstract, it is readily applicable outside epistemology, notably to debates on infinite regresses in metaphysics. The book is a potential game-changer and a must for any advanced student or researcher in the field.
Download or read book Relativism and the Foundations of Philosophy written by Steven D. Hales and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2009-08-21 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A defense of the view that philosophical propositions are true in some perspectives and false in others, arguing that the rationalist, intuition-driven method of acquiring basic beliefs favored by analytic philosophy is not epistemically superior to such alternate belief-acquiring methods as religious revelation and the ritual use of hallucinogens. The grand and sweeping claims of many relativists might seem to amount to the argument that everything is relative—except the thesis of relativism. In this book, Steven Hales defends relativism, but in a more circumscribed form that applies specifically to philosophical propositions. His claim is that philosophical propositions are relatively true—true in some perspectives and false in others. Hales defends this argument first by examining rational intuition as the method by which philosophers come to have the beliefs they do. Analytic rationalism, he claims, has a foundational reliance on rational intuition as a method of acquiring basic beliefs. He then argues that there are other methods that people use to gain beliefs about philosophical topics that are strikingly analogous to rational intuition and examines two of these: Christian revelation and the ritual use of hallucinogens. Hales argues that rational intuition is not epistemically superior to either of these alternative methods. There are only three possible outcomes: we have no philosophical knowledge (skepticism); there are no philosophical propositions (naturalism); or there are knowable philosophical propositions, but our knowledge of them is relative to doxastic perspective. Hales defends relativism against the charge that it is self-refuting and answers a variety of objections to this account of relativism. Finally, he examines the most sweeping objection to relativism: that philosophical propositions are not merely relatively true, because there are no philosophical propositions—all propositions are ultimately empirical, as the naturalists contend. Hales's somewhat disturbing conclusion—that intuition-driven philosophy does produce knowledge, but not absolute knowledge—is sure to inspire debate among philosophers.
Download or read book The Kal m Cosmological Argument A Reassessment written by Jacobus Erasmus and published by Springer. This book was released on 2018-01-08 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers a discussion of the kalām cosmological argument, and presents a defence of a version of that argument after critically evaluating three of the most important versions of the argument. It argues that, since the versions of the kalām cosmological argument defended by Philoponus (c. 490–c. 570), al-Ghazālī (1058– 1111), and the contemporary philosopher, William Lane Craig, all deny the possibility of the existence of an actual infinite, these arguments are incompatible with Platonism and the view that God foreknows an endless future. This conclusion, however, is not a problem for the proponents of the kalām cosmological argument, for the book shows how the argument can be defended without denying the possibility of the actual infinite. In order to offer a comprehensive analysis of Philoponus and al-Ghazālī’s cosmological arguments, the book draws on recent English translations of some of their works. Next, the book advances a detailed argument against the popular argument based on the impossibility of an actual infinite. Finally, the book offers a unique defence of the kalām cosmological argument by defending philosophical arguments for a beginning of time that do not deny the actual infinite, evaluating which hypothesis best explains the discoveries of modern cosmology, and offering an argument in support of the premise that, if the universe came into existence, then God brought it into existence.
