Download or read book The Metaphysics of Practice written by Wilfrid Sellars and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2023-06-15 with total page 766 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Metaphysics of Practice brings together Wilfrid Sellars's writings on topics to do with action, community, and obligation: published essays, manuscripts, and correspondence. Sellars's practical philosophy was absolutely central to his overarching philosophical project of situating persons as practically rational, norm-governed animals within the world as described by an ideal science. The Editors' Introduction offers an overview of Sellars's metaethics, detailing its key features and explaining how these features are supposed to solve outstanding metaethical problems that not only faced Sellars's contemporaries, but continue to create lively debate among contemporary theorists. And the editors give chapter summaries indicating the main lines of argument and showing where each piece fits into Sellars's overall picture.
Download or read book Philosophy in Practice written by Adam Morton and published by Wiley-Blackwell. This book was released on 2003-12-30 with total page 464 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Philosophy in Practice is a completely new kind of introductory philosophy textbook, focusing on philosophy as an activity, rather than as a doctrine. Thoroughly revised edition of a popular introductory philosophy textbook. Contains new discussions of philosophy of religion, freedom, The Matrix, and the epistemology of the internet. Offers a wealth of pedagogical features to guide students through the text, including discussion plans at the beginning of each section, questions, chapter summaries, annotated guides to further reading, and a glossary. Classic passages from the history of philosophy are used throughout, and each part ends with a one-page historical summary. Includes an on-line teacher's guide with teaching suggestions, tests, and essay topics at: www.blackwellpublishing.com/pip
Download or read book The Metaphysics of Practice written by Wilfrid Sellars and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2023-08-08 with total page 666 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Metaphysics of Practice brings together Wilfrid Sellars's writings on topics to do with action, community, and obligation: published essays, manuscripts, and correspondence. Sellars's practical philosophy was absolutely central to his overarching philosophical project of situating persons as practically rational, norm-governed animals within the world as described by an ideal science. The Editors' Introduction offers an overview of Sellars's metaethics, detailing its key features and explaining how these features are supposed to solve outstanding metaethical problems that not only faced Sellars's contemporaries, but continue to create lively debate among contemporary theorists. And the editors give chapter summaries indicating the main lines of argument and showing where each piece fits into Sellars's overall picture.
Download or read book Ethics and the Metaphysics of Medicine written by Kenneth A. Richman and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2004-06-18 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Explores the philosophical and practical ethical implications of a definition of health as a state that allows us to reach our goals. Definitions of health and disease are of more than theoretical interest. Understanding what it means to be healthy has implications for choices in medical treatment, for ethically sound informed consent, and for accurate assessment of policies or programs. This deeper understanding can help us create more effective public policy for health and medicine. It is notable that such contentious legal initiatives as the Americans with Disability Act and the Patients' Bill of Rights fail to define adequately the medical terms on which their effectiveness depends. In Ethics and the Metaphysics of Medicine, Kenneth Richman develops an "embedded instrumentalist" theory of health and applies it to practical problems in health care and medicine, addressing topics that range from the philosophy of science to knee surgery. "Embedded instrumentalist" theories hold that health is a match between one's goals and one's ability to reach those goals, and that the relevant goals may vary from individual to individual. This captures the normative implications of the term health while avoiding problematic relativism. Richman's embedded instrumentalism differs from other theories of health in drawing a distinction between the health of individuals as biological organisms and the health of individuals as moral agents. This distinction illuminates many difficulties in patient-provider communication and helps us understand conflicts between promoting health and promoting ethically permissible behavior. After exploring, expanding, and defending this theory in the first part of the book, Richman examines its ethical implications, discussing such concerns as the connection between medical beneficence and respect for autonomy, patient-provider communication, living wills, and clinical education.
Download or read book Aquinas Ethics and Philosophy of Religion written by Thomas Hibbs and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2007-05-31 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Aquinas, Ethics, and Philosophy of Religion, Thomas Hibbs recovers the notion of practice to develop a more descriptive account of human action and knowing, grounded in the venerable vocabulary of virtue and vice. Drawing on Aquinas, who believed that all good works originate from virtue, Hibbs postulates how epistemology, ethics, metaphysics, and theology combine into a set of contemporary philosophical practices that remain open to metaphysics. Hibbs brings Aquinas into conversation with analytic and Continental philosophy and suggests how a more nuanced appreciation of his thought enriches contemporary debates. This book offers readers a new appreciation of Aquinas and articulates a metaphysics integrally related to ethical practice.
Download or read book The Theory and Practice of Experimental Philosophy written by Justin Sytsma and published by Broadview Press. This book was released on 2015-11-27 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In recent years, developments in experimental philosophy have led many thinkers to reconsider their central assumptions and methods. It is not enough to speculate and introspect from the armchair—philosophers must subject their claims to scientific scrutiny, looking at evidence and in some cases conducting new empirical research. The Theory and Practice of Experimental Philosophy is an introduction and guide to the systematic collection and analysis of empirical data in academic philosophy. This book serves two purposes: first, it examines the theory behind “x-phi,” including its underlying motivations and the objections that have been leveled against it. Second, the book offers a practical guide for those interested in doing experimental philosophy, detailing how to design, implement, and analyze empirical studies. Thus, the book explains the reasoning behind x-phi and provides tools to help readers become experimental philosophers.
Download or read book The Ethics of Wilfrid Sellars written by Jeremy Randel Koons and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-12-07 with total page 347 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wilfrid Sellars’s ethical theory was rich and deeply innovative. On Sellars’s view, moral judgments express a special kind of shared intention. Thus, we should see Sellars as an early advocate of an expressivism of plans and intentions, and an early theorist of collective intentionality. He supplemented this theory with a sophisticated logic of intentions, a robust theory of the categorical validity of normative expressions, a subtle way of reconciling the cognitive and motivating aspects of moral judgment, and much more—all within a strict nominalism that preserves Sellars’s commitment to naturalism. The Ethics of Wilfrid Sellars offers the first systematic treatment of this sadly-neglected aspect of Sellars’s work, and demonstrates that his ethical theory—just like his more widely-discussed epistemology—has much to contribute to current debates.
Download or read book Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals written by Immanuel Kant and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2008-10-01 with total page 295 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Immanuel Kant’s Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals is one of the most important texts in the history of ethics. In it Kant searches for the supreme principle of morality and argues for a conception of the moral life that has made this work a continuing source of controversy and an object of reinterpretation for over two centuries. This new edition of Kant’s work provides a fresh translation that is uniquely faithful to the German original and more fully annotated than any previous translation. There are also four essays by well-known scholars that discuss Kant’s views and the philosophical issues raised by the Groundwork. J.B. Schneewind defends the continuing interest in Kantian ethics by examining its historical relation both to the ethical thought that preceded it and to its influence on the ethical theories that came after it; Marcia Baron sheds light on Kant’s famous views about moral motivation; and Shelly Kagan and Allen W. Wood advocate contrasting interpretations of Kantian ethics and its practical implications.
Download or read book A Minimal Metaphysics for Scientific Practice written by Andreas Hüttemann and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2023-08-31 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What are the metaphysical commitments which best 'make sense' of our scientific practice (rather than our scientific theories)? In this book, Andreas Hüttemann provides a minimal metaphysics for scientific practice, i.e. a metaphysics that refrains from postulating any structure that is explanatorily irrelevant. Hüttemann closely analyses paradigmatic aspects of scientific practice, such as prediction, explanation and manipulation, to consider the questions whether and (if so) what metaphysical presuppositions best account for these practices. He looks at the role which scientific generalisation (laws of nature) play in predicting, testing, and explaining the behaviour of systems. He also develops a theory of causation in terms of quasi-inertial processes and interfering factors, and he proposes an account of reductive practices that makes minimal metaphysical assumptions. His book will be valuable for scholars and advanced students working in both philosophy of science and metaphysics.
Download or read book Sellars and Contemporary Philosophy written by David Pereplyotchik and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2016-12-08 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wilfrid Sellars made profound and lasting contributions to nearly every area of philosophy. The aim of this collection is to highlight the continuing importance of Sellars’ work to contemporary debates. The contributors include several luminaries in Sellars scholarship, as well as members of the new generation whose work demonstrates the lasting power of Sellars’ ideas. Papers by O’Shea and Koons develop Sellars’ underexplored views concerning ethics, practical reasoning, and free will, with an emphasis on his longstanding engagement with Kant. Sachs, Hicks and Pereplyotchik relate Sellars’ views of mental phenomena to current topics in cognitive science and philosophy of mind. Fink, deVries, Price, Macbeth, Christias, and Brandom grapple with traditional Sellarsian themes, including meaning, truth, existence, and objectivity. Brandhoff provides an original account of the evolution of Sellars’ philosophy of language and his project of "pure pragmatics". The volume concludes with an author-meets-critics section centered around Robert Brandom’s recent book, From Empiricism to Expressivism: Brandom Reads Sellars, with original commentaries and replies.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Metaphysics written by Michael J. Loux and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2005-09-08 with total page 740 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Some of the world's specialists provide in this handbook essays about what kinds of things there are, in what ways they exist, and how they relate to each other. They give the word on such topics as identity, modality, time, causation, persons and minds, freedom, and vagueness.
Download or read book Meaning Understanding and Practice written by Barry Stroud and published by Clarendon Press. This book was released on 2002 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Contains thirteen essays published by Barry Stroud between 1965 and 2000 on central topics in the philosophy of language and epistemology.
Download or read book Life and Action written by Michael Thompson and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2012-03-05 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Any sound practical philosophy must be clear on practical concepts—concepts, in particular, of life, action, and practice. This clarity is Michael Thompson’s aim in his ambitious work. In Thompson’s view, failure to comprehend the structures of thought and judgment expressed in these concepts has disfigured modern moral philosophy, rendering it incapable of addressing the larger questions that should be its focus. In three investigations, Thompson considers life, action, and practice successively, attempting to exhibit these interrelated concepts as pure categories of thought, and to show how a proper exposition of them must be Aristotelian in character. He contends that the pure character of these categories, and the Aristotelian forms of reflection necessary to grasp them, are systematically obscured by modern theoretical philosophy, which thus blocks the way to the renewal of practical philosophy. His work recovers the possibility, within the tradition of analytic philosophy, of hazarding powerful generalities, and of focusing on the larger issues—like “life”—that have the power to revive philosophy. As an attempt to relocate crucial concepts from moral philosophy and the theory of action into what might be called the metaphysics of life, this original work promises to reconfigure a whole sector of philosophy. It is a work that any student of contemporary philosophy must grapple with.
Download or read book Every Thing Must Go written by James Ladyman and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2007-07-05 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Every Thing Must Go argues that the only kind of metaphysics that can contribute to objective knowledge is one based specifically on contemporary science as it really is, and not on philosophers' a priori intuitions, common sense, or simplifications of science. In addition to showing how recent metaphysics has drifted away from connection with all other serious scholarly inquiry as a result of not heeding this restriction, they demonstrate how to build a metaphysics compatible with current fundamental physics ('ontic structural realism'), which, when combined with their metaphysics of the special sciences ('rainforest realism'), can be used to unify physics with the other sciences without reducing these sciences to physics itself. Taking science metaphysically seriously, Ladyman and Ross argue, means that metaphysicians must abandon the picture of the world as composed of self-subsistent individual objects, and the paradigm of causation as the collision of such objects. Every Thing Must Go also assesses the role of information theory and complex systems theory in attempts to explain the relationship between the special sciences and physics, treading a middle road between the grand synthesis of thermodynamics and information, and eliminativism about information. The consequences of the author's metaphysical theory for central issues in the philosophy of science are explored, including the implications for the realism vs. empiricism debate, the role of causation in scientific explanations, the nature of causation and laws, the status of abstract and virtual objects, and the objective reality of natural kinds.
Download or read book Partakers of the Divine written by Jacob Holsinger Sherman and published by Fortress Press. This book was released on 2014-04-01 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An extended essay in contemplative philosophy, the meeting of mystical and philosophical theology, Partakers of the Divine shows that Christian philosophical and contemplative practices arose together and that throughout much of Christian history philosophy, theology and contemplation remained internal to one another. Further, the relation of philosophy, theology, and contemplation to one another is of more than antiquarian interest, for it provides theologians and philosophers of religion today with a way forward beyond many of the stalemates that have beset discussions about faith and reason, the role of religion in contemporary culture, and the challenges of modernity and postmodernity.
Download or read book Artworld Metaphysics written by Robert Kraut and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2010-04-08 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Artworld Metaphysics turns a critical eye upon aspects of the artworld, and articulates some of the problems, principles, and norms implicit in the actual practices of artistic creation, interpretation, evaluation, and commodification. Aesthetic theory is treated as descriptive and explanatory, rather than normative: a theory that relates to artworld realities as a semantic theory relates to the fragments of natural language it seeks to describe. Robert Kraut examines emotional expression, correct interpretation and objectivity in the context of artworld practice, the relevance of jazz to aesthetic theory, and the goals of ontology (artworld and otherwise). He also considers the relation between art and language, the confusions of postmodern relativism, and the relation between artistic/critical practice and aesthetic theory.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Time written by Craig Callender and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2011-04-07 with total page 704 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the first comprehensive book on the philosophy of time. Leading philosophers discuss the metaphysics of time, our experience and representation of time, the role of time in ethics and action, and philosophical issues in the sciences of time, especially quantum mechanics and relativity theory.
