In "Actualism or Possibilism?" (Philosophical Studies, 84 (2-3), December 1996), James Tomberlin develops two challenges for actualism. The challenges are to account for the truth of certain sentences without appealing to merely possible objects. After canvassing the main actualist attempts to account for these phenomena, he then criticizes the new conception of actualism that we described in our paper "In Defense of the Simplest Quantified Modal Logic" (Philosophical Perspectives 8: Philosophy of Logic and Language, Atascadero, CA: Ridgeview, 1994). We respond (...) to Tomberlin's criticism by showing that we wouldn't analyze the problematic claim (e.g., "Ponce de Leon searched for the fountain of youth") in the way he suggests. (shrink)

Current thinking and research on consciousness and the brain.

Bertrand Russell presented three systems of propositional logic, one first in Principles of Mathematics, University Press, Cambridge, 1903 then in “The Theory of Implication”, Routledge, New York, London, pp. 14–61, 1906) and culminating with Principia Mathematica, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1910. They are each based on different primitive connectives and axioms. This paper follows “Peirce’s Law” through those systems with the aim of understanding some of the notorious peculiarities of the 1910 system and so revealing some of the early history (...) of classical propositional logic. “Peirce’s Law” is a valid formula of elementary propositional logic: [ ⊃ p] ⊃ p This sentence is not even a theorem in the 1910 system although it is one of the axioms in 1903 and is proved as a theorem in 1906. Although it is not proved in 1910, the two lemmas from the proof in 1906 occur as theorems, and Peirce’s Law could have been derived from them in a two step proof. The history of Peirce’s Law in Russell’s systems helps to reconstruct some of the history of axiomatic systems of classical propositional logic. (shrink)

The scholastic philosopher is interested in definition for a different reason than the lexicographer and linguist. The philosopher is trying to learn things. Fe defines, after investigating reality, in an attempt to describe reality clearly and to sum up some aspect of his understanding of reality. Hence, we find our scholastic philosophers adopting as a main feature of their method this insistence on defining, on precise and detailed explanation of their definitions, and on proving that their definitions da correctly express (...) what a nature or activity is. A dictionary of the language of scholastic philosophy fitted to the needs of beginners and of undergraduate students of the subject is not available in English. (shrink)

This book sets out to present Kant as a theological thinker. His critical philosophy was not only destructive of "natural" theology, with its attempt to prove devine existence by logical argument, it also left no room for "revelation" in the traditional sense. Yet Kant himself, who was brought up in Lutheran pietism, certainly believed in God, and could fairly be described as a religious man. But he held that religion can be based only on the moral consciousness, and in his (...) last major work, "Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone"ódiscussed here in detailóhe interpreted Christianity purely in terms of moral symbolism. (shrink)

This paper explores a remarkable convergence of ideas and evidence, previously presented in separate places by its authors. That convergence has now become so persuasive that we believe we are working within substantially the same broad framework. Taylor's mathematical papers on neuronal systems involved in consciousness dovetail well with work by Newman and Baars on the thalamocortical system, suggesting a brain mechanism much like the global workspace architecture developed by Baars (see references below). This architecture is relational, in the sense (...) that it continuously mediates the interaction of input with memory. While our approaches overlap in a number of ways, each of us tends to focus on different areas of detail. What is most striking, and we believe significant, is the extent of consensus, which we believe to be consistent with other contemporary approaches by Weiskrantz, Gray, Crick and Koch, Edelman, Gazzaniga, Newell and colleagues, Posner, Baddeley, and a number of others. We suggest that cognitive neuroscience is moving toward a shared understanding of consciousness in the brain. (shrink)

This paper attempts to refute the familiar sceptical argument based upon the theoretical possibility of systematic transpositions of colours in different observers? colour?vision. The force of this argument lies in its apparent demonstration that cases of transposed colour?vision would be on a quite different cognitive footing from ordinary cases of colour?blindness; since colour transposition, unlike colour?blindness, could not possibly have any effect on the use of language by a person who suffered from it. It is argued (1) that this demonstration (...) works only if we assume the truth of a certain theory of the logical nature of our colour vocabulary, and (2) that this theory is false. (shrink)

This study investigated the relations of cheating on an exam and using a false excuse to avoid taking an exam as scheduled to various forms of minor deviance. College students completed measures of cheating, false excuse making, and minor deviance. A factor analysis identified clusters of deviance behaviors. Cheaters scored higher than noncheaters on measures of unreliability and risky driving behaviors, and false excuse makers scored higher than other students on measures of substance use, risky driving, illegal behaviors, and personal (...) unreliability. In addition, men scored higher than women on substance abuse and illegal behaviors factors. Results are interpreted in terms of personological theories of honesty and reliability. (shrink)

Excerpt from A Companion to Plato's Republic: For English Readers; Being a Commentary Adapted to Davies and Vaughan's Translation The idea of writing a 'Companion to Plato's Republic for English Readers' was suggested to me by the appearance of Mr. Walter Lea's Companion to the Iliad, combined with my own experience of the intense desire for a closer knowledge of Plato, felt by many students who could read him in a translation only. Philosophy loses sorely by translation, but less than (...) poetry; and perhaps a commentator can do more to restore its real meaning. And, indeed, as not all scholars have been trained in philosophy, "I may perhaps hope," to quote Mr. Leaf, 'that even those who have a knowledge of the language may find something to help them' in my work. Whether I have succeeded well or ill, I have at least spared no pains to ascertain and express the real import of Plato's ideas; and this I take to be the true duty of a commentator, especially in dealing with a philosophical genius of the first rank. I ought to say that I have made no attempt at textual criticism. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. (shrink)

The renowned Christian theologian Bernard Lonergan was also a professor, teaching courses on theological method at universities in Canada, the United States, and Italy. This volume records his lectures and teaching materials, thus preserving and elucidating his intellectual development between the publication of Insight in 1957 and Method in Theology in 1972. The present volume contains a record of the lectures delivered in 1962, 1964, and 1968. This is the most 'interactive' volume yet published in the Collected Works series. (...) The audio recordings of the 1962 and 1968 lectures are now available on the website www.bernardlonergan.com, as are PDF files of original papers from his 1964 institute at Georgetown. These lectures help to elucidate the development of Lonergan's ideas on such key notions as horizon, conversion, and meaning, as well as his evolving opinion on how best to divide theology into fields of specialization. (shrink)

From the assumption that the presence of consciousness is detectable, in the first instance, only from behavioral indicators, I offer a proof to the effect that, with respect to any theory T that states that some particular state or process is the neural correlate of consciousness, there are always rival neural correlates that, from T’s perspective, can never be empirically ruled out. That's because, with respect to these states, the means of detecting consciousness is disrupted along with the empirical test. (...) Possible responses are discussed. (shrink)

In his dialogue with Blanchot (The Disavowed Community vs. The Unavowable Community), Jean-Luc Nancy intended to denounce, but without opposing another figure, the idea according to which the community of lovers, as exemplified by Marguerite Duras in The Disease of Death, would be the accomplishment of the community as a work of death. On the basis of a reading of Richard Dehmel’s poem, Verklärte Nacht (Transfigured Night), we would like here to outline the schema of a couple in which the (...) unspeakable is transfigured into the power of the advent of a shared community. (shrink)

This article is partly an exercise in academic autobiography, seeking to make sense of the different ways in which I have applied semiotics to secular law on the one hand, Jewish law on the other. The very fact that it can be applied to both shows that its claims are methodological. But it also indicates a possible reformulation of the semiotic issues in philosophical terms: we may view the relationship between the semantic and pragmatic levels in terms of the relationship/balance (...) between certainty/truth (the semantic level) on the one hand and trust (the pragmatic level) on the other. What may distinguish the secular and religious systems is the manner in the issue of trust is be ideologically concealed. (shrink)