The book attempts, in as comprehensive a way as possible, to make clear the central issues for the theory of knowledge, so as to provide a framework for that subject and also to indicate something of the way in which, as the author believes, the issues should be faced.

This book is available either individually, or as part of the specially-priced Arguments of the Philosphers Collection.

Some philosophers have argued recently that the content of perception is either entirely or mainly non- conceptual. Much of the motivation for that view derives from theories of information processing, which are a modern version of ancient considerations about the causal processes underlying perception. The paper argues to the contrary that perception is essentially concept- dependent. While perception must have a structure derived from what is purely sensory, and is thereby dependent on processes involving information in the technical sense which (...) Gibson said amounted to structure, the information which perception provides about the world depends on the concepts which we have. (shrink)

INTRODUCTION If there is one underlying implication in the following essays it is the inadequacy of the information-processing model for cognitive ...

There are certain metaphysical theories which present a view of the world and of the position of human-beings within it which have seemed attractive or at least impressive to many irrespective of the arguments that are marshalled in their favour. That is certainly true of Schopenhauer. His identification of the inner nature of reality with the will, and the conclusions which he drew from this as regards the nature of human-beings and their place in the world, have seemed striking and (...) perhaps even illuminating to many thinkers, not all of whom have been philosophers in the most obvious sense and not all of whom have had much concern for the underlying argument that led Schopenhauer to his conclusions. It is in this way too, perhaps, that certain of Schopenhauer's ideas have become well known—his emphasis on the will to live, his pessimism and his views on suicide, and his thoughts about human nature and about sex that have been seen as something of an anticipation of Freud. In recent times attention has also been directed to his influence on Wittgenstein. In all these respects, however, it is Schopenhauer's ideas that have been influential, rather than the argument that underlies them. Indeed it is sometimes said that Schopenhauer was not a very systematic thinker at all. If that seems true it is so in the sense that Kant too has seemed to some unsystematic in the details of his argument. That does not mean that the main structure of the argument is not clear. So it is with Schopenhauer. (shrink)

‘The Principle of Sufficient Reason in all its forms is the sole principle and the sole support of all necessity. For necessity has no other true and distinct meaning than that of the infallibility of the consequence when the reason is posited. Accordingly every necessity is conditioned ; absolute, i.e. unconditioned, necessity therefore is a contradicto in adjecto . For to be necessary can never mean anything but to result from a given reason.’ These words are taken from the beginning (...) of section 49 of Schopenhauer's The Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason . They express sentiments with which I am to some extent in agreement, and it therefore seemed to me worth while to explore in some kind of detail Schopenhauer's treatment of the issues. It might, however, be asked why the view expressed by Schopenhauer should be of philosophical interest, what, if anything, turns on the rejection of the notion of absolute necessity. To this I can reply by saying only that apart from the intrinsic interest of the notion of necessity itself, an issue on which a philosopher ought to make himself clear, Schopenhauer himself points to some of the consequences of his doctrine - the impossiblity, for example, of an absolutely necessary being, and the similar impossibility of ontological or cosmological arguments. (shrink)

This book is available either individually, or as part of the specially-priced Arguments of the Philosphers Collection.

This book is an attempt to provide an account of the conception of perception by way of a discussion of the conditions which may have to be satisfied for that concept to have an application. There is included, therefore, a discussion not only of perceptual experience but of the part played in perception by such things as conceptual understanding, belief, imagination, attention and activity. Although there is some reference to psychological work in the field of perception the main approach is (...) philosophical in an analytical style. Nevertheless, the book tends to eschew large gestures in the philosophy of mind, favouring an attention to detail in a way which some might describe as phenomenological. The author has written much about perception in the past and the book might be characterized as summing up a lifetime of thinking about the subject. (shrink)

This book collects the work of leading scholars on Alain Badiou and G.W.F. Hegel, creating a dialogue between, and a critical appraisal of, these two central figures in European philosophy.