To what degree should we rely on our own resources and methods to form opinions about important matters? To what degree should we depend on various authorities, such as a recognized expert or a social tradition? In this provocative account of intellectual trust and authority, Richard Foley argues that it can be reasonable to have intellectual trust in oneself even though it is not possible to provide a defence of the reliability of one's faculties, methods and opinions that does (...) not beg the question. Moreover, he shows how this account of intellectual self-trust can be used to understand the degree to which it is reasonable to rely on alternative authorities. This book will be of interest to advanced students and professionals working in the fields of philosophy and the social sciences as well as anyone looking for a unified account of the issues at the centre of intellectual trust. (shrink)

What propositions are rational for one to believe? With what confidence is it rational for one to believe these propositions? Answering the first of these questions requires an epistemology of beliefs, answering the second an epistemology of degrees of belief.

From the historical roots of second-wave feminism to current debates about feminist theory and politics. This introduction to Anglo-American feminist thought provides a critical and panoramic survey of dominant trends in feminism since 1968. Feminism is too often considered a monolithic movement, consisting of an enormous range of women and ideologies, with both similar and different perspectives and approaches. The book is divided into two parts, the first of which takes a close look at the most influential strands of feminism: (...) liberal feminism, Marxist/socialist feminism, radical feminism, lesbian feminism, and black feminism. In later chapters, Whelehan ties these complexities of, and conflicts within, feminism. The role and relationship of men to feminism, and feminism's often thorny relationship to postmodernism, are also the subject of chapter length treatment. Concluding with a provocative discussion of the much-heralded advent of post-feminism and the rise of the new feminist superstars such as Camille Paglia, Naomi Wolf, Susan Faludi, and Katie Roiphe, Modern Feminist thought is an ideal text for students and a book no feminist teacher or activist should be without. (shrink)

Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, encompassing philosophy, literature, politics and history, John Foley examines the full breadth of Camus' ideas to provide a comprehensive and rigorous study of his political and philosophical thought and a significant contribution to a range of debates current in Camus research. Foley argues that the coherence of Camus' thought can best be understood through a thorough understanding of the concepts of 'the absurd' and 'revolt' as well as the relation between them. This book includes (...) a detailed discussion of Camus' writings for the newspaper "Combat", a systematic analysis of Camus' discussion of the moral legitimacy of political violence and terrorism, a reassessment of the prevailing postcolonial critique of Camus' humanism, and a sustained analysis of Camus' most important and frequently neglected work, "L'Homme revolte". (shrink)

El estudio de una Educación para la Revolución a una Revolución en la Educación se refiere al Proceso político de la Independencia de Venezuela (1810 - 1830) respecto al imperio español y su incidencia en la teoría republicana de la educación ideada por el Libertador Simón Bolívar en el marco ..

Henri Bergson was a French professor and philosopher. Born in Paris in 1859 to a Polish composer and Yorkshire woman of Irish descent, his revelatory ideas of life as ceaseless transformation and the importance of attention, learning, humor and joy brought him incredible fame and media celebrity.Here you will find insights from his greatest works.The Life Lessons series from The School of Life takes a great thinker and highlights those ideas most relevant to ordinary everyday dilemmas. These books emphasize ways (...) in which wise voices from the past have urgently important and inspiring things to tell us. (shrink)

It is commonly thought that the requirements of inferential justification are such that necessarily the process of inferentially justifying a belief will come to an end. But, If this is so, We should be able to pick out those requirements of justification which necessitate an end to the justification process. Unfortunately, Although there is nearly unanimous agreement as to the need for such an end, It is by no means clear which particular requirements of justification impose this need. I examine (...) and criticize several seemingly plausible ways of showing that regresses of inferential justification are impossible and then propose two requirements of inferential justification which, I argue, Are sufficient to show the impossibility. (shrink)

The two most fundamental questions for an epistemology are, what is involved in having good reasons to believe a claim, and what is involved in meeting the higher standard of knowing that a claim is true? The theory of justified belief tries to answer the former, whereas the theory of knowledge addresses the latter.

Like the virtue it purports to explain, St Thomas Aquinas' treatment of modestia in the Summa Theologiae is something that can easily be overlooked. Such neglect is unfortunate, for it is liable to obscure the surprising character of Aquinas' account, departing as it does from many of his philosophical sources , to say nothing of our own contemporary assumptions. This novel treatment is especially significant given its potential value in addressing the social and political needs of the current age, for (...) rather than being the virtue least fitted for contemporary life, the modesty that emerges in Thomas' moral theology may have an enduring civic significance. This essay therefore begins with an exegesis of Aquinas' account of modestia and concludes with an analysis of its political dimensions. (shrink)

This part of Logic, which studies what reasoning is, and how it must proceed whatever its content or the use which the mind makes of it (investigation or demonstration), should therefore be called formal Logic even at the risk of ambiguity.

Descartes, and many of the other great epistemologists of the modern period, looked to epistemology to put science and intellectual inquiry generally on a secure foundation. Epistemology’s role was to provide assurances of the reliability of properly conducted inquiry. Indeed, its role was nothing less than to be czar of the sciences and of intellectual inquiry in general. This conception of epistemology is now almost universally regarded as overly grandiose. Nonetheless, Descartes and the other great epistemologists of the modern era (...) were not completely mistaken. Epistemology does have a foundational role to play, but not that of a guarantor of knowledge. Its role, rather, is the less flamboyant but nonetheless theoretically crucial one of providing a philosophically respectable foundation for a general theory of rationality. (shrink)

Part of the appeal of classical foundationalism was that it purported to provide a definitive refutation of skepticism. With the fall of foundationalism, we can no longer pretend that such a refutation is possible. We must instead acknowledge that skeptical worries cannot be completely banished and that, thus, inquiry always involves an element of risk which cannot be eliminated by further inquiry, whether it be scientific or philosophical. The flip side of this point is that inquiry always involves some element (...) of unargued-for trust in one’s faculties and the opinions they generate. (shrink)

Plato’s Sophist features a discussion of false statements, the literal sense of which has been the source of much scholarly controversy. Two readings of the discussion, the Oxford Interpretation and the Incompatibility Range Interpretation, are especially plausible. This essay enters the exegetical debate by placing the discussion of false statements in the broader context of the dialogue, which is principally concerned with sophistic speech, not false statements. When the discussion of false statements is understood as contributing to an inquiry into (...) sophistic speech, the Incompatibility Range Interpretation—with slight modification—emerges as a clear favorite. (shrink)

Duncan Foley provides an alternative to Keynesian and 'new classical' macroeconomics, based on the Marxian theory of capital.

In this new book, Foley defends an epistemology that takes seriously the perspectives of individual thinkers. He argues that having rational opinions is a matter of meeting our own internal standards rather than standards that are somehow imposed upon us from the outside. It is a matter of making ourselves invulnerable to intellectual self-criticism. Foley also shows how the theory of rational belief is part of a general theory of rationality. He thus avoids treating the rationality of belief (...) as a fundamentally different kind of phenomenon from the rationality of decision or action. His approach generates promising suggestions about a wide range of issues--e.g., the distinction between epistemic and non-epistemic reasons for belief; the question of what aspects of the Cartesian project are still worth doing; the significance of simplicity and other theoretical virtues; the relevance of skeptical hypotheses; the difference between a theory of rational belief and a theory of knowledge; the difference between a theory of rational belief and a theory of rational degrees of belief; and the limits of idealization in epistemology. (shrink)

'Epistemology with a Broad and Long View' is an original and provocative challenge to standard epistemologies that assume that the reasonability of beliefs is wholly a function of considerations indicating their current likelihood. Richard Foley argues that this view, although widely accepted, is excessively narrow. Foley argues for a less constricted epistemology that acknowledges that, in addition to beliefs and degrees-of-confidence, intellectual commitments play a vital role in our intellectual lives; that the key issue in overseeing all these (...) attitudes is whether it's appropriate to revise or add to them for our purposes; and that a mixture of practical, ethical, political, social, and long-term intellectual considerations, and not just ones about current likelihood, determine what's appropriate. On this view, there is no purely epistemic notion of reasonability. There are truth-related considerations, but except in those rare cases where there is complete certainty, they don't determine the reasonability of our belief-like attitudes. They do so only in partnership with a broad and long range of non-truth-related considerations. Foley suggests that a failure to recognize these partnerships can result in theoretical confusion, and also can impede our ability to understand and deal with dogmatists who have unlikely or toxic views. Foley's overriding theme is that a broad and long view is as necessary for making sense of the reasonableness or unreasonableness of our opinions, as it is for other aspects of our lives. (shrink)

Adam's vision -- Gloomy science -- The severest critic -- On the margins -- Voices in the air -- Grand illusions.

One of the advantages of classical foundationalism was that it was thought to provide a refutation of skeptical worries, which raise the specter that our beliefs might be extensively mistaken. The most extreme versions of these worries are expressed in familiar thought experiments such as the brain-in-a-vat hypothesis, which imagines a world in which, unbeknownst to you, your brain is in a vat hooked up to equipment programmed to provide it with precisely the same visual, auditory, tactile, and other sensory (...) inputs that you have in this world. As a result, your opinions about your immediate environment are the same as they are in this world. You have the same beliefs about your recent activities, your current physical appearance, your present job, and so on, but in fact you are a brain in a vat tucked away in a corner of a laboratory. Thus, in the brain-in-a-vat world, your beliefs about these everyday matters are mistaken, and mistaken not just in detail, but deeply mistaken. (shrink)