This text is a translation of Lucretius’ poem which adheres faithfully to the text, yet with poetic force, accuracy, and humanitas and includes introduction, notes, and a glossary of philosophical terms cross-referenced to use throughout the poem.

A biosemiotic view of living things is presented that supersedes the mechanistic view of life prevalent in biology today. Living things are active agents with autonomous subjectivity, whose structure is triadic, consisting of the individual organism, its Umwelt and the society. Sociality inheres in every living thing since the very origin of life on the earth. The temporality of living things is guided by the purpose to live, which works as the semantic boundary condition for the processes (...) of embodiment of the subjectivity. Freedom at the molecular and cellular levels allows autonomy and spontaneity to emerge even in single cell organisms, and the presence of the dimension of mind in every living thing is deduced. Living things transcend their individualness, as they live in historically formed higher order structure consisting of the lineage-species and the society. They also transcend materiality, having the dimension of mind. (shrink)

We have become estranged from the cosmic movements, according to Bataille. We are confined by the error linked to the representation of ‘the stationary earth’. We have negated the immersive immanence of the whole and made nature into a fixed world of tools and things. How then do we recognise ourselves as part of the ‘rapture of the heavens’? Bataille urges us to consider life as a solar phenomenon, the free play of solar energy on the earth. This (...) paper argues how Bataille’s cosmic vision anticipates both planetary and ecological thinking. This entails a base materialism of difference based on a radical Nietzschean and Heraclitean theory of becoming and flux. This thought is developed along Bataillean concepts such as the movement of the whole, the labyrinthine, and compound beings, ipseity, as well as the concept of a communifying movement. This materialism paired with Vladimir Vernadsky’s biosphere lays the foundation for the laws of the general economy, which also constitutes an economy inclusive of a general ecology: a tragic vision of Gaia and Dionysos. Finally, poetry is considered, as a way we might reconnect with the universe and stimulate ecological imagination. (shrink)

Anthony Quinton's The Nature of Things covers competently a good deal of philosophical ground in hopeful pursuit of a coherent ontology de-scribable as ‘a version of materialism’. He seems to discern two major difficulties for the enterprise: first, that of giving an acceptable account of ontology, and, secondly, that of reconciling his naturalism with his empiricist principles. ‘Naturalism’ is the view that man and his doings constitute a part of nature on the same ontological level as other (...) natural things, and materialism is a naturalist philosophy. Of the second difficulty Quinton writes:…a naturalistic view of the world has had to find its chief philosophical expression through doctrines of a sceptical and subjectivist kind, such as Hume's, which have a tendency to undermine the naturalistic presumptions which inspired them. In this book I have tried to equip materialism with solid philosophical credentials. (shrink)

On the Nature of Marx's Things traces to Marx's earliest writings a Lucretianpractice that Lezra calls necrophilological translation.

This book articulates the nature of truth as a cooperative activity between human beings and the natural world that is rooted in our endeavors to do justice to the nature of things.

In “The Nature of the Atonement”, Eleonore Stump explores the problem of human sin that the atonement is meant to solve, helpfully uncovering important adequacy conditions for theories of atonement. She then uses those conditions to critically evaluate Anselmian and Thomistic theories of atonement, arguing (among many other interesting things) that the Thomist has a leg up on the Anselmian when it comes to the atonement-motivating problem of human sin (pp.11-12 of ms.). I argue for two claims in (...) what follows. First, Stump’s two seemingly independent “further problems” for theorists of atonement (discussed in the penultimate section of her paper) in fact reduce to a single challenge, which suggests a strategy for future theorizing about the atonement. Second, Stump’s case that the Thomist outperforms the Anselmian on the problem of human sin is weaker than it initially appears. As we’ll see, Stump’s own account of shame implies that the Anselmian’s difficulties on this front are less serious than she thinks. (shrink)

This book is a synthesis of more than three decades of research into the concept of time and its semiotic nature. If traditional philosophy – and philosophy of time should be no exception – in the shadow of advancing biology can be said to have reached an impasse, one important reason for this, in harmony with Wittgenstein’s vision, appears to have been its lack of appropriate tools for explicating language. The present theory of time proceeds, accordingly, from the exploration (...) of temporal expressions in language as an evolutionary fact. It derives in a hypothetical, coherent feedback process of hierarchically ordered distinctions the semantics of time from its biologically dictated perceptual and cognitive-pragmatic origins. The corresponding abductive-regulative model is anchored in the assumption of biological rhythmization as the very foundation of perception and mental/physical action. Understood to originate in space and spatial perspective, time reveals itself as an instrument for temporal perspective on motion (events and situations) in a process of analysis, i.e., discontinuation of chaos made divisible and continuous by the rhythmical screen. Whereas traditional philosophy of time paid attention almost exclusively to the temporal category of tense, the biopragmatic model sees strong evidence in the perspectival nature of time for ascribing the decisive, and probably universal, role in temporal analysis to the linguistic category of aspect. Aspect may, according to the present findings, be assumed to partake already of change-of-state and cause-effect analysis without which man’s adaptation to new situations – and precondition for survival – would be inconceivable. The proposed model of space/time cognition, inspired by Hegelian dialectics, Heidegger-Gadamer’s hermeneutic circle and Peircean logic, makes Kantian a priori superfluous and liberates time from its enigmatic appearance. For the first time in temporal studies it thus appears possible to derive hypothetically linguistic expressions of time all the way from pretemporal, homogeneous continuity effected by biological rhythmization, via pretemporal metonymic (Gestalt), chunk-wise partitioning – as a general precondition for the perception and, based on primary metaphorization, the cognition of things, space and motion – to temporal analysis/discontinuation proper, primarily by aspectual perspective, and the subsequent synthesized, heterogeneous continuity of temporally ordered events. The conception of time, so disastrous for modern temporal logic, i.e., as moving object assigned extension, divisible continuity (‛linearity’) and direction, can be shown to have emerged as a result of secondary metaphorization. (shrink)

In this article the author discusses Peter A. Redpath’s understanding of the nature of philosophy and his account of how erroneous understandings of philosophy have led to the decline of the West and to the separation of philosophy from modern science and modern science from wisdom. Following Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas, Redpath argues that philosophy is a sense realism because it begins in wonder about real things known through the senses. Philosophy presupposes pre-philosophical knowledge, common sense, which (...) consists of principles rooted in sensation that make human experience, sense wonder, and philosophy possible. Philosophy is certain knowledge demonstrated through causes and thus philosophy is the same as science. Redpath understands science as a habit that we acquire through repeated practice. More precisely, a scientific habit is a simple quality of the intellect that enables us to demonstrate (prove) the necessary properties of a genus through their causes or principles. In this way, science is the study of the one and the many. Redpath argues that metaphysics is the final cause of the arts and sciences, providing the foundation for all of the arts and sciences and justifying their principles. Finally, he argues that with modernity’s loss of belief in God and its rejection of metaphysics as a science, utopian socialism has become an historical/political substitute for metaphysics. (shrink)

This chapter examines the theory of moral obligation presented by Robert Adams in Finite and Infinite Goods. The theory holds, quite plausibly, that obligations are requirements which arise within the context of social relationships. It also holds, more controversially, that genuinely moral obligations are requirements resulting from the commands of a loving God. The advantage Adams sees in introducing the notion of a loving God into the theory is that doing so rules out the possibility that certain sorts of horrendous (...) evils, including wanton cruelties, could turn out, according to the theory, to be morally obligatory. This advantage obtains, however, only if God's love is taken to be unlike that of the jealous, strongly preferential sort apparently attributed to God in many biblical passages. Adams does not adequately explain why he identifies the God posited by his theory with the God of the Old and New Testaments. Nor does he adequately explain why one should suppose that a God who conforms to Adams's conception of a perfectly loving being actually exists, given the horrendous evils there are and given the confusing biblical portrait of God as both a horror-defeater and a horror-commander. All things considered, more modest versions of the social theory of obligation appear more plausible than Adams's metaphysically extravagant version. A slightly more modest version would appeal directly to Adams's own theistic theory of excellence, without making reference to divine commands. An even more modest version would eschew the theistic commitments of Adams's ethical theory altogether. The chapter concludes by raising questions about Adams's conception of the metaphysics of morals as a discipline analogous to scientific inquiry into the natural kinds. (shrink)

It would be improper for a President to play safe. After two years of curbing my tongue and not making all sorts of observations that have sprung to my mind, in order to let you have an opportunity of having your say, I am now off the leash. And whereas mostly in academic life it is appropriate to adopt a prudential strategy, and not say anything that might be wrong, I owe it to you on this occasion to play a (...) maximax strategy, to speak out and say what I really think, being willing to run the risk of being wrong in order not to forgo the chance of actually being right in an area of the philosophy of science which must, I think for ever, be largely a matter of metaphysical speculation. (shrink)

The author argues for a non-sensual reality, basing his arguments on parapsychology, a consideration of prophecies, and not quite digested aspects of modern scientific developments. As Hawley points out, his views may be those of the future; unfortunately his arguments will not make them so.--K. H.

On the Arbitrary Nature of Things approaches Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit through a paradigm of agnosticism developed from Hegel's own critique of systems of knowledge. This work traces Hegel's descriptions of the movements of Spirit with equal measures of charity and skepticism. It provokes one to question the level of agnosticism that should be taken toward our various systems of human understanding, both in Hegel's Phenomenology and in our contemporary world. With respect to our contemporary world, Bridges questions (...) whether the nature of things is ultimately arbitrary and finds that phenomena such as the placebo effect and the use of sensoriums in phenomenological anthropology add credence to the position of agnosticism toward the arbitrary nature of things. (shrink)

Evolving the Mind has two main themes: how ideas about the mind evolved in science; and how the mind itself evolved in nature. The mind came into physical science when it was realised, first, that it is the activity of a physical object, a brain, which makes a mind; and secondly, that our theories of nature are largely mental constructions, artificial extensions of an inner model of the world which we inherited from our distant ancestors. From both of (...) these perspectives, consciousness is the great enigma. If consciousness evolved, however, it is in some sense a material thing whatever else may be said of it. Physics, chemistry, molecular biology, brain function and evolutionary biology - almost the whole of science - is involved, and there can be no expert in all these fields. So the style of the book is simple, almost conversational. The excitement is that we seem to be close to a scientific theory of consciousness. (shrink)

_Makes Schelling’s dialogue Bruno readily accessible to the English-language reader, with valuable commentary on the work itself, which details Schelling’s account of his differences from Fichte._.

There are two dominant contradictory approaches towards understanding the nature of language: one, the epistemological approach; two, the ontological approach. The epistemological approach understands language as a mere tool and denies the close relationship between a word and the actual thing for which that word stands. The ontological approach, on the other hand, understands language as the disclosure of world experience and professes a close relationship between a word and the thing it signifies. However, this approach opposes the epistemological (...) approach towards the understanding of language. In this article, we propose that Hegel, in his Phenomenology of Spirit, depicts an interesting relationship between language and spirit which points towards the consistency between the two contradictory approaches towards the nature of language. For Hegel, language not only plays a role in spirit’s pursuit of self-knowledge which signifies the epistemological approach, but also in spirit’s existence which signifies the ontological approach. Thus, in Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, the epistemological approach and the ontological approach towards the nature of language coexist. In this article, by turning to Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit and through an analysis of the relationship between language and spirit, we not only attempt to seek some resolution to the epistemology-ontology contradiction, but we also reveal the homogeneity of language and spirit, which we take as the true nature of language in Hegel’s philosophy. (shrink)

The social sciences often fail to examine in any systematic way the nature of their subject matter. Demonstrating that this is a central explanation of the widely acknowledged failings of the social sciences, not least of modern economics, this book sets about rectifying matters. Providing an account of the nature of social material in general, as well as of the specific natures of central components of the modern world, such as money and the corporation, Lawson also considers the (...) implications of this theory regarding possibilities for social change. Readers will gain an understanding of how social phenomena, from tables and chairs, to money and firms, and nurses and Presidents are constituted. Fundamental to Lawson's conception is a theory of community-based social positioning, whereby people and things within a community become constituted as components of emergent totalities, with actions governed by the rights and obligations of relevant members of the community. This theory isolates a set of basic principles that will offer the reader an understanding of the natures of all social phenomena. The Nature of Social Realityis for all those, academics and non-academics alike, who wish to gain a grasp on the nature of social phenomena that goes beyond the superficial. isolates a set of basic principles that will offer the reader an understanding of the natures of all social phenomena. The Nature of Social Realityis for all those, academics and non-academics alike, who wish to gain a grasp on the nature of social phenomena that goes beyond the superficial. (shrink)

Muammar b. Abbād al-Sulamī (d.215/830) was one of the most influential figures of his time in terms of recognizing things and making sense of the changes in the universe, which occupies an important place in Islamic thought. Muammar, who was a Basra Mu'tazilite, appears especially with his naturalistic ideas. What makes him stand out is that he also embraced atomism. Although the atomist conception was of foreign origin, the theologians revised it according to their theological views. This view was (...) also presented as a proof of God’s constant activity in the universe. Muammar, who also defined substance, body and accident, which are the basic concepts of kalam cosmology, influenced other theologians, especially with his definition of body. For Muammar, things have a nature. The body creates its accidents as a result of its own nature. Ultimately, in his thought, it is God who gives this nature to the body. Therefore, he accepts that the functioning of the universe takes place within the framework of the laws that God has set in the universe. This idea of Muammar’s about the nature of bodies is actually to demonstrate that the universe functions in a tremendous way in this way. The concept of māna, which is based on Muammar’s thought, occupies an important place at this point. With this concept, which is identified with the understanding of nature, he aimed to exclude the essence of God from the beings. In his view, this concept is also active when it comes to God’s attributes. For him, that’s why God is the wise and the powerful by means of the knowledge and the power that He possesses through the māna. According to Muammar, māna means cause. He argues that the separation of a moving object from an immobile object is the result of a māna. Therefore, objects are also differentiated from each other through a māna. A māna can exist with a māna, which brings forth the idea of the infinity of māna. However, the infinity of māna does not mean the infinity of things. Muammar’s most criticized point is the nature of objects and the fact that they undergo change as a result of this nature, that is, they create their accidents. In this case, the concept of continuous re-creation, which is generally accepted in theology, does not fit Muammar’s system. For Muammar, there is a system based on cause and effect. Although there are criticisms that this relationship he defended belongs to a strict determinist approach, in fact, it can be said that he was concerned with excluding God from situations that take place on the plane of time and space, such as movement and change. Compared to other contemporary theologians who held naturalistic views like him, Muammar’s justification of nature on the basis of māna sets him apart from the others. (shrink)

The main contribution of this work is to develop the account of material constitution presented in Spatially Coinciding Objects (Ratio 24, 1982) and a series of related articles. This account was merely ‘analytical’ in that it applied generously to ‘putative’ examples of distinct entities (individuals, pluralities and masses of stuff) in the same place at the same time. The account herein is ‘critical’ in that it seeks justification for recognizing the existence of entities constituted in addition to the entities that (...) allegedly constitute them. While the earlier account used examples such as a clay statue and the clay of the statue for purposes of illustrating material constitution, the present account would consider ‘reducing’ the statue to the clay, and seeks justification for how to resist this and admit the existence of generable and perishable natural objects in general. The justification sought is ‘deep’ in the sense that (unlike the popular ‘method of cases) it does not belong to ‘descriptive’ metaphysics (in Strawson’s sense) but is sufficiently potent to counter ‘revisionist’ views. Transcendental arguments, beginning with austere assumptions of justification itself, are thereby employed. Suggestions are made about what to conclude about our own identity, which amount to supporting animalism. (shrink)

The concept stepping-out-of-oneself concerns a process by which things manifest themselves and make themselves present. This process does not depend on subjective influence but on the power of the thing itself. In this respect, the value of the thing itself and its impact on the sensory experience are brought to the foreground. From an aesthetic point of view, this concept corresponds to a new orientation of contemporary aesthetics of nature, which reflects the programmatic weakening of the subject-centered approach, (...) the estrangement from the substance ontology as well as the phenomenological interest in the power of things. In this article, I attempt to argue that traditional Daoist thought can also provide a point of contact for the exploration of stepping-out-of-oneself. The focus on my study is on two issues: 1. under what circumstances is stepping-out-of-oneself possible? 2. how is it possible to perceive stepping-out-of-oneself? (shrink)

There appear to be at least two kinds of compound physical substances: compound pieces of matter, which have their parts essentially, and living organisms, which do not. Examples of the former are carbon atoms, salt molecules, and pieces of gold; and examples of the latter are protozoa, trees, and cats. Given that there are compound entities of these two kinds, and given that they can be created or destroyed by assembly or disassembly, questions naturally arise about the nature of (...) the causal relations which unite their parts. In answer to these questions, we first argue that the parts of a compound piece of matter are connected via a relation of dynamic equilibrium of attractive and repulsive forces. We then argue that the parts of an organic living thing are united in a different way: they are functionally connected in a broadly Aristotelian sense which is compatible with an ultimately non‐teleological, naturalistic biology. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Locke on the Knowledge of Material Things ROBERT FENDEL ANDERSON IT IS nOT John Locke's intention, in his Essay Concerning Human Understanding, to deal with matter and material substance nor with how these are able to affect the mind. These are considerations for natural philosophy; Locke counts himself rather among the moral philosophers. He does not propose, therefore, to meddle with the physical aspects of the mind, nor (...) with the physical production of sensations through the organs, nor with the production of ideas in the understanding, nor even with whether ideas depend upon matter for their source. He defers to the wisdom of such men as Boyle, Sydenham, Huygens and Newton in these considerations, and finds it "... ambition enough to be employed as an under-labourer in clearing the ground a little, and removing some of the rubbish that lies in the way to knowledge....,, 1 It is true that Locke's Essay is characterized chiefly not by an interest in matter and the mechanics of perception but rather by an interest in epistemology and in the ordering and assessment of our knowledge. Because of the very nature and emphasis of this epistemology, however, Locke finds that he must, from time to time, at least mention the nature of matter and how it affects us. Finally, it becomes apparent, certain changes or ambiguities in his point of view regarding the mode of our knowledge and its certainty are consequences of his understanding of matter. It is a demonstration of these elements of his doctrine, which seem not to have obtained the full attention of such scholars as Aaron, Fraser, and Gibson, that I shall attempt in this paper. Fundamentally, Locke's theory of matter appears to be that of Democritus and Epicurus. Like the Greek atomists, he conceives of matter as consisting of particles or corpuscles infinite in number. At least some of these are so minute as to be individually insensible, and probably he intends that all are, although, to my knowledge, he never states that this is so. In the aggregate, in any case, particles do constitute perceptible bodies. As for the Greeks, so also for Locke, the particles arc all extended, having size and shape. They are said also to possess motion or rest, although he takes care to say that matter cannot produce motion in itself,e Locke frequently mentions other properties as being "primary" or "really in" material things. Some of these are solidity, texture, cohesion of parts, situation, and number. Apparently some of these may be ranked under others since, as he 1"Epistle to the Reader," Vol. I, p. 14. All footnotes refer to passages in John Locke's An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, collated and annotated, with prolegomena, biographical, critical, and historical by Alexander Campbell Fraser, in two volumes (New York, Dover Publications, Inc., 1959). Large Roman numerals refer to books of the Essay; small Roman numerals refer to chapters of the books; Arabic numerals refer to sections of the chapters. 2 IV, x, 10. [205] 206 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY remarks, figure presupposes extension, and receiving or communicating motion through impact presupposes solidity. The influences of these particles upon one another are treated by Locke under the topic of "powers," a notion which includes in it some kind of "secret relation of parts." 3 The capacities in any substance to give alterations of primary qualities are active powers; the capacities to receive such alterations are passive powers. This alteration must be accomplished by impact or impulse since this, Locke says, is the only way in which bodies can be conceived to operate. Sensation in the percipient being then is to be understood as a special case of this impact of particles upon others. It is evident to Locke that from external obiects some motion must be conveyed by some parts of our bodies to the brain or seat of sensation to produce in our minds the particular ideas we have of these external objects. We are able by sight to perceive at a distance the primary qualities of bodies of observable size. Locke reasons that therefore "... some singly imperceptible bodies must come from them to the eyes, and thereby convey to... (shrink)

This paper attempts to provide a general reconstruction of Francis of Marchia's doctrine of accidental being. The paper is divided into two parts. (1) In the first part, I begin by reconstructing the debate on the nature of accidents held before Marchia, showing that such a debate is characterised by a progressive shift concerning the way to understand accidents. While the first Aristotelian interpreters regard accidents especially as inhering modes of being of substances, the majority of theologians and philosophers (...) in the second half of the thirteenth century regard accidents as absolute beings. For them, the problem is no longer to explain if and, if so, how accidents can be distinct from substances, but how accidents and substances can make some one thing. Metaphysically, their primary focus is on explaining what the ontological status of inherence is. Although it is especially the consideration of the Eucharistic case that induces this change, I point out that many philosophers and theologians find in Aristotle's texts the philosophical support for taking this step. (2) In the second part, I focus more closely on Marchia's doctrine, arguing that Marchia's position is a slightly revised version of Scotus's. Unlike Aquinas and Bonaventure, Marchia explains Aristotle's metaphysics of accidents by way of the metaphysics of the Eucharist and not vice versa. So, in order to explain the philosophical consistency of this miraculous case, Marchia maintains that one does not need to modify the notion of inherence by distinguishing actual from potential inherence and including the latter in the accident's essence; rather it is necessary to take the case of the Eucharist seriously and, on this basis, to remove inherence totally from an accident's essence. In conclusion, the Eucharist shows that accidents are absolute beings to which actual inherence pertains contingently, potential inherence necessarily. But like Scotus's, Marchia's doctrine faces some difficulties that remain unresolved. (shrink)

FOR PLATO, PRINCIPLES WERE THE ROOT-SOURCE of being or of knowledge. For Aristotle, they were the “first cause” of being, of becoming, or of being known. Much the same conception is at issue in Thomas of Aquinas, for whom a principle was something primary in the being of a thing, or in its becoming, or in knowledge of it. As standard philosophical usage has evolved in the light of these ideas, a principle is as something basic—as a fundamentum or archê. (...) It either admits no proof or it needs not proof. Moreover, it must be abstract by way of applying to a broad range of cases. Thus, all concerned seem agreed that principles are fundamental generalities governing our understanding of the modus operandi of some knowledge-accessible domain. (shrink)

The dissertation examines Davidson and Heidegger's rejections of correspondence truth, as well as their claims that truth is theoretically primitive. Truth is primitive in the sense that it cannot be reduced to, nor defined in terms of, some other more theoretically basic concepts, such as those offered in correspondence, coherence, and pragmatic accounts of truth. The fact that truth cannot be defined in terms of more basic concepts does not mean that there are not important and meaningful things to (...) say about truth; Davidson and Heidegger's agreement that there is more to say about truth distinguishes them from minimalist approaches to truth. Davidson and Heidegger make explicit truth's conceptual relationship to other important areas of inquiry such as language, subjectivity, and ontology. The dissertation claims that the two philosophers agree, despite radically different background texts and methodologies, on the fundamental relationship between self, other, and world. The dissertation moves beyond mere comparison by showing that Davidson's own position commits him to a Heideggerian treatment of truth, or something like it. I argue that understanding the similarities and supplemental arguments offered by each philosopher leads to a better overall account of truth than that offered by each philosopher individually. Moreover, I argue that although Heidegger and Davidson offer primarily transcendental arguments, their theories can accommodate naturalistic theories of language and concept acquisition. (shrink)

'We desire all and only those things we conceive to be good; we avoid what we conceive to be bad.' This slogan was once the standard view of the relationship between desire or motivation and rational evaluation. Many critics have rejected this scholastic formula as either trivial or wrong. It appears to be trivial if we just define the good as 'what we want', and wrong if we consider apparent conflicts between what we seem to want and what we (...) seem to think is good. In Appearances of the Good, Sergio Tenenbaum argues that the old slogan is both significant and right, even in cases of apparent conflict between our desires and our evaluative judgements. Maintaining that the good is the formal end of practical inquiry in much the same way as truth is the formal end of theoretical inquiry, he provides a fully unified account of motivation and evaluation. (shrink)

What do modern academic economists do? What currently is mainstream economics? What is neoclassical economics? And how about heterodox economics? How do the central concerns of modern economists, whatever their associations or allegiances, relate to those traditionally taken up in the discipline? And how did economics arrive at its current state? These and various cognate questions and concerns are systematically pursued in this new book by Tony Lawson. The result is a collection of previously published and new papers distinguished in (...) providing the only comprehensive and coherent account of these issues currently available. The financial crisis has not only revealed weaknesses of the capitalist economy but also highlighted just how limited and impoverished is modern academic economics. Despite the failings of the latter being more widely acknowledged now than ever, there is still an enormous amount of confusion about their source and true nature. In this collection, Tony Lawson also identifies the causes of the discipline's failings and outlines a transformative solution to its deficiencies. Amongst other things, Lawson advocates for the adoption of a more historical and philosophical orientation to the study of economics, one that deemphasizes the current focus on mathematical modelling while maintaining a high level of analytical rigour. In so doing Lawson argues for a return to long term systematic and sustained projects, in the manner pursued by the likes of Marx, Veblen, Hayek and Keynes, concerned first and foremost with advancing our understanding of social reality. Overall, this forceful and persuasive collection represents a major intervention in the on-going debates about the nature, state and future direction of economics. (shrink)

What kind of mental state is episodic memory? I defend the claim that it is, in key part, imagining the past, where the imagining in question is experiential imagining. To remember a past episode is to experientially imagine how things were, in a way controlled by one’s past experience of that episode. Call this the Inclusion View. I motive this view by appeal both to patterns of compatibilities and incompatibilities between various states, and to phenomenology. The bulk of the (...) paper defends the account against four objections. Imagining and remembering seem to differ in whether they are active or passive, in the forms of singular content they involve, in their relations to observation and in their relations to belief. I argue that these differences can be accommodated, and some even explained, once we flesh out what else is involved in episodic memory, in addition to imagining the past. (shrink)

This new English rendition of Schelling’s foray into the genre of the philosophical dialogue significantly enhances the growing list of SUNY Press titles on German idealism. Bruno, published in 1802, is the centerpiece of his “identity-philosophy” writings. These in turn are the culmination and attempted reconciliation of the “idealist” and “realist” strains in his earlier thought, the high-water mark of the rational system Schelling was soon to challenge and modify as a result of his subsequent fascination with the will, evil, (...) and what he called “positive” philosophy. Bruno contains a few tantalizing hints of these later directions. But it is mainly a retrospective piece that attempts to set forth in a single framework the philosophical foundations of all he had written before. Bruno exudes an engaging vitality missing in its better-known and austerely Spinozistic predecessor, the Darstellung of 1801. It is nevertheless heavily didactic in spots, even as philosophical dialogues go, and is beset by several conceptual difficulties and gaps in the presentation, amply discussed by Vater in the introduction and notes. (shrink)

Aristotle's Politics claims that the polis or city-state "exists by nature" (Pol. 1.2.1252630). Thinkers as diverse as Marsilius of Padua, Thomas Hobbes, and Martha Nussbaum have struggled with how to interpret such a claim-some finding in it a salutary alternative to existing political theories, others finding in it the basis of deeply wrong-headed political thinking. In Aristotle on the Nature of Community, Adriel Trott seeks both to elucidate and to defend Aristotle's claim about the naturalness of the polis (...) by interpreting nature in the Politics through the notion of nature as an internal principle of motion ( a notion central to the understanding of natural things articulated in his treatise thereupon, viz. Physics2.1). (shrink)