When Kant wrote the Critique of Pure Reason in 1781, he addressed the question of the status of metaphysics itself. It had fallen into low regard in the previous century or so, struggling to keep up with advances in mathematics and the sciences and easily co-opted for dogmatic or oppressive projects. Kant’s own view was that one …
Kant’s Reason: The Unity of Reason and the Limits of Comprehension in Kant Read More »
Though it is not very widely discussed in the Anglophone world, Lebensphilosophie was a key movement in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in Europe. The conceptual anchor of Lebensphilosophie, as its name suggests, is that of “life” (5)—in particular, human life (6). It is from this standpoint that the exponents of Lebensphilosophie propose to offer a distinctive philosophical …
Philosophy of Life: German Lebensphilosophie 1870–1920 Read More »
According to libertarian views of free will, people sometimes act freely, but this freedom is incompatible with causal determinism. While attractive to many, philosophers have long been skeptical of such views. Two concerns have been central: (i) How can a person have control over an undetermined action? Wouldn’t it just be a matter of chance …
The Complex Tapestry of Free Will: A Free Will Odyssey Read More »
Annamaria Schiaparelli has provided readers with a reliable translation and an informative commentary for book six of the Topics, the book in which Aristotle speaks at length on definition and how it may be (truly) predicated. As the core books of the Topics (i.e., books II–VII) have not been explored very much at all in the English-language commentary …
Aristotle: Topics, Book VI, Translated with an Introduction and Commentary Read More »
In The Cognitive Life of Maps, Roberto Casati reflects on how maps, as well as many other superficially different but fundamentally similar kinds of representation, such as clocks and musical notation, aid us in navigation and other cognitive tasks. Chapter 1 begins by describing how using a map aids navigation by offloading the difficult task of …
This monograph provides a compact thematic overview of an understudied and often misunderstood terrain, the ethical and political thought of early modern Protestant Aristotelians. Indeed, the topic might appear to many readers as a contradiction in terms: didn’t the Reformation throw out Aristotle along with the whole baggage of medieval scholasticism? After all, Martin Luther …
“Philosophers don’t often write about the heart,” Stephen Darwall begins in The Heart & Its Attitudes, “At least, analytical philosophers don’t” (1). In taking up “matters of the heart,” Darwall means to consider our mutual emotional vulnerabilities and the attitudes that mediate our personal and social relationships. His journey leads the reader through ten chapters: an …
This is a collection of essays most of which have been published before, between 2001 and 2018. They all deal with John Rawls’ political philosophy, defending it against various criticisms and what Freeman takes to be misinterpretations. The essays are of admirable clarity, arguing for their positions in meticulous detail. For those interested in a …
According to a traditional view, whether a subject is in an epistemic state like knowledge (justified belief, etc.) depends only on epistemic, truth-related factors like reliability or evidence. According to a relatively recent view, the pragmatic encroachment view, this also depends on non-epistemic, pragmatic factors like what is practically at stake for the subject. If …
Stephen S. Bush takes on the difficult task of building an account of William James’s democratic political thought. As Bush notes, a number of scholars have dismissed the idea that James had anything to say politically, with the exception of a few condemnations of lynching. Bush clearly succeeds in rebutting those dismissive of James as …