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Books > Humanities > Philosophy > Topics in philosophy > Logic
Moral Inferences is the first volume to thoroughly explore the relationship between morality and reasoning. Drawing on the expertise of world-leading researchers, this text provides ground-breaking insight into the importance of studying these distinct fields together. The volume integrates the latest research into morality with current theories in reasoning to consider the prominent role reasoning plays in everyday moral judgements. Featuring contributions on topics such as moral arguments, causal models, and dual process theory, this text provides a new perspectives on previous studies, encouraging researchers to adopt a more integrated approach in the future. Moral Inferences will be essential reading for students and researchers of moral psychology, specifically those interested in reasoning, rationality and decision-making.
Moral Inferences is the first volume to thoroughly explore the relationship between morality and reasoning. Drawing on the expertise of world-leading researchers, this text provides ground-breaking insight into the importance of studying these distinct fields together. The volume integrates the latest research into morality with current theories in reasoning to consider the prominent role reasoning plays in everyday moral judgements. Featuring contributions on topics such as moral arguments, causal models, and dual process theory, this text provides a new perspectives on previous studies, encouraging researchers to adopt a more integrated approach in the future. Moral Inferences will be essential reading for students and researchers of moral psychology, specifically those interested in reasoning, rationality and decision-making.
The classical conception of reason (or logos) has been repeatedly attacked in the modern era. Its enemies range from Descartes, who complains that logos is not sufficiently useful or precise, to Derrida who hopes to liberate Western thought from its bondage to "logocentrism." At least since the time of Nietzsche, Plato has been damned as the chief architect of the classical conception of logos. He is accused of overvaluing reason and thereby devaluing the other, more human aspects of life. As it was originally formulated in Nietzsche's The Birth of Tragedy, Plato has been taken to be the arch-enemy of tragedy, which for Nietzsche was the most life-affirming of all the art forms of Greek culture. Originally published in 1990, The Tragedy of Reason defends Plato against his accusers. Employing a mode of exposition which exhibits Plato's position, Roochnik presents the Platonic conception of logos in confrontation with texts by Homer, Hesiod, Heraclitus, Aristotle, Descartes, Porty, and Derrida. In clear language, unencumbered by technical terminology, Roochnik shows that Platonic conception of logos is keenly aware of the strength of its opponents. The result is a presentation of Plato as a "tragic philosopher" whose conception of logos is characterized by an affirmation of its own limits as well as its goodness.
This book offers new insights into the nature of human rational capacities by engaging inferentialism with empirical research in the cognitive sciences. Inferentialism advocates that humans' unique kind of intelligence is discursive and rooted in competencies to make, assess and justify claims. This approach provides a rich source of valuable insights into the nature of our rational capacities, but it is underdeveloped in important respects. For example, little attempt has been made to assess inferentialism considering relevant scientific research on human communication, cognition or reasoning. By engaging philosophical and scientific approaches in a productive dialogue, this book shows how we can better understand human rational capacities by comparing their respective strengths and weaknesses. In this vein, the author critically revisits and constructively develops central themes from the work of Robert Brandom and other "language rationalists": the nature of the assertoric practice and its connection to reasoned discourse, the linguistic constitution of the shared space of reasons, the social nature and function of reasoning, the intersubjective roots of social-normative practices and the nature of objective thought. Practices of Reason will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working in philosophy of mind, philosophy of language and philosophy of logic.
A lively and engaging look at logic puzzles and their role in mathematics, philosophy, and recreation Logic puzzles were first introduced to the public by Lewis Carroll in the late nineteenth century and have been popular ever since. Games like Sudoku and Mastermind are fun and engrossing recreational activities, but they also share deep foundations in mathematical logic and are worthy of serious intellectual inquiry. Games for Your Mind explores the history and future of logic puzzles while enabling you to test your skill against a variety of puzzles yourself. In this informative and entertaining book, Jason Rosenhouse begins by introducing readers to logic and logic puzzles and goes on to reveal the rich history of these puzzles. He shows how Carroll's puzzles presented Aristotelian logic as a game for children, yet also informed his scholarly work on logic. He reveals how another pioneer of logic puzzles, Raymond Smullyan, drew on classic puzzles about liars and truthtellers to illustrate Kurt Goedel's theorems and illuminate profound questions in mathematical logic. Rosenhouse then presents a new vision for the future of logic puzzles based on nonclassical logic, which is used today in computer science and automated reasoning to manipulate large and sometimes contradictory sets of data. Featuring a wealth of sample puzzles ranging from simple to extremely challenging, this lively and engaging book brings together many of the most ingenious puzzles ever devised, including the "Hardest Logic Puzzle Ever," metapuzzles, paradoxes, and the logic puzzles in detective stories.
This book addresses the logical aspects of the foundations of scientific theories. Even though the relevance of formal methods in the study of scientific theories is now widely recognized and regaining prominence, the issues covered here are still not generally discussed in philosophy of science. The authors focus mainly on the role played by the underlying formal apparatuses employed in the construction of the models of scientific theories, relating the discussion with the so-called semantic approach to scientific theories. The book describes the role played by this metamathematical framework in three main aspects: considerations of formal languages employed to axiomatize scientific theories, the role of the axiomatic method itself, and the way set-theoretical structures, which play the role of the models of theories, are developed. The authors also discuss the differences and philosophical relevance of the two basic ways of aximoatizing a scientific theory, namely Patrick Suppes' set theoretical predicates and the "da Costa and Chuaqui" approach. This book engages with important discussions of the nature of scientific theories and will be a useful resource for researchers and upper-level students working in philosophy of science.
Originally published in 1973, this book shows that methods developed for the semantics of systems of formal logic can be successfully applied to problems about the semantics of natural languages; and, moreover, that such methods can take account of features of natural language which have often been thought incapable of formal treatment, such as vagueness, context dependence and metaphorical meaning. Parts 1 and 2 set out a class of formal languages and their semantics. Parts 3 and 4 show that these formal languages are rich enought to be used in the precise description of natural languages. Appendices describe some of the concepts discussed in the text.
This book advances a reading of Wittgenstein's Tractatus that moves beyond the main interpretative options of the New Wittgenstein debate. It covers Wittgenstein's approach to language and logic, as well as other areas unduly neglected in the literature, such as his treatment of metaphysics, the natural sciences and value. Tejedor re-contextualises Wittgenstein's thinking in these areas, plotting its evolution in his diaries, correspondence and pre-Tractatus texts, and developing a fuller picture of its intellectual background. This broadening of the angle of view is central to the interpretative strategy of her book: only by looking at the Tractatus in this richer light can we address the fundamental questions posed by the New Wittgenstein debate - questions concerning the method of the Tractatus, its approach to nonsense and the continuity in Wittgenstein's philosophy. Wittgenstein's early work remains insightful, thought-inspiring and relevant to contemporary philosophy of language and science, metaphysics and ethics. Tejedor's ground-breaking work ultimately conveys a surprisingly positive message concerning the power for ethical transformation that philosophy can have, when it is understood as an activity aimed at increasing conceptual clarification and awareness.
First published in 1989. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
First Published in 2004. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
AS Critical Thinking for AQA is the definitive textbook for students of the current AQA Advanced Subsidiary Level syllabus. Structured very closely around the AQA specification, it covers the two units of the AS level in an exceptionally clear and student-friendly style. The chapters are helpfully subdivided into short digestible passages, and include: intended learning objectives at the beginning of each chapter student exercises at the end of each section with a 'stretching activity' for more advanced learners exam orientated questions key point summaries at the end of each section cross references. In line with the AQA specification, there is a heavy emphasis on more imaginative forms of source material, for example, music, film, artwork, historical documents, adverts, moral dilemmas and scientific debates, as a means of illustrating key points. A great deal of emphasis is also placed on 'live' or 'real' arguments, taking topical examples from the world of science, politics, entertainment and sport. The book is accompanied by a companion website with extensive resources for both instructors and students.
In this book, Jennifer Moon explores and clarifies critical thinking and provides practical guidance for improving student learning and supporting the teaching process. Key themes covered include:
Teachers in all disciplines in post-compulsory education will find this approach to defining and improving students critical thinking skills invaluable.
How to Think Critically begins with the premise that we are all, every day, engaged in critical thinking. But just as we may develop bad habits in daily life if we don't scrutinize our practices, so we are apt to develop bad habits in critical thinking if we are careless in our reasoning. Readers are presented with a traditional step-by-step method for analysis that can be applied to all argument forms. Hundreds of exercises (with solutions) are included, as are several random statement generators which can be used to create thousands of additional examples. Venn diagrams, truth tables, and other essential concepts are presented not as definitions for academic study but as tools for better thinking and living. This second edition is substantially revised and improved throughout, and includes an all-new chapter on the applications of critical thinking in online contexts.
This book presents an edition of the Questiones super libro De Animalibus Aristotelis, a work by one of the greatest philosophers and physicians of the 13th century, Peter of Spain (later Pope John XXI, 1205-1277). He took as the basis for his work the translation from the Arabic made in Toledo around 1220 by Michael Scotus which included three important Aristotelian treatises. Preceding the critical edition, Dr Navarro offers an introduction to the person and works of Peter of Spain, the intellectual context of the 13th century characterized by Scholasticism and an Aristotelian Renaissance, and a short analysis of the linguistics and form of the Questiones. She also analyses the sources on which Peter drew, Greco-Latin, Arabo-Jewish and, of course, late antique and medieval treatises, showing that the text was not exclusively zoological in nature, but discusses important medical and philosophical topics, illustrating his extensive knowledge of both the Aristotelian corpus and 13th-century medicine. The text (divided into XIX books) is not a mere commentary about animals, but rather, as the title shows, a collection of questions in the Salernitan manner, the use of which was considered most appropriate for analysis and communication in the medieval scientific community to which Peter of Spain belonged. Alongside methodological and zoological problems, Peter of Spain discusses important questions disputed among the scholars of the period, including the location, hierarchy, motion, function and parts of the principal organs, the five senses, and many other medical issues such as reproduction, illnesses, or growth. Finally Dr Navarro includes a glossary that contains proper names (mainly those of the authorities and sources quoted by Petrus Hispanus), animal names (and their parts and substances), and the names of plants, metals, and the like.
This book presents an interpretation of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason as a priori psychologism. It groups Kant's philosophy together with those of the British empiricists-Locke, Berkeley, and Hume-in a single line of psychologistic succession and offers a clear explanation of how Kant's psychologism differs from psychology and idealism. The book reconciles Kant's philosophy with subsequent developments in science and mathematics, including post-Fregean mathematical logic, non-Euclidean geometry, and both relativity and quantum theory. It also relates Kant's psychologism to Wittgenstein's later conception of language. Finally, the author reveals the ways in which Kant's philosophy dovetails with contemporary scientific theorizing about the natural phenomenon of consciousness and its place in nature. This book will be of interest to Kant scholars and historians of philosophy working on the British empiricists.
What are reason and rationality? How significant are recent postmodernist and neuroscientific challenges to these longheld notions? Should we abandon a belief in reason and an adherence to rationality? Or can reason and rationality be reformulated and reframed? And what does politics have to do with how we think about reason and why we act more or less rationally? The Politics of Rationality differs from other books with "reason" or "rationality" due to its historical, political, depth-psychological, and multidisciplinary approach to understanding reason through history. Charles P. Webel eloquently clarifies the links among ideas, their creators, the relevant mental processes, and the political cultures within which such important concepts as reasons and rationality take hold. He demonstrates how reason and rationality/irrationality have become what they mean for us today and proposes a way to rethink reason and rationality in light of the withering critiques leveled against them. In doing so, he presents a "history of reason and rationality" by examining the intellectual and political contexts of four representative theorists of reason and rationality-- Plato, Machiavelli, Kant, and Weber-and by addressing contemporary challenges posed by postmodernism, depth psychology, and neurophilosophy.
This volume responds to the growing interest in finding explanations for why moral claims may lose their validity based on what they ask of their addressees. Two main ideas relate to that question: the moral demandingness objection and the principle "ought implies can." Though both of these ideas can be understood to provide an answer to the same question, they have usually been discussed separately in the philosophical literature. The aim of this collection is to provide a focused and comprehensive discussion of these two ideas and the ways in which they relate to one another, and to take a closer look at the consequences for the limits of moral normativity in general. Chapters engage with contemporary discussions surrounding "ought implies can" as well as current debates on moral demandingness, and argue that applying the moral demandingness objection to the entire range of normative ethical theories also calls for an analysis of its (metaethical) presuppositions. The contributions to this volume are at the leading edge of ethical theory, and have implications for moral theorists, philosophers of action, and those working in metaethics, theoretical ethics and applied ethics.
Paradoxes from A to Z, Third edition is the essential guide to paradoxes, and takes the reader on a lively tour of puzzles that have taxed thinkers from Zeno to Galileo, and Lewis Carroll to Bertrand Russell. Michael Clark uncovers an array of conundrums, such as Achilles and the Tortoise, Theseus' Ship, and the Prisoner's Dilemma, taking in subjects as diverse as knowledge, science, art and politics. Clark discusses each paradox in non-technical terms, considering its significance and looking at likely solutions. This third edition is revised throughout, and adds nine new paradoxes that have important bearings in areas such as law, logic, ethics and probability. Paradoxes from A to Z, Third edition is an ideal starting point for those interested not just in philosophical puzzles and conundrums, but anyone seeking to hone their thinking skills.
This unique introduction fully engages and clearly explains pragmatism, an approach to knowledge and philosophy that rejects outmoded conceptions of objectivity while avoiding relativism and subjectivism. It follows pragmatism's focus on the process of inquiry rather than on abstract justifications meant to appease the skeptic. According to pragmatists, getting to know the world is a creative human enterprise, wherein we fashion our concepts in terms of how they affect us practically, including in future inquiry. This book fully illuminates that enterprise and the resulting radical rethinking of basic philosophical conceptions like truth, reality, and reason. Author Cornelis de Waal helps the reader recognize, understand, and assess classical and current pragmatist contributions-from Charles S. Peirce to Cornel West-evaluate existing views from a pragmatist angle, formulate pragmatist critiques, and develop a pragmatist viewpoint on a specific issue. The book discusses: Classical pragmatists, including Peirce, James, Dewey, and Addams; Contemporary figures, including Rorty, Putnam, Haack, and West; Connections with other twentieth-century approaches, including phenomenology, critical theory, and logical positivism; Peirce's pragmatic maxim and its relation to James's Will to Believe; Applications to philosophy of law, feminism, and issues of race and racism.
Experimental philosophy is one of the most exciting and controversial philosophical movements today. This book explores how it is reshaping thought about philosophical method. Experimental philosophy imports experimental methods and findings from psychology into philosophy. These fresh resources can be used to develop and defend both armchair methods and naturalist approaches, on an empirical basis. This outstanding collection brings together leading proponents of this new meta-philosophical naturalism, from within and beyond experimental philosophy. They explore how the empirical study of philosophically relevant intuition and cognition transforms traditional philosophical approaches and facilitates fresh ones. Part One examines important uses of traditional "armchair" methods which are not threatened by experimental work and develops empirically informed accounts of such methods that can potentially stand up to experimental scrutiny. Part Two analyses different uses and rationales of experimental methods in several areas of philosophy and addresses the key methodological challenges to experimental philosophy: Do its experiments target the intuitions that matter in philosophy? And how can they support conclusions about the rights and wrongs of philosophical views? Essential reading for students of experimental philosophy and metaphilosophy, Experimental Philosophy, Rationalism, and Naturalism will also interest students and researchers in related areas such as epistemology and the philosophies of language, perception, mind and action, science and psychology.
Experimental philosophy is one of the most exciting and controversial philosophical movements today. This book explores how it is reshaping thought about philosophical method. Experimental philosophy imports experimental methods and findings from psychology into philosophy. These fresh resources can be used to develop and defend both armchair methods and naturalist approaches, on an empirical basis. This outstanding collection brings together leading proponents of this new meta-philosophical naturalism, from within and beyond experimental philosophy. They explore how the empirical study of philosophically relevant intuition and cognition transforms traditional philosophical approaches and facilitates fresh ones. Part One examines important uses of traditional "armchair" methods which are not threatened by experimental work and develops empirically informed accounts of such methods that can potentially stand up to experimental scrutiny. Part Two analyses different uses and rationales of experimental methods in several areas of philosophy and addresses the key methodological challenges to experimental philosophy: Do its experiments target the intuitions that matter in philosophy? And how can they support conclusions about the rights and wrongs of philosophical views? Essential reading for students of experimental philosophy and metaphilosophy, Experimental Philosophy, Rationalism, and Naturalism will also interest students and researchers in related areas such as epistemology and the philosophies of language, perception, mind and action, science and psychology.
The mathematical proof is the most important form of justification in mathematics. It is not, however, the only kind of justification for mathematical propositions. The existence of other forms, some of very significant strength, places a question mark over the prominence given to proof within mathematics. This collection of essays, by leading figures working within the philosophy of mathematics, is a response to the challenge of understanding the nature and role of the proof.
Paradoxes of the Infinite presents one of the most insightful, yet strangely unacknowledged, mathematical treatises of the 19th century: Dr Bernard Bolzano's Paradoxien. This volume contains an adept translation of the work itself by Donald A. Steele S.J., and in addition an historical introduction to the masterpiece, which includes a brief biography as well as an evaluation of Bolzano the mathematician, logician and physicist.
This second edition of Free Will presents a complete treatment of the history of the debate over whether humans have free will. It analyses the conditions under which actions must be characterized as unfree, and explores whether recent findings in brain physiology counter-indicate free will. Nicholas Rescher leads the reader through a conceptual web of distinctions that, taken together, provide a satisfying contribution to philosophical thought on free will. To determine if humans have free will, Rescher first examines exactly what free will is and how it should function. He examines the role of nature, nurture, and free choice, and he concludes that it is possible to validate the compatibility between freedom of the will and a certain special mode of determinism. Rescher sharpens his highly conceptual assessment by making distinctions between productive (or metaphysical) and moral (or motivational) freedom. He also distinguishes between free decision and free action, and motivational and causal determination of choices. In addition, he considers the distinction between durational events and the instantaneous outcomes that mark their commencements and completions, as well as between pre-determination and determination based on precedence. New in paperback and completely revised, this edition of Free Will represents a leading contemporary philosopher in top form.
Timothy Smiley has made ground-breaking contributions to modal logic, free logic, multiple-conclusion logic, and plural logic. He has illuminated Aristotle's syllogistic, the ideas of logical form and consequence, and the distinction between assertion and rejection, and has worked to debunk the theory of descriptions. This volume brings together new articles by an international roster of leading logicians and philosophers in order to honour Smiley's work. Their essays will be of significant interest to those working across the logical spectrum-in philosophy of language, philosophical and mathematical logic, and philosophy of mathematics. |
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