We act for reasons. But, it is sometimes claimed, the mental states and events that make up reasons, are not sufficient conditions of actions. Reasons never make actions happen. We- as agents (persons, selves, subjects) - make our actions happen. Actions are done by us, not elicited by reasons. The present essay is an attempt to understand this concept of agent causality. Who - or what - is an agent ? And how - in virtue of what - does an agent do things, or refrain from doing them? The first chapter deals with problems in the theory of action that seem to require the assumption that actions are controlled by agents. Chapters two and three then review and discuss theories of agent cau sality. Chapters four and five make up the central parts of the essay in which my own solution is put forth, and chapter six presents some data that seem to support this view. Chapter seven discusses how the theory can be reconciled with neuro-physiological facts. And in the last two chapters the theory is confronted with conflicting viewpoints and phe nomena. Daniel Robinson and Richard Swinburne took time to read parts of the manuscript in draft form. Though they disagree with my main viewpoints on the nature of the self, their conunents were very helpful. I hereby thank them both."

In Representational Ideas: From Plato to Patricia Churchland Watson argues that all intelligible theories of representation by ideas are based on likeness between representations and objects. He concludes that 17th century materialist criticisms of having' mental representations in the mind apply to contemporary material representations in the brain, as proposed by neurophilosophers. The argument begins with Plato, with particular stress on Descartes, Malebranche, and Arnauld. He then proceeds with an examination of the picture theory developed by Wittgenstein, Carnap, and Goodman, and concludes with an examination of Patricia Churchland, Ruth Millikan, Robert Cummins, and Mark Rollins. The use of the historical development of representationalism to pose a central problem in contemporary cognitive science is unique. For students, scholars and researchers in neuroscience, cognitive science, philosophy of mind, and modern philosophy.

The first comprehensive philosophical introduction and assessment to the problem of self-control, an increasingly popular topic in philosophy Self-control is one of the most fascinating problems in philosophy, studied in core subjects such as free will and ethics, yet there is no book available explaining in clear language what it is Plenty of examples from psychology and philosophy including self-deception in mental disorder, addiction and everyday examples such as loss of willpower and even mind-wandering Includes helpful additional features such as chapter summaries, annotated further reading and glossary Very strong author team led by Neil Levy, well-known for his work on addiction, consciousness and free will.

The book questions two key dichotomies: that of the apparent and real, and that of the internal and external. This leads to revised notions of the structure of experience and the object of knowledge. Our world is experienced as possibilities of action, and to know is to know what to do. A further consequence is that the mind is best considered as a property of organisms' interactions with their environment. The unit of analysis is the loop of action and perception, and the central concept is the notion of habit of action, which provides the embodied basis of cognition as the anticipation of action. This holds for non-linguistic tacit meanings as well as for linguistic meanings. Habit of action is a teleological notion and thus opens a possibility for defining intentionality and normativity in terms of the soft naturalism adopted in the book. The mind is embodied, and this embodiment determines our physical perspective on the world. Our sensory organs and other instruments give us instrumental access to the world, and this access is epistemic in character. The distinction between the physical and conceptual viewpoint allows us to define truth as the correspondence with operational fit. This embodied epistemic truth is however not a sign of antirealism, as the instrumentally accessed theoretical objects are precisely those objects that experimental science deals with.

If man has no nature - if our intellect and understanding are products of our own activities - do we possess a key to self-modification? Are we free to re-make mankind? Sartre champions the romantic idea that we can - by sheer determination - begin afresh. Oakeshott is struck by the vandalism of such a project - he seeks to defend political culture from degradation by meddling academics. The Radical and Conservative understanding of social order and the human self are compared in this in-depth analysis of two contrasting philosophies.

Including two new essays, this remarkable volume is an updated edition of Davidson's classic Essays on Actions and Events (1980). A superb work on the nature of human action, it features influential discussions of numerous topics. These include the freedom to act; weakness of the will; the logical form of talk about actions, intentions, and causality; the logic of practical reasoning; Hume's theory of the indirect passions; and the nature and limits of decision theory.

We yearn to experience the idealized love depicted in so many novels, movies, poems, and popular songs. Ironically, it is the idealization of love that arms it with its destructive power. Popular media consistently remind us that love is all we need, but statistics concerning the rate of depression and suicides after divorce or romantic break up remind us what might happened if "all that we need" is taken away. This book is about our ideals of love, our experiences, of love, the actual disparity between the two, and the manners of coping with this disparity. A major study case of the book concerns men who have murdered their wives or partners allegedly 'out of love'. It is estimated that over 30% of all female murder victims in the United States die at the hands of a former or present spouse or boyfriend. How can murdering a loved one be associated with the assumed moral and altruistic love? Not only is love intrinsically ambivalent, but it can also give rise to dangerous consequences. Some of the worst evils have been committed in the name of love (as in the name of God). A unique collaboration between a leading philosopher in the field of emotions and a social scientist, In the Name of Love presents fascinating insights into romantic love and its future in modern society.

Philosophy of Mind is concerned with fundamental issues about the relation between mind and body and mind and world, and with the nature of the diverse variety of mental phenomena, such as thought, self-knowledge, consciousness, perception, sensation, and emotion. Philosophers of mind explore some of the most perplexing questions about our mental lives. For instance:

• How exactly is the mental related to the physical?
• How is it that our thoughts can reach out to reality and refer to objects distant in time and space?
• What is consciousness? Can it be explained by science?
• How is thought related to language?
• Can animals think?
• Is there some one thing, some special property, that all mental phenomena share that distinguishes them from non-mental phenomena?
• To what extent has the computer helped us to understand the nature of mind?
• Does emotion play a larger role in our rationality that has previously been thought?

For as long as humanity has sought an understanding of its place in the universe, philosophy of mind has been at the centre of philosophy, but it flourishes now as it has never done before. This new title in the Routledge's Major Works series, Critical Concepts in Philosophy, meets the need for an authoritative reference work to make sense of the subject's enormous literature and the continuing explosion in research output. Edited by Sean Crawford, a prominent scholar in the field, it is a four-volume collection of classic and contemporary contributions to all of the major debates in philosophy of mind.

With comprehensive introductions to each volume, newly written by the editor, which place the collected material in its historical and intellectual context, Philosophy of Mind is an essential work of reference and is destined to be valued by philosophers of mind?as well as those working in allied areas such as metaphysics, epistemology, and philosophy of language; and cognate disciplines such as psychology?as a vital research tool.

This book offers readers a collection of 50 short chapter entries on topics in the philosophy of language. Each entry addresses a paradox, a longstanding puzzle, or a major theme that has emerged in the field from the last 150 years, tracing overlap with issues in philosophy of mind, cognitive science, ethics, political philosophy, and literature. Each of the 50 entries is written as a piece that can stand on its own, though useful connections to other entries are mentioned throughout the text. Readers can open the book and start with almost any of the entries, following themes of greatest interest to them. Each entry includes recommendations for further reading on the topic. Philosophy of Language: 50 Puzzles, Paradoxes, and Thought Experiments is useful as a standalone textbook, or can be supplemented by additional readings that instructors choose. The accessible style makes it suitable for introductory level through intermediate undergraduate courses, as well as for independent learners, or even as a reference for more advanced students and researchers. Key Features: Uses a problem-centered approach to philosophy of language (rather than author- or theory-centered) making the text more inviting to first-time students of the subject. Offers stand-alone chapters, allowing students to quickly understand an issue and giving instructors flexibility in assigning readings to match the themes of the course. Provides up-to-date recommended readings at the end of each chapter, or about 500 sources in total, amounting to an extensive review of the literature on each topic.

This is the first English translation of Causalite' et Lois de La Nature, and is an important contribution to the theory of causation. Max Kistler reconstructs a unified concept of causation that is general enough to adequately deal with both elementary physical processes, and the macroscopic level of phenomena we encounter in everyday life. This book will be of great interest to philosophers of science and metaphysics, and also to students and scholars of philosophy of mind where concepts of causation and law play a prominent role. Contents1. What is a Causal Relation? 2. Laws of Nature and Universal Generalisations 3. Applicability Conditions and the Concept of "Strict Law" 4. Consequences 5. The Nomological Theory of Causation and Causal Responsibility 6. Efficacious Properties and the Instantiation of Laws 7. Causal Responsibility and its Applications Conclusion.

This Routledge Revival reissues Oliver Letwin's philosophical treatise: Ethics, Emotion and the Unity of the Self, first published in 1987, which concerns the applicability of the artistic classifications of romanticism and classicism to philosophical doctrine. Dr Letwin examines three particular theses associated with philosophical romanticism: that there is within us a high self and a low self; that there is a moral self in inevitable conflict with an amoral self; and that there is a rational self disjoined from and in tension with a passionate self. He argues that these notions of philosophical romanticism are, in fact, radically false, and instead takes the view that man can be a unified being of the sort described by philosophical classicists. But man has to work to achieve this status. The intrinsic unity of the human personality is not a guarantee of a coherent life, but a challenge to be met.

The aim of this book is to acquire a better understanding of the question 'who am I?' By means of the concepts of self-knowledge and self-deception questions about the self are studied. The light in which its topic is seen is the light of love, the light in which other people really become visible and so oneself in one's relation to them.

Delusions play a fundamental role in the history of psychology, philosophy and culture, dividing not only the mad from the sane but reason from unreason. Yet the very nature and extent of delusions are poorly understood. What are delusions? How do they differ from everyday errors or mistaken beliefs? Are they scientific categories?

In this superb, panoramic investigation of delusion Jennifer Radden explores these questions and more, unravelling a fascinating story that ranges from Descartes's demon to famous first-hand accounts of delusion, such as Daniel Schreber's Memoirs of My Nervous Illness.

Radden places delusion in both a clinical and cultural context and explores a fascinating range of themes: delusions as both individually and collectively held, including the phenomenon of folies ? deux; spiritual and religious delusions, in particular what distinguishes normal religious belief from delusions with religious themes; how we assess those suffering from delusion from a moral standpoint; and how we are to interpret violent actions when they are the result of delusional thinking. As well as more common delusions, such as those of grandeur, she also discusses some of the most interesting and perplexing forms of clinical delusion, such as Cotard and Capgras.

Thisvolumeexploresabductivecognition, animportantbut, atleastuntilthe third quarter of the last century, neglected topic in cognition. It integrates and further develops ideas already introduced in a previous book, which I published in 2001 (Abduction, Reason, and Science. Processes of Discovery and Explanation, Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers, New York). Thestatusofabductionisverycontroversial. Whendealingwithabductive reasoning misinterpretations and equivocations are common. What are the di?erences between abduction and induction? What are the di?erences - tween abduction and the well-known hypothetico-deductive method? What did Peircemeanwhen heconsideredabductionboth a kindofinferenceanda kind of instinct or when he considered perception a kind of abduction? Does abduction involve only the generation of hypotheses or their evaluation too? Are the criteria for the best explanation in abductive reasoning epistemic, or pragmatic, or both? Does abduction preserve ignorance or extend truth or both? How many kinds of abduction are there? Is abduction merely a kind of "explanatory" inference or does it involve other non-explanatory ways of guessing hypotheses? The book aims at increasing knowledge about creative and expert inf- ences. The study of these high-level methods of abductive reasoning is s- uated at the crossroads of philosophy, logic, epistemology, arti?cial intel- gence, neuroscience, cognitive psychology, animal cognition and evolutionary theories; that is, at the heart of cognitive science. Philosophers of science in thetwentiethcenturyhavetraditionallydistinguishedbetweentheinferential processesactiveinthelogicofdiscoveryandtheonesactiveinthelogicofj- ti?cation. Most have concluded that no logic of creative processes exists and, moreover, that a rational model of discovery is impossible. In short, scienti?c creative inferences are irrational and there is no "reasoning" to hypotheses.

From the Foreword by Alan Cohen:

"The lessons here in Mastering Life keep pointing us back to the simplicity of loving. We find ourselves in a world where complexity seems to pull us from joy at every turn. Simply holding the consciousness of love will open doors that anxious striving cannot. Behold the answer that sooths, heals, uplifts and changes the world, beginning with ourselves.

"Take your time as you stroll through these insightful pages. Absorb the words and images and make them your own. While they seem to be teaching you, they are really reminding you of what you know deep inside your heart. Then bring the principles to life in your own unique way and enjoy the blessings they deliver."

Priscian of Lydia was one of the Athenian philosophers who took refuge in 531 AD with King Khosroes I of Persia, after the Christian Emperor Justinian stopped the teaching of the pagan Neoplatonist school in Athens. This was one of the earliest examples of the sixth-century diffusion of the philosophy of the commentators to other cultures. Tantalisingly, Priscian fully recorded in Greek the answers provided by the Athenian philosophers to the king's questions on philosophy and science. But these answers survive only in a later Latin translation which understood both the Greek and the subject matter very poorly. Our translators have often had to reconstruct from the Latin what the Greek would have been, in order to recover the original sense. The answers start with subjects close to the Athenians' hearts: the human soul, on which Priscian was an expert, and sleep and visions. But their interest may have diminished when the king sought their expertise on matters of physical science: the seasons, celestial zones, medical effects of heat and cold, the tides, displacement of the four elements, the effect of regions on living things, why only reptiles are poisonous, and winds. At any rate, in 532 AD, they moved on from the palace, but still under Khosroes' protection. This is the first translation of the record they left into English or any modern language. This English translation is accompanied by an introduction and comprehensive commentary notes, which clarify and discuss the meaning and implications of the original philosophy. Part of the Ancient Commentators on Aristotle series, the edition makes this philosophical work accessible to a modern readership and includes additional scholarly apparatus such as a bibliography, glossary of translated terms and a subject index.

According to Russellian monism, an alternative to the familiar theories in the philosophy of mind that combines attractive components of physicalism and dualism, matter has intrinsic properties that both constitute consciousness and serve as categorical bases for the dispositional properties described in physics. Consciousness in the Physical World collects various works on Russellian monism, including historical selections, recent classics, and new pieces. Most chapters are sympathetic with the view, but some are skeptical. Together, they constitute the first book-length treatment of the view itself, its relationship to other theories, its motivations, and its problems.

Cognitive Systems and the Extended Mind surveys philosophical issues raised by the situated movement in cognitive science, that is, the treatment of cognitive phenomena as the joint products of brain, body, and environment. The book focuses primarily on the hypothesis of extended cognition, which asserts that human cognitive processes literally comprise elements beyond the boundary of the human organism. Rupert argues that the only plausible way in which to demarcate cognitions is systems-based: cognitive states or processes are the states of the integrated set of mechanisms and capacities that contribute causally and distinctively to the production of cognitive phenomena--for example, language-use, memory, decision-making, theory construction, and, more importantly, the associated forms of behavior. Rupert argues that this integrated system is most likely to appear within the boundaries of the human organism. He argues that the systems-based view explains the existing successes of cognitive psychology and cognate fields in a way that extended conceptions of cognition do not, and that once the systems-based view has been adopted, it is especially clear how extant arguments in support of the extended view go wrong.
Cognitive Systems and the Extended Mind also examines further aspects of the situated program in cognitive science, including the embedded and embodied approaches to cognition. Rupert asks to what extent the plausible incarnations of these situated views depart from orthodox, computational cognitive science. Here, Rupert focuses on the notions of representation and computation, arguing that the embedded and embodied views do not constitute the radical shifts in perspective they are often claimed to be. Rupert also argues that, properly understood, the embodied view does not offer a new role for the body, different in principle from the one presupposed by orthodox cognitive science.
"Rupert's book is a good read. It is a sustained, systematic, critical examination of the idea that minds are not simply ensconced inside heads, but extend into both bodies and the world beyond the body.... There is much to admire in this book. It is well-structured and well-written, adopting a self-consciously naturalistic perspective on how to understand the mind -- through our best, even if imperfect, empirical sciences in the domain of cognition. By presenting and critiquing a number of explicit arguments for and against the specific views that Rupert considers, Cognitive Systems advances the field."-- Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews
"Rupert's treatment is a state of the art sustained attack on various forms of the 'extended mind hypothesis'. It is rigorous and challenging, and will be of interest to a quite a large audience of researchers (graduates and above) in philosophy and in cognitive science. Rupert studiously avoids the 'straw men' that populate some recent critiques, and raises deep and sympathetic challenges that go to the core of the program."
--Andy Clark, Department of Philosophy, University of Edinburgh

This book presents a variety of narratives on key elements of academic work, from data analysis, writing practices and engagement with the field. The authors discuss how elements of academic work and life - usually edited out of traditional research papers - can elicit important analytical insight. The book reveals how the unplanned, accidental and even obstructive events that often occur in research life, the 'detours', can potentially glean important results. The authors introduce the process of 'writing-sharing-reading-writing' as a way to expand the playground of research and inspire a culture in which 'accountable' research methodologies involve adventurousness and an element of uncertainty. Written by scholars from a range of different fields, academic levels and geographic locations, this unique book will offer significant insight to those from a range of academic fields.

All humans can interpret sentences of their native language quickly and without effort. Working from the perspective of generative grammar, the contributors investigate three mental mechanisms, widely assumed to underlie this ability: compositional semantics, implicature computation and presupposition computation. This volume brings together experts from semantics and pragmatics to bring forward the study of interconnections between these three mechanisms. The contributions develop new insights into important empirical phenomena; for example, approximation, free choice, accommodation, and exhaustivity effects.

This book contains a series of essays that explore the concept of unconsciousness as it is situated between phenomenology and psychoanalysis. A leading goal of the collection is to carve out phenomenological dimensions within psychoanalysis and, equally, to carve out psychoanalytical dimensions within phenomenology. The book examines the nature of unconsciousness and the role it plays in structuring our sense of self. It also looks at the extent to which the unconscious marks the body as it functions outside of experience as well as manifests itself in experience. In addition, the book explores the relationship between unconsciousness and language, particularly if unconsciousness exists prior to language or if the concept can only be understood through speech. The collection includes contributions from leading scholars, each of whom grounds their investigations in a nuanced mastery of the traditional voices of their fields. These contributors provide diverse viewpoints that challenge both the phenomenological and psychoanalytical traditions in their relation to unconsciousness.

In Self-Reliance, Emerson expounds on the importance of trusting your soul, as well as divine providence, to carve out a life. A firm believer in nonconformity, Emerson celebrates the individual and stresses the value of listening to the inner voice unique to each of us?even when it defies society's expectations. This new 2019 edition of Self-Reliance from Logos Books includes The American Scholar, a stirring speech of Emerson's, as well as footnotes and images throughout.

A precious resource for anybody interested in contemporary thinking on happiness, "Philosophy and Happiness" encompasses a variety of philosophical traditions and draws from empirical work in psychology and economics to answer some of the oldest, and most pressing, questions about what contributes to individual well-being and life satisfaction.

This book offers an array of important perspectives on Kant and nonconceptualism from some of the leading scholars in current Kant studies. As well as discussing the various arguments surrounding Kantian nonconceptualism, the book provides broad insight into the theory of perception, philosophy of mind, philosophy of mathematics, epistemology, and aesthetics. His idealism aside, Kantian nonconceptualism is the most topical contemporary issue in Kant's theoretical philosophy. In this collection of specially commissioned essays, major players in the current debate, including Robert Hanna and Lucy Allais, engage with each other and with the broader literature in the field addressing all the important aspects of Kantian nonconceptualism. Among other topics, the authors analyse the notion of intuition and the conditions of its generation, Kant's theory of space, including his pre-Critical view of space, the relation between nonconceptualism and the Transcendental Deduction, and various challenges to both conceptualist and nonconceptualist interpretations of Kant. Two further chapters explore a prominent Hegelian conceptualist reading of Kant and Kant's nonconceptualist position in the Third Critique. The volume also contains a helpful survey of the recent literature on Kant and nonconceptual content. Kantian Nonconceptualism provides a comprehensive overview of recent perspectives on Kant and nonconceptual content, and will be a key resource for Kant scholars and philosophers interested in the topic of nonconceptualism.

Original papers by leading international authors address the most important problem in the philosophy of language, the question of how to assess the prospects of developing a tenable theory of meaning, given the influential sceptical attacks mounted against the concept of meaning by Willard Van Quine and Saul Kripke and their adherents in particular. Thus the texts attempt to answer the fundamental questions a " of whether there are meanings, and, if there are, of what they are and of the form a serious philosophical theory of meaning should take.