This collection of papers investigates the most recent debates about individualism and holism in the philosophy of social science. The debates revolve mainly around two issues: firstly, whether social phenomena exist "sui generis" and how they relate to individuals. This is the focus of discussions between ontological individualists and ontological holists. Secondly, to what extent social scientific explanations may and should, focus on individuals and social phenomena respectively. This issue is debated amongst methodological holists and methodological individualists.

In social science and philosophy, both issues have been intensively discussed and new versions of the dispute have appeared just as new arguments have been advanced. At present, the individualism/holism debate is extremely lively and this book reflects the major positions and perspectives within the debate. This volume is also relevant to debates about two closely related issues in social science: the micro-macro debate and the agency-structure debate.

This book presents contributions from key figures in both social science and philosophy, in the first such collection on this topic to be published since the 1970s.

Social reality is currently a hotly debated topic not only in social science, but also in philosophy and the other humanities. Finn Collin, in this concise guide, asks if social reality is created by the way social agents conceive of it? Is there a difference between the kind of existence attributed to social and to physical facts - do physical facts enjoy a more independent existence? To what extent is social reality a matter of social convention.
Finn Collin considers a number of traditional doctrines which support the constructivist position that social reality is generated by our 'interpretation' of it. He also examines the way social facts are contingent upon the meaning invested in them by social agents; the nature of social convention; the status of social facts as symbolic; the ways in which socially shared language is claimed to generate the reality described, as well as the limitations of some of the over-ambitious popular arguments for social constructivism.

This book approaches its subject matter in a way that combines a strong analytical and critical perspective with a historical and sociological framework for the understanding of the emergence of Science Studies. This is a novelty, since extant literature on this topic tends either to narrate the history of the field, with little criticism, or to criticize Science Studies from a philosophical platform but with little interest in its historical and social context. The book provides a critical review of the most prominent figures in Science Studies (also known as Science and Technology Studies) and traces the historical roots of the discipline back to developments emerging after World War II. It also presents it as an heir to a long trend in Western thought towards the naturalization of philosophy, where a priori modes of thought are replaced by empirical ones. Finally, it points to ways for Science Studies to proceed in the future.

This collection of papers investigates the most recent debates about individualism and holism in the philosophy of social science. The debates revolve mainly around two issues: firstly, whether social phenomena exist sui generis and how they relate to individuals. This is the focus of discussions between ontological individualists and ontological holists. Secondly, to what extent social scientific explanations may and should, focus on individuals and social phenomena respectively. This issue is debated amongst methodological holists and methodological individualists. In social science and philosophy, both issues have been intensively discussed and new versions of the dispute have appeared just as new arguments have been advanced. At present, the individualism/holism debate is extremely lively and this book reflects the major positions and perspectives within the debate. This volume is also relevant to debates about two closely related issues in social science: the micro-macro debate and the agency-structure debate. This book presents contributions from key figures in both social science and philosophy, in the first such collection on this topic to be published since the 1970s.

This book approaches its subject matter in a way that combines a strong analytical and critical perspective with a historical and sociological framework for the understanding of the emergence of Science Studies. This is a novelty, since extant literature on this topic tends either to narrate the history of the field, with little criticism, or to criticize Science Studies from a philosophical platform but with little interest in its historical and social context. The book provides a critical review of the most prominent figures in Science Studies (also known as Science and Technology Studies) and traces the historical roots of the discipline back to developments emerging after World War II. It also presents it as an heir to a long trend in Western thought towards the naturalization of philosophy, where a priori modes of thought are replaced by empirical ones. Finally, it points to ways for Science Studies to proceed in the future.

Danish Yearbook of Philosophy is a peer reviewed journal committed to publishing high quality articles from Danish and international scholars and encourages papers across a wide range of philosophical issues. Editorial Board: Finn Collin (University of Copenhagen), Uffe Juul Jensen (Aarhus University), Sven Erik Nordenbo (University of Copenhagen), Stig Andur Pedersen (Roskilde University), Erich Klawonn (University of Southern Denmark), Hans Siggaard Jensen (Copenhagen Business School), Mogens Pahuus (Aalborg University).

The Danish Yearbook of Philosophy is a peer reviewed journal committed to publishing high quality articles from Danish and international scholars, and encourages papers across a wide range of philosophical issues. Volume 44 includes the following: Unreduced Experience in the Medium of Conceptual Reflection: Adorno and the Future of Post-Analytical Philosophy; Dissent in Communicative Ethics and Political Philosophy; A Brief History of Climatological Time; Modalities of Science: Narrative, Phronesis, and the Practices of Medicine; Humanities for Humanity 2.0: The Problem of 'Human' as a Projectible Predicate; A New Start for the Humanities Is Required for the 21st Century: A Debate among Steve Fuller, Ronald Schleifer, and Robert Markley.

The Danish Yearbook of Philosophy is a peer reviewed journal committed to publishing high quality articles from Danish and international scholars, and encourages papers across a wide range of philosophical issues. Volume 42 includes the following: Between Reason and Experience * Remarks on Wittgenstein's Philosophy: Private Language and Meaning * Ungrounded Semantics: Searle's Chinese Room Thought Experiment, the Failure of Meta- and Subsystemic Understanding, and Some Thoughts about Thought-Experiments * Genealogies of Modern Technology * Skepticism and Transcendental Arguments from Semantic Externalism

Danish Yearbook of Philosophy - Volume 36

The Danish Yearbook of Philosophy is a peer reviewed journal committed to publishing high quality articles from Danish and international scholars and encourages papers across a wide range of philosophical issues.

Table of Contents include: Shaun Gallagher's Consciousness and Free Will - Soren Overgaard's The Private Language Argument and Externalism - Morten Ebbe Juul Nielsen's Out of Harm's Way? - Nikolaj Nottelmann's Foresight and Blameworthiness for Action Consequences - Stig Alstrup Rasmussen's Reality Confounded: Discussion Review

What is linguistic meaning? What do people precisely do in uttering sentences? What are the principles involved in linguistic interpretation? How is it possible that linguistic signs, such as oral sounds or squiggles on a piece of paper, refer to things in the world? This book presents the attempts by philosophers in the 20th century to understand the workings of language, and address questions such as these. Presenting an accessible, balanced introduction to the philosophy of language as it has evolved in analytical philosophy during the 20th century, this textbooks offers equal attention to both of the main divisions within the field of philosophical semantics -truth-conditional theory and speech act theory - and shows how these theoretical approaches may be construed as complementary abstractions from a prior, undifferentiated understanding of meaning as defined by use. Meaning, Use and Truth offers students of philosophy of language, and those in related fields such as logic and linguistics, a comprehensive introduction to the field, and explores why philosophy of language in the 20th century could be viewed as providing the key to the solution if the classical problems of philosophy. Finn Collin is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. Finn Guldmann is External Lecturer at the University of Copenhagen and at Roskilde University, Denmark.

The Danish Yearbook of Philosophy is a peer reviewed journal committed to publishing high quality articles from Danish and international scholars, and encourages papers across a wide range of philosophical issues. Volume 41 includes the following: Collapse of Distance: Epistemic Strategies of Science and Technoscience * Vom Jenseits des Bekannten. Adorno uber Darstellung, Sprache und Rhetorik * Cultural Rights and Liberal Multiculturalism * Quantum Realism: The Interpretation of an Interpretation? * Towards an Integration of Mainstream and Formal Epistemology