Robert Fogelin here collects fifteen of his essays, organized around the theme of interpreting philosophical texts. The book begins with an essay that lays down a set of principles governing the interpretation of difficult texts. Fogelin places particular emphasis on understanding the argumentative or dialectical role that passages play in the specific context in which they occur. The somewhat surprising result of taking this principle seriously is that certain traditional, well-worked texts are given a radical re-interpretation. Certain seemingly implausible positions are found to have more merit than has usually been attributed to them. Throughout the essays reprinted here, Fogelin argues that, when carefully read, the philosophical position under consideration has more merit than commonly believed. Included are essays dealing with texts from the works of Plato, Aquinas, Hume, Berkeley, Kant, Price, Hamilton, and Wittgenstein. With three exceptions, the selections were first published in major journals. Two appeared as part of collections, and one is new to this volume.

Originally published in 1967. This is an examination of warrant statements - statements which indicated something about the grounds on behalf of some further judgement, choice or action. The first part of the study is concerned with the role of warrant statements in theoretical discourse; while the second part concerns their role in practical discourse. Also examined are necessity, probability, knowing, seeing and the complex of terms which allow us to introduce an argumentative structure into discourse.

This work, first published in 1985, offers a general interpretation of Hume's Treatise of Human Nature. Most Hume scholarship has either neglected or downplayed an important aspect of Hume's position - his scepticism. This book puts that right, examining in close detail the sceptical arguments in Hume's philosophy.

This work, first published in 1985, offers a general interpretation of Hume's Treatise of Human Nature. Most Hume scholarship has either neglected or downplayed an important aspect of Hume's position - his scepticism. This book puts that right, examining in close detail the sceptical arguments in Hume's philosophy.

No serious philosopher or student of philosophy can afford to neglect Wittgenstein's work. Professor Fogelin provides an authoritative critical evaluation of both the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and Philosophical Investigations, enabling the reader to come to grips with these difficult yet key works. Fogelin explains Wittgenstein's attempt in the Tractatus to combine a picture theory of propositional structure, and also explores Wittgenstein's own criticisms of the Tractarian synthesis. He gives particular attention to topics in the philosophy of language, logic, psychology and the foundations of mathematics, examining Wittgenstein's work on these fields and arguing that Wittgenstein's criticisms in these areas form the basis for a radically new standpoint in philosophy.

Originally published in 1967. This is an examination of warrant statements - statements which indicated something about the grounds on behalf of some further judgement, choice or action. The first part of the study is concerned with the role of warrant statements in theoretical discourse; while the second part concerns their role in practical discourse. Also examined are necessity, probability, knowing, seeing and the complex of terms which allow us to introduce an argumentative structure into discourse.

This work, written from a neo-Pyrrhonian perspective, is an examination of contemporary theories of knowledge and justification. It takes ideas primarily found in Sextus Empiricus's Outlines of Pyrrhonism, restates them in a modern idiom, and then asks whether any contemporary theory of knowledge meets the challenges they raise. The first part, entitled "Gettier and the Problem of Knowledge," attempts to rescue our ordinary concept of knowledge from those philosophers who have assigned burdens to it that it cannot bear. Properly understood, Fogelin shows that the concept of knowledge is unproblematic. The second part of this study, called "Agrippa and the Problem of Justification," examines Agrippa's contribution to Pyrrhonism, a systematic reduction of its procedures which came to be known as the "Five Modes Leading to the Suspension of Belief." These modes present a completely general procedure for refuting any claim a dogmatist might make. Though largely unnoticed, there is, according to Fogelin, an uncanny resemblance between problems posed by Agrippa's "Five Modes" and those that contemporary epistemologists address under the heading of a theory of justification. Fogelin examines the strongest contemporary theories of justification--in both foundationalist and anti-foundationalist forms. The conclusion is that recent philosophical writings on justification have made no significant progress in responding to the Pyrrhonian problems these writings have addressed.

Series Information:
The Arguments of the Philosophers

Why did David Hume feel so deeply about publishing The Dialouges Concerning Natural Religion that he set aside funds in his will providing for its posthumous publication? Part of the answer is that it provided a literary, satirical work responding to his mean-spirited theological critics. In Hume's Presence Robert J. Fogelin provides a textual analysis that demonstrates the close relationship of The Dialogues with his central philosophical writings and its centrality to his relationship with skepticism. A striking feature of The Dialogues is that Cleanthes and Philo seem well versed in the works of the philosopher David Hume. Their arguments often echo in content-even wording-claims found in Hume's central philosophical writings. Beyond this, the overall dialectical structure of The Dialogues mirrors dialectical developments found in both The Treatise of Human Nature and the Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding: the naturalistic effort to provide a rational defense of religion ends in weakening religious commitments rather than in strengthening them. Nowhere in The Dialogues does Hume address his readers directly. As a result, it may not immediately be clear whether Hume is expressing his own opinions through one of his characters or is using a character to represent a position he wishes to examine, perhaps to reject. The Dialogues is a contest, and Hume, by not speaking directly in his own voice, leaves it-officially, at least-to his readers to judge who, if anyone, wins. The central problem of The Dialogues is to consider what Hume understood by skepticism. The second section of this book examines competing views of Hume's skepticism, concluding with his own remarks. In the Treatise and the Enquiry, Hume says, when consumed by skeptical arguments and reasoning, he finds philosophical nurture in rejoining the practices of everyday life. His famous, concluding remark in The Dialogues about skepticism being the basis for a believing Christian seems cut from the same cloth.

"Taking Wittgenstein at His Word" is an experiment in reading organized around a central question: What kind of interpretation of Wittgenstein's later philosophy emerges if we adhere strictly to his claims that he is not in the business of presenting and defending philosophical theses and that his only aim is to expose persistent conceptual misunderstandings that lead to deep philosophical perplexities? Robert Fogelin draws out the therapeutic aspects of Wittgenstein's later work by closely examining his account of rule-following and how he applies the idea in the philosophy of mathematics.

The first of the book's two parts focuses on rule-following, Wittgenstein's "paradox of interpretation," and his naturalistic response to this paradox, all of which are persistent and crucial features of his later philosophy. Fogelin offers a corrective to the frequent misunderstanding that the paradox of interpretation is a paradox about meaning, and he emphasizes the importance of Wittgenstein's often undervalued appeals to natural responses. The second half of the book examines how Wittgenstein applies his reflections on rule-following to the status of mathematical propositions, proofs, and objects, leading to remarkable, demystifying results.

"Taking Wittgenstein at His Word" shows that what Wittgenstein claims to be doing and what he actually does are much closer than is often recognized. In doing so, the book underscores fundamental--but frequently underappreciated--insights about Wittgenstein's later philosophy.

In Hume's Skeptical Crisis Robert Fogelin provides a textual study of the changes in perspective that emerged as Hume pursued his attempt to introduce the experimental method of reasoning into moral subjects--the subtitle of the Treatise of Human of Nature. In the process of giving an account of the operations of the human mind, Hume discovered that the mechanisms that create and sustain our beliefs are deeply unreliable and, in fact, capricious in their operations. Hume's crisis emerged when he recognized that the weaknesses that he ascribed to the operations of the human mind apply with equal force to the operations of his own mind. How, he asked himself, could he justify pursuing profoundly difficult investigations employing mental faculties that were manifestly not up to the task? His response was to trim back the ambitious program announced at the start of the Treatise.
Hume returned to this topic in the opening section of the Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, where, in a more circumspect mood, he weighed the reasons for and against pursuing what he calls abstruse philosophy. Given our limited capacities and the complexities of the subject, what, he asked, are the chances of success in pursing abstruse philosophical investigations? Hume answered that we could expect at least modest success by adopting the stance of a mitigated skeptic, where one cautiously examines only those topics suitable to our limited mental capacities. Hume held that this standpoint could be attained by counter-balancing radical Pyrrhonian doubt on one side with our non-rational instincts to believe on the other side. As a result, Hume's initial attempt to produce a "compleat system of the sciences" was transformed into "reflections of common life, methodized and corrected."

Taking Wittgenstein at His Word is an experiment in reading organized around a central question: What kind of interpretation of Wittgenstein's later philosophy emerges if we adhere strictly to his claims that he is not in the business of presenting and defending philosophical theses and that his only aim is to expose persistent conceptual misunderstandings that lead to deep philosophical perplexities? Robert Fogelin draws out the therapeutic aspects of Wittgenstein's later work by closely examining his account of rule-following and how he applies the idea in the philosophy of mathematics. The first of the book's two parts focuses on rule-following, Wittgenstein's "paradox of interpretation," and his naturalistic response to this paradox, all of which are persistent and crucial features of his later philosophy. Fogelin offers a corrective to the frequent misunderstanding that the paradox of interpretation is a paradox about meaning, and he emphasizes the importance of Wittgenstein's often undervalued appeals to natural responses. The second half of the book examines how Wittgenstein applies his reflections on rule-following to the status of mathematical propositions, proofs, and objects, leading to remarkable, demystifying results. Taking Wittgenstein at His Word shows that what Wittgenstein claims to be doing and what he actually does are much closer than is often recognized. In doing so, the book underscores fundamental-but frequently underappreciated-insights about Wittgenstein's later philosophy.

Since its publication in the mid-eighteenth century, Hume's discussion of miracles has been the target of severe and often ill-tempered attacks. In this book, one of our leading historians of philosophy offers a systematic response to these attacks.

Arguing that these criticisms have--from the very start--rested on misreadings, Robert Fogelin begins by providing a narrative of the way Hume's argument actually unfolds. What Hume's critics (and even some of his defenders) have failed to see is that Hume's primary argument depends on fixing the appropriate standards of evaluating testimony presented on behalf of a miracle. Given the definition of a miracle, Hume quite reasonably argues that the standards for evaluating such testimony must be extremely high. Hume then argues that, as a matter of fact, no testimony on behalf of a religious miracle has even come close to meeting the appropriate standards for acceptance. Fogelin illustrates that Hume's critics have consistently misunderstood the structure of this argument--and have saddled Hume with perfectly awful arguments not found in the text. He responds first to some early critics of Hume's argument and then to two recent critics, David Johnson and John Earman. Fogelin's goal, however, is not to "bash the bashers," but rather to show that Hume's treatment of miracles has a coherence, depth, and power that makes it still the best work on the subject.