That a science of human conduct is possible, that what any man may do even in moments of the most sober and careful reflection can be understood and explained, has seemed to many a philosopher to cast doubt upon our common view that any human action can ever be said to be truly free. This book, first published in 1961, into crucially important issues that are often ignored in the familiar arguments for and against the possibility of free action. These (...) issues are brought to light and examined in some detail. (shrink)

What are the objects of thought? To consider a familiar case, may we assert that the proposition “I am thinking of a unicorn” entails that there is some object which is being thought of? Theories of subsistent objects provide an affirmative answer and seem to be based on the consideration that we are thinking of something when we think of a unicorn. Otherwise, to paraphrase G. E. Moore's well known statement of the argument, we would be thinking of the same (...) thing whether we thought of a unicorn or a griffen, namely, nothing. But, as G. E. Moore has shown, subsistence theories fail to distinguish between the logical and grammatical forms of such statements as “I am thinking of a unicorn” and “I am hunting a lion”. The latter is of the form · φx · Ψx; the former is not since it does not assert that the property of being a unicorn and the property of thought of by me both belong to something. But the problem that suggests itself is the nature of the contention that something is being thought of when, for example, we think of a unicorn. To begin with, is there no acceptable alternative to the various forms of the theory of subsistent objects according to which it would be correct to say that the proposition “I am thinking of a unicorn” entails the proposition “·x is being thought of”? And if saying that we are thinking of something, when we think of a unicorn, does not mean that there exists something that is being thought of, what is the force of the contention that we are thinking of something? (shrink)