ABSTRACT The aim of this article is to bring philosophical thinking closer to practice-based empirical work. Using Martin Heidegger’s philosophy, it offers a bridge between these two worlds, attempting to provide philosophical depth to the findings of a hermeneutic phenomenological study. This process unfolded through the appearance of three intertwined, potential, meaningful modes of being in the lifeworld: space as a condition for being and being for worlding the world; temporal and spatial self-being, the existence of multiple selves in time (...) and space; and suffering and thriving as modes of being. The article extends the dialogue and concludes with key reflections and insight for research practice. (shrink)

Graham Priest presents a ground-breaking account of the semantics of intentional language--verbs such as "believes," "fears," "seeks," or "imagines." Towards Non-Being proceeds in terms of objects that may be either existent or non-existent, at worlds that may be either possible or impossible. The book will be of central interest to anyone who is concerned with intentionality in the philosophy of mind or philosophy of language, the metaphysics of existence and identity, the philosophy of fiction, the philosophy of mathematics, or (...) cognitive representation in AI. (shrink)

The problem of higher-order misrepresentation poses a dilemma for the higher-order theory of consciousness. The two ways of conceiving of the theory each run into a different difficulty raised by the problem of misrepresentation. If the theory is conceived relationally, i.e., conceived so as the higher-order state causes or makes a first-order state conscious, then the theory faces a problem raised by Block concerning the implausibility of non-existent conscious states. If conceived non-relationally, i.e., conceived in such a way as it (...) is the higher-order state itself which is the conscious state, then consideration of Neander’s original misrepresentation problem, that this seems to make the first-order state a spinning wheel in the explanation of consciousness, raises the conceptual problem that this version of the higher-order theory seems not to offer a philosophical theory of consciousness that is distinct from the first-order theory. (shrink)

This book brings together three distinct research programs in moral psychology - Moral Foundations Theory, Cognitive Adaptations for Social Exchange and the Linguistic Analogy in Moral Psychology - and shows that they can be combined to create a unified cognitive science of moral intuition. The book assumes evolution has furnished the human mind with two types of judgement: intuitive and deliberative. Focusing on moral intuitions (understood as moral judgments that were not arrived at via a process of conscious deliberation), the (...) book explores the origins of these intuitions, examines how they are produced, and explains why the moral intuitions of different humans differ. Providing a unique synthesis of three separate established fields, this book presents a new research program that will further our understanding of the various different intuitive moral judgements at the heart of some of the moral tensions within human society. (shrink)

If you thought you knew who you were, THINK AGAIN. Did you know that half your DNA isn't human? That somebody, somewhere has exactly the same face? Or that most of your memories are fiction? What about the fact that you are as hairy as a chimpanzee, various parts of your body don't belong to you, or that you can read other people's minds? Do you really know why you blush, yawn and cry? Why 90 per cent of laughter has (...) nothing to do with humour? Or what will happen to your mind after you die? You belong to a unique, fascinating and often misunderstood species. How to be Human is your guide to making the most of it. (shrink)

Disgrace , by J.M. Coetzee, is a story of a rape; more, it is a tale in which the victim of the rape, Lucy Lurie, is silent. She demands neither sympathy nor justice for what happens toher, presenting herself as neither a victim nor someone seeking revenge. Instead she stands as a witness, and does so by adopting an attitude reminiscent of the thinking of Simone Weil—rejecting the possibility of rights, and not looking for explanations. Rape, Coetzee thus suggests, is (...) an act without meaning, a trauma whose reality cannot be exorcised through narration. Fittingly, therefore, the novel ends with a tableau of Lucy growing flowers in her garden; living, like Candide, without rationalisation or consolatory myth. (shrink)

This book combines a historical and philosophical study of Russell's theory of descriptions. It defends, develops, and extends the theory as a contribution to natural language semantics while also arguing for a reassessment of the importance of linguistic inquiry to Russell's philosophical project.

There is an important distinction between two different kinds of expressions of gratitude: propositional expressions of gratitude and prepositional expressions of gratitude. I argue that there is a corresponding distinction between two different kinds of expression of resentment: propositional expressions of resentment and prepositional expressions of resentment. I then argue that theists should suppose neither that propositional expressions of gratitude are prepositional expressions of gratitude to God, nor that propositional expressions of resentment are prepositional expressions of resentment of God.

Clinical decision-making within an ethical context -- The ethical self -- Ethical reasoning : a pragmatic approach -- Recognising ethical issues -- Gathering facts and values -- Ethical rules and frameworks -- Ethical theories -- Managing the outcome -- Future development.

It is a very curious thing that proponents of Idealism have considered it to be a satisfactory counter to ‘scepticism’, ‘nihilism’, and the like. On the contrary, it seems to me that Idealism is a very close cousin to ‘brain-in-a-vat’ scepticism and other anti-naturalistic fantasies. Moreover, it seems to me that Idealism is inferior to Naturalism for much the same kinds of reasons that ‘brain-in-a-vat’ scepticism and other anti-naturalistic fantasies are inferior to Naturalism: a proper weighing of theoretical virtues discloses (...) that Naturalism is the most virtuous worldview. (shrink)

This paper discusses the treatment of "infinity" in philosophy of religion, including its use in discussions of divine attributes, and its use in various arguments about the existence of God (including the kalam cosmological argument and Pascal's wager). The aim of the paper is to set out -- and where possible, to resolve -- various foundational problems about infinity.

In this paper, I offer a novel analysis of logical arguments from evil. I claim that logical arguments from evil have three parts: (1) characterisation (attribution of specified attributes to God); (2) datum (a claim about evil); and (3) link (connection between attributes and evil). I argue that, while familiar logical arguments from evil are known to be unsuccessful, it remains an open question whether there are successful logical arguments from evil.

This is the concluding chapter of a debate book about the existence of God: *Theism and Atheism: Opposing Arguments in Philosophy* (Gale, 2019). The book has a large number of contributors on both sides. My chapter suggests one way of unifying the contributions that are made on the atheistic side.

This paper is an English version of the paper that was published in German under the title: "Über die Aussichten erfolgreicher Beweise für Theismus oder Atheismus". My English paper was translated into German by Gabriele Schlegel. -/- The aim of this paper is to examine the prospects for proofs or successful arguments for the existence or non-existence of God.

A discussion of the recent prominence of 'new atheism' and 'Christian nationalism' in the United States.

General discussion of ontological arguments. (Extended the discussion of ontological arguments in the then current version of my SEP entry on ontological arguments.).

_Reading Philosophy of Religion_ combines a diverse selection of classical and contemporary texts in philosophy of religion with insightful commentaries. Offers a unique presentation through a combination of text and interactive commentary Provides a mix of classic and contemporary texts, including some not anthologized elsewhere Includes writings from thinkers such as Aquinas, Boethius, Hume, Plantinga and Putnam Divided into sections which examine religious language, the existence of God, reason, argument and belief, divine properties, and religious pluralism.

In this article we present a number of axiomatic theories of truth which are conservative extensions of arithmetic. We isolate a set of ten natural principles of truth and prove that every consistent permutation of them forms a theory conservative over Peano arithmetic.

v. 1. Public lectures on philosophy in Australia and New Zealand -- 2. Interviews with Australian and New Zealand philosophers.

In Four Views on Christianity and Philosophy contributors argue four positions: that philosophy and the Christian faith are in conflict, that Christian beliefs trump philosophical claims, that philosophy confirms the beliefs of Christianity, and finally, that philosophy must be reconceived under the Christian faith.

Why should the philosophical achievement of Ludwig Wittgenstein be taken seriously in the twenty-first century? This text answers this question by elaborating the distinctive therapeutic conception of philosophy defended in Wittgenstein's later work, typified by Philosophical Investigations. Here, Wittgenstein's highly contextual, problem-specific and person-specific conception of the philosophical project is clarified with reference to his own writings. In so doing, this text challenges contemporary failures to properly acknowledge all publications from those writings as posthumous, Nachlass (Legacy), or to treat judiciously (...) the material published from that Legacy. Explicitly following Gordon Baker's last essays (Wittgenstein's Method: Neglected Aspects, 2004), and drawing on biographical sources as well as scholarly ones, the text addresses Wittgenstein's published oeuvre. Importantly, this exposition gives weight to the Big Typescript (2005) and Voices of Wittgenstein (2003), as two "projected works" attempting to present Wittgenstein's philosophical agenda. Further, Wittgenstein's very last writings are argued here to constitute a single, broadly unified project, rebutting the suggestion of a 'third Wittgenstein'. Moreover, the book sketches philosophical discussions conducted in line with Wittgenstein's own conception of philosophy's project to continue chains of examples of the kind he used in exposition of it. (shrink)

This work is a companion to philosophy in Australia and New Zealand. It contains over two hundred entries on: Australasian philosophy departments; notable Australasian philosophers; significant events in the history of Australasian philosophy; and areas to which Australasian philosophers have made notable contributions.

This book is a collection of exchanges between Christian philosophers who adopt very different perspectives on Christianity.

This book is a discussion of a wide range of topics that bear on the existence of God. For each topic, there is a chapter by one (or more) theists, and a chapter by one (or more) atheists. Topics: (1) Definition; (2) Method; (3) Logic; (4) Doxastic Foundations; (5) Religious Experience; (6) Faith and Revelation; (7) Miracles; (8) Religious Diversity; (9) Causation and Sufficient Reason; (10) A Priori; (11) Our Universe; (12) Human History; (13) Human Beings; (14) Ethics; (15) Meaning; (...) (16) Evil and Suffering; (17) Science; (18) Theories of Religion; (19) Prudential / Pragmatic Arguments; (20) Final Reckonings. (shrink)

Graham McAleer's Erich Przywara and Postmodern Natural Law is the first work to present in an accessible way the thinking of Erich Przywara (1889-1972) for an English-speaking audience. Przywara's work remains little known to a broad Catholic audience, but it had a major impact on many of the most celebrated theologians of the twentieth century, including Hans Urs von Balthasar, Karl Rahner, Edith Stein, and Karl Barth. Przywara's ground-breaking text Analogia Entis (The analogy of being) brought theological metaphysics into (...) the modern era. While the concept of "analogy of being" is typically understood in static terms, McAleer explores how Przywara transformed it into something dynamic. McAleer shows the extension of Przywara's thought into a range of disciplines: from a new theory of natural law to an explanation of how misunderstanding the analogy of being lies at the foundation of the puzzles of modernity and postmodernity. He demonstrates, through Przywara's conceptual framework, how contemporary moral problems, such as those surrounding robots, Islam and sumptuary laws, Nazism (including fascism and race), embryos, migration, and body modification, among others, are shaped by the failure of Western thought to address metaphysical quandaries. McAleer updates Przywara for a new audience searching for solutions to the failing humanism of the current age. This book will be of interest to intellectuals and scholars in a wide range of disciplines within philosophy or theology, and will appeal especially to those interested in systematic and moral theology. (shrink)

Based on Michel Foucault's 1978 and 1979 lectures at the Collège de France on governmental rationalities and his 1977 interview regarding his work on imprisonment, this volume is the long-awaited sequel to Power/Knowledge.

René Guénon is a major figure for anyone who recognises a need to rediscover the spiritual roots from which Western society has become so comprehensively alienated. Immersing himself in the search for spiritual truth, he chose Islam as the vehicle for his spiritual life. Settling in Egypt, he clarified and deepened our understanding of the teachings of traditional metaphysics, his central message being that there is at the source of all humanity's traditions a 'Primordial Tradition' -- a Universal Metaphysics which (...) sets out the principles that underlie this Tradition. The truths it embodies are universal and unchanging, and form part of a unified body of higher knowledge which transcends the multiplicity of religious dogmas and philosophical systems that abound in Western society. He wrote about the need to transcend the formal and emotional aspect of religion in order to prepare ourselves for an understanding of 'pure metaphysics'. He explained how traditional societies achieved this, exploring the symbols used, in order to help individuals forward to levels of understanding which are otherwise inaccessible to minds blinkered by the limitations of the currently prevailing Western approach to existence and its meaning. (shrink)

This book argues that sport in the era of global or financialised capitalism has undergone a process of fracturing, which requires a re-assessment of longstanding and consensual accounts of traditional-to-modern sporting activity. Considering rival concepts of sport, it presents detailed, illustrative studies of various types of sporting or athletic activity - including soccer, cricket, rugby and track and field - to advance an alternative sociological understanding of sport rooted in the philosophies and theories of critical realism and critical theory. As (...) such, A Critical Realist Theory of Sport will appeal to scholars of sociology and social theory with interests in sport, research methods and critical realist thought. (shrink)

This book makes a reasoned & informed case for a critical reappraisal of many ideas that impact on the contemporary human situation. The text wanders through a series of disjointed philosophical, scientific & biographical themes, which present a unique cameo of an attempt to scrutinise the significance or insignificance of a human life.