Philosophy of language Books

Book Synopsis

Read more less

Book SynopsisMichael Dummett is one of the most important and influential of contemporary philosophers; this book covers his work in the closely related fields of metaphysics and the philosophy of language.Trade ReviewDummett is clear and concise. * The Philosophers' Magazine *An impressive collection by one of the most influential of living English philosophers ... Reading him, one has the impression of being at the hub of the discussion in the philosophy of language and his points in other areas are invariably authoritative and original. It is welcome as an elaborate and useful contribution to contemporary philosophical thinking. * History and Philosophy of Logic *His observations are of great interest ... The publishers should be thanked for making it less likely that these important papers will escape the attention of philosophers. * International Philosophical Quarterly *Table of Contents1. What is a Theory of Meaning? (I) ; 2. What is a Theory of Meaning? (II) ; 3. What do I Know When I Know a Language? ; 4. What does the Appeal to Use do for the Theory of Meaning? ; 5. Language and Truth ; 6. Truth and Meaning * ; 7. Language and Communication ; 8. The Source of the Concept of Truth ; 9. Mood, Force, and Convention * ; 10. Frege and Husserl on Reference ; 11. Realism ; 12. Existence ; 13. Does Quantification Involve Identity? ; 14. Could there be Unicorns? + ; 15. Causal Loops ; 16. Common Sense and Physics ; 17. Testimony and Memory * ; 18. What is Mathematics About? ; 19. Wittgenstein on Necessity: Some Reflections ; 20. Realism and Anti-Realism *

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis volume contains thirteen papers, including two previously unpublished, by Gareth Evans, a brilliant philosopher who died in 1980 at the age of 34. The treatments of problems about language are here informed by a lively sense of interconnections with issues in metaphysics and the problem of mind, and some of the papers are primarly directed to problems in these fields. Anyone who is concerned with the central questions of philosophy will be interested in this collection.Trade ReviewGareth Evans ... was widely regarded as the most brilliant and exciting philosopher of his generation ... The present volume now collects his previously published papers ... together with two substantial unpublished pieces ... These two papers, like the older ones, exemplify Evans's great virtues--his ability to develop sophisticated arguments with great clarity, his lightly worn technical expertise, and above all his capacity to get to the very heart of philosophical issues. This is analytical philosophy of the very highest quality. Those who already know Evans's work will be grateful to have his scattered papers brought together in this handsome volume; and any professional philosopher or advanced student unfamiliar with his work has an intellectual treat in store. * British Book News *

Read more less

Book SynopsisSubjective, Intersubjective, Objective is the long-awaited third volume of philosophical writings by Donald Davidson, whose influence on philosophy since the 1960s has been deep and broad. His first two collections, published by OUP in the early 1980s, are recognized as contemporary classics. Now Davidson presents a selection of his work on knowledge, mind, and language from the 1980s and the 1990s. We all have knowledge of our own minds, knowledge of the contents of other minds, and knowledge of the shared environment. Davidson examines the nature and status of each of these three sorts of knowledge, and the connections and differences among them. Along the way he has illuminating things to say about truth, human rationality, and the relations among language, thought, and the world.This new volume offers a rich and rewarding feast for anyone interested in philosophy today, and is essential reading for anyone working on its central topics.Trade ReviewDavidson's philosophical project is one of the most remarkable and productive of the twentieth century. * Kirk Ludwig, Mind Journal *There is a wealth of fascinating ideas here ... Davidson's project is ambitious, but his vision is immensely powerful and its execution highly ingenious. It is a very considerable achievement at the intersection of epistemology, philosophy of mind and philosophy of language. * Philosophical Investigations *Davidson writes philosophy like Wagner wrote operas: nothing less than everything is ever at stake. * Jerry Fodor, London Review of Books *Ces essais contiennent les principes de sa théorie de la connaissance. Réconcilier, comme ce volume s'en donne le programme, connaissance de soi, connaissance d'autrui, et connaissance du monde commun, n'est pas un programme aisé. Quoi qu'il en soit, l'ambition est là, et la constance, la profondeur de la recherche de Davidson depuis une vingtaine d'années sont manifestes. A peu près tous les thèmes classiques de la philosophie analytique sont ici retravaillés, approfondis, et modifiés, dans une prose extrêmement travaillée. Peu de philosophes ont eu une influence si forte sur la philosophie de ces derniè res dé cennies, aussi bien dans les pays anglophones qu'en Europe. Qu'on suive ou non Davidson dans son ambitieux projet, qui ne vise rien moins qu'à concilier naturalisme et normativité, la lecture de ce volume est un must. * Pascal Engel, Revue Philosophique *Table of Contents1. FIRST PERSON AUTHORITY (1984) ; 7. RATIONAL ANIMALS (1982) ; 10. A COHERENCE THEORY (1983)

Read more less

Book SynopsisTruth, Language, and History is the much-anticipated final volume of Donald Davidson''s philosophical writings. In the four groups of essays that comprise it, Davidson continues to explore the themes that occupied him for more than fifty years: the relations between language and the world; speaker intention and linguistic meaning; language and mind; mind and body; mind and world; mind and other minds. He asks: what is the role of the concept of truth in these explorations? And, can a scientific world view make room for human thought without reducing it to something material and mechanistic? Davidson''s underlying picture, which can be seen in many of these essays, is that we are acquainted directly with the world, not indirectly via some intermediary such as sense-data, representations, or language itself; that thought emerges in the first place through interpersonal communication in a shared material world, and continues to develop as we engage each other in dialogue; and that languagTrade Review'While every one of the five volumes of Davidson's essays is a philosophical treasure trove, all containing influential and important essays, this final volume is especially interesting since it encompasses a number of key topics that are of special significance in Davidson's thinking. . . . One of the great merits of this volume is that it does indeed give a sense of the breadth of Davidson's thinking, and of the extent to which it extended beyond the usual confines of traditional "analytic" philosophy. . . . the radical and idiosyncratic character of Davidson's thinking is still, it seems to me, very much underappreciated and often unrecognised . . . The hope is that the publication of the essays in this volume, along with the essays included in the other four . . . will eventually give rise to a more integrated appreciation of Davidson's work - work that constitutes one of the landmarks of twentieth-century philosophy' * Jeff Malpas, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *Table of ContentsTRUTH ; LANGUAGE ; ANOMALOUS MONISM ; HISTORICAL THOUGHTS

Read more less

Book SynopsisProvides a comprehensive introduction to the major philosophical theories attempting to explain the workings of language.Trade ReviewOriginal, provocative, and illuminating....Deserves to be widely read. Blackburn's mastery of the issues, and of the extensive literature, is very impressive, his philosophical judgment is good, and his treatment of the issues is consistently intelligent, sensitive, fair-minded, and insightful. * Nous *

Read more less

Book SynopsisAn attempt to provide a unified solution to a number of philosophical puzzles through a study of blindspots, ie consistent propositions that cannot be rationally accepted by certain individuals even if they are true.Trade Review'the book is challenging and extremely interesting. It will, I am certain, provike a good deal of exciting philosophical discussion.'Times Literary Supplement'Blindspots is full of stimulating discussions of innumerable philosophically interesting puzzles and problems ... It shows a lively sense of humour ... and reveals a knack for the provocative' Lloyd Humberstone, Monash University, Australasian Journal of Philosophy

Read more less

Book SynopsisLaw, Language, and Legal Determinancy discusses the role of language within law, and the role of philosophy of language in understanding the nature of law. The book argues that the major re-thinking of the common and `common sense'' views about law that have been proposed by various recent legal theorists are unnecessary.Trade Reviewa densly-packed, yet subtle book ... his analysis is inclusive and succinct * Dalhousie Journal of Legal Studies *

Read more less

Book SynopsisVagueness leads to indeterminacies in the application of the law in many cases. This book responds to the challenges that those indeterminacies pose to a theory of law and adjudication.The book puts controversies in legal theory in a new light, using arguments in the philosophy of language to offer an explanation of the unclarities that arise in borderline cases for the application of vague expressions. But the author also argues that vagueness is a feature of law, and not merely of legal language: the linguistic and non-linguistic resources of the law are commonly vague.These claims have consequences that have seemed unacceptable to many legal theorists. Because law is vague, judges cannot always decide cases by giving effect to the legal rights and obligations of the parties. Judges cannot always treat like cases alike. The ideal of the rule of law seems to be unattainable. The book offers a new articulation of the content of that ideal. It argues that the pursuit of justice and the Table of Contents1. Introduction ; 2. Linguistic Indeterminacy ; 3. Sources of Indeterminacy ; 4. Vagueness and Legal Theory ; 5. How not to Solve the Paradox of the Heap ; 6. The Epistemic Theory of Vagueness ; 7. Vagueness and Similarity ; 8. Vagueness and Interpretation ; 9. The Impossibility of the Rule of Law ; Bibliography ; Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisPaolo Mancosu presents a series of innovative studies in the history and the philosophy of logic and mathematics in the first half of the twentieth century. The Adventure of Reason is divided into five main sections: history of logic (from Russell to Tarski); foundational issues (Hilbert''s program, constructivity, Wittgenstein, Gödel); mathematics and phenomenology (Weyl, Becker, Mahnke); nominalism (Quine, Tarski); semantics (Tarski, Carnap, Neurath). Mancosu exploits extensive untapped archival sources to make available a wealth of new material that deepens in significant ways our understanding of these fascinating areas of modern intellectual history. At the same time, the book is a contribution to recent philosophical debates, in particular on the prospects for a successful nominalist reconstruction of mathematics, the nature of finitist intuition, the viability of alternative definitions of logical consequence, and the extent to which phenomenology can hope to account for the exaTrade ReviewThis book contains an enormous amount of material that historians will wish to consult. Mancosu convincingly demonstrates that there is a great deal more that we can still learn about the origins of modern mathematical logic. * Michael Potter, Philosophia Mathematica *Table of ContentsPART 1: HISTORY OF LOGIC; OART 2: FOUNDATIONS OF MATHEMATICS; PART 3: PHENOMENOLOGY AND MATHEMATICS; PART 4: NOMINALISM; PART 5: THE EMERGENCE OF SEMANTICS: TRUTH AND LOGICAL CONSEQUENCE

Read more less

Book SynopsisJohn Hawthorne and David Manley present an original treatment of the semantic phenomenon of reference and the cognitive phenomenon of singular thought. In Part I, they argue against the idea that either is tied to a special relation of causal or epistemic acquaintance. Part II challenges the alleged semantic rift between definite and indefinite descriptions on the one hand, and names and demonstratives on the other--a division that has been motivated in part by appeals to considerations of acquaintance. Drawing on recent work in linguistics and philosophical semantics, Hawthorne and Manley explore a more unified account of all four types of expression according to which none of them paradigmatically fits the profile of a referential term. On the preferred framework put forward in The Reference Book, all four types of expression involve existential quantification but admit of uses that exhibit many of the traits associated with reference--a phenomenon that is due to the presence of whatTrade Review'John Hawthorne and David Manley have two main objectives in this excellent book. The first is to demolish the common assumption, following Bertrand Russell, that some kind of acquaintance is required for both (singular) reference and singular thought. The second is to establish a semantic uniformity among four kinds of noun phrases - specific indefinite descriptions, definite descriptions, demonstratives, and proper names ... a wonderful book. The authors' writing style is lively . . . readable, and clear, and their very careful consideration of all sides of every issue should leave readers with a whole new appreciation of the complexity of those issues, and a sense that many of their automatic assumptions about the functioning of noun phrases in English (and most likely other languages as well) need to be revised.' * Barbara Abbott, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *Table of ContentsPART I: AGAINST ACQUAINTANCE; PART II: BEYOND ACQUAINTANCE

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis volume presents twenty-two uncollected philosophical essays by Sir Peter Strawson, one of the leading philosophers of the second half of the twentieth century. The essays (two of them previously unpublished) are drawn from seven decades of work, from 1949 to 2003. They span the broad range of Strawson''s work: metaphysics, epistemology, philosophical logic, philosophy of language, ethical theory, and history of philosophy, along with metaphilosophical reflections and intellectual autobiography.Table of ContentsPreface ; 1. Ethical Intuitionism ; 2. In Defence of a Dogma ; 3. Construction and Analysis ; 4. Proper Names ; 5. The Post-Linguistic Thaw ; 6. Analysis, Science, and Metaphysics ; 7. Bennett on Kant's Analytic ; 8. Does Knowledge have Foundations? ; 9. Knowledge and Truth ; 10. Scruton and Wright on Anti-Realism ; 11. Perception and its Objects ; 12. Liberty and Necessity ; 13. Sensibility, Understanding, and the Doctrine of Synthesis ; 14. Two Conceptions of Philosophy ; 15. Review of Paul Grice, Studies in the Way of Words ; 16. Knowing from Words ; 17. What have we learned from Philosophy in the Twentieth Century? ; 18. A Category of Particulars ; 19. Paul Grice ; 20. Why Philosophy? ; 21. Intellectual Autobiography ; 22. A Bit of Intellectual Autobiography ; Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisWhat does talk of meaning mean? All thinking consists in natural happenings in the brain. Talk of meaning though, has resisted interpretation in terms of anything that is clearly natural, such as linguistic dispositions. This, Kripke''s Wittgenstein suggests, is because the concept of meaning is normative, on the ''ought'' side of Hume''s divide between is and ought. Allan Gibbard''s previous books Wise Choices, Apt Feelings and Thinking How to Live treated normative discourse as a natural phenomenon, but not as describing the world naturalistically. His theory is a form of expressivism for normative concepts, holding, roughly, that normative statements express states of planning. This new book integrates his expressivism for normative language with a theory of how the meaning of meaning could be normative. The result applies to itself: metaethics expands to address key topics in the philosophy of language, topics which in turn include core parts of metaethics. An upshot is to lessen tTrade ReviewThe book is rich in original ideas and arguments, and the topics canvassed or commented on are significant and bewildering in their number ... serious students of the relevant topics should find its study rewarding, and clearly it is essential reading for anyone working on meaning and normativity. * Teemu Toppinen, Ethics *the most ambitious and innovative attempt to explain meaning since Paul Horwich and Robert Brandom developed their theories in the nineties ... I hope that this splendid book will find a wide audience. It is wonderfully stimulating, opening up vast new territories for investigation. * Christopher S. Hill, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *Table of Contents1. Introduction ; 2. Normativity and Community ; 3. Kripke's Wittgenstein on Meaning ; 4. Correct Belief ; 5. Horwich on Meaning ; 6. The Normative Meaning Role ; 7. Reference, Truth, and Context ; 8. Meaning and Plans ; 9. Interpreting Interpretation ; 10. Expressivism, Non-Naturalism, and Us ; Appendix 1: The Objects of Belief ; Appendix 2: Schroeder on Expressivism ; References ; Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisSome things in the world--intentional items such as words, thoughts, portraits, and passport photos--are about things, whereas other things in the world--sticks, stones, and fireflies--are not about anything. Necessary Intentionality is a study of aboutness, or intentionality, with a focus on the following question: are intentional items typically about whatever they are about as a matter of necessity, or is their aboutness, rather, a matter of mere contingency? Consider, for example, a particular name referring to a particular person, or a specific belief with respect to some particular thing that it is such and so. Is it possible for the name not to have referred to the person and for the belief not to have been about the thing? Ori Simchen defends a negative answer to such questions. That the name refers to the person is necessary for the name and that the belief is about the thing is necessary for the belief. Simchen articulates his overall position in two main stages. In the firstTrade ReviewIn Necessary Intentionality, Ori Simchen crafts razor-sharp arguments for a surprising package of theses in metaphysics, philosophy of language, and philosophy of mind. On Simchen's view, all modal facts are determined by the essences of actual particular objects, a wordâs being of a given type depends necessarily on what the word is about, and a thought of a given type cannot occur absent its particular object. In developing these views, Simchen rejects many bits of prevailing philosophical wisdom ... Most radically, he develops a parameter-based account of cognitive states that explains much about cognition while doing entirely without mental representations or mental content. Simchen masterfully integrates these strands into a single coherent picture and in doing so provides a model of careful, substantive philosophical investigation. * Professor Robert D. Rupert, University of Colorado at Boulder *A sustained defense of the necessary aboutness of language and of cognitive states, based on an account of modality according to which the space of possibilities is determined by the natures of existing particular things. Simchen revisits arguments about, among other topics, actualism, essentialism, rigidity, the de re/de dicto distinction, and the distinction between narrow and wide content shedding new light on old themes. This book should be of interest to anyone working on reference, modality or cognition. * Professor Genoveva Marti of Western University, Ontario *Table of ContentsMODALITY; INTENTIONALITY

Read more less

Book SynopsisPart of the "Oxford Readings in Philosophy" series, this volume presents a selection of the major writings in the debate on the nature of meaning and reference which started 100 years ago with Frege's essay "On Sense and Reference". This subject lies at the heart of the philosophy of language.Trade Review`Since the 1960's, the Oxford Readings in Philosophy have provided an essential service to all teachers of the subject. ... in a colourful and attractive new format, but the essential aim of the series remains unchanged: to introduce students, as gently as is realistically possible, to the best work in a given area. ... the volume on time is very wide-ranging Cogito:Winter 1993`Excellent for my second year undergraduate course - right on the topics - and making central papers easily available.' Martin Bell, University of York`This is a valuable collection of articles: the quality is outstanding, and the choice is excellent, for courses on the philosophy of language.' David Bell, University of Sheffield`This is a really excellent book.' Hugh Bredin, Queen's University, Belfast`It is excellent for teaching the subject in a British University' Dr G. McCulloch, University of Nottingham`A very useful anthology of seminal essays in this field.' Stephen P. Thornton, Mary Immaculate College, Limerick, Ireland`This is an excellent selection of articles.' R. Fellows, University of Bradford`Excellent, nicely priced volume with many of the classic texts.' D.E. Cooper, University of Durham`This is an excellent collection of articles.' Maria Baghramian, University College Dublin`An extremely useful collection on meaning and reference containing classic papers students ought to read.' Dr C. Macdonald, University of Manchester`One of the most useful texts in the series Oxford Readings in Philosophy. It has the most important of the relevant essays.' B.B. Rundle, Trinity College, OxfordTable of ContentsOn sense and reference, Gottlob Frege; letter to Jourdain, Gottlob Frege; descriptions, Bertrand Russell; on referring, P.F. Strawson; mind and verbal dispositions, W.V. Quine; truth and meaning, Donald Davidson; on the sense and reference of a proper name, John McDowell; what does the appeal to use do for the theory of meaning, Michael Dummett; meaning and reference, Hilary Putnam; identity and necessity, Saul Kripke; Putnam's doctrine of natural kind words and Frege's doctrines of sense, reference and extension - can they cohere?, David Wiggins; the causal theory of names, Gareth Evans; Frege's distinction between sense and reference, Michael Dummett; Wittgenstein on following a rule, John McDowell.

Read more less

Book SynopsisBertrand Russell famously distinguished between ''knowledge by acquaintance'' and ''knowledge by description''. For much of the latter half of the twentieth century, many philosophers viewed the notion of acquaintance with suspicion, associating it with Russellian ideas that they would wish to reject. However in the past decade or two the concept has undergone a striking revival in mainstream ''analytic'' philosophy--acquaintance is, it seems, respectable again. This volume showcases the great variety of topics in philosophy of mind, epistemology, and philosophy of language for which philosophers are currently employing the notion of acquaintance. It is the first collection of new essays devoted to the topic of acquaintance, featuring chapters from many of the world''s leading experts in this area. Opening with an extensive introductory essay, which provides some historical background and summarizes the main debates and issues concerning acquaintance, the remaining thirteen contributions are grouped thematically into four sections: phenomenal consciousness, perceptual experience, reference, and epistemology.Table of ContentsThomas Raleigh: Introduction: The Recent Renaissance of Acquaintance Part I: Phenomenal Consciousness 1: Joseph Levine: Consciousness is Acquaintance 2: Sam Coleman: Natural Acquaintance 3: Alex Grzankowski and Michael Tye: What Acquaintance Teaches 4: M. G. F. Martin: Betwixt Feeling and Thinking: Two-Level Accounts of Experience Part II: Perceptual Experience 5: David Woodruff Smith: Acquaintance in an Experience of Perception-cum-Action 6: Tom Stoneham: Dreaming, Phenomenal Character and Acquaintance 7: Jonathan Knowles: Relationalism, Berkeley's Puzzle and Phenomenological Externalism 8: Anders Nes: Conceptualism and the Explanatory Role of Experience Part III: Reference 9: John Campbell: Acquaintance as Grounded in Joint Attention 10: Jessica Pepp: Principles of Acquaintance Part IV: Epistemology 11: Richard Fumerton: Acquaintance: The Foundation of Knowledge and Thought 12: Katalin Farkas: Objectual Knowledge 13: Bill Brewer: Visual Experience, Revelation and the Three Rs

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis book offers a concise but comprehensive entry-level guide to the study of meaning in context. There can be a big difference between what a speaker says and what they mean - i.e. between literal meaning and intended meaning. A speaker who says I need coffee can mean anything from ''Please buy more coffee'' to ''I''m really sleepy''. How is a hearer to know? In this book, Betty Birner explores how we get from what is said to what is meant, from the perspective of both the speaker and the hearer, dealing with a range of context-dependent issues in language along the way: literal and non-literal meaning, implicature, speech acts, reference, definiteness, presupposition, and information structure. She reveals how language users can infer each other''s meanings using not just what is being said but also the context and an assumption of rationality and cooperation. This slim guide summarizes the most important and foundational theories in the field of linguistic pragmatics, illustrated with plenty of real-life examples, and including a helpful glossary of key terms. Written in a lively and accessible style, the book will appeal to a wide range of readers, from undergraduate and graduate students of pragmatics to general readers interested in how we successfully communicate with one another.Trade ReviewSumming up, Pragmatics: A slim guide is a valuable tool for anyone interested in the study of pragmatics. * Nicolas Ruytenbeek, Ghent University, Linguist List *Just what a slim guide should be: brisk, authoritative, even-handed, accessible, entertaining. Birner deftly traverses the theoretical and empirical landscape of contemporary pragmatics from (non-)literality to speech acts, from presupposition to implicature, from reference to information structure, enlivened at each stop with illustrative data from Poe's tales to political innuendo. * Laurence R. Horn, Yale University *Combining elegant exposition and well-chosen examples, this book serves not only to introduce the study of pragmatics to a new audience, but also to shed new light on several widely-discussed topics. * Chris Cummins, University of Edinburgh *Table of Contents1: Introduction 2: Literal vs. non-literal meaning 3: Implicature 4: Speech acts 5: Reference 6: Definiteness and anaphora 7: Presupposition 8: Information structure 9: New directions 10: Conclusion Glossary

Read more less

Book SynopsisLogical monism is the claim that there is a single correct logic, the ''one true logic'' of our title. The view has evident appeal, as it reflects assumptions made in ordinary reasoning as well as in mathematics, the sciences, and the law. In all these spheres, we tend to believe that there are determinate facts about the validity of arguments. Despite its evident appeal, however, logical monism must meet two challenges. The first is the challenge from logical pluralism, according to which there is more than one correct logic. The second challenge is to determine which form of logical monism is the correct one. One True Logic is the first monograph to explicitly articulate a version of logical monism and defend it against the first challenge. It provides a critical overview of the monism vs pluralism debate and argues for the former. It also responds to the second challenge by defending a particular monism, based on a highly infinitary logic. It breaks new ground on a number of fronts and unifies disparate discussions in the philosophical and logical literature. In particular, it generalises the Tarski-Sher criterion of logicality, provides a novel defence of this generalisation, offers a clear new argument for the logicality of infinitary logic and replies to recent pluralist arguments.Trade ReviewOne True Logic is the first monograph to explicitly articulate a version of logical monism and defend it against the first challenge. It provides a critical overview of the monism vs pluralism debate and argues for the former. It also responds to the second challenge by defending a particular monism, based on a highly infinitary logic. It breaks new ground on a number of fronts and unifies disparate discussions in the philosophical and logical literature. * MathSciNet *In One True Logic: A Monist Manifesto, Griffiths and Paseau set out to defend the doctrine known as logical monism. In short, the book is part of an ongoing debate between logical pluralists and logical monists...Their work is challenging yet worth the effort. It advances a strong defense of logical monism by offering just as strong objections to logical pluralism. Anyone interested in the philosophy of logic must read this book! * Choice *a bold and original book. Its discussion of foundational questions about logic is detailed and mathematically rigorous. At the same time, it is admirably clear and approachable. It is also fun to read. Its uncompromising style ...its precise argumentation, and its dialectical clarity make it an engaging and thought-provoking investigation into the nature of logical consequence... full of original arguments worthy of discussion... a fascinating and rich book. * Erik Stei, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *Table of ContentsIntroduction Prologue 1: Conceptions of Logical Consequence 2: What is Monism? 3: Against Pluralism 4: The LIFGIFS Hypothesis 5: Beyond the Finitary 6: Isomorphism Invariance 7: Towards the One True Logic 8: The Heterogeneity Objection 9: The Overgeneration Objection 10: The Absoluteness Objection 11: The Intensional Objection Conclusion

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis book develops a theory of enriched meanings for natural language interpretation that uses the concept of monads and related ideas from category theory, a branch of mathematics that has been influential in theoretical computer science and elsewhere. Certain expressions that exhibit complex effects at the semantics/pragmatics boundary live in an enriched meaning space, while others live in a more basic meaning space. These basic meanings are mapped to enriched meanings only when required compositionally, which avoids generalizing meanings to the worst case. Ash Asudeh and Gianluca Giorgolo show that the monadic theory of enriched meanings offers a formally and computationally well-defined way to tackle important challenges at the semantics/pragmatics boundary. In particular, they develop innovative monadic analyses of three phenomena - conventional implicature, substitution puzzles, and conjunction fallacies - and demonstrate that the compositional properties of monads model linguistic intuitions about these cases particularly well. The analyses are accompanied by exercises to aid understanding, and the computational tools used are available on the book''s companion website. The book also contains background chapters on enriched meanings and category theory. The volume is interdisciplinary in nature, with insights from semantics, pragmatics, philosophy of language, psychology, and computer science, and will appeal to graduate students and researchers from a wide range of disciplines with an interest in natural language understanding and representation.Table of Contents1: Introduction Part I: Background 2: Enriched meanings in semantics and pragmatics 3: Category theory Part II: Case Studies 4: Conventional implicature 5: Perspectival reference 6: Uncertainty and conjunction fallacies Part III: Composition and Interactions 7: Monad combinatorics 8: Conclusion

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis book explores conversational units of language - vocatives, interjections, particles, and illocutionary complementizers - in Ibero-Romance languages. It draws on naturalistic data and elicited judgements to offer new insights into colloquial grammar and morphosyntactic variation in Romance and into the organization of grammar more broadly.Trade ReviewThis is an excellent book. * Patrícia Amaral, Journal of Pragmatics *Table of ContentsGeneral preface Acknowledgements List of abbreviations 1: Introduction 2: A grammar for the utterance Part I: Mapping utterances 3: Vocatives 4: Interjections and particles 5: Doing things with utterance grammar Part II: Illocutionary complementizer constructions 6: The expression of affect 7: Utterances without commitment 8: The grammar of dialogue 9: Conclusions References Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis collection of papers by Eva Picardi (1948-2017), one of the most influential Italian philosophers of her generation, examines the work of Gottlob Frege. Picardi combines theoretical and historical considerations to bring out the significance of his work for contemporary philosophy of language.Table of ContentsIntroduction, by Annalisa Coliva Part I: Frege in Context--Logic and Psychology 1: The Logic of Frege's Contemporaries 2: Kerry and Frege on Concept and Object 3: Sigwart, Husserl, and Frege on Truth and Logic, or Is Psychologism Still a Threat? 4: Frege's Anti-Psychologism 5: Frege, Peano, and Russell on the Primitive Ideas of Logic Part II: Frege's Philosophy of Language 6: Über Sinn und Bedeutung: An Elementary Exposition 7: The Chemistry of Concepts 8: Assertion and Assertion Sign 9: A Note on Dummett and Frege on Sense-Identity 10: Michael Dummett's Interpretation of Frege's Context Principle: Some Reflections Part III: Frege s Legacy 11: Carnap Interpreter of Frege 12: Frege and Davidson on Predication 13: Davidson and Frege on the Unity of the Proposition: Some Remarks 14: Was Frege a Proto-Inferentialist?

Read more less

Book SynopsisOxford Pragmatism uncovers and explores the unrecognized impact of American pragmatism on the Oxford linguistic philosophy that thrived from the 1930s to the 1950s, made famous by Gilbert Ryle and J. L Austin.

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read on Oxford Academic and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.If we don''t know what the words ''democracy'' and ''democratic'' mean, then we don''t know what democracy is. This book defends a radical view: these words mean nothing and should be abandoned. The argument for Abolitionism is simple: those terms are defective and we can easily do better, so let''s get rid of them. According to the abolitionist, the switch to alternative devices would be a significant communicative, cognitive, and political advance.The first part of the book presents a general theory of abandonment: the conditions under which language should be abandoned. The rest of the book applies this general theory to the case of ''democracy'' and ''democratic''. Cappelen shows that ''democracy'' and ''democratic'' are semantically, pragmatically, and communicatively Table of ContentsPreface & Acknowledgements Part I: A Theory of Abandonment 1: Introduction 2: Arguments for Abandonment 3: Abandonment compared to Elimination, Reduction, Replacement, and Amelioration 4: Abandonment and Communication Part II: Some Data about 'Democracy' 5: The Ordinary Notion of 'Democracy': Methodological Preamble 6: Some Data about 'Democracy' and 'Democratic' Part III: Abandonment of 'Democracy'? 7: Problems with 'Democracy' 8: Better than 'Democracy': A Chapter of Good Cheers 9: Consequences of Abandoning 'Democracy' Part IV: Democracy Ameliorated 10: Ameliorations of 'Democracy' 11: Verbal Disputes about 'Democracy' Part V: Efforts to Defend Democracy 12: Objections and Replies Bibliography

Read more less

Book SynopsisPhilosophy of language has been at the center of philosophical research at least since the start of the 20th century. Since that ''linguistic turn'' much of the most important work in philosophy has related to language. But until now there has been no regular forum for outstanding original work in this area. That is what Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Language offers. Anyone wanting to know what''s happening in philosophy of language could start with these volumes.Table of Contents1: Josh Dever: Scoreboards Without Scorekeepers 2: Rachel Goodman: Singularism vs. Descriptivism 3: Mitch Green: Verbal Signaling 4: Richard Kimberly Heck: Disquotation, Translation, and Context-Dependence 5: Thomas Hofweber: The Place of Philosophy of Language in Metaphysics 6: Marga Reimer: On Lying, 'Strictly Speaking' 7: Nathan Salmon: À Propos de Pierre, Does He... or Doesn't He? 8: Jeff Speaks: The Schmidentity Strategy 9: Stephen Yablo: Leverage: A Theory of Cognitive Content

Read more less

Book SynopsisTruth and Paradox offers a comprehensive account of truth values and the norms governing claims about truth, based on a new approach to logic and semantics. Since the seminal work of Tarski in the mid-twentieth century, the Liar paradox and other related paradoxes have stood in the way of a precise philosophical account of truth. Tim Maudlin draws on analogies from mathematical physics to explicate the origin of classical truth-value gaps, and to provide an account of truth that avoids any hierarchy of languages or of truth predicates. He also closely investigates our reasoning about truth, including apparently unobjectionable reasoning about the paradoxical sentences. The fallacies in that reasoning are located not in any inferences concerning truth, but in the foundations of standard logic. Blocking the paradoxical arguments requires emendation of classical logic, and the requisite emendations call into question the existence of any a priori logical truths. Maudlin also includes a diTrade ReviewTim Maudlin's Truth and Paradox is a terrific book... the perspective it casts on [the] situation is completely novel ... sure to interest a wide range of philosophers, not just those with special interest in the paradoxes...lucid and lively, a pleasure to read. * Hartry Field, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research *Tim Maudlin offers a theory of truth that arises from a foundationalist picture of language. The picture is attractive, and Maudlin builds on it courageously (indeed, fearlessly) ... a though-provoking book, one that offers a novel way of conceptualizing a fixed-point theory of truth. * Anil Gupta, MIND *Table of Contents1. Two Versions of the Liar Paradox ; 2. On the Origin of Truth Values ; 3. What is Truth, and What is a Theory of Truth? ; 4. A Language That Can Express Its Own Truth Theory ; 5. The Norms of Assertion and Denial ; 6. Solving the Inferential Liar Antinomy ; 7. Reasoning about Permissible Sentences ; 8. The Permissibility Paradox ; 9. The Metaphysics of Truth ; Bibliography

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe Law of Non-Contradiction-that no contradiction can be true-has been a seemingly unassailable dogma since the work of Aristotle, in Book Gamma of the Metaphysics. It is an assumption challenged from a variety of angles in this collection of original papers. Twenty-three of the world''s leading experts investigate the ''law'', considering arguments for and against it and discussing methodological issues that arise whenever we question the legitimacy of logical principles. The result is a balanced inquiry into a venerable principle of logic, one that raises questions at the very centre of logic itself. The aim of this volume is to present a comprehensive debate about the Law of Non-Contradiction, from discussions as to how the law is to be understood, to reasons for accepting or re-thinking the law, and to issues that raise challenges to the law, such as the Liar Paradox, and a ''dialetheic'' resolution of that paradox. One of the editors contributes an introduction which surveys the Trade ReviewReview from previous edition Since dialetheism has, in recent years, scrounged its way from being a view easily defeated by the dreaded incredulous stare to being a major (but still sometimes ignored) contender in the contest for an adequate logical account of the semantic and set-theoretic paradoxes (or an adequate logical theory in general), the volume is to be commended merely for its existence. The fact that it contains, not just a number of good philosophers taking this view seriously, but also a lot of seriously good philosophy increases its worth. * Roy Cook, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *Table of ContentsPART I: SETTING UP THE DEBATE ; PART II: WHAT IS THE LNC? ; PART III: METHODOLOGICAL ISSUES IN THE DEBATE ; PART IV: AGAINST THE LNC ; PART V: FOR THE LNC

Read more less

Book SynopsisFrançois Recanati argues against the traditional understanding of the semantics/pragmatics divide and puts forward a radical alternative. Through half a dozen case studies, he shows that what an utterance says cannot be neatly separated from what the speaker means. In particular, the speaker''s meaning endows words with senses that are tailored to the situation of utterance and depart from the conventional meanings carried by the words in isolation. This phenomenon of ''pragmatic modulation'' must be taken into account in theorizing about semantic content, for it interacts with the grammar-driven process of semantic composition. Because of that interaction, Recanati argues, the content of a sentence always depends upon the context in which it is used. This claim defines Contextualism, a view which has attracted considerable attention in recent years, and of which Recanati is one of the main proponents.Trade ReviewThe book is an important contribution to the debate on the relationship between semantics and pragmatics, and to discussions of particular linguistic phenomena featured in the case studies. Anyone interested in any of these issues should certainly read it. * Karen Lewis, Mind *a rich and provocative book, which is eloquently written ... There is no doubt in my mind that Truth-Conditional Pragmatics will become a standard reference for future discussions pertaining to semantics, pragmatics and the distinction between the two. * Berit Brogaard, Analysis *Table of ContentsIntroduction ; 1. Compositionality, Flexibility, and Context-Dependence ; 2. Adjectives: A Case Study ; 3. Weather Reports ; 4. Pragmatics and Logical Form ; 5. Embedded Implicatures ; 6. Indexicality and Context-Shift ; 7. Open Quotation ; 8. Open Quotation Revisited ; References

Read more less

Book SynopsisJason Stanley presents a startling and provocative claim about knowledge: that whether or not someone knows a proposition at a given time is in part determined by his or her practical interests, i.e. by how much is at stake for that person at that time. So whether a true belief is knowledge is not merely a matter of supporting beliefs or reliability; in the case of knowledge, practical rationality and theoretical rationality are intertwined. Stanley defends this thesis against alternative accounts of the phenomena that motivate it, such as the claim that knowledge attributions are linguistically context-sensitive (contextualism about knowledge attributions), and the claim that the truth of a knowledge claim is somehow relative to the person making the claim (relativism about knowledge).In the course of his argument Stanley introduces readers to a number of strategies for resolving philosophical paradox, making the book essential not just for specialists in epistemology but for all philTrade ReviewNeedless to say, I find Stanley's book extremely important and powerfully argued. I recommend it highly, not only to those interested in recent debates over the semantics of knowledge attributions, for whom it is absolutely essential, but also to anyone with a healthy interest in what knowledge is - and indeed to anybody who enjoys well-executed, insightful philosophy books * Keith DeRose, Mind *Jason Stanleys Knowledge and Practical Interests is a brilliant book, combining insights about knowledge with a careful examination of how recent views in epistemology fit with the best of recent linguistic semantics. * Gilbert Harman, Princeton University *Table of ContentsIntroduction ; 1. Contextualism ; 2. Knowledge Ascriptions and Gradability ; 3. Knowledge Ascriptions and Context-Sensitivity ; 4. Contextualism on the Cheap? ; 5. Interest-Relative Invariantism ; 6. Interest-Relative Invariantism vs. Contextualism ; 7. Interest-Relative Invariantism vs. Relativism ; 8. Contextualism, Interest-Relativism, and Philosophical Paradox ; 9. Conclusion

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis book contains updated and substantially revised versions of Angelika Kratzer''s classic papers on modals and conditionals, including ''What must and can must and can mean'', ''Partition and Revision'', ''The Notional Category of Modality'', ''Conditionals'', ''An Investigation of the Lumps of Thought'', and ''Facts: Particulars or Information Units?''. The book''s contents add up to some of the most important work on modals and conditionals in particular and on the semantics-syntax interface more generally. It will be of central interest to linguists and philosophers of language of all theoretical persuasions.Trade ReviewThe book's contents add up to some of the most important work on modals and conditionals. It will be of central interest to linguists and philosophers of language of all theoretical persuasions. * MathSciNet *An indispensible resource. * François Recanati, Institut Jean Nicod *This book is a treasure of the puzzles, illustrations, and parables that have shaped the modern view of the language of modals and conditionals. It defines the standard against which all theorizing on the subject is to be measured. A classic. * Barry Schein, University of Southern California *This work collects and dramatically expands upon Angelika Kratzer's now classic papers. There is scarcely an area of philosophy that remains or will remain untouched by their influence. * Jason Stanley, Rutgers University *Table of Contents1. What Must and Can Must and Can Mean ; 2. The Notional Category of Modality ; 3. Partition and Revision: The Semantics of Counterfactuals ; 4. Conditionals ; 5. An Investigation of the Lumps of Thought ; 6. Facts: Particulars or Information Units? ; References ; Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisGardeners, poets, lovers, and philosophers are all interested in the redness of roses; but only philosophers wonder how it is that two different roses can share the same property. Are red things red because they resemble each other? Or do they resemble each other because they are red? Since the 1970s philosophers have tended to favour the latter view, and held that a satisfactory account of properties must involve the postulation of either universals or tropes. But Gonzalo Rodriguez-Pereyra revives the dormant alternative theory of resemblance nominalism, showing first that it can withstand the attacks of such eminent opponents as Goodman and Armstrong, and then that there are reasons to prefer it to its rival theories. The clarity and rigour of his arguments will challenge metaphysicians to rethink their views on properties.Trade ReviewRodriguez-Pereyra . . . develops a novel understanding of the problem of universals, offers his own conception of truthmaking and examines the relative virtues of qualitative and quantitative economy. . . . [he] deserves praise for following arguments where they lead and challenging so many of the ingrained assumptions that metaphysicians routinely bring to bear upon the discussion of resemblance nominalism. * Fraser MacBride, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *Dan Dennett's Philosophical Lexicon contains the entry: 'Exhume, v. to revive a position generally thought to be humed.' This book is the most brilliant philosophical exhumation that it has been my pleasure to encounter. This book argues that our attributions of properties and relations can be given satisfactory truthmakers using no more than resemblances holding between ordinary particulars. Many of us had assumed that this program is bankrupt, but now we must think again ... With patient and ingenious argument [Rodriguez-Pereyra] has shown that the theory has more to be said for it than ever I, and I suspect many others, had imagined. The fundamental nature of properties and relations may be the central question in metaphysics. He has made an important contribution to the topic. * D. M. Armstrong, Australasian Journal of Philosophy *Table of ContentsIntroduction ; 1. The Problem of Universals: A Problem about Truthmakers ; 2. The Explananda of the Problems of Universals ; 3. The Many over One ; 4. Resemblance Nominalism ; 5. The Coextension Difficulty ; 6. Russell's Regress ; 7. The Resemblance Structure of Property Classes ; 8. Goodman's Difficulties ; 9. The Imperfect Community Difficulty ; 10. The Companionship Difficulty ; 11. The Mere Intersections Difficulty ; 12. The Superiority of Resemblance Nominalism ; Appendix: On Imperfect Communities and the Non-communities they Entail ; References, Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisWhat explains our ability to refer to the objects we perceive? John Campbell argues that our capacity for reference is explained by our capacity to attend selectively to the objects of which we are aware; that this capacity for conscious attention to a perceived object is what provides us with our knowledge of reference. When someone makes a reference to a perceived object, your knowledge of which thing they are talking about is constituted by your consciously attending to the relevant object. Campbell articulates the connections between these three concepts: reference, attention and consciousness. He looks at the metaphysical conception of the environment demanded by such an account, and at the demands imposed on our conception of consciousness by the point that consciousness of objects is what explains our capacity to think about them. He argues that empirical work on the binding problem can illuminate our grasp of the way in which we have knowledge of reference, supplied by conscious attention to the relevant object.Reference and Consciousness illuminates fundamental problems about thought, reference, and experience by looking at the underlying psychological mechanisms on which conscious attention depends. It is an original and stimulating contribution to philosophy and to cognitive science.The Oxford Cognitive Science Series is a forum for the best contemporary work in this flourishing field, where various disciplines - cognitive psychology, philosophy, linguistics, cognitive neuroscience, and computational theory - join forces in the investigation of thought, awareness, understanding, and associated workings of the mind. Each book will constitute an original contribution to its subject, but will be accessible beyond the ranks of specialists, so as to reach a broad interdisciplinary readership. The series will be carefully shaped and steered with the aim of representing the most important developments in the field and bringing together its constituent disciplines.General Editors: Martin Davies, James Higginbotham, Philip Johnson-Laird, Christopher Peacocke, Kim PlunkettTrade ReviewThis is important work which should be widely read. * The Philosophical Quarterly *... this book is an exciting contribution to an area which urgently needs a new sense of direction. Campbell has opened up an original set of problems and has identified links between subjects that have been pursued independently, to the impoverishment of each. * The Philosophical Quarterly *This is the most striking and interesting of the long series of recent books on consciousness. Refreshingly, it has absolutely nothing to say about the philosophical preoccupations standard in this area. * The Philosophical Quarterly *Campbell has many important things to say about the mechanisms that relate perception to action, memory and our awareness of space. All readers will be able to learn from his treatment of these issues. * David Papineau, Times Literary Supplement, 2003 *Table of ContentsIntroduction ; 1. Experiential Highlighting ; 2. What is Knowledge of Reference? ; 3. Space and Action ; 4. Sortals ; 5. Sense ; 6. The Relational View of Experience ; 7. The Explanatory Role of Consciousness ; 8. Joint Attention ; 9. Memory Demonstratives ; 10. The Anti-Realist Alternative ; 11. Indeterminacy and Inscrutability ; 12. Dispositional vs. Categorical ; Bibliography ; Index

Read more less

Book SynopsisGraham Priest presents a new, expanded edition of his highly original exploration of the nature and limits of thought. Drawing on recent developments in the field of logic, Priest shows that the description of such limits leads to contradiction, and argues that these contradictions are in fact true. Beginning with an analysis of the way in which these limits arise in pre-Kantian philosophy, Priest goes on to illustrate how the nature of these limits was theorized by Kant and Hegel. He offers new interpretations of Berkeley''s master argument for idealism and Kant on the antinomies. He explores the paradoxes of self-reference, and provides a unified account of the structure of such paradoxes. The book goes on to trace the theme of the limits of thought in modern philosophy of language, including discussions of the ideas of Wittgenstein and Derrida.The second edition includes new chapters on Heidegger and Nagarjuna, as well as reflections on reactions to the first edition. This clear, prTrade ReviewReview from previous edition This book is a splendid tour de force, one which should be read by every philosopher... * Alan Weir, Philosophical Quarterly *clever, resourceful, undogmatic, unpretentious, often sensible and usually clear over a wide range of issues * Timothy Williamson, British Journal for the Philosophy of Science *highly entertaining and provocative... an engaging and instructive tour through some of the most perplexing features of our own conceptual finitude... * A. W. Moore, Times Literary Supplement *Graham Priest combines a deep philosophical appreciation of fundamental logical issues with a marvelously informed reading of both the history of philosophy and contemporary texts. His work is ambitious and insightful... The book is an ambitious attempt to do important philosophical work across major borders - borders of the formal and philosophical, the historical and the contemporary, the Analytical and the Continental traditions. In [this] regard it is a resounding success. * Patrick Grim, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research *Table of Contents1. THE LIMITS OF EXPRESSION ; 5. NOUMENA AND THE CATEGORIES ; 8. ABSOLUTE INFINITY ; 12. THE UNITY OF THOUGHT ; 15. HEIDEGGER AND THE GRAMMAR OF BEING

Read more less

Book SynopsisDiscusses topics such as: 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. This book argues for an ontology which includes events along with persons and other objects.Trade ReviewReview from other book by this author `...these intriguing views are ingeniously argued and fruitfully provocative.' Philosophy.Review from previous edition 'it must be said that this is one of the most impressive works of analytical philosophy to appear for a good many years.' * Peter Strawson, Times Literary Supplement *Review from previous edition 'it must be said that this is one of the most impressive works of analytical philosophy to appear for a good many years... The positions adopted are argued for with an extraordinarily sustained seriousness and determination... the work will become, and deserves to become, a classic in its field.' * Peter Strawson, Times Literary Supplement *Table of Contents1. ACTIONS, REASONS, AND CAUSES (1963) ; 6. THE LOGICAL FORM OF ACTION SENTENCES (1967) ; 11. MENTAL EVENTS (1970)

Read more less

Book SynopsisDonald Davidson presents a new edition of the 1984 volume which set out his enormously influential philosophy of language. Inquiries into Truth and Interpretation has been a central point of reference and a focus of controversy in the subject ever since, and its influence has extended into linguistic theory, philosophy of mind, and epistemology. This new edition features an additional essay, previously uncollected.The central question which these essays address is what it is for words to mean what they do. Davidson argues that a philosophically instructive theory of meaning should acknowledge the holistic nature of linguistic understanding, in that it should provide an interpretation of all utterances, actual and potential, of a speaker or group of speakers; and that it should not rely upon the concepts it attempts to explain, in that it should be verifiable independently of knowledge of the detailed propositional attitudes of the speaker. Among the topics covered in the essays are theTrade ReviewDavidson, aside from being one of the most influential philosophers of the last century, shares with many of his generation a capacity to write intelligibly. * The Philosophers' Magazine *Table of Contents1. THEORIES OF MEANING AND LEARNABLE LANGUAGES (1965); 6. QUOTATION (1979); 9. RADICAL INTERPRETATION (1973); 13. ON THE VERY IDEA OF A CONCEPTUAL SCHEME (1974); 17. WHAT METAPHORS MEAN (1978)

Read more less

Book SynopsisPaul Horwich, one of the world''s most distinguished philosophers, develops in this book his highly original deflationary conception of language. His main aim in Reflections on Meaning is to explain how mere noises, marks, gestures, and mental symbols are able to capture the world - that is, how words and sentences (in whatever medium) come to mean what they do, to stand for certain things, to be true or false of reality. His answer is an innovative development of Wittgenstein''s idea that the meaning of a term is nothing more than its use.Trade ReviewThis lucid, closely argued, and stimulating book offers Horwich's latest formulation and defence of his Use Theory of Meaning . . . there is a great deal of interesting and nuanced argument on almost every page of this thought-provoking book, including detailed responses to important semantic theorists such as Chomsky, Davidson, Dummett, Fodor, Grice, Kripke, Putnam, and Quine. For anyone interested in the prospects for a use-based theory of meaning, or a naturalistic reduction of semantics, or who wants a clear sense of current issues at the cutting-edge of philosophy of language, Horwich's book is required reading. * David Macarthur, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *Table of ContentsPreface ; 1. The Space of Issues and Options ; 2. A Use Theory of Meaning ; 3. The Pseudo-Problem of Error ; 4. The Sharpness of Vague Terms ; 5. Norms of Truth and Meaning ; 6. Meaning Constitution and Epistemic Rationality ; 7. Meaning and its Place in the Faculty of Language ; 8. Deflating Compositionality

Read more less

Book SynopsisGraham Priest presents an expanded edition of his exploration of the nature and limits of thought. Embracing contradiction and challenging traditional logic, he engages with issues across philosophical borders, from the historical to the modern, Eastern to Western, continental to analytic.Trade Review...a welcome new edition... * Carlo Penco, Epistemologia *Table of Contents1. THE LIMITS OF EXPRESSION ; 5. NOUMENA AND THE CATEGORIES ; 8. ABSOLUTE INFINITY ; 12. THE UNITY OF THOUGHT ; 15. HEIDEGGER AND THE GRAMMAR OF BEING

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis is a new edition, revised and expanded, of a seminal work in the logic and philosophy of time, originally published in 1968. Arthur N. Prior (1914-1969) was the founding father of temporal logic. His work has attracted increased attention in the decades since his death: its influence stretches beyond philosophy and logic to computer science and formal linguistics. Prior''s fundamental ideas about the logic of time are presented here along with his investigations into the formal properties of time and tense. Already in 1969 Prior had been planning a new edition of Papers on Time and Tense, to incorporate his more recent work. Because of his untimely death this plan was never followed through--till now. Seven important papers have been added to the original selection, as well as a comprehensive bibliography of his work and an illuminating interview with his widow, Mary Prior, about his life and work. In addition, the Polish logic which made the original book difficult for many readeTrade Review[An] excellent collection. Every paper is densely argued and challenging * Philosophy Journal, Vol. 82 *Table of Contents1. LIFE AND WORK OF ARTHUR N. PRIOR: 'AN INTERVIEW WITH MARY PRIOR'

Read more less

Book SynopsisIn Contradiction advocates and defends the view that there are true contradictions (dialetheism), a view that flies in the face of orthodoxy in Western philosophy since Aristotle. The book has been at the centre of the controversies surrounding dialetheism ever since its first publication in 1987. This second edition of the book substantially expands upon the original in various ways, and also contains the author''s reflections on developments over the last two decades. Further aspects of dialetheism are discussed in the companion volume, Doubt Truth to be a Liar, also published by Oxford University Press.Trade Reviewafter reading the careful arguments that Priest builds to defend dialetheism, and the passionate attack he launches on classical logic and consistent views of the world, one realizes that dialetheism is a major logical theory, deserving a detailed examination. . . . I strongly recommend its reading to anyone interested in logic and language * José Martínez Fernández, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *Table of ContentsFull contents to follow

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis book revives the study of conventional implicatures in natural language semantics. H. Paul Grice first defined the concept. Since then his definition has seen much use and many redefinitions, but it has never enjoyed a stable place in linguistic theory. Christopher Potts returns to the original and uses it as a key into two presently under-studied areas of natural language: supplements (appositives, parentheticals) and expressives (e.g., honorifics, epithets). The account of both depends on a theory in which sentence meanings can be multidimensional. The theory is logically and intuitively compositional, and it minimally extends a familiar kind of intensional logic, thereby providing an adaptable, highly useful tool for semantic analysis. The result is a linguistic theory that is accessible not only to linguists of all stripes, but also philosophers of language, logicians, and computer scientists who have linguistic applications in mind.Trade Reviewa virtuosic blend of astute descriptive observations and technically sophisticated formulations, * Kent Bach, Journal of Linguistics *The Logic of Conventional Implicatures, by Christopher Potts, which I consider one of the highlights of 2005, presents an ingenious new theory for describing the semantic interpretation of sentences that are said to contain 'conventional implicatures' (CIs). * The Year's Work in English Studies *Table of Contents1. Introduction ; 2. A Preliminary Case for Conventional Implicatures ; 3. A Logic for Conventional Implicatures ; 4. Supplements ; 5. Expressive Content ; 6. The Supplement Relation: A Syntactic Analysis ; 7. A Look Outside Grice's Definition ; Appendix ; Bibliography

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis book introduces generative grammar as an area of study and asks what it tells us about the human mind. Wolfram Hinzen lays the foundation for the unification of modern generative linguistics with the philosophies of mind and language. He introduces Chomsky''s program of a ''minimalist'' syntax as a novel explanatory vision of the human mind. He explains how the Minimalist Program originated in work in cognitive science, biology, linguistics, and philosophy, and examines its implications for work in these fields. He considers the way the human mind is designed when seen as an arrangement of structural patterns in nature, and argues that its design is the product not so much of adaptive evolutionary history as of principles and processes that are ahistorical and internalist in character. Linguistic meaning, he suggests, arises in the mind as a consequence of structures emerging on formal rather than functional grounds. From this he substantiates an unexpected and deeply unfashionablTable of ContentsPREFACE; ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS; PART I: NATURALLY HUMAN; PART II: DEDUCING VARIATION; PART III: RATIONAL MIND; CONCLUSIONS; REFERENCES

Read more less

Book SynopsisKit Fine has since the 1970s been one of the leading contributors to work at the intersection of logic and metaphysics. This is his eagerly-awaited first book in the area. It draws together a series of essays, three of them previously unpublished, on possibility, necessity, and tense. These puzzling aspects of the way the world is have been the focus of considerable philosophical attention in recent decades.Fine gives here the definitive exposition and defence of certain positions for which he is well known: the intelligibility of modality de re; the primitiveness of the modal; and the primacy of the actual over the possible. But the book also argues for several positions that are not so familiar: the existence of distinctive forms of natural and normative necessity, not reducible to any form of metaphysical necessity; the need to make a distinction between the worldly and the unworldly, analogous to the distinction between the tensed and the tenseless; and the viability of a non-standTable of ContentsI. ISSUES IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF LANGUAGE ; II. ISSUES IN ONTOLOGY ; III. ISSUES IN METAPHYSICS ; IV. REVIEWS

Read more less

Book SynopsisGuiding the work of most linguists and philosophers of language today is the assumption that language is governed by prescriptive normative rules. Many believe that it is of the essence of thought itself to follow rules, rules of inference determining the intentional contents of our concepts, and that these rules originate as internalized rules of language. However, exactly what it is for there to be such things as normative rules of language remains distressingly unclear. From what source do these norms flow? What sanctions enforce them? What happens, exactly, if you don''t follow the rules? How do children learn the rules?Ruth Millikan presents a radicallly different way of viewing the partial regularities that language displays, the norms and conventions of language. The central norms applying to language, like those norms of function and behavior that account for the survival and proliferation of biological traits, are non-evaluative norms. Specific linguistic forms survive and areTrade ReviewThe essays are carefully organized to present Millikan's account of language in a novel, systemic manner...it's unapologetically ambitious, uncommonly though-provoking, and is full of insights, in every chapter. Moreover, she does often succeed at making her ideas more accessible than in other of her works...this new collection is often fascinating and consistently thought-provoking, and many of her claims that seem on first look to be obviously wrong become, over time, utterly compelling. The book is a challenge, but it's worth it. * Brian Epstein, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews *the individual essays of Language serve to confirm Millikan's status as one of the most innovative and compelling thinkers of our time. * Emma Borg, Times Literary Supplement *Ruth Garrett Millikan is one of the most important thinkers in philosophy of mind and language of the current generation. * Emma Borg, Times Literary Supplement *Table of Contents1. Language Conventions Made Simple ; 2. In Defense of Public Language ; 3. Meaning, Meaning, and Meaning ; 4. The Son and the Daughter: On Sellars, Brandom, and Millikan ; 5. The Language-Thought Partnership ; 6. Why (most) Kinds are not Classes ; 7. Cutting Philosophy of Language Down to Size ; 8. Proper Function and Convention in Speech Acts ; 9. Pushmi-pullyu Representations ; 10. Semantics/Pragmatics (Purposes and Cross-Purposes)

Read more less

Book SynopsisThe Essential Davidson compiles the most celebrated papers of one of the twentieth century''s greatest philosophers. It distils Donald Davidson''s seminal contributions to our understanding of ourselves, from three decades of essays, into one thematically organized collection. A new, specially written introduction by Ernie Lepore and Kirk Ludwig, two of the world''s leading authorities on his work, offers a guide through the ideas and arguments, shows how they interconnect, and reveals the systematic coherence of Davidson''s worldview.Davidson''s philosophical program is organized around two connected projects. The first is that of understanding the nature of human agency. The second is that of understanding the nature and function of language, and its relation to the world. Accordingly, the first part of the book presents Davidson''s investigation of reasons, causes, and intentions, which revolutionized the philosophy of action. This leads to his notable doctrine of anomalous monism, Table of ContentsIntroduction ; PHILOSOPHY OF ACTION AND PSYCHOLOGY ; 1. Action, Reasons, and Causes (1963) ; 2. The Logical Form of Action Sentences (with Comments, Criticism, and Defense) (1967) ; 3. How is Weakness of the Will Possible? (1969) ; 4. Individuation of Events (1969) ; 5. Mental Events (1970) (with Emeroses by Other Names (1966)) ; 6. Intending (1978) ; 7. Paradoxes of Irrationality (1982) ; TRUTH, MEANING, AND INTERPRETATION ; 8. Truth and Meaning (1967) ; 9. On Saying That (1968) ; 10. Radical Interpretation (1973) ; 11. On the Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme (1974) ; 12. What Metaphors Mean (1978) ; 13. A Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge (1983); Afterthoughts (1987) ; 14. First Person Authority (1984) ; 15. A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs (1986)

Read more less

Book SynopsisThis is a book about semantic theories of modality. Its main goal is to explain and evaluate important contemporary theories within linguistics and to discuss a wide range of linguistic phenomena from the perspective of these theories. The introduction describes the variety of grammatical phenomena associated with modality, explaining why modal verbs, adjectives, and adverbs represent the core phenomena. Chapters are then devoted to the possible worlds semantics for modality developed in modal logic; current theories of modal semantics within linguistics; and the most important empirical areas of research. The author concludes by discussing the relation between modality and other topics, especially tense, aspect, mood, and discourse meaning.Paul Portner''s accessible guide to this key area of current research will be welcomed by students of linguistics at graduate level and above, as well as by researchers in philosophy, computational science, and related fields.Trade ReviewThis is a most welcome, challenging and insightful book...an invaluable source of information for both students and senior researchers in linguistic semantics. * Ferenc Keifer, The Journal of Linguistics *This book is sure to be recognized as the most thorough systematic survey of the semantics of modality yet undertaken...written with admirable care * Frank Veltman, Professor of Logic and Cognitive Science, University of Amsterdam *...constitutes an ideal introduction for the beginner; but also the expert will learn from it... An extremely valuable, up to date, inspiring resource. * Gennaro Chierchia, Haas Foundations Professor of Linguistics, Harvard University *A self-contained monograph, it does not assume much familiarity on the reader's part with modal logic or any major theory of linguistic modality, so that those who have just started exploring modality will find the book very accessible and helpful. On the other hand, experts will find the book an excellent resource to turn to when they want to have a quick brush-up on one theory of modality or another. An authoritative figure on linguistic modality, Portner takes an unimposing position when presenting his own ideas (where applicable). Overall the book is a great pleasure to read. * Zhiguo Xie, Department of Linguistics, Cornell University *Table of Contents1. Introduction ; 2. Modal Logic ; 3. Major Linguistic Theories of Modality ; 4. Sentential Modality ; 5. Modality and Other Intensional Categories ; Bibliography ; Index

Read more less