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_FirstPhilosophy: Knowledge and Reality_ brings together classic and ground-breaking readings on epistemology and thephilosophy of science. Andrew Bailey’s highly regarded introductory anthology has been revised and updated in this new edition. The comprehensive introductory material for each chapter and selection remains, and new sections on philosophical puzzles and paradoxes and philosophical terminology have been added. New readings include Edmund Gettier on justified true belief, Wesley Salmon on induction, and Helen Longino on feminist science.

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FirstPhilosophy : Knowledge and Reality brings together classic and ground-breaking readings on epistemology and thephilosophy of science. Mindful of the intrinsic difficulty of much of the material, the editor has provided comprehensive introductions both to the central topics and to each individual selection. By providing a detailed discussion of the historical and intellectual background to each piece, he aims to enable readers to approach the material without unnecessary barriers to understanding. In an introductory chapter, the (...) editor provides a brief introduction to the nature of philosophical enquiry, to the nature of argument, and to the process of reading and writing within the academic discipline ofphilosophy. (shrink)

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This bilingual edition of Descartes' Meditations onFirstPhilosophy is aimed both specifically at serious students and professors ofphilosophy, and generally at anyone motivated by a strong philosophical interest.

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The dissertation focuses on the work of Emmanuel Levinas. In claiming "ethics isfirstphilosophy," Levinas helps overcome the perceived indifference to ethical concerns among post-modern thinkers. However, it is often overlooked that this claim is as much aboutphilosophy as it is about the importance of ethics. The dissertation explains why Levinas'philosophy turns to ethics and whatphilosophy is capable of once it has adopted this ethical figure. ;Thefirst section is devoted (...) to Levinas' Totality and Infinity. There, Levinas argues that ethics reorientsphilosophy by accomplishing the metaphysical desire for beings as such, what Levinas calls the absolutely other. A reading of Jacques Derrida's essay "Violence and Metaphysics" shows that Totality and Infinity is profoundly determined by a theological conceptuality and correlatively by forgetting the ontological difference. This suggests that the primacy of ethics depends on an anterior instance, thus rendering Levinas'firstphilosophy secondary. ;The second section of the dissertation positions Levinas' ethicalphilosophy within the tradition of phenomenologicalphilosophy and its quest for a subject who isfirst or ultimate. Whereas Husserl practiced the reduction to the point where it reached consciousness, Levinas practices it to a point beyond that: responsibility. Ethics intervenes as a supplement to Husserl's phenomenology: ethics is added to phenomenology in order to explain its possibility at the same time as it replaces phenomenology with ethical descriptions. This section concludes by contesting the privilege that Levinas accords to ethics in the phenomenology of the subject. It does so by showing that Heidegger's Dasein analytic offers phenomenologicalphilosophy a similar subject. ;The third section argues that in responsibility, phenomena appear which do not appear when the subject is consciousness. These include religious phenomena. The phenomenology of responsibility can thus be the basis for aphilosophy of religion. Like the modernphilosophy of religion figured in Hegel and Nietzsche, it articulates the rationality or significance of religious phenomena without recourse to the dogmatic authority of faith or historical tradition. However, aphilosophy of religion issued from Levinas surpasses the origin of this tradition in the death of God and end of metaphysics. (shrink)

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Friedrich Nietzsche is one of the most elusive thinkers in the philosophical tradition. His highly unusual style and insistence on what remains hidden or unsaid in his writing make pinning him to a particular position tricky. Nonetheless, certain readings of his work have become standard and influential. In this major new interpretation of Nietzsche’s work, Robert B. Pippin challenges various traditional views of Nietzsche, taking him at his word when he says that his writing can best be understood as a (...) kind of psychology. Pippin traces this idea of Nietzsche as a psychologist to his admiration for the French moralists: La Rochefoucauld, Pascal, Stendhal, and especially Montaigne. In distinction from philosophers, Pippin shows, these writers avoided grand metaphysical theories in favor of reflections on life as lived and experienced. Aligning himself with this project, Nietzsche sought to make psychology “the queen of the sciences” and the “path to the fundamental problems.” Pippin contends that Nietzsche’s singular prose was an essential part of this goal, and so he organizes the book around four of Nietzsche’s most important images and metaphors: that truth could be a woman, that a science could be gay, that God could have died, and that an agent is as much one with his act as lightning is with its flash. Expanded from a series of lectures Pippin delivered at the Collège de France, _Nietzsche, Psychology, andFirst Philosophy_ offers a brilliant, novel, and accessible reading of this seminal thinker. (shrink)

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This volume presents, for thefirst time in English, Husserl’s seminal 1923/24 lecture courseFirstPhilosophy together with a selection of material from the famous research manuscripts of the same time period. The lecture course is divided into two systematic, yet interrelated parts. It has long been recognized by scholars as among the most important of the many lecture courses he taught in his career. Indeed it was deemed as crucially important by Husserl himself, who composed it (...) with a view toward eventual publication. It is unsurprising, then, thatFirstPhilosophy is the only lecture course that is consistently counted among his major works. In addition to furnishing valuable insights into Husserl’s understanding of the history ofphilosophy,FirstPhilosophy is his most sustained treatment of the phenomenological reduction, the central concept of his philosophical methodology. The selection of supplemental texts expands on the topics treated in the lectures, but also add other themes from Husserl’s vast oeuvre. The manuscript material is especially worthwhile, because in it, Husserl offers candid self-criticisms of his publicly enunciated words, and also makes forays into areas of hisphilosophy that he was loath to publicize, lest his words be misunderstood. As Husserl’s position as a key contributor to contemporary thought has, with the passage of time, become increasingly clear, the demand for access to his writings in English has steadily grown. This translation strives to meet this demand by providing English-speaking readers access to this central Husserlian text. It will be of interest to scholars of Husserl’s work, non-specialists, and students of phenomenology. (shrink)

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I argue that Metaphysicsλ‎ is a unified work, and one which is not a continuation of the central books ΖΗΘ‎. It outlines an extensive project inFirstPhilosophy, which has close connections with ΑΒΓΕ‎, but which proceeds on a different trajectory from ΖΗ‎. The principal problem in understanding λ‎ as a whole is how to reconcile Aristotle's explicit presentation of the book as a highly unified study with the disparate character of its two halves – thefirst (...) a general‐metaphysical enquiry into the features which changeable substances have as being substances of that kind, the second a detailed investigation of the specific character and activity of immaterial substances. My paper aims to show how this reconciliation is possible, and what we can learn about Aristotle's conception offirstphilosophy as a result. (shrink)

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I have always considered that the two questions respecting God and the Soul were the chief of those that ought to be demonstrated by philosophical rather than ...

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Reale’s monumental work establishes the exact dimensions of Aristotle’s concept offirstphilosophy and proves the profound unity of concept that exists in Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Reale’s opposition to the genetic interpretation of the Metaphysics is an updated return to a more traditional view of Aristotle’s work, one which runs counter to nearly all contemporary scholarship. Reale argues that Aristotle’sfirstphilosophy includes a study of being, a study of substance, a study of divine substance, and a (...) study of principles and causes, all of which are integrated and dialectically reconciled. (shrink)

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_Traces the roots of logos in different cultural milieux._.

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In the Metaphysics Aristotle explicitly identifiesfirstphilosophy, the science of "being qua being," with theology . But the treatise never explains how theology could also be a universal science of being. This dissertation will attempt to provide such an explanation. Its procedure will differ from past approaches by attempting to understand the programmatic remarks of VI.1 in the light of Aristotle's actual conception of god, his theology proper. ;Chapter two examines Aristotle's notion of god as a self-thinker. (...) It argues that the god of Metaphysics XII is not narcissistically engaged in self-contemplation. Rather, Aristotle's statements that god "thinks himself" are meant to express the fact that he is an essentially active mind and therefore a pure actuality. ;Chapter three examines what it means for something to be a pure actuality, and in particular, a purely actual mind. It argues, based on a comparison between god and the fullest actuality of human thought, that the content of the divine thinking is just the principles of "being qua being." ;Chapter four addresses directly Aristotle's conception offirstphilosophy. It argues that the conception of theology as a universal science of being is grounded in the application of two kinds of priority relations. Substance is the focal meaning ) of being, while god is thefirst of the series of three kinds of substance. ;In concluding, Ifirst review Aristotle's conception of substance in Metaphysics VII. Following Frede , I contend that Aristotle understands sensible substance in its primary sense to be form. Accordingly, there are two grounds on which Aristotle may consistently and intelligently identify metaphysics with theology. As a pure form god is thefirst kind of substance. He is therefore the best example of a being, knowledge of which is necessary to understand being in general. As an essentially self-thinking, and therefore purely actual mind, god possesses the most universal knowledge. He is therefore the most appropriate object for a science of being qua being, for one comes to have knowledge of god by coming to know the principles of being qua being. (shrink)

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This chapter contains sections titled: What isFirstPhilosophy? The Science of Being qua Being Categories and Change What Being is Primary? Overview of Metaphysics Z Subject Essence The Problem of Matter The Status of Form Potentiality and Actuality Form–Matter Predication Form and Functional Matter Primary Substances Theology Bibliography.

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In addition to the above Aquinas notes that there are other objects of theoretical knowledge that do not depend on matter for their being, since they can exist apart from matter. Some of these are never found in matter, such as God or an angel. Others, such as substance, quality, being, potency, act, the one and the many, etc., exist in matter in certain cases although not in others. The fact that such objects exist without matter in certain instances suffices (...) to establish Thomas’ point here, that they do not depend on matter in order to exist. Such objects, therefore, those that do not depend on matter for their being, will be treated by a third theoretical science, sometimes known as theology or divine science, sometimes as metaphysics, and sometimes asfirstphilosophy. (shrink)

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This bilingual edition of Descartes' _Meditations onFirst Philosophy_ is aimed both specifically at serious students and professors ofphilosophy, and generally at anyone motivated by a strong philosophical interest.

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Philosophy has sometimes been described as the discipline in which you can never be wrong, as the reserve of absentminded professors, aloof academics and purveyors of obscure ideas or interesting opinions. Quite the contrary.Philosophy answers the hard questions: Does everything happen by chance? Is there anything more than matter in the universe? Are humans in the same class as animals? Is there a God? Can we know the correct answer to these questions? The answers to these questions (...) matter. We are all philosophers even though we are not aware of the fact. We each have a set of ultimate priorities and principles, answers to these questions, a big picture that determines our everyday thoughts, decisions, and actions. In this book Brian Cronin uses the ideas of Bernard Lonergan's Insight: A Study of Human Understanding, to argue methodically towards a correct, critical, comprehensive worldview, an answer to those big questions which is the precise task offirstphilosophy. This book is an accessible and readable presentation of Lonergan's metaphysics, a somewhat neglected topic. Science andphilosophy are complementary. Scientists answer the concrete, detailed questions about everything around us: the parts.Philosophy integrates all these into a correct worldview of the whole: of everything. (shrink)

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FirstPhilosophy and the Kinds of Substance JOSEPH G. DEFILIPPO ON A CERTAIN INTERPRETATION Aristotle's Metaphysics contains two incompati- ble conceptions of metaphysics or, as he calls it,firstphilosophy. At two points in the treatise he identifiesfirstphilosophy with theology . Along with this identification comes a certain view about the nature and number of theoretical sciences. We are told in E. 1 that there are three: naturalphilosophy, mathematics, and theology. (...) Naturalphilosophy deals with nonseparate,' mutable substance, whereas the objects of mathematics are nonseparate but immutable. It is left to theology to study substance that is both separate and immutable . Hence it is prior to the other two theoretical sciences and more worthy of honor. But for Aristotlefirstphilosophy is not merely a compartmentalized science concerned with a single genus or kind of substance; he means it to be a universal science of "being qua being." Indeed, it is the status offirstphilosophy as the primary theoretical science that is supposed to provide for its universal scope. As he says in E. 1, it is universal "in this way, because it isfirst" 0o26a3o-31). Large and well- known difficulties loom in the way of this tantalizing idea.First, it is not clear how theology's position of primacy is the cause of its universal scope; if anything, divine substance seems to be a special item within a more.. (shrink)

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Juan Manuel Burgos presents his own version of personalism, which is nevertheless well rooted in the personalist tradition. He has been developing his project for years and is among a group of world-renowned personalists who study the complexity and mystery of the human person. His new book deals with the relationship between personalism and metaphysics. He poses the question of whether personalism can be considered afirstphilosophy. The answer is positive: it is indeed a sectorialfirst (...)philosophy, which may or may not be supported by traditional metaphysical projects, especially Thomistic ones. Not every personalist has to agree with its final thesis, although its position is well-founded and deserves much scholarly attention. It provokes further questions and opens up new areas of personalist discussion. This book confirms that personalism is a dynamic and growing school of thought that goes beyond describing the mere phenomena of the person and seeks deeper reasons for his being. I highly recommend this book as a new step to help us better understand the reality of the human person. (shrink)

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In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy and Rhetoric 36.3 (2003) 189-206 [Access article in PDF]First Philosophies and RegressivePhilosophy Chaïm Perelman "As a crystal reconstitutes itself from one of its particles, allphilosophy creates itself from the idea of an open dialectic, and carries, in itself, the same dialectical character." —Ferdinand Gonseth A number of metaphysicians, including Bergson and Heidegger, consider metaphysics the only knowledge of consequence and use (...) the word to refer to their own philosophies. But a large number of eminent metaphysicians, among them Descartes, Spinoza, Kant, Fichte and Hegel had only disdain for metaphysics and used the word to discredit thephilosophy of their adversaries. D'Alembert (602-604) once noted that those referred to as metaphysicians had little regard for one another. "I have no doubt," he added, "that this title will soon be an insult to our great minds, just as the name sophist which, although it meant wise, was debased in Greece by those who bore it and rejected by the true philosophers."The preceding remarks should, I think, convince the few who would still doubt it that declaring oneself an adversary of metaphysics does not mean that one does not do metaphysics. On the contrary, the very fact of opposing a certain conception of metaphysics presupposes that one advocates another conception of metaphysics; this needs to be made explicit, if it is only implicit. In a very interesting study, Mr. Everett W. Hall has recently analyzed the metaphysical assumptions of four types of positivism (Mach, Comte, Watson, Carnap). Even without this analysis the conclusion is predictable; he who is opposed to a certain manner of treating a problem remains himself within the same problematic. Indeed, such oppositions produce a continuous expansion and dialogue about the meaning of the word "metaphysics." This happens not through an automatic and necessary dialectic, but through the dialectic directed by the philosopher's concerns.Thefirst metaphysicians set forth a particularphilosophy of being [être]; those opposed advocated a differentphilosophy of being. By expanding its meaning, Aristotle gave metaphysics itsfirst dialectical movement and identified it as the study of being as being and ontology. Kantian criticism treats dogmatic metaphysics with disdain, and shows that all theories [End Page 189] of being must be preceded by a theory of knowledge: thefirst principles ofphilosophy would be those of epistemology and not those of ontology. Since Kant, and for more than a century, metaphysical debates would be about the primacy of ontology or epistemology, and the opposition to their variants, realism and idealism. Then, at the end of the nineteenth century, the debate broadened. Under the influence of pragmatism, thephilosophy of values, and Bergsonism, a strong current of philosophical thinking developed, which integrated the theory of knowledge into a general theory of action. It proclaimed the primacy of aphilosophy of action,philosophy of life, andphilosophy of values. It is within a metaphysics broadened by these various developments that different conceptions of metaphysics will struggle to establish the primacy of their principles. But, despite their differences, all of these metaphysics can be consideredfirst philosophies.Aristotle wrote a treatise onfirstphilosophy, thefirst to be called metaphysics.First philosophies refer to any metaphysics that purports to determinefirst principles such as the fundamentals of being (ontology), of knowledge (epistemology), or of action (axiology).First philosophies positionfirst principles as absolute and that they underlie all philosophical questions. The word "first" informs the argumentation used to establish the primacy offirst philosophies. A principle isfirst when it comes before all others in a temporal, logical, epistemological or ontological order; the insistence on this point serves to emphasize its primacy or axiologic pre-eminence. That which isfirst or basic, that which precedes or presupposes all the rest, is alsofirst in order of importance.As systematic metaphysics,first philosophies establish an interdependence among ontology, epistemology, and axiology. The course taken byfirst philosophies is determined by a starting point constituted by a necessary reality, a self-evident concept, or an absolute value before which one can... (shrink)

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Thefirst four chapters of Pippin's elegant volume on Nietzsche were originally delivered as a series of lectures at the Collège de France in 2004. In a certain respect, the context of these lectures defines the parameters of Pippin's reading of Nietzsche: he advocates an interpretation very close to Bernard Williams in emphasizing the psychological aspects and motifs of Nietzsche's thought over and against certain contemporary French appropriations . In over-emphasizing the deconstructive capacity of Nietzsche's text, Pippin holds, these (...) interpretations conclude that Nietzsche's thought provides no philosophical insight—that "Nietzsche's texts always seem to take away with one hand what they appear to have given with the other". In sharp contrast, Pippin claims that Nietzsche's thought is extremely relevant philosophically insofar as it deals with the genealogy of human desires and actions. Put differently, Nietzsche's philosophical teaching isfirst and foremost a psychology. For this reason, Pippin's book amounts to a sustained attempt to "present a comprehensive interpretation of what Nietzsche means by 'psychology,' what the relationship is … between psychology and traditional. (shrink)

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First, The doctrine of naturalism, That reality is spatio-Temporal, Is defended. Second, The doctrine of materialism or physicalism, That this spatio-Temporal reality involves nothing but the entities of physics working according to the principles of physics, Is defended. Third, It is argued that these doctrines do not constitute a "firstphilosophy." a satisfactoryfirstphilosophy should recognize universals, In the form of instantiated properties and relations. Laws of nature are constituted by relations between universals. What (...) universals there are, And what relations hold between them, Must be discovered "a posteriori" by scientific investigation. (shrink)

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Descartes was both metaphysician and natural philosopher. He used his metaphysics to ground portions of his physics. However, as should be a commonplace but is not, he did not think he could spin all of his physics out of his metaphysics a priori, and in fact he both emphasized the need for appeals to experience in his methodological remarks on philosophizing about nature and constantly appealed to experience in describing his ownphilosophy of nature. During the 1630s, he offered (...) empirical support for the basic principles of his naturalphilosophy, while also promising to provide a metaphysical justification. He offered the metaphysical justification in the Meditations and Principles. and claimed absolute certainty for it. At the same time, he recognized that the particular postulated mechanisms of his naturalphilosophy did not reach that standard of certainty. These mechanisms were supported by empirical testing or confirming of causes through observed effects. (shrink)

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Reale's monumental work establishes the exact dimensions of Aristotle's concept offirstphilosophy and proves the profound unity of concept that exists in Aristotle's Metaphysics.

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During his lifetime, F.C.S. Schiller was viewed as a major figure in the pragmatist movement, but his reputation has faded. This article will challenge the view that he was an unoriginal or less important figure. In particular, I will attempt a reconstruction of Schiller’s position onfirstphilosophy, which will examine the differences between Schiller and the other major figures in the pragmatist movement. By using texts from Schiller’s writings, I attempt to create an undistorted reconstruction of what (...) he wrote in order to support this interpretation. I outline the implicit system contained in Schiller’s scattered writings and briefly examine the relation between Schiller’s humanism and other forms of pragmatism. The task seems both justified and worthwhile, since his work has been neglected, despite his prominence in the debates over pragmatism that took place when it emerged at the beginning of the twentieth century. (shrink)

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Over the last two decades, Kant’s name has become closely associated with the “constitutivist” program within metaethics. But is Kant best read as pursuing a constitutivist approach to meta- normative questions? And if so, in what sense? In this essay, I’ll argue that we can best answer these questions by considering them in the context of a broader issue – namely, how Kant understands the proper methodology forphilosophy in general. The result of this investigation will be that, while (...) Kant can indeed be read as a sort of constitutivist, his constitutivism is ultimately just one instance of a much more general approach tophilosophy – which treats as fundamental our basic, self-conscious rational capacities. Thus, to truly understand why and how Kant is a constitutivist, we need to consider this question within the context of his more fundamental commitment to “capacities-firstphilosophy”. (shrink)

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A translation and commentary on al-Kindi's “OnFirstPhilosophy,” a seminal work of early Islamic thought.

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This article responds to Merold Westphal’s assertion that Paul Tillich suffers from “ontological xenophobia.” Westphal 1) subverts Tillich’s Augustinian/Thomistic typology into a Neoplatonist/Augustinian one and 2) critiques Tillich via Levinasian alterity. In response I show that 1) Westphal has misunderstood Tillich’s notion of Augustinianism insofar as he minimizes the role of estrangement in this viewpoint and that 2) Tillich’s notion of personhood and responsibility are anything but incompatible with Levinasian Ethics asFirstPhilosophy. Tillich’s endorsement of theonomy in (...) contradistinction to autonomy and heteronomy overcomes both the arbitrariness of pure autonomy and the tyranny of pure heteronomy. (shrink)

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This paper explores, from a phenomenological perspective, the conditions necessary for the possession of intentional content, i.e., for being intentionally directed toward the world. It argues that Levinas's concept of ethics asfirstphilosophy makes an important contribution to this task. Intentional directedness, as understood here, is normatively structured. Levinas's ‘ethics’ can be understood as a phenomenological account of how our experience of the other subject as another subject takes place in the recognition of the normative force of (...) a command. This supplies a condition that—as the paper shows by examining Husserl and Sartre on how our experience of the Other constitutes an ‘objective’ world—earlier phenomenologists have misunderstood, because they have treated ethical experience as ‘founded’ on a prior theory of representation (‘ontology’ in Levinas's language). Ethics isfirstphilosophy because it is only by acknowledging the command in the ‘face’ of the Other that we can account for the sensitivity to the normative distinctions that structure intentional content. Throughout, the paper shows how Levinas's analyses, in Totality and Infinity, draw upon and develop the analyses of Husserl and Sartre. (shrink)

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Book Description\n\nIn Aristotle's Ethics asFirstPhilosophy, Claudia Baracchi demonstrates\nthe indissoluble links between practical and theoretical wisdom in\nAristotle's thinking. Baracchi shows how the theoretical is always\ninformed by a set of practices, and, specifically, how one's encounter\nwith phenomena, the world, or nature in the broadest sense, is always\na matter of ethos. \n\nAbout the Author\n\nClaudia Baracchi is a Professor of MoralPhilosophy at the Universit...\ndi Milano-Bicocca, Italy and the author of Of Myth, Life, and War\nin Plato's Republic.

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The Meditations, one of the key texts of Westernphilosophy, is the most widely studied of all Descartes' writings. This authoritative translation by John Cottingham, taken from the much acclaimed three-volume Cambridge edition of the Philosophical Writings of Descartes, is based upon the best available texts and presents Descartes' central metaphysical writings in clear, readable modern English. As well as the complete text of the Meditations, the reader will find a thematic abridgement of the Objections and Replies containing Descartes' (...) replies to his critics. These extracts, specially selected for the present volume, indicate the main philosophical difficulties which occurred to Descartes' contemporaries and show how Descartes developed and clarified his arguments in response. This edition contains a new comprehensive introduction to Descartes'philosophy by John Cottingham and the classic introductory essay on the Meditations by Bernard Williams. (shrink)

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"Science and Theology in Descartes' Meditations onFirstPhilosophy" has two primary goals. Thefirst is to establish Descartes' understanding of the primary purpose of the Meditations . The second is to determine the meaning, status, and purpose of the fundamental Cartesian theological and scientific principles employed in the Meditations. ;Descartes makes two distinct and explicit statements of the primary purpose of the Meditations. Thefirst statement, made in the dedicatory epistle to the Meditations, claims that (...) the primary purpose of the Meditations is to establish the truth of the Christian religion on the basis of demonstrative proofs of the existence of God and of the immortality of the human soul. The second statement, made in theFirst Meditation, claims that the primary purpose of the Meditations is the establishment of "unshakable" foundations of the sciences. Descartes compels the reader to determine whether the Meditations is primarily a work of Christian theology or a scientific treatise dedicated to establishing the certitude and indubitability of its primary concepts. The dissertation defends the view that only if the Meditations' "theological" purpose is understood to be subordinate to and in the service of advancing its "foundational" purpose is a coherent interpretation of the Meditations possible. ;The second goal of the dissertation is advanced through the study of the fundamental Cartesian theological and scientific principles in relation to "Cartesian doubt." These principles are shown to be advanced and defended by Descartes in order to establish the foundations of a comprehensive science of nature directed toward the unification of the human and the non-human order. The sought for derivation of the human from the non-human order is shown, however, to be in principle impossible on precisely Cartesian grounds. Cartesian "FirstPhilosophy" demonstrates that what is "first for us" and what is "first by nature" are necessarily the same. The foundations of the sciences prove to be the very experiences of pre-scientific consciousness that are regarded as "patently false" by Cartesian doubt. The dissertation concludes with the suggestion that the possibility ofphilosophy itself is grounded in the unity and difference between pre-scientific "awareness" and scientific "cognition.". (shrink)

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Contains English translations of Descartes' 1637 treatise Discourse on the Method for Conducting One's Reason Well and for Searching for Truth in the Sciences and a subsequent development of the ideas contained in it, Meditations onFirstPhilosophy,first published in 1641. Includes a selected bibliography. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.

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A translation of theFirst Disputation from Francisco Suárez's Disputationes Metaphysicae.

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In Aristotle's Ethics asFirstPhilosophy Claudia Baracchi demonstrates the indissoluble links between practical and theoretical wisdom in Aristotle's thinking. Referring to a broad range of texts from the Aristotelian corpus, Baracchi shows how the theoretical is always informed by a set of practices, and specifically, how one's encounter with phenomena, the world, or nature in the broadest sense, is always a matter of ethos. Such a 'modern' intimation can, thus, be found at the heart of Greek thought. (...) Baracchi's book opens the way for a comprehensively reconfigured approach to classical Greekphilosophy. (shrink)

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I firmly believed there was a world outside of our own minds... But all around me were challenges.... How could we be so sure there were such things existing apart from us? Philosopher Benedict Chilwell faces a crisis of confidence and hopes to resolve it in a self-imposed exile, far away in the north of Norway. From his cabin, he begins his meditations, pondering the mysteries ofphilosophy in the dark Arctic winter. Pride, a whale, love and lust, the (...) Huldra, God and a chain of causes all interrupt Benedict's solitude. Could they prove his salvation? In six days approaching the return of the light, Benedict discovers a basis for certainty and tries his best to convince his hosts. Through doubts, questions and reasoning, Chilwell inadvertently follows in Descartes' footsteps. Will he be killed by the cold too; or will the warmth of Plato's sun save him in time? (shrink)

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Nancy revisitsfirstphilosophy's question of the relationship between the many ways of Being and defines ontological community and community more broadly by the communication/equivocation of the ways of Being rather than a common substance. Objections that Nancy's position is apolitical and ethically ambiguous take insufficient notice of the different task he has set himself. The preposition "with" names this new ontological conception of community, relieving it of a unifying point. A fraternal community of family resemblances without a (...) father is uncovered that allows for critical reflections on both Heidegger's fundamental ontology and Freud's speculations on the primal horde. (shrink)

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