Steward, Helen. The Truth in Compatibilism and the Truth of Libertarianism
2009, Philosophical Explorations 12 (2):167 – 179.
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Added by: Andrea Blomqvist, Contributed by: Will HornettAbstract: The paper offers the outlines of a response to the often-made suggestion that it is impossible to see how indeterminism could possibly provide us with anything that we might want in the way of freedom, anything that could really amount to control, as opposed merely to an openness in the flow of reality that would constitute the injection of chance, or randomness, into the unfolding of the processes which underlie our activity. It is suggested that the best first move for the libertarian is to make a number of important concessions to the compatibilist. It should be conceded, in particular, that certain sorts of alternative possibilities are neither truly available to real, worldly agents nor required in order that those agents act freely; and it should be admitted also that it is the compatibilist who tends to give the most plausible sorts of analyses of many of the 'can' and 'could have' statements which seem to need to be assertible of those agents we regard as free. But these concessions do not bring compatibilism itself in their wake. The most promising version of libertarianism, it is argued, is based on the idea that agency itself (and not merely some special instances of it which we might designate with the honorific appellation 'free') is inconsistent with determinism. This version of libertarianism, it is claimed, can avoid the objection that indeterminism is as difficult to square with true agential control as determinism can sometimes seem to be.Comment: Steward's paper is an innovative response to a classic problem for libertarianism in the free will debate. It should be taught in any Free Will module which deals with libertarianism and luck.
Steward, Helen. Processes, Continuants, and Individuals
2013, Mind, Vol. 122(487): 781–812
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Added by: Andrea Blomqvist, Contributed by: Will HornettAbstract: The paper considers and opposes the view that processes are best thought of as continuants, to be differentiated from events mainly by way of the fact that the latter, but not the former, are entities with temporal parts. The motivation for the investigation, though, is not so much the defeat of what is, in any case, a rather implausible claim, as the vindication of some of the ideas and intuitions that the claim is made in order to defend — and the grounding of those ideas and intuitions in a more plausible metaphysics than is provided by the continuant view. It is argued that in addition to a distinction between events (conceived of as count-quantified) and processes (conceived of as mass-quantified) there is room and need for a third category, that of the individual process, which can be illuminatingly compared with the idea of a substance. Individual processes indeed share important metaphysical features with substantial continuants, but they do not lack temporal parts. Instead, it is argued that individual processes share with substantial continuants an important property I call ‘modal robustness in virtue of form’. The paper explains what this property is, and further suggests that the category of individual process, thus understood, might be of considerable value to the philosophy of action.Comment: An important contribution to the debate on processes and events which should be central reading in a metaphysics course dealing with those issues. Steward argues against Stout's view of processes, so this paper should be taught alongside his 'Processes' (1997). Steward also deals with methodological issues in metaphysics and involves a nice elucidation of Wiggins's Conceptual Realism so can be taught as an example of that view. This paper could easily be taught in a senior year metaphysics course. An important contribution to the debate on processes and events which should be central reading in a metaphysics course dealing with those issues. Steward argues against Stout's view of processes, so this paper should be taught alongside his 'Processes' (1997). Steward also deals with methodological issues in metaphysics and involves a nice elucidation of Wiggins's Conceptual Realism so can be taught as an example of that view. This paper could easily be taught in a senior year metaphysics course.
Sullivan, Meghan, Peter Van Inwagen. Metaphysics
2016, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
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Added by: Laura JimenezIntroduction: It is not easy to say what metaphysics is. Ancient and Medieval philosophers might have said that metaphysics was, like chemistry or astrology, to be defined by its subject matter: metaphysics was the 'science' that studied 'being as such' or 'the first causes of things' or 'things that do not change'. It is no longer possible to define metaphysics that way. First, a philosopher who denied the existence of those things that had once been seen as constituting the subject-matter of metaphysics - first causes or unchanging things - would now be considered to be making thereby a metaphysical assertion. Second, there are many philosophical problems that are now considered to be metaphysical problems (or at least partly metaphysical problems) that are in no way related to first causes or unchanging things - the problem of free will, for example, or the problem of the mental and the physical. The first three sections of this entry examine a broad selection of problems considered to be metaphysical and discuss ways in which the purview of metaphysics has expanded over time. The central problems of metaphysics were significantly more unified in the Ancient and Medieval eras. Which raises a question - is there any common feature that unites the problems of contemporary metaphysics? The final two sections of the entry discuss some recent theories of the nature and methodology of metaphysics, including those that consider metaphysics as an impossible enterprise.Comment: Essential article for introducing metaphysics to undergraduete students.The article offers a clear overview of the main problems of metaphysics as well as of the historical evolution from antient to contemporary metaphysics.
Sullivan, Meghan. Are There Essential Properties? No.
2016, in Elizabeth Barnes (ed.) Current Controversies in Metaphysics, Routledge: 45-61.
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Added by: Emily PaulAbstract: This paper describes motivations for the view that some objects have essential properties: properties which they must have in any world/situation where they exist (without qualification). I raise objections to the motivations for so-called ``hardcore essentialism''. And I articulate and defend an alternative theory: explanation-relative essentialism.Comment: Very useful for an intermediate Metaphysics course. Could be good to include this reading after teaching about modality, as a way to apply possible worlds talk to a new topic: are there certain properties that objects/entities must have in every possible world, in order to be that very object/entity? It could also be useful to teach de re/de dicto necessity first.
Sullivan, Meghan. Modal Logic as Methodology
2014, Sullivan, Meghan (2014). Modal Logic as Methodology. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 88 (3):734-743.
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Added by: Christopher MastermanAbstract:
Comment: This article would work well in any masters course, or advanced undergraduate course, covering the metaphysics of logic of modality, particularly Williamson's views on these topics. This is a good replacement for Philip Bricker's article "The Methodology of Modal Logic as Metaphysics" which covers the same topic.
Thalos, Mariam. A modest proposal for interpreting structural explanations
1998, British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 49(2): 279-295.
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Added by: Nick NovelliAbstract: Social sciences face a well-known problem, which is an instance of a general problem faced as well by psychological and biological sciences: the problem of establishing their legitimate existence alongside physics. This, as will become clear, is a problem in metaphysics. I will show how a new account of structural explanations, put forward by Frank Jackson and Philip Pettit, which is designed to solve this metaphysical problem with social sciences in mind, fails to treat the problem in any importantly new way. Then I will propose a more modest approach, and show how it does not deserve the criticism directed at a prototype by Jackson and PettitComment: An interesting argument for the value of structual explanations in sociology. Useful in the context of a discussion of reductionism or of the proper classification of social sciences as real science.
The Chan School. Chapter 26: The Zen (ch’an) School of Sudden Enlightenment
1963, In Chan,Wing-tsit (ed.), A Sourcebook in Chinese Philosophy. Princeton University Press
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Added by: Xintong WeiAbstract:
A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy covers the entire historical development of Chinese philosophy from its ancient origins to today, providing the most wide-ranging and authoritative English-language anthology of Chinese thought available. This superb book brings together key selections from all the great thinkers and schools in every period—ancient, medieval, modern, and contemporary—and presents these texts in their entirety. Each selection is accompanied by explanatory aids and scholarly documentation that shed invaluable light on all aspects of Chinese thought. Featuring elegant and faithful translations of some of the most important classical writings, some translated here for the first time, A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy is an indispensable resource for students, scholars, and anyone interested in Chinese philosophy and culture.Comment: available in this Blueprint
Thomasson, Amie. Ontology Made Easy
2015, OUP USA.
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Added by: Nick NovelliAbstract: Existence questions have been topics for heated debates in metaphysics, but this book argues that they can often be answered easily, by trivial inferences from uncontroversial premises. This 'easy' approach to ontology leads to realism about disputed entities, and to the view that metaphysical disputes about existence questions are misguided.Comment: An interesting presentation of a way to avoid ontological disputes. Would work well as a conclusion to a course or section on ontology, to show students there might be a way to simply avoid these debates if desired.
Thomasson, Amie. Answerable and Unanswerable Questions
2009, In MetaMetaphysics, eds. David Chalmers, Ryan Wasserman, and David Manley. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 444-471.
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Added by: Jamie CollinSummary: Thomasson argues that merely verbal disputes arise in metaphysics when ontologists misuse the words 'thing' and 'object'. Application conditions fix the conditions under which a claim can be applied or refused, but some ontological disputes involve using the terms 'thing' and 'object' in such a way that they lack application conditions. When this happens there is no way to determine the truth values of the claims being made.Comment: This would be useful in a course on metaphysics, ontology or metametaphysics. It gives an interesting and plausible articulation of the idea that some metaphysical disputes are illegitimate in some sense (an intution that some students share). This isn't an easy paper, but it is clearly written and suitable for advanced undergraduates or graduates.
Thomasson, Amie L.. Research Problems and Methods in Metaphysics
2012, In Robert Barnard & Neil Manson (eds.), The Continuum Companion to Metaphysics. Continuum International.
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Added by: Chris Blake-Turner, Contributed by: Nora BerenstainAbstract: This article offers a guide to a key area on metaphysics and covers the fundamental questions asked in metaphysics - areas that have continued to attract interest historically as well as topics that have emerged more recently as active areas of research. It is especially focused on research methods and problems.
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