Diversity Reading List

Abstract: The book presents Kant's theory of the cognitive subject. It begins by setting the stage for his discussions of the unity and power of 'apperception' by presenting the attempts of his predecessors to explain the nature of the self and of self-consciousness, and the relation between self-consciousness and object cognition. The central chapters lay out the structure of the transcendental deduction, the argument from cognition to the necessary unity of apperception, and the relations among his theories of the unity and power of apperception, the 'psychological ideal,' and the 'noumenal' self. Later chapters draw on this material to offer a more precise account of his criticism that the Rational Psychologists failed to understand the unique character of the representation 'I-think' and to defend Kant against the charges that his theory of cognition and apperception is inconsistent or psychologistic. The concluding chapters present Kantian alternatives to recent theories of the activities of the self in cognition and moral action, the self-ascription of belief, knowledge of other minds, the appropriate explananda for theories of consciousness, and the efficacy of 'transcendental' arguments.

Publisher's Note: This is the first comprehensive account of Kant's cosmopolitanism, highlighting its moral, political, legal, economic, cultural, and psychological aspects. Contrasting Kant's views with those of his German contemporaries, and relating them to current debates, Pauline Kleingeld sheds new light on texts that have been hitherto neglected or underestimated. In clear and carefully argued discussions, she shows that Kant's philosophical cosmopolitanism underwent a radical transformation in the mid 1790s and that the resulting theory is philosophically stronger than is usually thought. Using the work of figures such as Fichte, Cloots, Forster, Hegewisch, Wieland, and Novalis, Kleingeld analyzes Kant's arguments regarding the relationship between cosmopolitanism and patriotism, the importance of states, the ideal of an international federation, cultural pluralism, race, global economic justice, and the psychological feasibility of the cosmopolitan ideal. In doing so, she reveals a broad spectrum of positions in cosmopolitan theory that are relevant to current discussions of cosmopolitanism.

Abstract: At the heart of the argument of the Critique of Practical Reason, one finds Kant's puzzling and much-criticized claim that the consciousness of the moral law can be called a 'fact of reason'. In this essay, I clarify the meaning and the importance of this claim. I correct misunderstandings of the term 'Factum', situate the relevant passages within their argumentative context, and argue that Kant's argument can be given a consistent reading on the basis of which the main questions and criticisms can be answered.

Abstract: This article examines questions connected with the two features of Locke's intellectual landscape that are most salient for understanding his philosophy of science: (1) the profound shift underway in disciplinary boundaries, in methodological approaches to understanding the natural world, and in conceptions of induction and scientific knowledge; and (2) the dominant scientific theory of his day, the corpuscular hypothesis. Following the introduction, section 2 addresses questions connected to changing conceptions of scientific knowledge. What does Locke take science (scientia) and scientific knowledge to be generally, why does he think that scientia in natural philosophy is beyond the reach of human beings, and what characterizes the conception of human knowledge in natural philosophy that he develops? Section 3 addresses the question provoked by Locke's apparently conflicting treatments of the corpuscular hypothesis. Does he accept or defend the corpuscular hypothesis? If not, what is its role in his thought, and what explains its close connection to key theses of the Essay? Since a scholarly debate has arisen about the status of the corpuscular hypothesis for Locke, Section 3 reviews some main positions in that debate. Section 4 considers the relationship between Locke's thought and that of a figure instrumental to the changing conceptions of scientific knowledge, Isaac Newton

Publisher's Note: Christine Korsgaard has become one of the leading interpreters of Kant's moral philosophy. She is identified with a small group of philosophers who are intent on producing a version of Kant's moral philosophy that is at once sensitive to its historical roots while revealing its particular relevance to contemporary problems. She rejects the traditional picture of Kant's ethics as a cold vision of the moral life which emphasises duty at the expense of love and value. Rather, Kant's work is seen as providing a resource for addressing not only the metaphysics of morals, but also for tackling practical questions about personal relations, politics, and everyday human interaction. This collection contains some of the finest current work on Kant's ethics and will command the attention of all those involved in teaching and studying moral theory.

Introduction: Philosophers occasionally take note of the degree to which their theories make use of metaphoric language. Plato may have been the first to call attention to the heuristic use of sensory images to illuminate the world of abstractions, but twentieth-century thinkers have been particulalry reflective on the subject. Metaphors, remarks Iris Murdoch, are "fundamental forms of our awareness of our condition: metaphors of space, metaphors of movement, metaphors of vision." Philosophical systems, she believes, can often be understood as explorations of centrally important images. Indeed, it seems to her "impossible to discuss certain kinds of concepts without resort to metaphor, since the concepts are themselves deeply metaphorical, and cannot be analyzed into non-metaphorical components without a loss of substance." Mark Johnson agrees and obeserves that recent discoveries in cognitive science provide empirical evidence for claims about metaphor that previously were largely intuitive, namely, that "metaphor is not merely a linguistic phenomenon, but more fundamentallly, a conceptual and experiential process that structures our world.

Summary: One of the most important and creative works in modern Japanese aesthetics. Kuki develops a description of a uniquely Japanese sense of taste (iki) that brings together characteristics of the geisha, samurai, and Buddhist priest.

Abstract: Article: Epistemologists generally think that genuine warrant that is available to anyone must be available to everyone who is exposed to the relevant causal inputs and is able and willing to properly exercise her rationality. The motivating idea behind this requirement is roughly that an objective view is one that is not bound to a particular perspective. In this paper I ask whether the aperspectivality of our warrants is a precondition for securing the objectivity of our claims. I draw upon a Sellarsian account of perception in order to argue that it is not; rather, inquirers can have contingent properties and perspectives that give them access to forms of rational warrant and objective knowledge that others do not have. The universal accessibility of reasons, on my account, is not a precondition for the legitimacy of any actual warrant, but rather a regulative ideal governing inquiry and communication

Summary: The concept of the imaginary is pervasive within contemporary thought, yet can be a baffling and often controversial term. In Imagination and the Imaginary , Kathleen Lennon explores the links between imagination - regarded as the faculty of creating images or forms - and the imaginary, which links such imagery with affect or emotion and captures the significance which the world carries for us. Beginning with an examination of contrasting theories of imagination proposed by Hume and Kant, Lennon argues that the imaginary is not something in opposition to the real, but the very faculty through which the world is made real to us. She then turns to the vexed relationship between perception and imagination and, drawing on Kant, Merleau-Ponty and Sartre, explores some fundamental questions, such as whether there is a distinction between the perceived and the imagined; the relationship between imagination and creativity; and the role of the body in perception and imagination. Invoking also Spinoza and Coleridge, Lennon argues that, far from being a realm of illusion, the imaginary world is our most direct mode of perception. She then explores the role the imaginary plays in the formation of the self and the social world. A unique feature of the volume is that it compares and contrasts a philosophical tradition of thinking about the imagination - running from Kant and Hume to Strawson and John McDowell - with the work of phenomenological, psychoanalytic, poststructuralist and feminist thinkers such as Merleau-Ponty, Sartre, Lacan, Castoriadis, Irigaray, Gatens and Lloyd. This makes Imagination and the Imaginary essential reading for students and scholars working in phenomenology, philosophy of perception, social theory, cultural studies and aesthetics.

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Publisher’s Note: Harmony is a concept essential to Confucianism and to the way of life of past and present people in East Asia. Integrating methods of textual exegesis, historical investigation, comparative analysis, and philosophical argumentation, this book presents a comprehensive treatment of the Confucian philosophy of harmony. The book traces the roots of the concept to antiquity, examines its subsequent development, and explicates its theoretical and practical significance for the contemporary world. It argues that, contrary to a common view in the West, Confucian harmony is not mere agreement but has to be achieved and maintained with creative tension. Under the influence of a Weberian reading of Confucianism as "adjustment" to a world with an underlying fixed cosmic order, Confucian harmony has been systematically misinterpreted in the West as presupposing an invariable grand scheme of things that pre-exists in the world to which humanity has to conform. The book shows that Confucian harmony is a dynamic, generative process, which seeks to balance and reconcile differences and conflicts through creativity. Illuminating one of the most important concepts in Chinese philosophy and intellectual history, this book is of interest to students of Chinese studies, history and philosophy in general and eastern philosophy in particular.

Publisher's Note: Spinoza is a key figure in modern philosophy. Ethics is his most studied and well known work. Being both up-to-date and clear, this Guidebook is designed to lead the reader through this complex seminal text. Spinoza's Ethics introduces and assess Spinoza's life, and its connection with his thought.

Publisher's Note: Baruch Spinoza was born in Amsterdam during a period of unprecedented scientific, artistic, and intellectual discovery. Upon its release, Spinoza's Ethics was banned; today it is the quintessential example of philosophical method. Although acknowledged as difficult, the book is widely taught in philosophy, literature, history, and politics. This introduction is designed to be read side by side with Spinoza's work. As a guide to the style, vocabulary, and arguments of the Ethics, it offers a range of interpretive possibilities to prepare students to become conversant with Spinoza's philosophical method and his challenge to conventional thinking

Abstract: Now THAT THE NEW essentialism is forcing us to reconsider many issues in diverse areas of philosophy, it is appropriate to examine some of the implications of Saul Kripke's work for aesthetics. I shall be focusing on Kripke's "Naming and Necessity." 1 On Kripke's account, the table in my dining room could not have been made out of any other wood than the wood that was, in fact, actually used to make it. It is not merely that this particular kind of wood must have been used, namely oak, but this very piece, otherwise it would not be this particular table. I intend to show how Kripke's line of argument applies to a work of art and to draw the consequences of it for aesthetics. If we do not want to accept these consequences, then we will be forced into a ra- tional reconstruction of the identity issue. My application of Kripke's position is con- fined to painting and sculpture and turns for its example on Michelangelo's David. (Whether or not or how Kripke's analysis and our conclusions can be extended to the other arts is outside the scope of this paper.) Let me be clear about strategy. Through- out I assume without argument Kripke's position. I also assume and, in fact hold, again without argument, that the David is a physical entity. When the consequences of CATHERINE LORD is professor of philosophy at Syra- cuse University. the Kripkean analysis are explored, I engage in a descriptive metaphysics and assume these to be the facts. There is no waffling on the assumption that the David is a physical object. When the consequences of the Kripkean analysis are applied to that assumption, we may not wish to accept them. At that point I engage in a rational reconstruction. The descriptive metaphysics and the rational reconstruction or revisionary meta- physics must not be confused. Following Kripke's analysis, I shall show how it is that Michelangelo could not have made his David out of a different block of marble than the block which he actually used. Since this is counter-intuitive, we may want to protest as follows. Let us pretend that Michelangelo walks into his studio. There are two blocks of marble before him, block A and block B. As the sculptor de- liberates as to which block he will use, he has the work of art in his mind. In fact he has before his mind a perfect image, complete in every detail, of the statue which will result from his efforts. (Here I am not com- mitted to any particular theory of the imagination - one could be Rylean. On any account I see no logical difficulty in supposing that Michelangelo knew exactly what he wanted to do, that he had a representation vivid in every detail of what he would later execute.) We may say, then, that Michelangelo's intention, and I emphasize the word, intention, was to embody a certain idea in matter perhaps even a certain kind of matter, marble, and even perhaps a certain kind of marble. (Again, in speaking of embodying a certain idea, I should not be taken as prejudicing the case in favor of or against any theory of aesthetics.) After examining block A and block B and finding nothing to choose between them, Michelangelo chose block A. Now as far as Michelangelo's intention was concerned it could have been realized in block B. His intention was to create a definite statue which he envisioned in every detail. Accordingly, we seem bound to say that the David might just as readily have been made out of block B as block A. On a Kripkean analysis that is not the case. Had Michelangelo chosen to embody his idea in block B, an entity different from the David would have resulted. It would have looked exactly as the David does in fact look. It might, indeed, have weighed the same amount, etc., but it would not have been identical to the entity to which the David is identical. It would certainly have been a David. ". . . is a David" is a general term which is true of many statues; "the David," as I am using the expression, is a singular term referring to only one. Al- though there is a possible world in which Michelangelo embodies his idea in block B and in which the resulting sculpture comes to be put in the Academia in Florence and even to be enjoyed in precisely the same way as we do in fact enjoy the David, the object of our attention in that possible world is not to be identified with the entity in the Academia, i.e., with the David we ac- tually do enjoy. To grasp Kripke's central contention, let us consider it in its most dramatic formula- tion where he argues that Socrates could not possibly have come from different parents. More precisely, Kripke is willing to allow that the sperm and egg from which Socrates came might possibly have been transplanted from the bodies of his mother and father to the bodies of a different man and woman. Had such a transplantation taken place, Socrates might well have come from differ- ent parents, as the term is ordinarily under- stood. The key issue can be brought out as follows. Suppose that Socrates' parents had died in an earthquake in their early youth at a time before they first met. There is such a possible world. Now suppose that some other Athenian couple gave birth to a son on the precise date on which Socrates, our Socrates, was born. Suppose that this son was snub-nosed like Socrates, indeed looked exactly like him at every stage of his life. We may even suppose that his per- sonality, his genetic make-up, etc. was the same as our Socrates. We can imagine his living a life from birth to death just like the life Socrates lived, even becoming the teacher of Plato and being given the hem- lock. Would that person have been our Socrates? The answer for Kripke is No. Somewhere in outer space there may now, in fact, be a double of Gerald Ford. He may live on a planet qualitatively indistin- guishable in every respect down to the last detail from the planet Earth. He may even be president of a country exactly like ours, etc., but he would not be Gerald Ford even though his name may be "Gerald Ford." Qualitative similarity cannot suffice to es- tablish identity. To return to the table in my dining room, in traditional Aristotelian terms, Kripke in- sists that essential to the table is both its form and its matter, its being a table, on the one hand, and its being made of the very wood it is indeed made of, on the other. Supposing Michelangelo had chosen block B instead of block A for embodying his idea. Suppose also that Leonardo da Vinci had stepped into his studio and absconded with block A.2 Suppose that by some extraordi- nary coincidence Michelangelo and Leo- nardo, working separately, each produced a statue qualitatively indistinguishable from the David which is in the Academia. Which of the two works, that of Michelangelo or that of Leonardo would be the David, Michelangelo's made out of block B or Leo- nardo's made out of block A? Take a simpler case. Suppose that Michelangelo had worked on both blocks of marble and produced two qualitatively indistinguish- able statues. Let the one made from block A find its way to the Uffizi or the Louvre and the one made from block B find its way to the Academia (perhaps in the manner of Kripkean Approach To Identity of Art Work those statues of Daedelus). There is no logical reason why our David should have found its way to the Academia. There is, however, a necessity - an onto- logical necessity - that the David should have been made out of block A, though the truth of the sentence, "The David was made out of block A," cannot be established on the basis of a purely a priori reflection. We have here, then, a necessary a posteriori proposition. And it is the a posteriori char- acter of the proposition that encourages one to suppose that we could have discovered that the David was made out of granite. If we discover that the David is made out of granite, not marble, then we have dis- covered that the David is necessarily made out of granite. This is merely an epistemic possibility. We could even now, in a scepti- cal frame of mind, say that as far as we know David might in fact have been made out of granite. But since, in fact, the David is made out of marble and made from block A, in all possible worlds it is made of marble and from block A. There is no ontologically possible world in which we discover it to be made of granite or out of block B.

Abstract: FEW hold "A poem should not mean, but be" as dogma any longer, but most aestheticians agree that a work of art cannot be exhaustively paraphrased. Few dispute that the aesthetic ex- perience is, in some sense, disinterested, but the terms of that disinterestedness are still debated. I suggest that the work of art and the aesthetic experience are congruent and that an analysis of this congruence reveals both the nature of the import of art and the character of the aesthetic experience. I found my analysis on a faculty framework because I am convinced that neither the aesthetic experience nor the import of art can be illuminated without a fairly rigorous epistemology in which the roles of the imagination and the understanding are clearly defined. My framework is avowedly Kantian, for I think that the very incommensurability of the imagination and the un- derstanding, as emphasized by Kant, does more justice to the phenomenology of the aesthetic experience than an analysis of the cognitive faculties that stresses a difference in degree rather than kind.