After thirty years of study and reflection, Lutheran philosopher Robert Koons joined the Catholic Church in 2007. This book articulates his reasons for abandoning the church of his ancestors for the Roman communion, reasons that centered on a deep and systematic re-thinking of the central issue of the Reformation: the Lutheran doctrine of justification by faith alone. Koons draws on a broad knowledge of the Scriptures, the Church Fathers, and the most prominent theologians of the Lutheran ...

This volume provides a contemporary account of classical theism. It features 17 original essays from leading scholars that advance the discussion of classical theism in new and interesting directions.It’s safe to say that classical theism—the view that God is simple, omniscient, and the greatest possible being—is no longer the assumed view in analytic philosophy of religion. It is often dismissed as being rooted in outdated metaphysical systems of the sort advanced by ancient and m...

This book explores the relationship between a scientifically updated Aristotelian philosophy of nature and a scientifically engaged theology of nature. It features original contributions by some of the best scholars engaging with Aristotelianism in contemporary metaphysics, philosophy of science, and philosophical theology.Despite the growing interest in Aristotelian approaches to contemporary philosophy of science, few metaphysicians have engaged directly with the question of how ...

Metaphysics: The Fundamentals presents readers with a systematic, comprehensive introductory overview of modern analytic metaphysics.Presents an accessible, up-to-date and broad-ranging survey of one of the most dynamic and often daunting sub-fields in contemporary philosophyIntroduces readers to the seminal works of contemporary and historic philosophers, including Descartes, Leibniz, Russell, David Lewis, Alvin Plantinga, Kit Fine, Peter van Inwagen, John...

The Atlas of REALITYThe Atlas of Reality: A Comprehensive Guide to Metaphysics presents an extensive examination of the key concepts, principles, and arguments of metaphysics, traditionally the very core of philosophical thought. Representing the first exhaustive survey of metaphysics available, the book draws from historic sources while presenting the latest cutting-edge research in the field. Seminal works of philosophers such as David Lewis, Al...

Twenty-three philosophers examine the doctrine of materialism find it wanting. The case against materialism comprises arguments from conscious experience, from the unity and identity of the person, from intentionality, mental causation, and knowledge. The contributors include leaders in the fields of philosophy of mind, metaphysics, ontology, and epistemology, who respond ably to the most recent versions and defences of materialism. The modal arguments of Kripke and Chalmers, Jackson’s kno...

The last two decades have seen two significant trends emerging within the philosophy of science: the rapid development and focus on the philosophy of the specialised sciences, and a resurgence of Aristotelian metaphysics, much of which is concerned with the possibility of emergence, as well as the ontological status and indispensability of dispositions and powers in science. Despite these recent trends, few Aristotelian metaphysicians have engaged directly with the philosophy of the specia...

First Published in 2008. Now acknowledged as a classic in the philosophy of science, A Realist Theory of Science is one of the very few books which has transformed not only our understanding of science, but that of the nature of the world it studies. Since its original publication in 1975, the book has inspired the multi-disciplinary and international movement of thought known as "critical realism"; and its ideas have been influential across the whole spectrum of the sciences, art...

Scientific realism is the optimistic view that modern science is on the right track: that the world really is the way our best scientific theories describe it . In his book, Stathis Psillos gives us a detailed and comprehensive study which restores the intuitive plausibility of scientific realism. We see that throughout the twentieth century, scientific realism has been challenged by philosophical positions from all angles: from reductive empiricism, to instrumentalism and to modern scepti...

This is a major, wide-ranging history of analytic philosophy since 1900, told by one of the tradition's leading contemporary figures. The first volume takes the story from 1900 to mid-century. The second brings the history up to date.As Scott Soames tells it, the story of analytic philosophy is one of great but uneven progress, with leading thinkers making important advances toward solving the tradition's core problems. Though no broad philosophical position ever achieved lasting do...

Despite recent strides in neuroscience and psychology that have deepened understanding of the brain, consciousness remains one of the greatest philosophical and scientific puzzles. The second edition of Theories of Consciousness: An Introduction and Assessment provides a fresh and up-to-date introduction to a variety of approaches to consciousness, and contributes to the current lively debate about the nature of consciousness and whether a scientific understanding of it is possibl...