This collection originated at a conference organized by the Institute Vienna Circle and the University of Vienna on the Vienna Circle and Logical Empiricism and was held in Vienna in July 2001. (cf. The Vienna Orcle and Logical Empiricism. Re-evaluation and Future Perspectives. Edited by Frie drich Stadler. Dordrecht-Boston-London: Kluwer, 2003, Vienna Circle Institute Yearbook 10). All the essays in this volume with one exception are based on talks presented on that occasion and appear he...

With an introduction by Charlotte R. Brown and William Edward Morris.David Hume (1711–1776) was the most important philosopher ever to write in English, as well as a master stylist. This volume contains his major philosophical works. A Treatise of Human Nature (1739–1740), published while Hume was still in his twenties, consists of three books on the understanding, the passions, and morals. It applies the experimental method of reasoning to human nature in...

This book established a new conception of the mind and provided one of the most original and interesting externalist accounts of knowledge. Drawing upon the writings of psychologists such as William James and John Watson, Russell offers a comprehensive treatment of such considerations as belief, desire, habit, memory, meaning, and causal law. His reasoning formed the foundation for many subsequent theories of mind, as well as a framework for his own later philosophical writings. It remains...

De rerum natura (On the Nature of Things) is a first-century BC didactic poem by the Roman poet and philosopher Lucretius (c. 99 BC â c. 55 BC) with the intent of explaining Epicurean philosophy to a Roman audience. The poem, written in some 7,400 dactylic hexameters, is divided into six untitled books, and explores Epicurean physics through richly poetic language and metaphors. Lucretius presents the principles of atomism; the nature of the mind and soul; explanations of sensation and t...

In "Some Remarks on Logical Form," Ludwig Wittgenstein revisits and substantially qualifies the austere picture of language developed in the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. The essay examines the relation between propositions, elementary propositions, and the structures of reality they represent, with particular attention to the difficulty of analyzing systems of color exclusion and other forms of incompatibility. Its compressed, argumentative prose retains the Tractatus's architectonic am...

In its chase after idols this age has not wholly forgotten the gods, and reason and faith in reason are not left without advocates. Some years ago, at Trinity College, Cambridge, Mr. G.E. Moore began to produce a very deep impression amongst the younger spirits by his powerful and luminous dialectic. Like Socrates, he used all the sharp arts of a disputant in the interests of common sense and of an almost archaic dogmatism. Those who heard him felt how superior his position was, both in ri...

On Generation and Corruption, also known as On Coming to Be and Passing Away is a treatise by Aristotle. Like many of his texts, it is both scientific and philosophic (although not necessarily scientific in the modern sense). The philosophy, though, is essentially empirical; as in all Aristotle's works, the deductions made about the unexperienced and unobservable are based on observations and real experiences.

The main purpose of this book is the development of a new method for the semantical analysis of meaning, that is, a new method for analyzing and describing the meanings of linguistic expressions. This method, called the method of extension and intension, is developed by modifying and extending certain customary concepts, especially those of class and property. The method will be contrasted with various other semantical methods used in traditional philosophy or by contemporary authors. Thes...

On the occasion of bis sixtieth birthday, we dedicate this volume to Jan Wo leriski-s-our teacher, our colleague, our friend. Both of us are particularly indebted to Jan not only with regards to profes sional matters, but some private ones as well. Hence, we hope that he forgives us an occasional lapse into fondness and affection. That said, may the list of bis personalmerits remain shrouded in mystery; rather than unveil them, we open here by appraising Jan's presence from a broader persp...

Interest in the metaphysics and logic of possible worlds goes back at least as far as Aristotle, but few books address the history of these important concepts. This volume offers new essays on the theories about the logical modalities (necessity and possibility) held by leading philosophers from Aristotle in ancient Greece to Rudolf Carnap in the twentieth century. The story begins with an illuminating discussion of Aristotle's views on the connection between logic and metaphysics, continu...