Chapters 1-12 of this volume contain the papers on infonnal logic and argumentation that I've published and/or read at conferences over the last 17 years. These papers are reproduced here pretty much unchanged from their first appearance; it is my intention that their appearance here constitute a record of my positions and arguments at the time of their original publication or delivery. I've made minor changes in fonnat, in the style of references, etc., for the sake of consistency; I've a...

This book is designed to explain the technical ideas that are taken for granted in much contemporary philosophical writing. Notions like 'denumerability', 'modal scope distinction', 'Bayesian conditionalization', and 'logical completeness' are usually only elucidated deep within difficult specialist texts. By offering simple explanations that by-pass much irrelevant and boring detail, Philosophical Devices is able to cover a wealth of material that is normally only available to specialists...

The Cambridge Companion to Hegel and Nineteenth-Century Philosophy examines Hegel within his broader historical and philosophical contexts. Covering all major aspects of Hegel's philosophy, the volume provides an introduction to his logic, epistemology, philosophy of mind, social and political philosophy, philosophy of nature and aesthetics. It includes essays by an internationally recognised team of Hegel scholars. The volume begins with Terry Pinkard's article on Hegel's life, a conspect...

'You shouldn't drink too much. The Earth is round. Milk is good for your bones.' Are any of these claims true? How can you tell? Can you ever be certain you are right?For anyone tackling philosophical logic and critical thinking for the first time, Critical Thinking: An Introduction to Reasoning Well provides a practical guide to the skills required to think critically. From the basics of good reasoning to the difference between claims, evidence and arguments, Rob...

Is what could have happened but never did as real as what did happen? What did happen, but isn't happening now, happened at another time. Analogously, one can say that what could have happened happens in another possible world. Whatever their views about the reality of such things as possible worlds, philosophers need to take this analogy seriously. Adriane Rini and Max Cresswell exhibit, in an easy step-by-step manner, the logical structure of temporal and modal discourse, and show that e...

Bertrand Russell changed Western philosophy forever. He tackled many puzzles--how our minds work, how we experience the world, and what the true nature of meaning is. In "Introducing Bertrand Russell "we meet a passionate eccentric, active in world politics, who had outspoken views on sex, marriage, religion, and education.

This book is focused on the first three parts of Bolzano's Theory of Sciene and introduces a more systematic reconsideration of Bolzano's logial thought. In undertaking this task, the book is intended as an exploration, not so much of the more specifically discursive aspects of Bolzano's logial thought - already amply studied - as muh as on identifying the singularly coherent and systematic nature of the logic presented in Bolzano's work. Casari presents this within a formal system and ado...

This volume covers a wide range of topics in the most recent debates in the philosophy of mathematics, and is dedicated to how semantic, epistemological, ontological and logical issues interact in the attempt to give a satisfactory picture of mathematical knowledge.The essays collected here explore the semantic and epistemic problems raised by different kinds of mathematical objects, by their characterization in terms of axiomatic theories, and by the objectivity of both pure and a...

In 1945 Alonzo Church issued a pair of referee reports in which he anonymously conveyed to Frederic Fitch a surprising proof showing that wherever there is (empirical) ignorance there is also logically unknowable truth. Fitch published this and a generalization of the result in 1963. Ever since, philosophers have been attempting to understand the significance and address the counter-intuitiveness of this, the so-called paradox of knowability. This collection assembles Church's referee repo...

This book offers a novel perspective on abduction. It starts by discussing the major theories of abduction, focusing on the hybrid nature of abduction as both inference and intuition. It reports on the Peircean theory of abduction and discusses the more recent Magnani concept of animal abduction, connecting them to the work of medieval philosophers. Building on Magnani's manipulative abduction, the accompanying classification of abduction, and the hybrid concept of abduction as both infere...