Schelling’s masterpiece investigating evil and freedom.

Schelling's first systematic attempt to articulate a complete philosophy of nature.

On the History of Modern Philosophy is a key transitional text in the history of European philosophy. In it, F. W. J. Schelling surveys philosophy from Descartes to German Idealism and shows why the Idealist project is ultimately doomed to failure. The lectures trace the path of philosophy from Descartes through Spinoza, Leibniz, Kant, Fichte, Jacobi, to Hegel and Schelling's own work. The extensive critiques of Hegel prefigure many of the arguments to be found in Feuerbach, Kierkegaard, Marx, Nietzsche, Heidegger, (...) and Derrida. This is the first English translation of On the History of Modern Philosophy. In his introduction Andrew Bowie sets the work in the context of Schelling's career and clarifies its philosophical issues. The translation will be of special interest to philosophers, intellectual historians, literary theorists, and theologians. (shrink)

This is an English translation of Schelling's Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature (first published in 1797 and revised in 1803), one of the most significant works in the German tradition of philosophy of nature and early nineteenth-century philosophy of science. It stands in opposition to the Newtonian picture of matter as constituted by inert, impenetrable particles, and argues instead for matter as an equilibrium of active forces that engage in dynamic polar opposition to one another. In the revisions of (...) 1803 Schelling incorporated this dialectical view into a neo-Platonic conception of an original unity divided upon itself. The text is of more than simply historical interest: its daring and original vision of nature, philosophy, and empirical science will prove absorbing reading for all philosophers concerned with post-Kantian German idealism, for scholars of German Romanticism, and for historians of science. (shrink)

A new English translation of Schelling’s unfinished magnum opus, complete with a contextualizing introduction by the translator.

Appearing in English for the first time, Schelling’s 1842 lectures develop the idea that many philosophical concepts are born of religious-mythological notions.

For 20th century mathematicians, the role of Cantor's sets has been that of the ideally featureless canvases on which all needed algebraic and geometrical structures can be painted. (Certain passages in Cantor's writings refer to this role.) Clearly, the resulting contradication, 'the points of such sets are distinc yet indistinguishable', should not lead to inconsistency. Indeed, the productive nature of this dialectic is made explicit by a method fruitful in other parts of mathematics (see 'Adjointness in Foundations', Dialectia 1969). This (...) role of Cantor's theory is compared with the role of Galois theory in algebraic geometry. (shrink)

Makes Schelling’s dialogue Bruno readily accessible to the English-language reader, with valuable commentary on the work itself, which details Schelling’s account of his differences from Fichte.

Part novella, part philosophy, Clara was Schelling's most popular work during his lifetime, and appears here in English for the first time.

An adamant fan of Darwin, F.W. Headley attempts to argue the difficulties of believing in Socialism and Darwinism simultaneously and highlights issues which could prevent Socialism from being put into practice. Originally published in 1909, this study uses examples of communities in countries such as England and India to illustrate Headley’s key belief that societies only function well if they do not interfere with the fight for existence and natural selection. This title will be of interest to students of Philosophy, (...) Sociology and Anthropology. (shrink)

From what has already been said it will be clear that Alcaeus of Messene, like the anonymous author of Anth. Pal. xvi. 6, was a supporter of Philip V at least until 201 B.C., that is, until the Second Macedonian War. The view that his breach with Philip followed the Messenian events of 215–214 has, however, been so frequently upheld that it deserves consideration. It appears to be based on one or more of the following assumptions. Philip's activities in Messene (...) resulted in driving that state into the Aetolo-Spartan camp: Alcaeus, as a loyal Messenian, will have followed the official Messenian policy. Further, Alcaeus wrote a poem accusing Philip of poisoning his guests: this is to be connected with the death of Aratus, in which the Achaean himself professed to see the hand of Philip. Finally, it is assumed that Alcaeus had already started his literary career at the time of the Messenian events of 215–214, since he has left an epigram celebrating the threefold victory at the Isthmus of the famous Cleitomachus of Thebes, whose floruit, it is claimed, was 216–212 . None of these arguments is really cogent: a very good case can be, and has been, made out for dating Cleitomachus’ success towards the end of the third century; the poisoning referred to is undoubtedly that of Callias and Epicrates which, being itself undated, cannot be used as a chronological index; and politically Alcaeus, as we shall see, was far from being an orthodox Messenian. (shrink)

These notebooks were written during the years that F. W. J. Schelling spent as a student at the Tübinger Stift (1790–1795). From dates written by Schelling in the margins, we can surmise that the first portion (AA II/4: 15–28) was begun in August of 1792, and the latter portion (AA II/5: 133–142) was written in early 1794. To this latter portion is appended a substantial work, Schelling’s Timaeus-commentary, which is not included in the present translation. It appeared as “Timaeus (1794)” (...) (translated by Adam Arola, Jena Jolissaint, Peter Warnek) in Epoché 12: 2. These notebooks offer a window into Schelling’s philosophical development and proclivities, in light of his engagement with various Platonic dialogues, most notably the Ion, Theaetetus, Meno, Timaeus, and Philebus. They include discussions of divine power, rapture, and genius, especially as these relate to poetry, prophecy, and ordinary forms of human knowledge. These topics are discussed in the first portion (AA II/4: 15–25). In the latter portion, Schelling discusses myth, its function and relation to human greatness, Socrates’s daimonion, and the authority of tradition (AA II/4: 25–28; II/5: 133–142). (shrink)

Schelling's 1806 polemic against Fichte, and his last major work on the philosophy of nature. The heat of anger can concentrate the mind. Convinced that he had been betrayed by his former collaborator and colleague, Schelling attempts in this polemic to reach a final reckoning with Fichte. Employing the format of a book review, Schelling directs withering scorn at three of Fichte’s recent publications, at one point likening them to the hell, purgatory, and would-be paradise of Fichtean philosophy. The central (...) bone of contention is the understanding of nature: Fichte sees it as lifeless matter in motion, sheer opposition to be overcome, while Schelling waxes poetic in his defense of a living, organic nature of which humanity is a vital part. Indeed, we do not know ourselves without understanding our connection to nature, argues Schelling, anticipating many thinkers in contemporary environmental ethics. Dale E. Snow’s introduction sets the stage and explains the larger context of the conflict, which was already visible in the correspondence of the two philosophers, which broke off by 1802. Notes are included throughout the text, providing background information and identifying the many references to Fichte. Dale E. Snow is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Loyola University of Maryland and the author of Schelling and the End of Idealism, also published by SUNY Press. (shrink)

EXISTENTIALISM IN PHILOSOPHICAL LOGIC IS THE DOCTRINE THAT STATES OF AFFAIRS, PROPOSITIONS AND PROPERTIES INVOLVING OBJECTS INCLUDE THESE OBJECTS AS DIRECT CONSTITUENTS IN AT LEAST THE SENSE THAT THE NONEXISTENCE IN A WORLD w OF SOCRATES, SAY, IMPLIES THE NONEXISTENCE IN w OF SOCRATES' BEING SNUB-NOSED. JOHN POLLOCK HAS RECENTLY ARGUED (IN "THE FOUNDATIONS OF PHILOSOPHICAL SEMANTICS") THAT SUCH AN EXISTENTIALISM HARBOURS AN INCONSISTENCY. THE PRESENT PAPER REBUTS POLLOCK'S ARGUMENT BY ARGUING THAT IT DEPENDS ON A CHARACTERIZATION OF EXISTENTIALISM THAT (...) EXISTENTIALISTS HAVE NO REASON TO ACCEPT, AND, INDEED, GOOD REASON TO REJECT. (shrink)

Originally published in 1830, this book can be called the first modern work in the philosophy of science, covering an extraordinary range of philosophical, methodological, and scientific subjects. "Herschel's book . . . brilliantly analyzes both the history and nature of science."—Keith Stewart Thomson, American Scientist.

My apology for reverting to this subject is a recent article by Mr. W. C. F. Walters in the April number of the Classical Quarterly for 1910 on the signatures in the Vatican Codex . Mr. Walters does not seem to have been aware that this manuscript, though not of direct value in the constitution of the text of Livy, is one whose interest from a palaeographical point of view has long been recognized. A number of articles have been written (...) concerning it, most of which deal with the signatures, the subject of Mr. Walters' paper, more fully and more accurately than he has done. Beyond giving the signatures, two of them incorrectly, Walters does nothing more than to conclude that there were eight scribes, who copied 42 quaternions. But a great deal more than this is known about the scribes and the manuscript. In fact, thanks to the ingenious combinations of Chatelain and Traube in piecing together the hints suggested by the signatures, more is known about this particular manuscript and the circumstances under which it was made than is the case with any other manuscript of a classical author of so early a date. It may therefore be worth while to summarize the known data concerning the manuscript, with a brief account of how they were worked out, referring the reader for the details to the articles mentioned in the footnotes. (shrink)

Let g E(m, n)=o mean that n is the Gödel-number of the shortest derivation from E of an equation of the form (m)=k. Hao Wang suggests that the condition for general recursiveness mn(g E(m, n)=o) can be proved constructively if one can find a speedfunction s s, with s(m) bounding the number of steps for getting a value of (m), such that mn s(m) s.t. g E(m, n)=o. This idea, he thinks, yields a constructivist notion of an effectively computable function, (...) one that doesn't get us into a vicious circle since we intuitively know, to begin with, that certain proofs are constructive and certain functions effectively computable. This paper gives a broad possibility proof for the existence of such classes of effectively computable functions, with Wang's idea of effective computability generalized along a number of dimensions. (shrink)

This paper deals with a philosophical question that arises within the theory of computational complexity: how to understand the notion of INTRINSIC complexity or difficulty, as opposed to notions of difficulty that depend on the particular computational model used. The paper uses ideas from Blum's abstract approach to complexity theory to develop an extensional approach to this question. Among other things, it shows how such an approach gives detailed confirmation of the view that subrecursive hierarchies tend to rank functions in (...) terms of their intrinsic, and not just their model-dependent, difficulty, and it shows how the approach allows us to model the idea that intrinsic difficulty is a fuzzy concept. (shrink)

In the above paper I suggested that in Anth. Pal. ix. 519 and xi. 12 Philip V of Macedon was himself the Cyclops and the Centaur, and that these two identifications were not only appropriate to Philip's character , but also historically associated with the Argead dynasty. In my case for the ‘Centaur’ identification, however, I overlooked one of the most important pieces of evidence, though it had been available since 1926; and that is the meaning of the word κέντανυος (...) In an article published that year E. H. Sturtevant showed that κέντανυος is a word of Thraco-Macedonian origin with the same meaning as the Greek λππος. The first part κενττ– is the κενττ– οΤ κενθ which is a constituent of several Thracian personal names, e.g. Aulu-centus, Aulu-centius, πται-κενθος, Zipa-centhus, etc. . The second half of the word, avro-, occurs in βρο-ξελμης, βρου-πολις βρο-τονον etc. - and αλο- are alternative forms of the same word). Already Tomaschek had identified κεντ- with the Greek ιλ-, and had argued that Thracian avro- ‘was borrowed from Iranian neighbours of the Thracians. Avestan aurva-, aurvañt is strikingly similar in form to Thracian avro-, avrū-, and the Avestan word applies so frequently to the horse that it might easily come to mean ”horse”’. From a combination of the two forms Sturtevant gets the convincing κνταυρος = λιππος. (shrink)

Sir D'Arcy Thompson's emendation of νθρωπоς to νоς in several passages of the Historia Animalium , and his explanation of the corruption as due to confusion between νος and an abbreviation both receive strong confirmation from a passage of Polybius, describing an allenged procession held by Demetrius of Phalerum, in which a similar emendation has already been made and widely accepted.

Colin McGinn urged that while a brain state P explains consciousness, a conception P is cognitively inaccessible to us. This paper argues that McGinn's argument for his form of materialism is committed to P being epiphenomenal or causally inert relative to such things as the movements of our bodies. As a result, McGinn's materialism creates a duality in the brain and thereby faces the same problem of epiphenomenalism which plagues the Cartesian dualist.

‘Ergo abolendo rumori Nero subdidit reos et quaesitissimis poenis adfecit quos per flagitia invisos vulgus Christianos appellabat. auctor nominis eius Christus Tiberio imperitante per procuratorem Pontium Pilatum supplicio adfectus erat; repressaque in praesens exitiabilis superstitio rursum erumpebat, non modo per Iudaeam, originem eius mali, sed per urbem etiam quo cuncta undique atrocia aut pudenda confluuunt celebranturque. igitur primum correpti qui fatebantur deinde indicio eorum multitudo ingens haud proinde in crimine incendii quam odio humani generis convicti sunt. et pereuntibus addita ludibria, (...) ut ferarum tergis contecti laniatu canum interirent, aut crucibus adfixi aut flammandi, atque ubi defecisset dies in usum nocturni luminis urerentur. hortos suos ei spectaculo Nero obtulerat et circense ludicrum edebat, habitu aurigae permixtus plebi vel curriculo insistens. unde quamquam adversus sontes et novissima exempla meritos miseratio oriebatur, tamquam non utilitate publica sed in saevitiam unius absumerentur.’ Tac.Ann. 15. 44. (shrink)

Summary In establishing what he called the metaphysics of science , the French naturalist Buffon was confronted with the problem of situating the place occupied by man in the natural world, a problem which ultimately depended on discerning his true nature. The paradox of Descartes' dualism offered various solutions — the extremes being, either to condemn man's material nature as corrupted in order to exalt his spiritual nature as a moral being, as Pascal had done, or to reduce man's pretended (...) spiritual nature to nothing more than a manifestation of his material organization, the solution of La Mettrie. Buffon could accept neither, proves man's duality, and proceeds to establish his gnoseological principle on his critique of these two radical solutions. (shrink)

by W. S. F. Pickering Durkheim's sociological approach to morals and moral systems has always aroused considerable interest, be it by way of criticism or ...

By arguing that his use of representations at the core of Durkheim's sociological thought, this book makes a unique contribution to Durkheimian studies which have recently been dominated by postivist and functionalist interpretaions, and reveals a thinker very much in tune with contemporary developments in philosophy, linguistics and sociology.

This treatise presents thoughts on the divide that exists in chemistry between those who seek their understanding within a universe wherein the laws of physics apply and those who prefer alternative universes wherein the laws are suspended or ‘bent’ to suit preconceived ideas. The former approach is embodied in the quantum theory of atoms in molecules (QTAIM), a theory based upon the properties of a system’s observable distribution of charge. Science is experimental observation followed by appeal to theory that, upon (...) occasion, leads to new experiments. This is the path that led to the development of the molecular structure hypothesis—that a molecule is a collection atoms with characteristic properties linked by a network of bonds that impart a structure—a concept forged in the crucible of nineteenth century experimental chemistry. One hundred and fifty years of experimental chemistry underlie the realization that the properties of some total system are the sum of its atomic contributions. The concept of a functional group, consisting of a single atom or a linked set of atoms, with characteristic additive properties forms the cornerstone of chemical thinking of both molecules and crystals and Dalton’s atomic hypothesis has emerged as the operational theory of chemistry. We recognize the presence of a functional group in a given system and predict its effect upon the static, reactive and spectroscopic properties of the system in terms of the characteristic properties assigned to that group. QTAM gives physical substance to the concept of a functional group. (shrink)

With the publication of these two volumes the ground has now been prepared for a long awaited event, the critical edition of the works of Henry of Ghent. Henry was one of the outstanding philosophizing-theologians at the University of Paris in the second half of the thirteenth century and, during the period between the death of Thomas Aquinas in 1274 and the ascendancy of John Duns Scotus near the beginning of the fourteenth century, no other Master surpassed him in terms (...) of influence or importance. During his tenure there as Master in the theology faculty, Henry conducted fifteen Quodlibetal disputes. His written versions of these, along with his Summa of ordinary Disputed Questions, constitute his most important surviving works. And of these, his Quodlibets rank first. Henry's philosophical and theological views were highly original and drew considerable reaction from other leading Masters of the time, especially from Giles of Rome, Godfrey of Fontaines, and somewhat later, from Duns Scotus. While his personal thought cannot be reduced to that of any earlier thinker or tradition, his views were heavily influenced by Augustine, by Avicenna, and by various other Neoplatonic currents. At the same time, while he was quite familiar with the texts and thought of Aristotle, he reacted strongly against the more radical form of Aristotelianism developed by Siger of Brabant, Boethius of Dacia, and other Masters in the Arts Faculty at Paris in the 1260s and 1270s. Aquinas's incorporation of many Aristotelian positions into his own thought was also suspect in Henry's eyes. Given this background, Henry himself may be regarded as an outstanding representative of the Neo-Augustinian philosophical current which surfaced at Paris around 1270, which triumphed with the condemnation of 219 propositions by Stephen Tempier, Bishop of Paris, in 1277, and which would continue to be a dominant philosophical force until the end of the century. The need for a critical edition of his Quodlibets and his Summa has long been recognized, since the only printed versions date from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In these first two volumes of Henry's Opera omnia Macken has prepared the way for the critical edition of Henry's works and especially of his Quodlibets. Here one finds a valuable catalog, based on first-hand inspection, of the widely scattered manuscripts of Henry's works. The catalog also contains expert codicological descriptions of the contents of these manuscripts, including works whose authenticity remains doubtful. Manuscripts are also considered which contain works that treat ex professo of Henry's doctrine. This is followed by an appendix which surveys ancient references to other manuscripts allegedly containing Henry's works, which manuscripts have not yet been found. Then there is a Répertoire, not of manuscripts but of Henry's works themselves, including certainly authentic works, works of doubtful authenticity, and finally, in another short appendix, works which have been falsely ascribed to him. A third part of this survey of Henry's works is devoted to manuscripts of other writers who discuss Henry's doctrine ex professo. The two volumes conclude with all the necessary indices. One must congratulate Macken for the care, the industry, and the meticulous scholarship with which he has prepared these two volumes. Not only are they of great value to anyone interested in the manuscript tradition of Henry's works and doctrine; they also include helpful descriptions of the writings of many other medieval authors which are contained in many of these same manuscripts. They will undoubtedly be carefully combed for decades to come by other scholars interested in these same authors and manuscripts. These volumes will be indispensable for libraries of institutions making any serious claim to expertise in the history of medieval philosophical and theological thought. One can only wish Macken and his international team of collaborators every success in their next immediate task, the actual edition of Henry's most important works, his fifteen Quodlibetal Questions.--J.F.W. (shrink)

A persuasive attack on Ryle's notion that "remember" is an achievement verb, and on Russell's view that all acts of memory might be entirely misleading. Although we can never be sure in any particular case that our memories are veridical, we need not adopt total scepticism. The book suffers from awkwardness of style and unnecessary repetition.--F. W. N.

These twenty-nine essays from a period of thirty-five years cover topics in ethics, critical and speculative philosophy, American philosophy and social philosophy. The late Professor Murphy's concern for the social and political relevance of theoretical philosophical issues is very much in evidence, and something of his humane personality shows through.—F. W. N.