Bøker i Continuum Studies in Philosophy-serien

Provides a defence of metaphysics as central to philosophy and a criticism of the attempts of philosophy to replace it. This work argues that philosophy, and not simply science, has a positive role to play in our understanding of the world.

John Duns Scotus (d 1308), known as the 'subtle doctor' among medieval school men, produced a formidable philosophical theology using and adapting an Aristotelian metaphysical framework. This book shows how Scotus' treatment of the problem of universals is both coherent and, even by contemporary standards, cogent.

A monograph on an overlooked aspect of Kant's aesthetic theory, presenting an approach to one of modern philosophy's greatest works. It examines Kant's various attempts to distinguish beauty from agreeableness. It argues that the real interest of Kant's distinction between beauty and agreeableness is ultimately epistemological.

Presents a study of Hegel's social theory. This book outlines an alternative approach to a liberal politics of difference. It begins by constructing a definition of oppression that illuminates, from a liberal perspective, its salient features.

Examines Spinoza's moral and political philosophy and his engagement with Stoicism. This book explores the problematic view of the relationship between ethics and politics that Spinoza apparently inherited from the Stoics and in so doing asks some important questions that contribute to a crucial contemporary debate.

Offers an interpretation of Augustine and of a central aspect of medieval thought as a whole. This work seeks to revise a common reading of Augustine's critique of ancient virtue by focusing on that dialogue, while showing that his attitude towards those authors is more sympathetic, and more critical, than one might expect.

Proposes that agents must be motivated correctly to acquire knowledge, even in the case of perception. This book examines the empirical research in cognitive science and moral psychology to build an account of knowledge wherein an agent must perform acts of virtue in order to get knowledge.

Examines prominent feminist ideas regarding how to revise and enrich the concept of objectivity. These theories offer us warnings about 'idealized' concepts of objectivity and propose conceptions of objectivity that are intended to allow us to increase the extent to which our scientific theories are objective.

Argues that a good human being is one who has those traits the possession of which enables someone to achieve those ends natural to beings like us. This book shows that neither 'is-ought' gaps, nor objections concerning teleology pose insurmountable problems for naturalistic virtue ethics.

Shows how tolerance connects with the practice of philosophy. This book examines the virtue of tolerance as it appears in several historical contexts: Socratic philosophy, Stoic philosophy, Pragmatism, and Existentialism.

Addresses our understanding of the origins of early analytic philosophy. This book aims to chart the nature and significance of Frege's break with Kant over the question of whether arithmetic is a synthetic a priori or an analytic a priori science.

Relativism, the view that knowledge is relative to time, culture, group and/or individual, remains a pervasive intellectual position in philosophy. This book investigates several varieties of relativism proposed over the centuries and identifies relativism as a central strand of thought that permeates much of post-colonial and postmodern thinking.

Offers readings of Hegel's central works in order to explain his views on various topics and as such demonstrates that his accounts of representation, the concept and the speculative sentence can be used to create sophisticated theories of language acquisition, universal grammar and linguistic practice.

Nicolas Malebranche (1638-1715) was one of the most notorious and pious of Rene Descartes' philosophical followers. This book offers a detailed evaluation of Malebranche's efforts to provide a plausible account of human intellectual and moral agency in the context of his commitment to an infinitely perfect being possessing all causal power.

Thomas Aquinas and John Duns Scotus are representatives of the 'Golden Age' of scholasticism. They are known for their work in natural theology, which seeks to demonstrate tenets of faith without recourse to premises rooted in dogma or revelation. This book offers an examination of natural theology in the 'Golden Age' of scholastic philosophy.

Offers an innovative interpretation of a key element of Hegel's political thought. The author argues that the basic aim of Hegel's philosophy of right is to accommodate subjectivity within a framework of universally valid ethical norms and that an analysis of how Hegel attempts to do this provides a key to understanding his philosophy of right.

Descartes held that only ideas are immediately perceived, and that all ideas are really identical to mental states. This book brings a fresh perspective to debate over whether Descartes was a representationalist or a direct realist, and sheds light on his difficult notions of material falsity and the self-representational character of thought.

Franz Brentano (1838-1917) is almost unique as a forefather of both Analytic and Continental philosophy. His claim to fame is the reintroduction of intentionality (the 'aboutness' of consciousness) to the modern philosophy of mind. This book offers interpretations of a central philosophical concept employed in the Brentano School.

Examines key Radical Cartesian pamphlets and Spinoza's role in a Radical Cartesian circle in Amsterdam. This work also explores Spinoza's political writings and argues that they should not be seen as political innovations so much as systemizations of the Radical Cartesian ideas already circulating in his time.