Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Edited by Edward N. Zalta Table of Contents Principal Site: U.S.A. Stanford University Mirror site: Australia University of Sydney Library, Scholarly Electronic Text and Image Service Mirror site: The Netherlands University of Amsterdam, Institute for Logic, Language and Computation Mirror site: United Kingdom University of Leeds, LTSN Philosophical and ...
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Friedrich Nietzsche
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Friedrich Nietzsche. Biography, chronology of works, and comments on Nietzsche's influence, with a few links to other sites.
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Bertrand Russell
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Bertrand Russell Bertrand Arthur William Russell (b.1872 - d.1970), British philosopher, logician, essayist, and social critic, best known for his work in mathematical logic and analytic philosophy. His most influential contributions include his defense of ...
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Karl Popper
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Karl Popper Karl Popper is generally regarded as one of the greatest philosophers of science of this century. He was also a social and political philosopher of considerable stature, a self-professed critical-rationalist, a dedicated opponent of all forms of ...
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Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel Along with J. G. Fichte and F. W. J. von Schelling, Hegel (1770-1831) belongs to the period of German idealism in the decades following Kant. The most systematic of the post-Kantian idealists, Hegel attempted, throughout his ...
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Saint Thomas Aquinas
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Saint Thomas Aquinas Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) lived at a critical juncture of western culture when the arrival of the Aristotelian corpus in Latin translation reopened the question of the relation between faith and reason, calling into question the modus ...
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Alfred North Whitehead
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Alfred North Whitehead Alfred North Whitehead (b.1861 - d.1947), British mathematician, logician and philosopher best known for his work in mathematical logic and who, in collaboration with Bertrand Russell, authored the landmark three-volume Principia ...
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Liberalism
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Liberalism Liberalism can be understood as (1) a political tradition (2) a political philosophy and (3) a general philosophical theory, encompassing a theory of value, a conception of the person and a moral theory as well as a political philosophy. As a ...
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Pascal's Wager
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Pascal's Wager Pascal's Wager is the name given to an argument due to Blaise Pascal for believing, or for at least taking steps to believe, in God. The name is somewhat misleading, for in a single paragraph of his Pensees, Pascal apparently presents at least ...
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Søren Kierkegaard
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Søren Kierkegaard. Biography includes topics on Kierkegaard's life, rhetoric, aesthetics, ethics, religion, politics, and chronology of works.
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Aristotle's Logic
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Aristotle's Logic Aristotle's logic, especially his theory of the syllogism, has had an unparalleled influence on the history of Western thought. It did not always hold this position: in the Hellenistic period, Stoic logic, and in particular the work of ...
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Gottlob Frege
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Gottlob Frege. Entry has a biography, chronology, and analysis of Frege's works, chronology of works, bibliography of secondary literature, and links to other sites.
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Russell's Paradox
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Russell's Paradox Russell's paradox is the most famous of the logical or set-theoretical paradoxes. The paradox arises within naive set theory by considering the set of all sets that are not members of themselves. Such a set appears to be a member of itself if ...
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Stoicism
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Stoicism Stoicism was one of the new philosophical movements of the Hellenistic period. The name derives from the porch (stoa poikil ) in the Agora at Athens decorated with mural paintings, where the members of the school congregated, and their lectures were ...
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Skepticism, Ancient
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Ancient Skepticism Used in its most specific sense, the expression ancient skepticism refers to two movements in ancient philosophy. One is Pyrrhonism, which claims Pyrrho of Elis (4th-3rd c. B.C.) as its founder but was especially prominent during and after ...
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The Church-Turing Thesis
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Church-Turing Thesis There are various equivalent formulations of the Church-Turing thesis. A common one is that every effective computation can be carried out by a Turing machine. The Church-Turing thesis is often misunderstood, particularly in recent ...
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Aristotles Political Theory
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Aristotles Political Theory Aristotle (b. 384 - d. 322 BC), was a Greek philosopher, logician, and scientist. Along with his teacher Plato, Aristotle is generally regarded as one of the most influential ancient thinkers in a number of philosophical fields, ...
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Ontological Arguments
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Ontological Arguments Ontological arguments are arguments, for the conclusion that God exists, from premises which are supposed to derive from some source other than observation of the world -- e.g., from reason alone. In other words, ontological arguments are ...
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Principia Mathematica
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Principia Mathematica Principia Mathematica is the landmark work on mathematical logic and the foundations of mathematics written by Alfred North Whitehead and Bertrand Russell. It was first published in three volumes, in 1910, 1912 and 1913. Written as a ...
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Qualia
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Qualia Feelings and experiences vary widely. For example, I run my fingers over sandpaper, smell a skunk, feel a sharp pain in my finger, seem to see bright purple, become extremely angry. In each of these cases, I am the subject of a mental state with a very ...
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Pantheism
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Pantheism Pantheism is a metaphysical and religious position. Broadly defined it is the view that (1) God is everything and everything is God ... the world is either identical with God or in some way a self-expression of his nature (Owen 1971: 74). Similarly, ...
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Donald Davidson
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Donald Davidson Donald Davidson is one of the most important philosophers of the latter half of the twentieth century. His ideas, presented in a series of essays from the 1960s onwards, have been influential across a range of areas from semantic theory through ...
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Paul Feyerabend
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Paul Feyerabend Paul Feyerabend (b.1924, d.1994), having studied science at the University of Vienna, moved into philosophy for his doctoral thesis, made a name for himself both as an expositor and (later) as a critic of Karl Popper's critical rationalism, and ...
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Connectionism
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Connectionism Connectionism is a movement in cognitive science which hopes to explain human intellectual abilities using artificial neural networks (also known as neural networks or neural nets). Neural networks are simplified models of the brain composed of ...
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Cosmology and Theology
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Cosmology and Theology Reasoning known as the cosmological argument (Burrill 1967; Craig 1979, 1980; Hepburn 1967) tries to justify belief in God by pointing to the existence of the cosmos, its causal orderliness, and alleged evidence of its being in some ...
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Experiments in Physics
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Experiment in Physics Physics, and natural science in general, is a reasonable enterprise based on valid experimental evidence, criticism, and rational discussion. It provides us with knowledge of the physical world and it is experiment that provides the ...
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Descartes' Epistemology
Excerpt from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. René Descartes' approach to the theory of knowledge plays a prominent role in shaping the agenda of early modern philosophy.
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Leibniz on the Problem of Evil
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Leibniz on the Problem of Evil Without question, the problem of evil vexed Leibniz as much as any philosophical problem during his career. This is obvious from the fact that the first and the last book length works that he authored, the Philosopher s ...
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Frege's Logic, Theorem, and Foundations for Arithmetic
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Frege's Logic, Theorem, and Foundations for Arithmetic Frege formulated two distinguished formal systems and used these systems in his attempt both to express certain basic concepts of mathematics precisely and to derive certain mathematical laws from the laws ...
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Miracles
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Miracles Aquinas (Summa Contra Gentiles, III) says those things are properly called miracles which are done by divine agency beyond the order commonly observed in nature (praeter ordinem communiter observatum in rebus). A miracle, philosophically speaking, is ...
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Cognitive Science
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Cognitive Science Cognitive science is the interdisciplinary study of mind and intelligence, embracing philosophy, psychology, artificial intelligence, neuroscience, linguistics, and anthropology. Its intellectual origins are in the mid-1950s when researchers ...
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Turing Machine
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Turing Machine A Turing machine is an abstract representation of a computing device. It consists of a read/write head that scans a (possibly infinite) one-dimensional (bi-directional) tape divided into squares, each of which is inscribed with a 0 or 1.
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Peirce's Logic
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Peirce's Logic Charles Peirce's contributions to logical theory are numerous and profound. His work on relations building on ideas of De Morgan influenced Schroder, and through Schroder Peano, Russell, Lowenheim and much of contemporary logical theory.
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The Philosophy of Neuroscience
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Philosophy of Neuroscience Over the past three decades, philosophy of science has grown increasingly local. Concerns have switched from general features of scientific practice to concepts, issues, and puzzles specific to particular disciplines. Philosophy ...
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Properties
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Properties Questions about the nature and existence of properties are nearly as old as philosophy itself. Interest in properties has ebbed and flowed over the centuries, but they are now undergoing a resurgence. The last twenty five years have seen a great ...
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Category Theory
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Category Theory Category theory is a general mathematical theory of structures and sytems of structures. It allows us to see, among other things, how structures of different kinds are related to one another as well as the universal components of a family of ...
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Feminist Ethics
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Feminist Ethics Feminist Ethics is an attempt to revise, reformulate, or rethink those aspects of traditional western ethics that depreciate or devalue women's moral experience. Among others, feminist philosopher Alison Jaggar faults traditional western ethics ...
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Aristotle's Psychology
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Aristotle's Psychology Aristotle (384-322 BC) was born in what was to become Macedon in northern Greece, but spent most of his adult life in Athens. His life in Athens divides into two periods, first as a member of Plato's Academy (367-347) and later as ...
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Paraconsistent Logic
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Paraconsistent Logic The development of paraconsistent logic was initiated in order to challenge the logical principle that anything follows from contradictory premises, ex contradictione quodlibet (ECQ). Let be a relation of logical consequence, defined ...
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Vagueness
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Vagueness There is wide agreement that a term is vague to the extent that it has borderline cases. This makes the notion of a borderline case crucial in accounts of vagueness. I shall concentrate on an historical characterization of borderline cases that most ...
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Saint Anselm
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Saint Anselm Saint Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109) was the outstanding Christian philosopher and theologian of the eleventh century. He is best known for the celebrated ontological argument for the existence of God in chapter two of the Proslogion, but his ...
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Modal Logic
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Modal Logic A modal is an expression (like necessarily or possibly) that is used to qualify the truth of a judgement. Modal logic is, strictly speaking, the study of the deductive behavior of the expressions it is necessary that and it is possible that.
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The Epistemology of Religion
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Epistemology of Religion Contemporary epistemology of religion may conveniently be treated as a debate over whether Evidentialism applies to the belief-component of religious faith, or whether we should instead adopt a more permissive epistemology. Here by ...
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Private Language
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Private Language The idea of a private language was made famous in philosophy by Ludwig Wittgenstein, who in section 243 of his book Philosophical Investigations explains it thus: The words of this language are to refer to what can be known only to the ...
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Actualism
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Actualism To understand the thesis of actualism, consider the following example. Imagine a race of beings -- call them Aliens -- that is very different from any life-form that actually exists anywhere in the universe; different enough, in fact, that no ...
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Prisoner's Dilemma
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Prisoner's Dilemma Tanya and Cinque have been arrested for robbing the Hibernia Savings Bank and placed in separate isolation cells. Both care much more about their personal freedom than about the welfare of their accomplice. A clever prosecutor makes the ...
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John Locke
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z John Locke John Locke (b. 1632, d. 1704) was a British philosopher, Oxford academic and medical researcher, whose association with Anthony Ashley Cooper (later the First Earl of Shaftesbury) led him to become successively a government official charged with ...
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Sorites Paradox
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Sorites Paradox The sorites paradox is the name given to a class of paradoxical arguments, also known as little-by-little arguments, which arise as a result of the indeterminacy surrounding limits of application of the predicates involved. For example the ...
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Game Theory
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Game Theory Game theory is the study of the ways in which strategic interactions among rational players produce outcomes with respect to the preferences (or utilities) of those players, none of which might have been intended by any of them. The meaning of this ...
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Temporal Logic
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Temporal Logic The term Temporal Logic has been broadly used to cover all approaches to the representation of temporal information within a logical framework, and also more narrowly to refer specifically to the modal-logic type of approach introduced around ...
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The Coherence Theory of Truth
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Coherence Theory of Truth A coherence theory of truth states that the truth of any (true) proposition consists in its coherence with some specified set of propositions. The coherence theory differs from its principal competitor, the correspondence theory ...
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Truth, Deflationary Theory of
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Deflationary Theory of Truth According to the deflationary theory of truth, to assert that a statement is true is just to assert the statement itself. For example, to say that snow is white is true, or that it is true that snow is white, is equivalent to ...
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Intuitionistic Logic
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Intuitionistic Logic Intuitionistic logic encompasses the principles of logical reasoning which were used by L. E. J. Brouwer in developing his intuitionistic mathematics, beginning in . Because these principles also underly Russian recursive analysis and the ...
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Maritain
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Jacques Maritain Jacques Maritain (1882-1973), French philosopher and political thinker, was one of the principal exponents of Thomism in the twentieth century and an influential interpreter of the thought of St Thomas Aquinas. Life General Background ...
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Behaviorism
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Behaviorism It has sometimes been said that behave is what organisms do. Behaviorism is built on this assumption, and its goal is to promote the scientific study of behavior. In this entry I consider different types of behaviorism. I outline reasons for and ...
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Feminist Perspectives on the Self
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Feminist Perspectives on the Self The topic of the self has long been salient in feminist philosophy, for it is pivotal to questions about personhood, identity, the body, and agency that feminism must address. In some respects, Simone de Beauvoir's trenchant ...
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Voluntary Euthanasia
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Voluntary Euthanasia The entry sets out five individually necessary conditions for anyone to be a candidate for legalised voluntary euthanasia (or, in some usages, physician-assisted suicide), outlines the moral case advanced by those in favour of legalising ...
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Informal-logic
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Informal Logic Sometimes informal logic is portrayed as a theoretical alternative to formal logic. While some informal logicians may see the discipline this way, this description places too much emphasis on a rejection of formal methods of analysis -- a ...
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The Identity Theory of Mind
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Identity Theory of Mind The identity theory of mind holds that states and processes of the mind are identical to states and processes of the brain. Strictly speaking, it need not hold that the mind is identical to the brain. Idiomatically we do use She has ...
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Distributive Justice
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Distributive Justice Principles of distributive justice are normative principles designed to allocate goods in limited supply relative to demand. The principles vary in numerous dimensions. They vary in what goods are subject to distribution (income, wealth, ...
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Time Travel and Modern Physics
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Time Travel and Modern Physics Time travel has been a staple of science fiction. With the advent of general relativity it has been entertained by serious physicists. But, especially in the philosophy literature, there have been arguments that time travel is ...
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Original Position
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Original Position The idea of the original position is perhaps the most lasting contribution of John Rawls to our theorizing about social justice. The original position is a hypothetical situation in which rational calculators, acting as agents or trustees for ...
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Relevance Logic
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Relevance Logic Relevance logics are non-classical logics. Called relevance logics in North America and relevant logics in Britain and Australasia, these systems developed as attempts to avoid the paradoxes of material and strict implication. Among the ...
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Epiphenomenalism
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Epiphenomenalism Epiphenomenalism is the view that mental events are caused by physical events in the brain, but have no effects upon any physical events. Behavior is caused by muscles that contract upon receiving neural impulses, and neural impulses are ...
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War
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z War One apt definition of war is this: war is an actual, intentional and widespread armed conflict between political communities. Thus, a fisticuffs between individual persons does not count as a war, nor does a gang fight, nor does a feud on the order of the ...
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The Identity Theory of Truth
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Identity Theory of Truth The simplest and most general statement of the identity theory of truth is that when a truth-bearer (e.g. a proposition) is true, there is a truth-maker (e.g. a fact) with which it is identical and the truth of the former consists ...
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Mental Representation
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Mental Representation If a representation is an object with semantic properties, then a mental representation is a mental object with semantic properties. According to the Representational Theory of Mind (RTM), psychological states are to be understood as ...
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Animal Consciousness
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Animal Consciousness There are the many reasons for philosophical interest in nonhuman animal (hereafter animal ) consciousness . First, if philosophy often begins with questions about the place of humans in nature, one way humans have attempted to locate ...
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Measurement in Quantum Theory
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Measurement in Quantum Theory From the inception of Quantum Mechanics (QM) the concept of measurement has proved a source of difficulty. The Einstein-Bohr debates, out of which both the Einstein Podolski Rosen paradox and Schr dinger's cat paradox developed, ...
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Mental Imagery
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Mental Imagery Mental imagery (sometimes colloquially called visualization, or seeing in the mind's eye ) is experience that resembles perceptual experience, but which occurs in the absence of the appropriate stimuli for the relevant perception (cf. Finke, ...
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Probabilistic Causation
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Probabilistic Causation Probabilistic Causation designates a group of philosophical theories that aim to characterize the relationship between cause and effect using the tools of probability theory. A primary motivation for the development of such theories is ...
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Causal Processes
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Causal Processes Taking their point of departure from what science tells us about the world rather than from our everyday concept of a process, philosophers interested in analysing causal processes have tended to see the chief task to be to distinguish causal ...
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Francis Herbert Bradley
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z (Reproduced by kind permission of Dr T.J. Winnifrith) Francis Herbert Bradley F.H. Bradley (1846-1924) was the most famous, original and philosophically influential of the British Idealists. These philosophers came to prominence in the closing decades of the ...
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Bernard Bosanquet
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Bernard Bosanquet Bernard Bosanquet (1848-1923), British philosopher, political theorist and social reformer, was one of the principal exponents (with F.H. Bradley ) of late nineteenth and early twentieth century Absolute Idealism . Life General Background ...
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Nineteenth Century Geometry
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Nineteenth Century Geometry In the nineteenth century, geometry, like most academic disciplines, went through a period of growth that was near cataclysmic in proportion. During the course of this century, the content of geometry and its internal diversity ...
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Leibniz's Philosophy of Mind
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Leibniz's Philosophy of Mind In a more popular view, Leibniz's place in the history of the philosophy of mind is best secured by his pre-established harmony, that is, roughly, by the thesis that there is no mind-body interaction strictly speaking, but only a ...
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Propositional Attitude Reports
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Propositional Attitude Reports A person can be cognitively related to a proposition in many ways. These cognitive relations might be attributed in sentences like the following: Alicia believes that people walked on the Moon. Boris knows that people walked on ...
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Everett's Relative-State Formulation of Quantum Mechanics
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Everett's Relative-State Formulation of Quantum Mechanics Everett's relative-state formulation of quantum mechanics is an attempt to solve the measurement problem by dropping the collapse dynamics from the standard von Neumann-Dirac theory of quantum mechanics.
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Existence
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Existence Like many philosophically interesting notions, existence is at once familiar and rather elusive. Although we have no more trouble with using the verb exists than with the two-times table, there is more than a little difficulty in saying just what ...
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The Identity of Indiscernibles
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Identity of Indiscernibles The Identity of Indiscernibles is a principle of analytic ontology first explicitly formulated by Wilhelm Gottfried Leibniz in his Discourse on Metaphysics, Section 9 (Loemker 1969: 308). It states that no two distinct substances ...
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Arthur Prior
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Arthur Prior Arthur Prior (1914-1969) undertook pioneering work in intensional logic at a time when modality and intensional concepts in general were under attack. He invented tense logic and was principal theoretician of the movement to apply modal syntax to ...
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Logical Constructions
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Logical Constructions Bertrand Russell referred to several different definitions and philosophical analyses as providing logical constructions of certain entities and expressions. Examples he cited were the Frege/Russell definition of numbers as classes of ...
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The Hole Argument
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Hole Argument What is space What is time Do they exist independently of the things and processes in them Or is their existence parasitic on these things and processes Are they like a canvas onto which an artist paints; they exist whether or not the ...
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Dialetheism
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Dialetheism A dialetheia is a true contradiction, a statement, A, such that both it and its negation, A, are true. Hence, dialeth(e)ism is the view that there are true contradictions. Dialetheism opposes the so-called Law of Non-Contradiction (LNC) (sometimes ...
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Holism and Nonseparability in Physics
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Holism and Nonseparability in Physics It has sometimes been suggested that quantum phenomena exhibit a characteristic holism or nonseparability, and that this distinguishes quantum from classical physics. One puzzling quantum phenomenon arises when one ...
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Identity and Individuality in Quantum Theory
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Identity and Individuality in Quantum Theory What are the metaphysical implications of quantum physics One way of approaching this question is to consider the impact of the theory on our understanding of objects as individuals with well defined identity ...
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Saint Augustine
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Saint Augustine Aurelius Augustinus (354-430 C.E.): rhetor, Christian Neoplatonist, North African Bishop, Doctor of the Roman Catholic Church. One of the decisive developments in the western philosophical tradition was the eventually widespread merging of the ...
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Square of Opposition
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Traditional Square of Opposition This entry traces the historical development of the Square of Opposition, a collection of logical relationships traditionally embodied in a square diagram. This body of doctrine provided a foundation for work in logic for ...
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The Language of Thought Hypothesis
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z The Language of Thought Hypothesis The Language of Thought Hypothesis (LOTH) postulates that thought and thinking take place in a mental language. This language consists of a system of representations that is physically realized in the brain of thinkers and ...
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Multiple Realizability
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Multiple Realizability In the philosophy of mind, multiple realizability is the contention that a given mental kind (property, state, event) is realized by distinct physical kinds. The classic example (presented below) is pain: a wide variety of physical ...
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Singular Propositions
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Singular Propositions Singular propositions (also called Russellian propositions) are propositions that are about a particular object or individual in virtue of having the object or individual as a constituent of the proposition. Alleged examples of singular ...
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Inconsistent Mathematics
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Inconsistent Mathematics Inconsistent mathematics is the study of the mathematical theories that result when classical mathematical axioms are asserted within the framework of a (non-classical) logic which can tolerate the presence of a contradiction without ...
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Reichenbach's Common Cause Principle
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Reichenbach's Common Cause Principle Suppose that two geysers, about one mile apart, erupt at irregular intervals, but usually erupt almost exactly at the same time. One would suspect that they come from a common source, or at least that there is a common ...
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Virtue Epistemology
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Virtue Epistemology An approach in epistemology that applies the resources of virtue theory to problems in the theory of knowledge. It is argued that by doing so it is possible to give informative accounts of knowledge, evidence, and other important epistemic ...
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Medieval Theories of Analogy
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Medieval Theories of Analogy Medieval theories of analogy were a response to problems in three areas: logic, theology, and metaphysics. Logicians were concerned with the use of words having more than one sense, whether completely different, or related in some ...
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Logical Form
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Logical Form Some inferences are impeccable. Consider: (1) John danced if Mary sang, and Mary sang; so John danced. (2) Every politician is deceitful, and every senator is a politician; so every senator is deceitful. (3) The tallest man is in the garden; so ...
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Divine Illumination
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z Divine Illumination Divine illumination is the oldest and most influential alternative to naturalism in the areas of mind and knowledge. The doctrine holds that human beings require a special divine assistance in their ordinary cognitive activities. Although ...
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William Godwin
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z William Godwin William Godwin (1756-1836) was the founder of philosophical anarchism. In his An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793) he argued that government is a corrupting force in society, perpetuating dependence and ignorance, but that it will be ...
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