Books by Philosophy Faculty
Anne Margaret Baxley
"Kant's Theory of Virtue: The Value of Autocracy"
Cambridge University Press
Anne Margaret Baxley offers a systematic interpretation of Kant's theory of virtue, whose most distinctive features have not been properly understood. She explores the rich moral psychology... more
Carl F. Craver
Explaining the Brain: Mechanisms and the Mosaic Unity of Neuroscience
Oxford University Press
What distinguishes good explanations in neuroscience from bad? Carl F. Craver constructs and defends standards for evaluating neuroscientific explanations that are grounded in a systematic... more
Dennis DesChene
Life's Form: Late Aristotelian Conceptions of the Soul
Cornell University Press
Dennis Des Chene explores how Western philosophers understood life and the soul in the early modern period-before Descartes radically changed how the universe was conceived. Life's Form is... more
Spirits and Clocks: Machine and Organism in Descartes
Cornell University Press
Although the basis of modern biology is Cartesian, Descartes's theories of biology have been more often ridiculed than studied. Yet, Dennis Des Chene demonstrates, the themes, arguments,... more
Julia Driver
Ethics: the Fundamentals
Wiley-Blackwell
Ethics: The Fundamentals explores core ideas and arguments in moral theory by introducing students to different philosophical approaches to ethics, including virtue ethics, Kantian... more
Uneasy Virtue
Cambridge University Press
Driver challenges Aristotle's classical theory of virtue, arguing that it fails to take into account virtues that do seem to involve ignorance or epistemic defect. Modesty, for example, is... more
Claude Evans
Strategies of Deconstruction: Derrida and the Myth of the Voice
University of Minnesota Press
Strategies of Deconstruction focuses on the early work of Jacques Derrida, the French philosopher who introduced deconstruction in Speech and Phenomena,his study of Edmund... more
With Respect For Nature: Living As Part Of The Natural World
State University of New York Press
In this book philosopher J. Claude Evans challenges much of the accepted wisdom in environment ethics and argue that human participation in the natural cycles of life and death can have... more
The Metaphysics of Transcendental Subjectivity
John Benjamins Pub Co
The general topic of this book is the metaphysics of the subject in Kantian transcendental philosophy. A critical appreciation of Kant's achievements requires that we be able to view Kant's... more
Roger Gibson
The Philosophy of W. V. Quine
University Press of Florida
How we acquire our theory of the world is for W. V. Quine the central question of epistemology. Gibson sets forth Quine’s philosophy as a systematic attempt to answer this question; his... more
Enlightened Empiricism
University Press of Florida
An Examination of W. V. Quine's Theory of Knowledge
John Heil
Philosophy of Mind: A Contemporary Introduction
Routledge Contemporary Introductions to Philosophy, 2nd Edition
Philosophy of Mind: A Contemporary Introduction is a comprehensive and accessible survey of main themes, positions and debates in philosophy of mind. John Heil introduces and discusses the... more
From an Ontological Point of View
Oxford University Press, USA
From an Ontological Point of View is a highly original and accessible exploration of fundamental questions about what there is. John Heil discusses such issues as whether the world... more
Ron Mallon
"Philosophy: Traditional and Experimental Readings"
Oxford University Press
Recently, the fields of empirical and experimental philosophy have generated tremendous excitement, due to unexpected results that have challenged philosophical dogma. Responding to this... more
Mark Rollins
Mental Imagery: On the Limits of Cognitive Science
Yale University Press
A philosophical study of mental imagery in which Rollins aims to show that there are no logical or methodological reasons why the brain cannot store information in the form of pictures. He... more
Gillian Russell
Truth in Virtue of Meaning: A Defence of the Analytic/Synthetic Distinction
Oxford University Press, USA
The analytic/synthetic distinction looks simple. It is a distinction between two different kinds of sentence. Synthetic sentences are true in part because of the way the world is, and in... more
Roy Sorensen
Pseudo-Problems: How Analytic Philosophy Gets Done
Routledge
A fast-moving, fascinating alternative history of twentieth century analytic philosophy. Using many examples, Sorenson explains how problems are dissolved rather than solved. This... more
Seeing Dark Things: The Philosophy of Shadows
Oxford University Press, USA
If a spinning disk casts a round shadow does this shadow also spin? When you experience the total blackness of a cave, are you seeing in the dark? Or are you merely failing to see anything... more
A Brief History of the Paradox: Philosophy and the Labyrinths of the Mind
Oxford University Press, USA
Can God create a stone too heavy for him to lift? Can time have a beginning? Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Riddles, paradoxes, conundrums--for millennia the human mind has found... more
Vagueness and Contradiction
Oxford University Press, USA
Roy Sorenson offers a unique exploration of an ancient problem: vagueness. Did Buddha become a fat man in one second? Is there a tallest short giraffe? According to Sorenson's epistemicist... more
Thought Experiments
Oxford University Press, USA
Can merely thinking about an imaginary situation provide evidence for how the world actually is--or how it ought to be? In this lively book, Roy A. Sorensen addresses this question with an... more
Blindspots
Oxford University Press, USA
Sorensen here offers a unified solution to a large family of philosophical puzzles and paradoxes through a study of "blindspots": consistent propositions that cannot be rationally accepted... more
Richard Watson
Cogito, Ergo Sum: The Life of Rene Descartes
David R Godine; Revised edition
Descartes is the philosophical architect of our modern world. In metaphysics, he established the view that mind and body are distinct substances, which is foundational for any belief that... more
Cogito, Ergo Sum: The Life of Rene Descartes
2007, David R Godine; Revised edition
Descartes is the philosophical architect of our modern world. In metaphysics, he established the view that mind and body are distinct substances, which is foundational for any belief that... more
Kit Wellman
Debating the Ethics of Immigration: Is There a Right to Exclude?
Oxford University Press, USA
Do states have the right to prevent potential immigrants from crossing their borders, or should people have the freedom to migrate and settle wherever they wish? Christopher Heath Wellman... more
A Liberal Theory of International Justice
Oxford University Press, USA
A Liberal Theory of International Justice advances a novel theory of international justice that combines the orthodox liberal notion that the lives of individuals are what... more
Is There a Duty to Obey the Law?
Cambridge University Press
The central question in political philosophy is whether political states have the right to coerce their constituents and whether citizens have a moral duty to obey the commands of their... more
A Theory of Secession: The Case for Political Self-Determination
Cambridge University Press
Offering an unapologetic defense of the right to secede, Christopher Heath Wellman argues that any group has a moral right to secede as long as its political divorce will leave it and the... more