Peter R. Anstey

This volume contains the complete correspondence of two of the leading analytic philosophers of the late twentieth century, David Armstrong and David Lewis. Comprising some 345 letters, including letters to and from third parties, this correspondence is at once a deep philosophical resource shedding new light on the philosophical development of two of the great late twentieth-century philosophers, and a record of the development of a philosophical friendship. The letters are valuable, not only for the light they shed on the background to many of Armstrong’s and Lewis’ major publications, but also for what they show us about the practice of philosophy. The correspondence is a window into both the philosophical content of two leading thinkers’ minds and an exemplar of how philosophy of the highest level can be done.

This volume contains the complete correspondence of two of the leading analytic philosophers of the late twentieth century, David Armstrong and David Lewis. Comprising some 345 letters, including letters to and from third parties, this correspondence is at once a deep philosophical resource shedding new light on the philosophical development of two of the great late twentieth-century philosophers, and a record of the development of a philosophical friendship. The letters are valuable, not only for the light they shed on the background to many of Armstrong's and Lewis' major publications, but also for what they show us about the practice of philosophy. The correspondence is a window into both the philosophical content of two leading thinkers' minds and an exemplar of how philosophy of the highest level can be done.

This paper attempts to advance our understanding of the emergence of the modern notion of physical Laws of Nature by situating the earliest known discussions of laws of nature, those of Descartes, in the context of the theory of principles and the broader neo-Aristotelian theory of knowledge acquisition. It is claimed that together these theories are an important, though hitherto over­looked, seam within the conceptual resources from which Descartes’ distinctive and novel notion of Laws of Nature was developed.

This paper addresses the question of the nature and extent of the impact that the new experimental natural philosophy that emerged in the second half of the seventeenth century had on the discipline of logic or the art of thinking. It does so through the examination of the writings of three logicians whose works appeared in the first half of the eighteenth century, namely, Jean-Pierre de Crousaz, Isaac Watts, and William Duncan. Through an examination of references to experimental philosophy in their logic texts, with a special focus on their sections on method, the paper argues that experimental philosophy did, indeed, have an impact; an impact that increases in importance over time. Experimental philosophy was not simply used for illustrative purposes but was integrated into their accounts of induction and the methods of analysis and synthesis. The logics under consideration show the legacy of developments within late scholastic logic, the importance of the theory of principles, and the influence of leading philosophers such as Descartes, Pascal, and Locke.

This chapter examines Stephen Gaukroger’s claim that a new form of natural philosophical explanation, phenomenal explanation, emerged in the experimental practice of Boyle and Newton and was first articulated by Locke. Phenomenal explanation was autonomous in so far as it was independent of underlying foundational theory and, as such, it was a form of horizontal rather than vertical explanation. After setting out the thesis, the chapter proceeds to illustrate the thesis through Boyle’s air-pump experiments and his appeals to the spring of the air, to show how it is placed in Gaukroger’s broader historiography of early modern philosophy and science, and to show just where the thesis appears in his writings. It concludes with an assessment of Gaukroger’s thesis in comparison with an alternative reading by Alan Chalmers that posits that the salient explanatory notion is that of intermediate cause rather than phenomenal explanation.

Today, John Locke is recognized as one of the most important and formative philosophical influences on the modern world. His imprint is still felt in political and legal thought, in educational theory, moral theory and in the theory of knowledge. Locke’s key works, _Two Treatises of Government_, and the monumental _An Essay Concerning Human Understanding_, provoked lively debate when they were first published in 1690 and remain standard texts in undergraduate philosophy courses throughout the English-speaking world and beyond. It is not surprising therefore that Locke scholarship is a burgeoning force in the history of philosophy and that his ideas and arguments are repeatedly alluded to in current philosophical debate. Indeed, since the publication of the first series of _Locke: Critical Assessments_ in 1991, Locke research has proceeded apace, and it is now fitting that a second _Critical Assessments_ series be published. Of particular importance in recent work on Locke has been research into the colonial contexts of his political writings; a more nuanced and historically grounded approach to Locke’s writings on natural philosophy; and a theological turn in Locke scholarship that has centred on the content and reception of his _The Reasonableness of Christianity_. Each of these new trends is represented in this second series, as are recent contributions to long-standing debates concerning Lockean interpretation and influence.

This volume brings together twelve essays exploring the history of theories of definition and essence in Western philosophy from Aristotle to Kant. Definition and essence have been central to philosophical theorising since antiquity and remain so to this day. This volume presents a series of explorations of key authors and themes connected by a common set of questions: What are definitions and essences? What are the connections between them? What are their logical and metaphysical properties? What sorts of things have definitions and essences and what sorts of things do not? What functions do definitions and essences serve in the physical, mathematical, and human sciences? How, if at all, can we come to know them? This volume shows that answering these questions allows us to see in a new light key figures and movements in the history of Western thought. The volume's broad historical sweep also facilitates comparisons between different figures. And it reveals important connections between different subfields of philosophy as these were developed over the centuries - logic, metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language, and natural philosophy among them. Definition and Essence from Aristotle to Kant will be of interest to scholars and graduate students working in the history of philosophy, history of logic, history of mathematics, epistemology, and metaphysics.

This volume explores the themes of vanishing matter, matter and the laws of nature, the qualities of matter, and the diversity of the debates about matter in the early modern period. Chapters are unified by a number of interlocking themes which together enable some of the broader contours of the philosophy of matter to be charted in new ways. Part I concerns Cartesian Matter; Part II covers Matter, Mechanism and Medicine; Part III covers Matter and the Laws of Motion; and Part IV covers Leibniz and Hume. Bringing together some of the world’s leading scholars of early modern philosophy, as well as some exciting new researchers, _Vanishing Matter and the Laws of Motion _stakes out new territory that all serious scholars of early modern philosophy and science will want to traverse.

This paper examines the contents of the sixth paragraph of the “Tyrrell Memoir”. This paragraph makes some strong, critical claims about both Locke’s “obsession” with the London physician Thomas Sydenham, and his purported dismissive attitude towards another physician, Richard Lower. In the paragraph, Tyrrell sides with the First Earl of Shaftesbury’s mocking attitude towards the triumvirate Locke, his close friend David Thomas, and Sydenham, and relates some extraordinary and hitherto unknown anecdotes. Tyrrell’s claims are assessed in relation to what we know about the relations between these four men and in relation to the current state of Sydenham historiography.

This collection sheds new light on the nature, role and practice of philosophy and science in the renewed Berlin Academy from the mid-1740s to the 1790s, and in so doing provides a robust new instalment of materials for the broader task of constructing a historiography of philosophy at this important Enlightenment institution. The collection ranges from discussions of the roles of philosophy and natural philosophy in the formation of the reinvigorated Academy in the mid-1740s, to conceptions of the correct philosophical methodology to be deployed by the Academy. It provides the first ever study of the nature and arrangement of the new classes of the Academy, and a fresh appraisal of the Academy's methodological eclecticism. One recurring theme is the status of metaphysics: there are studies of both special metaphysics, including the study of the soul; general metaphysics, that is, the study of being in general; and foundational metaphysical principles and concepts, such as Maupertuis's Principle of least action, Euler's concept of space and Lambert's notion of an experimental metaphysics. The collection also takes the study of the Academy in new directions through focused studies of important figures whose writings deserve to be better understood, such as Jean Bernard Merian, Louis de Beausobre, Jean Henri Samuel Formey and Johann Georg Sulzer.

The emergence of experimental philosophy was one of the most significant developments in the early modern period. However, it is often overlooked in modern scholarship, despite being associated with leading figures such as Francis Bacon, Robert Boyle, Isaac Newton, Jean Le Rond d'Alembert, David Hume and Christian Wolff. Ranging from the early Royal Society of London in the seventeenth century to the uptake of experimental philosophy in Paris and Berlin in the eighteenth, this book provides new terms of reference for understanding early modern philosophy and science, and its eventual eclipse in the shadow of post-Kantian notions of empiricism and rationalism. Experimental Philosophy and the Origins of Empiricism is an integrated history of early modern experimental philosophy which challenges the rationalism and empiricism historiography that has dominated Anglophone history of philosophy for more than a century.

Locke scholarship has been flourishing in Japan for several decades, but its output is largely unknown to the West. This collection makes available in English for the first time the fruits of recent Japanese research, opening up the possibility of advancing Locke studies on an international scale. Covering three important areas of Locke's philosophical thought – knowledge and experimental method, law and politics, and religion and toleration – this volume criticizes established interpretations and replaces them with novel alternatives, breaking away from standard narratives and providing fresh ways of looking at Locke's relationship with philosophers such as Boyle, Berkeley and Hume. The specific topics that have been selected are ones that continue to have important contemporary moral and political implications, from constitutionalism and toleration to marriage and the death penalty. Applying Locke's views to 21st-century questions, this collection presents provocative readings of the defining aspects of Locke's philosophical thought, stimulating current debates and heralding a new era of collaborative work for Locke scholars around the world.

Peter Anstey rejects the widespread view that all knowledge for Locke is propositional. He argues, instead, that Locke accepts a form of non-propositional knowledge. The perception of the agreement and disagreement of ideas, according to Anstey's interpretation, is akin to what Bertrand Russell called “knowledge by acquaintance.” He presents a careful, four-step analysis of Locke’s view of the acquisition of knowledge, which is designed to show how the mind proceeds from perceiving to affirming, then to assenting, and finally to verbalizing propositions. This comprehensive account takes into account a variety of remarks Locke makes about perception, knowledge and true or false propositions, and Anstey claims that overall this interpretation is a better fit than the orthodox view that Locke held all knowledge to be propositional.

Early modern experimental philosophers were opposed to speculation, and yet many endorsed speculative theories. This chapter gives a partial explanation of why this is so, using Robert Boyle’s acceptance and promotion of the corpuscular philosophy as a case study. It argues that, in addition to furnishing experimental evidence for the corpuscular hypothesis in his Forms and Qualities, Boyle attempted to establish its epistemic superiority over other speculative theories on the grounds that it is founded upon superior principles. In his ‘Excellency and Grounds of the Mechanical Hypothesis’, Boyle claims that the principles of the corpuscular philosophy are more intelligible, more parsimonious, ontologically primary, simpler and more comprehensive than those of its rivals. On grounds of comparative plausibility then, according to Boyle, the corpuscular philosophy is eminently preferable to its rivals. The final section of the chapter traces the legacy of Boyle’s appraisal of the epistemic status of the corpuscular philosophy in the writings of many of his compatriots from the mid-1660s to the Cyclopedia of Ephraim Chambers of 1728.