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133We provide an introduction to some of the key issues raised in this volume by considering how individual chapters bear on the prospects of what may be called a ‘counterfactual process view’ of causal reasoning. According to such a view, counterfactual thought is an essential part of the processing involved in making causal judgements, at least in a central range of cases that are critical to a subject’s understanding of what it is for one thing to cause another. We argue that one fruitful way of…Read more
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1MACKIE, J. L. "Truth, Probability and Paradox: Studies in Philosophical Logic" (review)Mind 85 (n/a): 303. 1976.
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21The Pragmatics of the Logical ConstantsIn Ernest Lepore & Barry Smith (eds.), The Oxford Handbook to the Philosophy of Language, Oxford University Press. pp. 768--793. 2006.The logical constants are technical terms, invented and precisely defined by logicians for the purpose of producing rigorous formal proofs. Mathematics virtually exhausts the domain of deductive reasoning of any complexity, and it is there that the benefits of this refined form of language are felt. Pragmatic issues may arise — issues concerning the point of making a certain statement — for there will be more or less perspicuous and illuminating ways of presenting proofs in this language, and we…Read more
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138Counterfactuals and the benefit of hindsightIn Phil Dowe & Paul Noordhof (eds.), Cause and Chance: Causation in an Indeterministic World, Routledge. 2003.Book synopsis: Philosophers have long been fascinated by the connection between cause and effect: are 'causes' things we can experience, or are they concepts provided by our minds? The study of causation goes back to Aristotle, but resurged with David Hume and Immanuel Kant, and is now one of the most important topics in metaphysics. Most of the recent work done in this area has attempted to place causation in a deterministic, scientific, worldview. But what about the unpredictable and chancey w…Read more
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22The Concept of Probability by J. R. Lucas. (Oxford University Press, 1970. Pp. viii + 220. £2.10.)Philosophy 47 (182): 375-. 1972.
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255Possible knowledge of unknown truthSynthese 173 (1). 2010.Fitch’s argument purports to show that for any unknown truth, p , there is an unknowable truth, namely, that p is true and unknown; for a contradiction follows from the assumption that it is possible to know that p is true and unknown. In earlier work I argued that there is a sense in which it is possible to know that p is true and unknown, from a counterfactual perspective; that is, there can be possible, non-actual knowledge, of the actual situation, that in that situation, p is true and unkno…Read more
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Un argumento de Orayen en favor del condicional materialRevista Latinoamericana de Filosofia 13 (1): 54. 1987.
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3Conditionals, truth and assertionIn Ian Ravenscroft (ed.), Minds, Ethics, and Conditionals: Themes from the Philosophy of Frank Jackson, Oxford University Press. 2009.
London, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
Areas of Interest
Philosophy of Language |
Philosophy of Probability |