• This chapter contains sections titled: I II III IV.
  •  12
    The Logic of Being: Realism, Truth, and Time
    Northwestern University Press. 2017.
    In the Logic of Being: Realism, Truth, and Time, the influential philosopher Paul M. Livingston explores and illuminates truth, time, and their relationship by employing methods from both Continental and analytic philosophy.
  •  107
    "Philosophy of Language," by Scott Soames (review)
    Teaching Philosophy 35 (2): 230-235. 2012.
  •  225
    Functionalism and logical analysis
    In David Woodruff Smith & Amie L. Thomasson (eds.), Phenomenology and Philosophy of Mind, Oxford: Clarendon Press. pp. 19. 2005.
    After more than thirty-five years of debate and discussion, versions of the functionalist theory of mind originating in the work of Hilary Putnam, Jerry Fodor, and David Lewis still remain the most popular positions among philosophers of mind on the nature of mental states and processes. Functionalism has enjoyed such popularity owing, at least in part, to its claim to offer a plausible and compelling description of the nature of the mental that is also consistent with an underlying physicalist o…Read more
  •  2
    Introduction
    In Dominik Finkelde & Paul M. Livingston (eds.), Idealism, Relativism, and Realism: New Essays on Objectivity Beyond the Analytic-Continental Divide, De Gruyter. pp. 1-14. 2020.
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    Working through Balaska’s deeply perceptive, elegantly written, and profoundly honest book, Wittgenstein and Lacan at the Limit, a reader steeped in the recent academic literature about either or both of its main figures may come to feel herself placed at what is, itself, a certain kind of limit. The limit I mean is the limit of a familiar type of theoretical discourse about the constitution and structure of language and subjectivity as Wittgenstein and Lacan treat them: it includes the discours…Read more
  •  83
    Several debates of the last years within the research field of contemporary realism – known under titles such as "New Realism," "Continental Realism," or "Speculative Materialism" – have shown that science is not systematically the ultimate measure of truth and reality. This does not mean that we should abandon the notions of truth or objectivity all together, as has been posited repeatedly within certain currents of twentieth century philosophy. However, within the research field of contemporar…Read more
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    This paper considers the historical and current reception of Husserl’s phenomenological project within the tradition of analytic philosophy, especially in the United States. Despite the fact that both Husserlian phenomenology and the analytic tradition have centrally undertaken systematic analysis and clarification of structures of meaning or sense, the project of phenomenological analysis and reflection has never been centrally or comprehensively integrated into the most characteristic projects…Read more
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    Presentation and the Ontology of Consciousness
    Grazer Philosophische Studien 94 (3): 301-331. 2017.
    _ Source: _Volume 94, Issue 3, pp 301 - 331 The idea that we can understand key aspects of the metaphysics of consciousness by understanding conscious states as having a _presentational_ character plays an essential role in the phenomenological tradition beginning with Brentano and Husserl. In this paper, the author explores some potential consequences of this connection for contemporary discussions of the ontology of consciousness in the world. Drawing on Hintikka’s analysis of epistemic modali…Read more
  •  2
    Badiou and the Conseqeunces of Formalism
    Cosmos and History : The Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy 8 (1): 131-150. 2012.
    I consider the relationship of Badiou’s schematism of the event to critical thought following the linguistic turn as well as to the mathematical formalisms of set theory. In Being and Event, Badiou uses formal argumentation to support his sweeping rejection of the linguistic turn as well as much of contemporary critical thought. This rejection stems from his interpretation of set theory as barring thought from the 'One-All' of totality; but I argue that, by interpreting it differently, we can un…Read more
  •  1
    Experience and Structure: An Investigation in the History of Philosophy of Mind
    Dissertation, University of California, Irvine. 2002.
    Historical investigation and analysis of the concepts of "consciousness," "experience," and "explanation" can clarify and sharpen contemporary discussion in philosophy of mind about the problem of explaining consciousness. I have investigated the difficulties of explaining consciousness at four historically important moments in the development of analytic philosophy of mind. In each chapter, I unearth and evaluate the arguments originally made for influential theories and doctrines, and analyze …Read more
  •  157
    Experience and structure: Philosophical history and the problem of consciousness
    Journal of Consciousness Studies 9 (3): 15-33. 2002.
    Investigation and analysis of the history of the concepts employed in contemporary philosophy of mind could significantly change the contemporary debate about the explainability of consciousness. Philosophical investigation of the history of the concept of qualia and the concept of scientific explanation most often presupposed in contemporary discussions of consciousness reveals the origin of both concepts in some of the most interesting philosophical debates of the twentieth century. In particu…Read more
  •  97
    I consider Plato’s argument, in the dialogue Cratylus, against both of two opposed views of the “correctness of names.” The first is a conventionalist view, according to which this relationship is arbitrary, the product of a free inaugural decision made at the moment of the first institution of names. The second is a naturalist view, according to which the correctness of names is initially fixed and subsequently maintained by some kind of natural assignment, rooted in the things themselves. I ar…Read more
  •  167
    Thinking and being: Heidegger and Wittgenstein on machination and lived-experience
    Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 46 (3). 2003.
    Heidegger's treatment of 'machination' in the Beiträge zur Philosophie begins the critique of technological thinking that would centrally characterize his later work. Unlike later discussions of technology, the critique of machination in Beiträge connects its arising to the predominance of 'lived-experience' ( Erlebnis ) as the concealed basis for the possibility of a pre-delineated, rule-based metaphysical understanding of the world. In this essay I explore this connection. The unity of machina…Read more
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    _Philosophy and the Vision of Language_ explores the history and enduring significance of the twentieth-century turn to language as a specific object of investigation and resource for philosophical reflection. It traces the implications of the access to language in some of the most prominent projects and results of the historical and contemporary tradition of analytic philosophy, including the projects of Frege, Wittgenstein, Sellars, Quine, Brandom, and Cavell. Additionally, it demonstrates the…Read more
  •  175
    My aim in this paper is to begin a discussion about how, and to what extent, Martin Heidegger’s thinking about technology offers helpful critical terms for thinking about the nature and global sway of today’s most dominant and prevalent forms of technology, namely the interrelated technologies of information, communication, and (capitalist) commerce. My suggestion will be that Heidegger’s thought does indeed have implications for critical thinking about these technologies, but that in order to s…Read more
  •  99
    Badiou and the Politics of Form
    Philosophy Compass 7 (5): 304-315. 2012.
    In this essay, I explore Alain Badiou’s longstanding project of theorizing political situations and political transformation through the analysis of forms and formalisms. This amounts, I argue, to a politics of form that draws on the thought of Sartre, Althusser, and Lacan, but offers new alternatives for political thought and action today. In particular, Badiou’s rigorous consideration of forms, which draws on mathematics, model theory, set theory, and category theory, allows him to theorize po…Read more