Good morning, readers!

The September 2009 book reviews from Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews are available.

The reviewed books cover Hannah Arendt, Aristotle, St. Augustine, Ernst Cassirer, David Kaplan, Rene Descartes, David Hume, Socrates, Stephen Stich, and Ludwig Wittgenstein.

Topics covered include aesthetics, Asian philosophy, ancient philosophy, moral & political philosophy, and time, among others.

Are any worth considering for the Robbins collection?

Good morning, readers!

Here are the March 2009 Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews:

Moral & Political Philosophy

Metaphysics

Epistemology

Aesthetics

Philosophers & History of Philosophy

Philosophy of Science

Philosophy of Literature

Asian Philosophy

Philosophy of Religion

Good morning, readers!

Here are the February 2009 reviews from Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews:

Philosophy of Law

  • Peter Goodrich, Florian Hoffmann, Michel Rosenfeld, Cornelia Vismann (eds.), Derrida and Legal Philosophy, Reviewed by Douglas Litowitz, Magnetar Capital LLC

Moral & Political Philosophy

Philosophers and History of Philosophy

Critical Theory

Philosophy of Language

Aesthetics

Perception

Personal Identity

Philosophy of Religion

Logic

  • Douglas Walton, Chris Reed, Fabrizio Macagno, Argumentation Schemes, Reviewed by Leo Groarke, Wilfrid Laurier University

Good morning, readers!

Here are the January 2009 Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews.  Though collection development is on hold for the time being at Robbins, are any of these worth considering for purchase at a later date?

Aesthetics

Philosophers

Metaphysics

Epistemology

History of Philosophy

Moral & Political Philosophy

Philosophy of Law

Philosophy of Religion

Philosophy of Science

Good morning, readers, and happy Friday to you!

Here are the latest podcasts from Philosophy Bites, from late October 2008 to November 2008 — the titles are taken directly from the site:

Enjoy!

Good morning, readers!

Arrived last week: the latest issue of Philosophy & Phenomenological ResearchPhilosophy & Phenomenological Research 77(3) November 2008.

Here’s the Table of Contents:

Articles

  • The Causal Theory of Properties and the Causal Theory of Reference, or How to Name Properties and Why It Matters, Robert D. Rupert
  • Yet Another Paper on the Supervenience Argument Against Coincident Entities, Theodore Sider
  • Forgiving Someone for Who They Are (and Not Just What They’ve Done), Macalester Bell
  • Divine Hoorays: Some Parallels between Expressivism and Religious Ethics, Nicholas Unwin
  • Flattery, Yuval Eylon, David Heyd
  • Locke’s Problem Concerning Perceptual Error, Antonia Lolordo
  • Epistemic Goals and Epistemic Values, Stephen R. Grimm

Discussions

  • The Determinists Have Run Out of Luck—For a Good Reason, Storrs McCall, E.J. Lowe
  • Bad Luck Once Again, Neil Levy

Special Symposium

  • Understanding Simulation, Susan Hurley
  • Hurley on Simulation, Alvin I. Goldman

Book Symposium: Moral Skepticisms

  • Précis of Moral Skepticisms, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong
  • Coping with Moral Uncertainty, Peter Railton
  • Contrastivism, Relevance Contextualism, and Meta-Skepticism, Mark Timmons
  • Do We Have Any Justified Moral Beliefs?, David Copp
  • Replies to Copp, Timmons, and Railton, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong

Critical Notices

  • Epistemology and the Psychology of Human Judgment, reviewed by Earl Conee
  • Subjectivity and Selfhood: Investigating the First-Person Perspective, reviewed by Charles Siewert

Also arrived this week: the latest issue of NoûsNoûs 42(4) December 2008 — with an article by the department’s own Jeff McDonough:

  • New Foundations for Imperative Logic I: Logical Connectives, Consistency, and Quantifiers, Peter B.M. Vranas
  • How Expressivists Can and Should Solve Their Problem with Negation, Mark Schroeder
  • The Price of Inscrutability, J.R.G. Williams
  • Deontological Restrictions and the Self/Other Symmetry, David Alm
  • Leibniz’s Two Realms Revisited, Jeffrey K. McDonough
  • The Standard Argument for Blame Incompatibilism, Peter A. Graham
  • Problems for Testimonial Acquaintance, Michael J. Raven
  • Is the Problem of the Many a Problem in Metaphysics?, Dan López de Sa
  • On What it Takes for There to Be No Fact of the Matter, Jody Azzouni and Otávio Bueno
  • Frankfurt’s Argument against Alternative Possibilities: Looking Beyond the Exemplars, Michael McKenna

Good morning, readers!

Rene Girard

At right: René Girard

There has been a lot of great philosophical material popping up over the last few days.

For instance: while poking around Bookforum.com yesterday, I found a link to a translation of an interview with the French anthropologist, René Girard. Titled “Intellectuals as Castrators of Meaning,” Girard offers sharp criticisms of modernity in its many forms, from post-modernism to scientism.  While Girard challenges mainly French post-modernism, he also does not spare parts of the analytic tradition as well, especially philosophy of science.

Here is one example of Girard’s critique:

Today there are three areas—nuclear weapons, terrorism, and genetic manipulation—in which man is especially placed in danger:

“The twentieth century was the century of classical nihilism. The twenty-first century will be the century of alluring nihilism. C. S. Lewis was right when he talked about the abolition of man. Michel Foucault added that the abolition of man was becoming a philosophical concept. Today, one can no longer speak of ‘man.’ When Friedrich Nietzsche announced the death of God, in fact he was announcing the death of man. Eugenics is the negation of human rationality. If one considers man as the outcome of mere chance and as crude material for the laboratory, a malleable object to be manipulated, one reaches the point of being able to do anything to man. That ends with the destruction of the fundamental rationality that belongs to the human being. But man cannot be reorganized thus and still remain man.”

The other parts of the interview are worth reading, if only as an alternative view to the modern project.  Nonetheless, I suspect that much of what Girard writes will irritate, annoy, and perhaps even anger some of my readers.

Giambattista Vico

At left: Giambattista Vico (1668-1744)

Those upset by Girard’s critique might remember that he is not alone in challenging the dominant modern project’s paradigms.  Giambattista Vico, for example, offered many critiques of the modern project (and especially of Cartesian thought) in The New Science, On Humanistic Education, and On the Study Methods of Our Time.  Or Leszek Kolakowski’s essay, “Modernity on Endless Trial,” in the collection of the same title.

Sometimes, it’s a good idea to read things with which we might disagree, if only to see where the strengths and weakenesses of our own positions lie.

As for what I think of this interview, I’m not, at this point, suggesting that Girard is completely correct.  I have not read his work extensively, so I do not know how solid his critiques are.  All I will say is that his interview is provocative — to say the least! — and bears further study, nothing more.

What do you think, readers?

Good morning, readers, and welcome back after the Labor Day holiday weekend!

A short administrative update: I will be in tomorrow, as my plans have changed.

Now, for our main attraction: here are the Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews from August 2008.  Should any of these be added to the Robbins collection?

Epistemology

History of Philosophy

Philosophy of Law

Philosophy of Science

Philosophy of Religion

  • Charles Taylor, A Secular Age, Reviewed by Michael L. Morgan, Indiana University

Metaphysics

Historiography

Moral & Political Philosophy

Good morning, readers!

I realized yesterday that I haven’t posted any new podcasts from Philosophy Bites since late May. Here’s a list of the podcasts added since then:

  • Clare Carlisle on Kierkegaard’s Fear and Trembling
  • Alex Neill on the Paradox of Tragedy
  • Quentin Skinner on Machiavelli’s The Prince
  • Peter Adamson on Plotinus on Evil
  • Matthew Kramer on Legal Rights
  • Melissa Lane on Rousseau on Civilization
  • John Broome on Weighing Lives
  • Robert Rowland Smith on Derrida on Forgiveness
  • John Dunn on Locke on Toleration
  • Will Kymlicka on Minority Rights
  • Jennifer Hornsby on Human Agency
  • Enjoy!

    Good morning, readers!

    Here are the July reviews from Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews.  Are any of these books candidates for inclusion in the Robbins collection?

    Philosophy of Language

    Frederik Stjernfelt
    Diagrammatology: An Investigation on the Borderlines of Phenomenology, Ontology and Semiotics
    Reviewed by Valeria Giardino, Institut Jean Nicod (CNRS-EHESS-ENS), Paris

    François Recanati
    Perspectival Thought: A Plea for (Moderate) Relativism
    Reviewed by Kepa Korta, University of the Basque Country

     Epistemology

    Mark Okrent
    Rational Animals: The Teleological Roots of Intentionality
    Reviewed by Matthew Ratcliffe, Durham University

    Michael N. Forster
    Kant and Skepticism
    Reviewed by Anthony Brueckner, University of California, Santa Barbara

    Zenon W. Pylyshyn
    Things and Places: How the Mind Connects with the World
    Reviewed by Christopher S. Hill, Brown University

    Jennifer Lackey
    Learning from Words: Testimony as a Source of Knowledge
    Reviewed by Aaron Z. Zimmerman, University of California, Santa Barbara

    Philosophy of Religion

    Alvin Plantinga, Michael Tooley
    Knowledge of God
    Reviewed by William L. Rowe, Purdue University

    J. L. Schellenberg
    The Wisdom to Doubt: A Justification of Religious Skepticism
    Reviewed by Stephen Wykstra, Calvin College and Timothy Perrine, Calvin College

    Erik J. Wielenberg
    God and the Reach of Reason: C.S. Lewis, David Hume, and Bertrand Russell
    Reviewed by Bruce Russell, Wayne State University

    Metaphysics

    Robin Le Poidevin
    The Images of Time: An Essay on Temporal Representation
    Reviewed by Craig Callender, University of California, San Diego

    John Leslie
    Immortality Defended
    Reviewed by Charles Taliaferro, St. Olaf College

    Max Kistler, Bruno Gnassounou (eds.)
    Dispositions and Causal Powers
    Reviewed by Jennifer McKitrick, University of Nebraska, Lincoln

    Lynne Rudder Baker
    The Metaphysics of Everyday Life: An Essay in Practical Realism
    Reviewed by Charlotte Witt, University of New Hampshire

    History of Philosophy

    Terence Irwin
    The Development of Ethics: A Historical and Critical Study; Volume I: From Socrates to the Reformation
    Reviewed by Dimitrios Dentsoras, University of Manitoba

    Iain Macdonald, Krzysztof Ziarek (eds.)
    Adorno and Heidegger: Philosophical Questions
    Reviewed by David Pettigrew, Southern Connecticut State University

    Larry A. Hickman
    Pragmatism as Post-Postmodernism: Lessons from John Dewey
    Reviewed by Dennis M. Senchuk, Indiana University

    P. J. E. Kail
    Projection and Realism in Hume’s Philosophy
    Reviewed by Angela Coventry, Portland State University

    Christopher Shields
    Aristotle
    Reviewed by Barbara Sattler, Yale University

    Andrew Haas
    The Irony of Heidegger
    Reviewed by Richard Polt, Xavier University

    Quentin Skinner
    Hobbes and Republican Liberty
    Reviewed by Bernard Gert, Dartmouth College

    Paul Russell
    The Riddle of Hume’s Treatise: Skepticism, Naturalism, and Irreligion
    Reviewed by Rico Vitz, University of North Florida

    Charlie Huenemann (ed.)
    Interpreting Spinoza: Critical Essays
    Reviewed by Steven Barbone, San Diego State University

    Philosophical Practice

    Rupert Read, Laura Cook (ed.)
    Applying Wittgenstein
    Reviewed by Colin Johnston, Institute of Philosophy, University of London

    Steve Fuller
    The Knowledge Book: Key Concepts in Philosophy
    Reviewed by Val Dusek, University of New Hampshire

    Ethics/Moral Philosophy/Political Philosophy

    Jerome Neu
    Sticks and Stones: The Philosophy of Insults
    Reviewed by Macalester Bell, Columbia University

    J. McKenzie Alexander
    The Structural Evolution of Morality
    Reviewed by Herbert Gintis, University of Massachusetts

    Francisco J. Benzoni
    Ecological Ethics and the Human Soul: Aquinas, Whitehead, and the Metaphysics of Value
    Reviewed by Christopher M. Brown, University of Tennessee at Martin

    Aesthetics

    Jennifer Anna Gosetti-Ferencei
    The Ecstatic Quotidian: Phenomenological Sightings in Modern Art and Literature
    Reviewed by K. Gover, Bennington College

    Elisabeth Schellekens
    Aesthetics and Morality
    Reviewed by James Harold, Mount Holyoke College

    Jane Kneller
    Kant and the Power of Imagination
    Reviewed by James Schmidt, Boston University

    James O. Young
    Cultural Appropriation and the Arts
    Reviewed by John Rapko, San Francisco Art Institute

    Stephen Davies
    Philosophical Perspectives on Art
    Reviewed by Christian Helmut Wenzel, National Chi Nan University, Taiwan

    Philosophy of Mathematics

    Marcus Giaquinto
    Visual Thinking in Mathematics: An Epistemological Study
    Reviewed by Sun-Joo Shin, Yale University