METAPHYSICS

Overview

Metaphysics is concerned with the fundamental nature of reality. During the first half of the 20^th century, the accepted view of the relations between thought, language, and reality that had culminated in the metaphysically realist philosophies of G. E. Moore and Bertrand Russell underwent a series of changes. These changes had in turn a number of interesting effects. For example, a striking feature of Anglo-American philosophy during this period was the extent to which philosophers working after Moore and Russell came to question whether (and, if so, how) the practice of metaphysics is even possible.

Our specific focus in this course will be the changing conceptions of the nature of philosophy, and of analytic philosophy's general project, during this period. We shall examine the philosophical movements known as ontological atomism, logical atomism, logical positivism, and the "linguistic turn." We shall conclude by considering the ways in which the works of W. V. Quine, Wilfrid Sellars, and the later Ludwig Wittgenstein influenced the practice of philosophy in the 1950s and beyond.

Texts

Bertrand Russell, Logic and Knowledge, edited by Marsh (Routledge, 1988).

A. J. Ayer (ed.), Logical Positivism (The Free Press, 1966).

Richard M. Rorty (ed.), The Linguistic Turn: Essays in Philosophic Method (Chicago, 1992).

Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, third edition (Prentice-Hall, 1973).

Additional readings, available online.

Suggested: A. C. Grayling (ed.), Philosophy 1: A Guide Through the Subject (Oxford, 1998).

Books On Reserve

For those of you who are especially interested in a topic or who are having difficulty understanding a particular topic, I have put a number of ancillary works on reserve in the Central Library. The bibliographies in some of these works may be of special interest when writing your term papers.

Course Objectives

You will demonstrate an adequate understanding of the central figures and of the main philosophical problems discussed in this course. You will also acquire knowledge of key works in the field that will enable you to read the contemporary literature in this sub-disciplinary area with care and comprehension. You will display this latter ability — together with a knowledge of philosophical methods of analysis and the ability to write clear, effective, and thoughtful philosophical prose — in writing your term paper.

Evaluation of Students' Performance

Semester grades will be determined on the basis of your performance on a midterm take-home examination, a final (10- to 12-page) paper, a series of Reading Topic Paragraphs (RTPs), and class attendance. Your grades on the exam, paper, RTPs, and attendance will be weighted equally; that is, each will count as 25% of your overall semester grade. More will be said about the nature and timing of the exam and the paper, as the semester progresses. I shall be taking attendance daily. You will begin with an 'A' in attendance and lose one-third of a letter grade for every day you miss. The resulting grade will account for that (25%) portion of your overall semester grade.

The RTPs are to be brief, one-paragraph, descriptions of each of the assigned readings. For each reading, you are to answer the following two questions in your RTP: (i) What is the main point or conclusion for which the author argues? (ii) What is the main argument for that point? You are to turn in an RTP, during class, at the beginning of our discussion of each chapter or article. (The RTPs will be due at the beginning of our actual discussion of the relevant chapter or article, which will not necessarily coincide with the beginning of our tentatively scheduled discussion of that material.)

List of Readings

INTRODUCTION

D. M. Armstrong, Universals: An opinionated introduction, Chap. 1, "The Problem" (1989). [on e-reserve]

ONTOLOGICAL ATOMISM

G. E. Moore, "The Nature of Judgement" (1899). [on e-reserve]

Bertrand Russell, "Knowledge by Acquaintance and Knowledge by Description" (1910-11). [on e-reserve]

F. H. Bradley, "On Appearance, Error, and Contradiction" (1910). [on e-reserve]

Russell, "Some Explanations in Reply to Mr. Bradley," Mind, 19 (n.s.) (75) (July, 1910): pp. 373-378. [in JSTOR]

Bradley, "Reply to Mr. Russell's Explanations," Mind, 20 (n.s.) (77) (January, 1911): pp. 74-76. [in JSTOR]

Panayot Butchvarov, "The Limits of Ontological Analysis" (1974). [on e-reserve]

LOGICAL ATOMISM

Russell, "The Philosophy of Logical Atomism" (1918-19). [in Marsh]

John Wisdom, "Is Analysis a Useful Method in Philosophy?" (1934). [on e-reserve]

LOGICAL POSITIVISM

Moritz Schlick, "The Turning Point in Philosophy" (1930-31). [in Ayer]

Rudolf Carnap, "The Elimination of Metaphysics Through the Logical Analysis of Language" (1932). [in Ayer]

Carl G. Hempel, "The Empiricist Criterion of Meaning" (1950). [in Ayer]

THE LINGUISTIC TURN

Gilbert Ryle, "Systematically Misleading Expressions" (1931-32). [in Rorty]

Wisdom, "Philosophical Perplexity" (1936-37). [in Rorty]

J. L. Austin, "Other Minds" (1946). [on e-reserve]

Ryle, "Ordinary Language," The Philosophical Review, 62 (2) (April, 1953): pp. 167-186. [in JSTOR]

Carnap, "Empiricism, Semantics, and Ontology" (1950). [in Rorty]

ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY IN THE 1950's: QUINE, WITTGENSTEIN, AND SELLARS

W. V. Quine, "Two Dogmas of Empiricism" (1951). [on e-reserve]

Gustav Bergmann, "Two Cornerstones of Empiricism" (1951). [on e-reserve]

Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, §§ 1-350 (1953).

Wilfrid Sellars, "Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind" (1956). [on e-reserve]

Quine, "Ontological Relativity" (1969). [on e-reserve]

Donald Davidson, "On the Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme" (1974). [on e-reserve]

Richard Rorty, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature, Chap. 4, "Privileged Representations" (1979). [on e-reserve]