Philosophy in Practice An Introduction to the Main Questions

, by Morton, Adam

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ISBN: 9781405116176 | 140511617X
Cover: Hardcover
Copyright: 12/30/2003

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Summary

Author Biography

Supplemental Materials

Philosophy in Practice is a completely new kind of introductory textbook, focusing on philosophy as an activity, rather than as a doctrine.

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Note to Teachers

The Contract

xii

Part 1 The Lure of Certainty

(170)

1 Certainty and Doubt

(32)

1.1 Patterns of Thought

(3)

1.2 How Conventional Are Your Beliefs?

(2)

1.3 Conviction, Opinion, Doubt, and Belief

(2)

1.4 Trusting Textbooks

(1)

1.5 Certainty: the Closed-belief Trap

(2)

1.6 Cheat: a story about Deception

(3)

1.7 Tree-worshipers and Flat-earthers

(3)

1.8 Revising History: 1984

(1)

1.9 Doubt

(2)

1.10 Doubting What Someone Says

(2)

1.11 How Skeptical Are You?

(2)

1.12 Moral Skepticism

(1)

1.13 When is a Skeptic a Cynic?

(2)

1.14 Socratic Skepticism

(3)

Conclusions

(1)

Further Reading

(2)

2 Sources of Conviction

(24)

2.1 Authority

(3)

2.2 Faith

(1)

2.3 Reason

(2)

2.4 Arguments

(3)

2.5 Eight Short Arguments

(2)

2.6 Puzzling Arguments

(1)

2.7 Arguments within Arguments

(1)

2.8 Proofs of God

(5)

2.9 Paradoxes

(1)

2.10 What to Trust on the Internet

(2)

2.11 Transforming the Question

(1)

Conclusions

(1)

Further Reading

(1)

3 Rationalism

(30)

3.1 Optimism about Reason

(1)

3.2 Individualism

(2)

3.3 Galileo's Rationalism

(1)

3.4 Impossible Theories

(2)

3.5 Descartes' Optimism: Certainty from Doubt

(4)

3.6 Doubting Anything versus Doubting Everything

(1)

3.7 Demon Possibilities, Paranoia, and Fantasy

(3)

3.8 The Matrix

(2)

3.9 How Doubt Can Increase Belief

(1)

3.10 Skepticism and Religious Faith

(3)

3.11 "I Think, Therefore I Am"

(1)

3.12 Doubting Even One's Own Existence

(3)

3.13 Degrees of Certainty

(2)

Conclusions

(1)

Further Reading

(3)

4 Rationalism versus Relativism in Morals

(32)

4.1 The Appeal of Moral Rationalism

(1)

4.2 Four Golden Rules

(2)

4.3 Equality and Justice

(4)

4.4 Plato's Moral Rationalism

(2)

4.5 Three Arguments from Plato's Republic

(4)

4.6 Moral Relativism

102

(2)

4.7 For and Against Moral Relativism

104

(5)

4.8 The Ik

109

(1)

4.9 Law and Morality

110

(3)

4.10 Existentialism

113

(2)

4.11 What Is Morality About?

115

(3)

Conclusions

118

(1)

Further Reading

118

(3)

5 Induction and Deduction

121

(28)

5.1 Simple Induction

122

(1)

5.2 Applying Simple Induction

123

(3)

5.3 Seeing Patterns in Nature

126

(2)

5.4 Deduction 1: Syllogisms

128

(3)

5.5 Deduction 2: Validity

131

(2)

5.6 Deduction 3: Venn Diagrams and Counterexamples

133

(3)

5.7 Induction versus Deduction

136

(2)

5.8 The Induction-friendliness of the World

138

(3)

5.9 Diagramming Induction-friendliness

141

(1)

5.10 Hume's Discovery: Nightmare or Liberation?

142

(2)

5.11 Causation and Induction

144

(2)

5.12 Choosing the Right Concepts

146

(2)

Conclusions

148

(1)

Further Reading

148

(1)

6 The Retreat from Certainty

149

(21)

6.1 Feeble Reason?

150

(1)

6.2 Hume on the Power(lessness) of Reason

150

(3)

6.3 Four Famous Passages from Hume

153

(2)

6.4 Four Kinds of Irrationality

155

(3)

6.5 Degrees of Certainty

158

(1)

6.6 Valuing Values

158

(2)

6.7 How Tolerant Are You?

160

(3)

6.8 Mi11 on Freedom of Expression

163

(3)

6.9 Toleration in science

166

(1)

6.10 Making Uncertainty Pay

167

(1)

Conclusions

168

(1)

Further Reading

169

(1)

Postcard History of Philosophy I

170

(1)

Part II Life in An Uncertain World

171

(136)

7 Utilitarianism

173

(26)

7.1 Naive Utilitarianism

174

(1)

7.2 Choosing the Utilitarian Action

175

(2)

7.3 Pleasure, Pain, and Consequences

177

(1)

7.4 Hedonism

178

(3)

7.5 Four Styles of Advice

181

(1)

7.6 Bentham and Mill

182

(2)

7.7 Quotations from Bentham and Mill

184

(2)

7.8 Arguments for Utilitarianism

186

(2)

7.9 Objecting to the Arguments

188

(2)

7.10 Two Controversial Recommendations

190

(1)

7.11 The Appeal of Utilitarianism

191

(1)

7.12 Utilitarianism and Risk

192

(5)

Conclusions

197

(1)

Further Reading

197

(2)

8 Kantian Ethics

199

(18)

8.1 Means and Ends

200

(2)

8.2 Motive, Rule, and Means

202

(1)

8.3 Kant's Argument

203

(3)

8.4 Evaluating Kant's Argument

206

(1)

8.5 Consequentialism versus Deontology

207

(1)

8.6 Diagnosing Disagreements

208

(1)

8.7 When it Might Be Right to Lie and Break Promises

209

(2)

8.8 Strong Deontology

211

(2)

8.9 The Demands of Morality: the Case of Famine

213

(1)

8.10 Morality in an Uncertain World

214

(1)

Conclusions

215

(1)

Further Reading

216

(1)

9 Empiricism

217

(28)

9.1 Are You an Empiricist?

218

(3)

9.2 The Appeal of Empiricism

221

(1)

9.3 Some Empiricist Views

222

(2)

9.4 The Idea Idea

224

(2)

9.5 Translation Exercises

226

(1)

9.6 Locke's "Way of Ideas"

227

(1)

9.7 Locke against innate Ideas

228

(2)

9.8 Concepts, Beliefs, and Sensations

230

(3)

9.9 Ways of Defining Concepts

233

(2)

9.10 Barriers to Concept Acquisition

235

(2)

9.11 Empirical Evidence

237

(3)

9.12 Adequate Evidence?

240

(3)

Conclusions

243

(1)

Further Reading

243

(2)

10 Beyond Empiricism

245

(34)

10.1 Risk of What?

246

(1)

10.2 Accuracy versus Informativeness about Friendship

247

(2)

10.3 Other Minds

249

(2)

10.4 Testing the Argument from Analogy

251

(2)

10.5 Folk Psychology: the Argument from Explanation

253

(2)

10.6 Being Wrong about Yourself

255

(1)

10.7 The Inference to the Best Explanation

256

(2)

10.8 Explanation

258

(3)

10.9 Justifying Astrology

261

(1)

10.10 Inference to the Best Explanation versus Simple Induction

262

(2)

10.11 Perception and Belief

264

(3)

10.12 Falsification

267

(4)

10.13 The Hypothetico-deductive Method

271

(3)

10.14 A Test Case: Continental Drift

274

(3)

Conclusions

277

(1)

Further Reading

277

(2)

11 Objectivity

279

(26)

11.1 Escape from the Cave

280

(2)

11.2 Background Beliefs: First Test Case - Probability

282

(4)

11.3 Background Beliefs: Second Test Case - Moral Status

286

(4)

11.4 Reflective Equilibrium

290

(5)

11.5 How Ethics Is Like Science

295

(6)

11.6 Fallibilism

301

(3)

Conclusions

304

(1)

Further Reading

304

(1)

Postcard History of Philosophy II

305

(2)

Part III Reality

307

(123)

12 Materialism and Dualism

311

(26)

12.1 Materialism, Naturalism, Idealism

312

(1)

12.2 Materialisms

313

(2)

12.3 Are You a Materialist or an idealist?

315

(1)

12.4 Dualism

316

(5)

12.5 Leibniz on the Unimaginability of Materialism

321

(1)

12.6 Crude and Subtle Materialisms

322

(3)

12.7 Lucretius on Mind and Body

325

(1)

12.8 Antidepressants, Psychosomatic Medicine, and the Mind-Body Problem

326

(2)

12.9 Materialism and Self-knowledge

328

(2)

12.10 Technology versus Introspection

330

(2)

12.11 Eliminative Materialism

332

(2)

12.12 Five Typical Quotations

334

(1)

Conclusions

335

(1)

Further Reading

335

(2)

13 Morality for Naturalists

337

(30)

13.1 God and Morality

338

(3)

13.2 The Moralist's Nightmare

341

(2)

13.3 Hobbes on the State of Nature

343

(3)

13.4 A Restaurant Dilemma

346

(2)

13.5 The Prisoner's Dilemma

348

(2)

13.6 Hobbes and the Prisoner's Dilemma

350

(2)

13.7 Implicit Contracts

352

(3)

13.8 Imaginary social Contracts

355

(1)

13.9 Morals in Nature? Rousseau, Hegel, Marx

356

(3)

13.10 Real States of Nature

359

(2)

13.11 Moral Motivation: Decency, Villainy, and Hypocrisy

361

(1)

13.12 Morals within Nature?

362

(3)

Conclusions

365

(1)

Further Reading

365

(2)

14 Deep Illusions

367

(32)

14.1 Primary and Secondary Qualities

368

(2)

14.2 Hard Questions about Color

370

(2)

14.3 Color as Illusory

372

(1)

14.4 Free Will

373

(4)

14.5 Freedom and Responsibility

377

(2)

14.6 Freedom as a Secondary Quality

379

(3)

14.7 Fatalism versus Determinism

382

(2)

14.8 Identity through Time

384

(3)

14.9 Personal Identity: Problem Cases

387

(2)

14.10 Personal Identity: Theories

389

(2)

14.11 The Meanings of Lives

391

(5)

Conclusions

396

(1)

Further Reading

396

(3)

15 Realism

399

(30)

15.1 Science versus the Everyday World

400

(1)

15.2 Counting Objects

401

(3)

15.3 Berkeley's Idealism

404

(4)

15.4 A Puzzle about Pain: the Locations of Qualities

408

(1)

15.5 Apples, Surprises, Scopes, and Existence

409

(3)

15.6 Verificationism

412

(3)

15.7 Instrumentalism versus Realism

415

(4)

15.8 First Case Study: Crystal Spheres

419

(2)

15.9 Second Case Study: Phlogiston

421

(2)

15.10 Arguments for Realism and Instrumentalism

423

(3)

15.11 The Last Word

426

(1)

Conclusions

427

(1)

Further Reading

427

(2)

Postcard History of Philosophy III

429

(1)

Definitions

430

(7)

Index

437

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Philosophy in Practice An Introduction to the Main Questions

Summary

Author Biography

Table of Contents

Supplemental Materials