Relevantism, as a matter of definition, rejects classical logic as incorrect and adopts instead a relevant logic as encapsulating correct inference. It rejects classical logic on the grounds that the rule of Material Detachment, from A and not A or B to infer B, (that is, Disjunctive Syllogism considered as an inferential principle), sometimes leads from truth to falsity. Relevantism — although promoted by some relevant logicians (Routley and Routley), and an integral part of ultralogic (i.e. universal, all purpose, ultramodallogic; cf. [1], [8]) — has recently encountered heavy, but interesting, criticism from relevance logicians themselves (from Belnap, Dunn, and Meyer).

Some philosophers (‘nihilists’) deny the existence of composite material objects. Other philosophers (‘universalists’) hold that whenever there are some things, they compose something. The purpose of this paper is to scrutinize an objection to these revisionary views: the objection that nihilism and universalism are both unacceptably uncharitable because each of them implies that a great deal of what we ordinarily believe is false. Our main business is to show how nihilism and universalism can be defended against the objection. A secondary point is that universalism is harder to defend than nihilism.

Theoreticians that defend a form of realism regarding natural kinds minimally entertain the belief that the world features divisions into kinds and that the natural kind concept is a useful tool for philosophy of science. The objective of this paper is to challenge these assumptions. First, we challenge realism toward natural kinds by showing that the main arguments for their existence, which rely on the epistemic success of natural kinds, are unsatisfactory. Second, we show that, whether they exist or not, natural kinds are expendable when it comes to describing and analyzing scientific explanations accurately.

“The confusion of a logical with a real predicate,” according to the Critique of Pure Reason, “is almost beyond correction” (A598/B626). Kant did not assert that existence is no predicate, but that it is only a “logical” one, and not a “real” one. Much the same thing has been said about identity, although Kant himself thought it is real and not logical. We have long lacked a rigorous criterion to distinguish real from logical predicates, and hence have not been able to say why the difference matters. This paper has two objects. First it provides a demarcation between real and logical predicates that confirms Kant's dictum that existence is only “logical.” Secondly it states the theory of a “logical” (but not “real”) relation of identity. Perhaps this is not the only identity relation. I show only that once it has been precisely defined in the right setting, there are definite answers to a number of disputed questions about identity. Maybe there are other concepts of identity for which different answers are to be given, but I shall not discuss that disagreeable prospect here. A third application concerns the ontological argument.

What is the relationship between trying, desire, and desiring to try? Is it necessary to desire to do something in order to try to do it? Must Dave desire to quit smoking in order to try to quit? I shall defend the view that desiring to do A is necessary for trying to do A. First, Dave needs motivation to quit smoking and motivation comes in the form of desire. So it seems straightforward that when one tries to do something A, one’s desire to do that thing A is one’s motivation. Second, when Dave throws out a pack of cigarettes, this may or may not be part of an attempt to quit smoking. It may be a political protest against R.J.R. Nabisco (Dave may be changing brands, not lifestyles). Dave’s throwing out the cigarettes only counts as part of his attempt to quit smoking, if it is done for the right reason, out of the right motivation. Again, the right motivation seems to be the desire to quit smoking. Thus, the desire to do A appears to play important roles in the attempt to do A. At the very least, it helps to motivate, guide, and constitute the attempt as the attempt to do A. It is because Dave wants to quit smoking that his throwing out his cigarettes counts as part of his attempt to quit smoking, not as a political protest.

Timothy Williamson has argued for the radical conclusion that everything necessarily exists. In this paper, I assume that the conclusion of Williamson's argument is more incredible than the denial of his premises. Under the assumption that Williamson is mistaken, I argue for the claim that there are some structured propositions which have constituents that might not have existed. If those constituents had not existed, then the propositions would have had an unfilled role; they would have been gappy. This gappy propositions view allows for a plausible response to Williamson's argument. Additionally, a slight variant of the gappy propositions view allows for plausible defense of Linguistic Ersatzism from the problem of contingent non-existents (also known as the problem of aliens).

In the Categories Aristotle defined substance as that which is neither predicable of nor in another. In saying that a substance is not predicable of another, Aristotle meant to exclude genera and species from the category substance. Aman is a substance but not man. In saying that a substance is not in another, Aristotle meant to exclude property particulars from the category. A man is a substance, not his color.

The Categories treats substances as simples. Though a particular substance, Bucephalus the horse, has parts, it is nevertheless a single entity in the category substance and, hence, incomplex in the way a black thing or a running man are not. Black things and runners are complex because they are aggregates of substances and property particulars. Even if a horse is one substance and, thus, an entity (unlike a substance cum some of its attributes or a group of related substances), a horse is made of parts and one may wonder how it is related to its parts, as well as how its being made of parts coheres with the definition of substance given in the Categories.

The causal theory of human action that maintains that a person's wants cause his actions has recently gained considerable support in the philosophical community. The so-called logical connection argument, once a seemingly powerful obstacle to this theory, has fallen into disrepute. Roughly stated, this argument claims that since the relation between a want and the supposedly resultant action is logical in nature, whereas the relation between any cause and its effect must be contingent in nature, a want therefore cannot be the cause of an action.

In this paper I shall first of all consider four classical formulations of the logical connection argument (hereinafter the LCA), expounding them step-wise and reviewing various objections, some telling, that have been brought against them. Next I shall present my own formulation of the LCA, which is immune to such objections. Finally I shall propose a natural modification of the causal theory which would enable it to escape the brunt of the LCA. I shall then argue, however, that when the causal theory is modified in this way there are insuperable difficulties to the task of gathering evidence in support of it.

Is acrasia possible? Can you do wrong knowingly? Opinion divides. Each, to the other side, is a paradox monger.

At issue is the most felicitous set of concepts and principles to bring to descriptions and evaluations of human action. So to speak, such a set is an outline of a script for reality to play: it provides identities and relations in which individuals and events or whatever may be cast. Deniers typically begin with a set that rules acrasia out of court, recasting alleged examples in a different explanatory mold. Affirmers typically begin with plausible examples and look for a theoretical framework to place them in, taking those that disallow it to be absurd. But any denier, on legitimate dialectical grounds, can point out that such a reductio is a petitio. So it is a resilient issue, still with us after being bounced around so much in history.

Is it possible to characterize the sortal essence of Fs for a sortal concept F solely in terms of a criterion of identity C for F? That is, can the question ‘What sort of thing are Fs?’ be answered by saying that Fs are essentially those things whose identity can be assessed in terms of C? This paper presents a case study supporting a negative answer to these questions by critically examining the neo-Fregean suggestion that cardinal numbers can be fully characterized as those things whose identity can be assessed in terms of one-one correspondence between concepts.

If skepticism is once again fashionable, then much of the credit must go to Peter Unger who gives a sustained defense of an ultra-pyrrhonian position in his book, Ignorance: A case for Skepticism. Starting with a version of the traditional argument that we know nothing about the external world, Unger plunges deeper into skeptical waters by next arguing that there is at most hardly anything which we know to be so; and he scarcely pauses before proceeding to defend the stronger conclusion of ‘universal ignorance,’ the thesis that nobody ever knows anything to be the case. I view Unger's thesis and the arguments that led him to it as a challenge to be overcome, not by an appeal to dogmatism - which Unger sees as the only alternative to skepticism - but by recourse to hard-biting arguments of the sort in which Unger himself puts his faith. In what follows I shall attempt to restate Unger's three main skeptical arguments with a view to showing that their bite is not nearly so hard as he imagines.

According to inferential role semantics (IRS), for an expression to have a particular meaning or express a certain concept is for subjects to be disposed to make, or to treat as proper, certain inferential transitions involving that expression. Such a theory of meaning is holistic, since according to it the meaning or concept any given expression possesses or expresses depends on the inferential relations it stands in to other expressions.

It is widely recognised that this holism leads to two prima facie problems for IRS. First, since no two speakers share the same beliefs, they will inevitably be disposed to make, or treat as correct, different inferential transitions involving an expression. Hence, according to IRS, the same word in different mouths will possess a different meaning and be understood in different ways. It seems to follow that communication is impossible.

In 1968, Nelson Goodman published his Languages of Art which became one of the most important works on aesthetics in the tradition of analytical philosophy. Goodman offered there a semiotic theory of art, the purpose of which was to explicate our concept of art in terms of different symbolic or referential functions; the theory was further developed in his subsequent book Ways of Worldmaking. Though it is a very subtle and sophisticated theory, I will argue that it is not adequate, that it doesn't even satisfy Goodman's own requirements for a theory of art. Traditionally, the aim of a theory of art has been to capture the essence of art, to describe what is common to all works of art and at the same time distinguishes them from everything else. As a nominalist, Goodman does not, however, believe that there is any essence of art that we can discover.

In the de Anima, Aristotle outlines a theory of perception. In de Anima II, 5-12, he considers the basic kinds of sensory perception — seeing, hearing, touching, tasting and smelling. He uses a few basic elements, viz., the five senses and their proper, common and incidental objects, and a few explanatory principles to explain sensory perception. In de Anima III, 1–2, Aristotle turns to apperception, viz. perceptual selfawareness. He considers several basic cases of apperception – the selfconscious awareness of occurrent perceptions and the awareness that the objects of different senses are different.