On sait le tollé qui entoura vers le dernier quart du XVIIIe siècle la publication du Système de la nature de d'Holbach (1770), le nombre de «réfutations» qui surgirent de toutes parts pour pourfendre le livre outrageant vite apparu comme la véritable bible du matérialisme moderne. Pourtant, parmi les critiques du Système celui qui se détache comme le champion incontestable, car le plus implacable du point de vue de la force théorique et tout aussi systématique ou virulent que son adversaire, n'est qu'un modeste abbé: l'abbé Bergier, remarquablement bien au fait des idées de la nouvelle philosophie et de ses progrès. Bergier conduit méthodiquement une réfutation des thèses ontologiques, morales et politiques de son adversaire en les sapant au niveau des principes d'abord et en dégageant ensuite leurs conséquences pernicieuses par rapport à l'ordre existant.

Humpty-Dumpty affirmait que les mots signifiaient exactement ce qu'il lui plaisait qu'ils signifient, «ni plus, ni moins». Il a parfois des défenseurs chez les chercheurs qui se sont penchés sur le problème de la non-littéralité (Beardsley, 1962, 1978; Black, 1979). On peut cependant affirmer qu'ur locuteur, s'il utilise non littéralement des expressions qui ont ure signification conventionnelle, ne peut en changer à volonté la signification pour leur faire signifier exactement ce qu'il a l'intention de signifier. Par exemple, quelqu'un qui fait une métaphore ne peut changer la signification des expressions qu'il utilise. C'est la thèse que je défendrai au cours des prochaines pages. On verra aussi quelles intentions devrait avoir un locuteur qui signifierait non littéralement quelque chose.

It is often quite proper, philosophically speaking, to raise objections to a philosophical inquiry because it is seeking an answer to a question which ought not to have been raised in the first place. So in this instance, one might maintain that it is illegitimate to ask questions about the metaphysics of the Tractatus, just because the Tractatus is not the sort of book which is supposed to have a particular metaphysics. The Tractatus, we have heard said, is a book on the philosophy of language, not one on metaphysics; it is a specification of what language is, or ought to be like, and is not meant to have anything to do with the metaphysical constitution of the world.

On First view there seem to be many possible instances of knowers who lack knowledge of their knowledge. A self-deceiver seems capable of knowing his own faults without knowing that he knows them. A philosopher seems capable of knowing that there are physical objects around him without knowing that he has such knowledge. Deep-rooted insecurity seems capable of preventing a mathematician from knowing that he has just made a genuine discovery. A child seems capable of acquiring knowledge before acquiring the concept ‘knowledge’ and hence before being able to know that he knows.

A persistent and objectionable claim is that there are states of consciousness attainable wherein there is consciousness of consciousness per se through the absence or diminution of the ordinary objects of consciousness or awareness. The claim is made by phenomenologists, religious thinkers and mystics, and some psychologists.

John W. Danfor's position in David Hume and the Problem of Reason is refreshing and insightful but may be disturbing to those holding a more traditional view of Hume. The approach taken is highly accessible to those outside of the narrower circle of Humean scholarship; as well it is challenging to those who specialize in Hume's philosophy. I find that I am in general agreement with the overall thrust of Danford's work, which puts Hume's epistemological interests in the context of his political and ethical ones. Hume is cast in a conservative light, as reviving ancient philosophical attitudes to counter the brashness and thoughtlessness of the modern revolutionary thought of Descartes and Hobbes and the traditions following them.

Indifference in the choice, in the twofold sense found in Letter to Mesland, 9 February 1645, is similar to akrasia or incontinence. The aim in this article is to provide an explanation of the Cartesian analysis of the choice against better judgement which has different faces: “irresolution,” “extravagance,” “resolution grounded on false opinion,” the last two nowadays being called “megalomania.” Just as Descartes emphasizes the representative function of idea and the resolution to follow the better judgement, his conception of incontinence is to be understood on the basis of lack of representation, rather than on deliberation, in the Fifth Responses to Gassendi. Nevertheless, indifference is not deemed “irrational” by Descartes. I give an interpretation of this Cartesian abstention and conclude with a discussion of Davidson's conception of paradoxes of irrationality.

In this paper I shall first expose a weakness shared by several philosophical discussions of self-deception: I shall show that these discussions have failed to give it a complete analysis. The apparent phenomenon of self-deception is all too familiar, and yet its adequate characterization in general terms is wanting. More exactly, I shall argue that to understand self-deception statically, as these accounts have done, has been—and must be—to fail to give a characterization of it as a state of mind, sufficient to distinguish it from other mental states not born of self-deception.

ABSTRACT: The Bible illuminates Kant’s distinction between appearances and things-in-themselves. The two biblical creation stories, in Genesis 1 and in Genesis 2, offer different ontological parsings, only the second of which, like Kant’s appearances, is relativized to the human case. But while Kant’s other region remains undercharacterized (it is either understood negatively, as differing from the realm of appearances, or else uninformatively, as the object of supra-human cognition), the Bible articulates quite fully the world as it is before the advent of men and women. The Bible treats this realm from the sub-human standpoint. This broadly anthropological approach to the idea of appearances clarifies transcendental idealism.

Moral realists face an epistemological challenge: they must explain why many judgments that are likely to be (mind-independent) moral truths are those it would be evolutionarily adaptive to hold. Is it a coincidence? Do evolutionary forces track these truths? Third-factor explanation is the strategy most commonly adopted by moral realists to explain this striking correlation. In this article, I argue that it does not allow them to meet the challenge.