Real Materialism PDF Download

Author: Galen Strawson
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 019155619X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 488

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Book Description
Real Materialism draws together papers written over twenty years by Galen Strawson in philosophy of mind and metaphysics. Strawson focuses on five main areas of enquiry: [1] the nature of the physical, consciousness, the 'mind-body problem', and the prospects for panpsychism; [2] the self, the subject of experience, self-consciousness, and the 'narrative' self; [3] free will and moral responsibility; [4] the nature of thought and intentionality and their connection with consciousness; [5] the problem of causation with particular reference to the philosophy of David Hume.

Author: Bernardo Kastrup
Publisher: John Hunt Publishing
ISBN: 1782793615
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 245

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Book Description
The present framing of the cultural debate in terms of materialism versus religion has allowed materialism to go unchallenged as the only rationally-viable metaphysics. This book seeks to change this. It uncovers the absurd implications of materialism and then, uniquely, presents a hard-nosed non-materialist metaphysics substantiated by skepticism, hard empirical evidence, and clear logical argumentation. It lays out a coherent framework upon which one can interpret and make sense of every natural phenomenon and physical law, as well as the modalities of human consciousness, without materialist assumptions. According to this framework, the brain is merely the image of a self-localization process of mind, analogously to how a whirlpool is the image of a self-localization process of water. The brain doesn’t generate mind in the same way that a whirlpool doesn’t generate water. It is the brain that is in mind, not mind in the brain. Physical death is merely a de-clenching of awareness. The book closes with a series of educated speculations regarding the afterlife, psychic phenomena, and other related subjects. ,

Author: Christian List
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674239814
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 225

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Book Description
A crystal-clear, scientifically rigorous argument for the existence of free will, challenging what many scientists and scientifically minded philosophers believe. Philosophers have argued about the nature and the very existence of free will for centuries. Today, many scientists and scientifically minded commentators are skeptical that it exists, especially when it is understood to require the ability to choose between alternative possibilities. If the laws of physics govern everything that happens, they argue, then how can our choices be free? Believers in free will must be misled by habit, sentiment, or religious doctrine. Why Free Will Is Real defies scientific orthodoxy and presents a bold new defense of free will in the same naturalistic terms that are usually deployed against it. Unlike those who defend free will by giving up the idea that it requires alternative possibilities to choose from, Christian List retains this idea as central, resisting the tendency to defend free will by watering it down. He concedes that free will and its prerequisites—intentional agency, alternative possibilities, and causal control over our actions—cannot be found among the fundamental physical features of the natural world. But, he argues, that’s not where we should be looking. Free will is a “higher-level” phenomenon found at the level of psychology. It is like other phenomena that emerge from physical processes but are autonomous from them and not best understood in fundamental physical terms—like an ecosystem or the economy. When we discover it in its proper context, acknowledging that free will is real is not just scientifically respectable; it is indispensable for explaining our world.

Author: Tim Kasser
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 9780262611978
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 172

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Book Description
A study of how materialism and consumerism undermine our quality of life. In The High Price of Materialism, Tim Kasser offers a scientific explanation of how our contemporary culture of consumerism and materialism affects our everyday happiness and psychological health. Other writers have shown that once we have sufficient food, shelter, and clothing, further material gains do little to improve our well-being. Kasser goes beyond these findings to investigate how people's materialistic desires relate to their well-being. He shows that people whose values center on the accumulation of wealth or material possessions face a greater risk of unhappiness, including anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, and problems with intimacy—regardless of age, income, or culture. Drawing on a decade's worth of empirical data, Kasser examines what happens when we organize our lives around materialistic pursuits. He looks at the effects on our internal experience and interpersonal relationships, as well as on our communities and the world at large. He shows that materialistic values actually undermine our well-being, as they perpetuate feelings of insecurity, weaken the ties that bind us, and make us feel less free. Kasser not only defines the problem but proposes ways we can change ourselves, our families, and society to become less materialistic.

Author: Galen Strawson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199267421
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 489

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Book Description
Real Materialism is a collection of highly original essays on a set of related topics in philosophy of mind and metaphysics: consciousness and the mind-body problem; our knowledge of the world; the nature of the self or subject; free will and moral responsibility; the nature of thought and intentionality; causation and David Hume.

Author: Levi Bryant
Publisher: re.press
ISBN: 0980668344
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 442

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Book Description
Continental philosophy has entered a new period of ferment. The long deconstructionist era was followed with a period dominated by Deleuze, which has in turn evolved into a new situation still difficult to define. However, one common thread running through the new brand of continental positions is a renewed attention to materialist and realist options in philosophy. Among the current giants of this generation, this new focus takes numerous different and opposed forms. It might be hard to find many shared positions in the writings of Badiou, DeLanda, Laruelle, Latour, Stengers, and Zizek, but what is missing from their positions is an obsession with the critique of written texts. All of them elaborate a positive ontology, despite the incompatibility of their results. Meanwhile, the new generation of continental thinkers is pushing these trends still further, as seen in currents ranging from transcendental materialism to the London-based speculative realism movement to new revivals of Derrida. As indicated by the title The Speculative Turn, the new currents of continental philosophy depart from the text-centered hermeneutic models of the past and engage in daring speculations about the nature of reality itself. This anthology assembles authors, of several generations and numerous nationalities, who will be at the center of debate in continental philosophy for decades to come.

Author:
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198879466
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 481

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Book Description
Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Mind presents cutting-edge work in the philosophy of mind, combining invited articles and articles selected from submissions. Each volume will highlight two themes to bring focus to debates. The series will reflect the diversity of methods adopted in contemporary philosophy of mind and provide a venue for rigorous and innovative work by both established and up-and-coming voices in the field. The themes covered in the third volume are mind and science, sensory experience, and the philosophy of mind of Margaret Cavendish and C.A. Strong. It also contains a book symposium on David Papineau's The Metaphysics of Sensory Experience.

Author: Galen Strawson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0191083631
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 332

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Book Description
The Subject of Experience is about the self, the person. It takes the form of a series of essays which draw on literature and psychology as well as philosophy. Galen Strawson discusses the phenomenology or experience of having or being a self (What is the character of self-experience?) and the fundamental metaphysics of the self (Does the self exist? If so, what is its nature? How long do selves last?): he develops an approach to the metaphysical questions out of the results of the phenomenological investigation. He argues that it is legitimate to say that there is such a thing as the self as distinct from the human being. At the same time he raises doubts about how long selves can be supposed to last, insofar as they are distinct from human beings. He also raises a doubt about whether a self (or indeed a human being) can really be said to lose anything in dying. He criticizes the popular notion of the narrative self, and considers the differences between 'Endurers' or 'Diachronic' people, who feel that they are the same person when they consider their past and future, and 'Transients' or 'Episodic' people, who do not feel this. He considers the first-person pronoun 'I' and a number of puzzles raised by the phenomena of self-reference and self-knowledge. He examines Locke's, Hume's and Kant's accounts of the mind and personal identity, and argues that Locke and Hume have been badly misunderstood.

Author: Peter Augustine Lawler
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 9780739107621
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 208

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Book Description
In this edited collection, Peter Lawler presents a lucid and comprehensive introduction to a diverse set of political issues according to Tocqueville. Democracy and Its Friendly Critics addresses a variety of modern political and social concerns, such as the moral dimension of democracy, the theoretical challenges to democracy in our time, the religious dimension of liberty, and the meaning of work in contemporary American Life. Taking innovative and unexpected approaches toward familiar topics, the essays present engaging insights into a democratic society, and the contributors include some of today's leading figures in political philosophy. No other collection on Tocqueville addresses contemporary American political issues in such a direct and accessible fashion, making this book a valuable resource for the study of political theory in America.

Author: Joanna Leidenhag
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 0567696243
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 215

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Book Description
Are humans the only creatures that can appreciate God's creation? What if consciousness is spread more widely across all things? This volume examines panpsychism through the lens of Christian doctrine. Minding Creation is the first substantial examination of what a panpsychist theory of consciousness implies for key theological debates concerning God's presence and action, evolution and the origin of the soul, human uniqueness and the environmental crisis. Joanna Leidenhag develops a theological panpsychism that is based on an exceptionally wide range of scholarship. Minding Creation draws on the theologies of historical figures such as Augustine of Hippo, Gottfried von Leibniz and others, in order to create a critical and constructive conversation with contemporary analytic philosophers of mind, such as Thomas Nagel, Galen Strawson, and David J. Chalmers. Leidenhag also discusses key concepts and issues, such as emergence theory, divine action, and ecology. She concludes that God created a universe from nothing which is filled with indwelling powers, sacramental value, and intrinsic experience. This is a creation in which the Holy Spirit is internally present at every point, a creation that worships God, and a creation that human beings must protect and lead in praise.