Essays in Quasi-Realism PDF

Simon Blackburn ist ein englischer akademischer Philosoph, der für seine Arbeit in der Metaethik, wo er den Quasi-Realismus verteidigt, und in der Sprachphilosophie bekannt ist; In jüngerer Zeit hat er durch seine Bemühungen, die Philosophie zu popularisieren, ein großes allgemeines Publikum gewonnen. Er ging 2011 als Professor für Philosophie an der University of Cambridge in den Ruhestand, bleibt aber ein angesehener Forschungsprofessor für Philosophie an der University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill und unterrichtet jedes Herbstsemester. Er ist außerdem Fellow des Trinity College, Cambridge, und Mitglied der Professur des New College of the Humanities. Zuvor war er Fellow des Pembroke College, Oxford, und hat außerdem als Edna J. Koury-Professor Vollzeit an der University of North Carolina gelehrt. Er ist ein ehemaliger Präsident der Aristotelian Society und diente der Amtszeit 2009–2010. Er wurde 2002 zum Fellow der British Academy und 2008 zum Foreign Honorary Fellow der American Academy of Arts & Sciences gewählt.

Essays in Quasi-Realism pdf von Simon Blackburn

This volume collects some influential essays in which Simon Blackburn, one of our leading philosophers, explores one of the most profound and fertile of philosophical problems: the way in which our judgments relate to the world. This debate has centered on realism, or the view that what we say is validated by the way things stand in the world, and a variety of oppositions to it. Prominent among the latter are expressive and projective theories, but also a relaxed pluralism that discourages the view that there are substantial issues at stake. The figure of the "quasi-realist" dramatizes the difficulty of conducting these debates. Typically philosophers thinking of themselves as realists will believe that they alone can give a proper or literal account of some of our attachments--to truth, to facts, to the independent world, to knowledge and certainty. The quasi-realist challenge, developed by Blackburn in this volume, is that we can have those attachments without any metaphysic that deserves to be called realism, so that the metaphysical picture that goes with our practices is quite idle. The cases treated here include the theories of value and knowledge, modality, probability, causation, intentionality and rule-following, and explanation. A substantial new introduction has been added, drawing together some of the central themes. The essays articulate a fresh alternative to a primitive realist/anti-realist opposition, and their cumulative effect is to yield a new appreciation of the delicacy of the debate in these central areas.