Knowing Reality

Preface

Chapter 1: Philosophy and Sophistry

• 1.1 Ancient Greek Mythology
• 1.2 Ancient Greek Philosophy
  • Apology (Plato, 4th Century BCE)
• 1.3 Sophism
  • Sophist Writings (Protagoras, Prodicus, Hippias, Antiphon, 5th Century BCE)
• 1.4 The Upside of Philosophy
• 1.5 How to Win an Argument

Chapter 2: Truth and Relativism

• 2.1 Correspondence Theory
  • The Problems of Philosophy (Bertrand Russell, 1912)
• 2.2 Coherence Theory
  • The Nature of Thought (Brand Blanshard, 1921)
• 2.3 Pragmatic Theory
  • Pragmatism (William James, 1904)
• 2.4 Relativism
  • “Solidarity or Objectivity” (Richard Rorty, 1991)
  • “Post ‘Post-Truth’” (Susan Haack, 2019)

Chapter 3: Substances – Change and Sameness

• 3.1 Milesian Materialism
  • “Fragments” (Heraclitus, 490 BCE)
• 3.2 Eleatic Idealism
  • The Proem (Parmenides, 480 BCE)
• 3.3 Substratum Theory
  • Physics I.7 – I.8 (Aristotle, c. 350 BCE)
  • A Treatise of Human Nature (David Hume, 1739)
• 3.5 Perdurantism
  • How Things Persist (Katherine Hawley, 2002)

Chapter 4: Personal Identity

• 4.1 Soul Theory
  • Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man (Thomas Reid, 1785)
• 4.2 Bundle Theory
  • A Treatise of Human Nature (David Hume, 1739)
  • Majjhima Nikaya 109: “The Greater Discourse on the Full-moon Night” (Buddha, 3rd Century BCE)
• 4.3 Psychological Theory
  • An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (John Locke, 1689)
  • “Cartesian Persons” (Annette Baier, 1981)

Chapter 5: Mind and Brain

• 5.1 Dualism
  • Meditations on First Philosophy, Meditation VI (René Descartes, 1641)
  • The Conscious Mind (David Chalmers, 1996)
• 5.2 Mind-Brain Identity Theory
  • “Sensations and Brain Processes” (J. J. C. Smart, 1959)
  • Physicalism or Something Near Enough (Jaegwon Kim, 2005)
• 5.3 Functionalism
  • “The Mind-Body Problem” (Jerry Fodor, 1981)
• 5.4. Eliminative Materialism
• 5.5. Idealism

Chapter 6: Free Will and Determinism

• 6.1 Hard Determinism
  • The System of Nature (Baron Henry d’Holbach, 1770)
  • Living Without Free Will (Derk Pereboom, 2004)
• 6.2 Libertarianism
  • Essays on the Active Powers of Man (Thomas Reid, 1788)
  • A Contemporary Introduction to Free Will (Robert Kane, 2005)
• 6.3 Compatibilism
  • “Freedom and Necessity” (A. J. Ayer, 1954)
  • “Freedom of the Will and the Concept of a Person” (Harry Frankfurt, 1971)

Chapter 7: Knowledge

• 7.1 Propositional Knowledge
• 7.2 Descartes’ Rationalism
  • Meditations on First Philosophy (René Descartes, 1641)
• 7.3 Hume’s Empiricism
  • A Treatise of Human Nature (David Hume, 1739)
• 7.4 Naturalized Epistemology
  • “Epistemology Naturalized” (W. V. O. Quine, 1969)
• 7.5 Social Epistemology
  • “Testimony” (Jennifer Lackey, 2011)

Chapter 8: Perception

• 8.1 Direct Realism
  • Physics, Book 2.1, and De Anima, Books 2 and 3 (Aristotle, 350 BCE)
• 8.2 Skepticism
  • Outlines of Pyrrhonism, Book I (Sextus Empiricus, 2nd or 3rd Century BCE)
• 8.3 Representational Model
  • An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (John Locke, 1689)
• 8.4 Idealism
  • A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge (George Berkeley, 1710)
• 8.5 Intentionalism
  • “Externalism and the Gappy Content of Hallucination” (Susanna Schellenberg, 2013)

Chapter 9: Self-Knowledge

• 9.1 Inner Sense Model
  • The Mind-Body Problem (David Armstrong, 1998)
• 9.2 Behaviorism
  • The Concept of Mind (Gilbert Ryle, 1949)
• 9.3 Acquaintance Model
  • “Renewed Acquaintance” (Brie Gertler, 2012)
• 9.4 Externalist Models
  • The Varieties of Reference (Gareth Evans, 1982)
  • Nicomachean Ethics, 9.9 & 9.12 (Aristotle, 350 BCE)
• 9.5 Self-Deception
  • Self-Deception Unmasked (Alfred Mele, 2001)
• 9.6 Rationality and Irrationality

Chapter 10: Philosophy of Science

• 10.1 Aristotle
  • Posterior Analytics, II.19 (Aristotle, 350 BCE)
• 10.2 Francis Bacon
  • The New Organon (Francis Bacon, 1620)
• 10.3 David Hume
  • An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (David Hume, 1748)
• 10.4 Immanuel Kant
  • Critique of Pure Reason (Immanuel Kant, 1787)
• 10.5 Logical Positivism
  • “Verification and Experience” (A. J. Ayer, 1937)
• 10.6. W. V. O. Quine
  • “Two Dogmas of Empiricism” (W. V. O. Quine, 1951)
• 10.7 Helen Longino
  • “Can There Be a Feminist Science” (Helen Longino, 1987)

Chapter 11: God and Naturalism

• 11.1 The Cosmological Argument for Theism
  • Summa Theologiae, 2. I 2.3 (Thomas Aquinas, 1273)
  • Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion (David Hume, 1779)
  • “The Kalam Cosmological Argument” (William Craig, 2002)
• 11.2 The Naturalistic Argument for Naturalism
  • “An Argument for Atheism from Naturalism” (Graham Oppy, 2018)
• 11.3 The Teleological Argument for Theism
  • The Watch Maker (William Paley, 1802)
  • “Design and the Anthropic Fine-Tuning of the Universe” (William Craig, 2003)
  • “Does the Universe Need God” (Sean Carroll, 2012)
• 11.4 The Problem of Evil
  • “No Good Reason” (Louise Antony, 2018)
  • Evil and the God of Love (John Hick, 1966)

Chapter 12: Religious Experience, Faith, and Reason

• 12.1 Varieties of Religious Experience
  • Ptecincala Ska Wakan (Eagle Man, 1990)
  • The Life of the Holy Mother Teresa of Jesus (Teresa of Ávila, 1565)
• 12.2 Religious Experience as Delusions
  • “The Ethics of Belief” (William Clifford, 1877)
• 12.3 The Principle of Credulity and the Principle of Testimony
  • The Existence of God (Richard Swinburne, 2004)
• 12.4 Naturalistic Accounts
  • Born to Believe (Andrew Newberg and Mark Waldman, 2007)
• 12.5 Reason and Faith
• 12.6 Fideism
  • Philosophical Fragments (Søren Kierkegaard, 1844)
  • Pensées (Blaise Pascal, 1660)
• 12.7 Evidentialism
  • “The Ethics of Belief” (William Clifford, 1877)
• 12.8 The Belief Model
  • “When Is Faith Rational” (Lara Buchak, 2018)

Appendix: How to Write a Philosophy Essay

• 1. Thesis Statement
• 2. Roadmap
• 3. Logical Structure
• 4. Sentence Structure
• 5. Original Ideas
• 6. Accurate Portrayal of Philosophical Positions
• 7. Effective Critiques of Philosophical Positions
• 8. Quotations and References