Philosophical provocations : 55 short essays / Colin McGinn.

Author
McGinn, Colin, 1950- [Browse]
Uniform title
Format
Book
Language
English
Published/​Created
Cambridge, Massachusetts : MIT Press, [2017]
Description
viii, 317 pages ; 24 cm

Availability

Available Online

Copies in the Library

Location Call Number Status Location Service Notes
Firestone Library - Stacks BD41 .M34 2017 Browse related items Request

    Details

    Subject(s)
    Library of Congress genre(s)
    Getty AAT genre
    Summary note
    In Philosophical Provocations, Colin McGinn offers a series of short, sharp essays that take on philosophical problems ranging from the concept of mind to paradox, altruism, and the relation between God and the Devil. Avoiding the usual scholarly apparatus and embracing a blunt pithiness, McGinn aims to achieve as much as possible in as short a space as possible while covering as many topics as possible. Much academic philosophical writing today is long, leaden, citation heavy, dense with qualifications, and painful to read. The essays in Philosophical Provocations are short, direct, and engaging, often challenging philosophical orthodoxy as they consider issues in mind, language, knowledge, metaphysics, biology, ethics, and religion. McGinn is looking for new ways to think about old problems. Thus he writes, about consciousness, "I think we have been all wrong," and goes on to suggest that both consciousness and the unconscious are mysteries. Summing up his proposal on altruism, he remarks, "My suggestion can now be stated, somewhat brutally, as follows: human altruism is the result of parasitic manipulation." He takes a moment to reflect: "I really don't know why it is good to be alive, though I am convinced that the standard suggestions don't work." McGinn gets straight to the point and states his position with maximum clarity. These essays offer provocative invitations to think again.-- Provided by Publisher.
    Bibliographic references
    Includes bibliographical references and index.
    Contents
    • I. Mind. The mystery of the unconscious
    • Concepts of mind
    • Knowledge and emotion : an untenable dualism
    • The second mind
    • Awareness of time
    • Mind
    • brain identity theories
    • Are there actions?
    • Actions and reasons
    • Consciousness and light
    • Have we already solved the mind
    • body problem?
    • The reality of the inner
    • The thought of language
    • II. Language. Meaning monism
    • Against language-games
    • Meaning without language
    • For privacy
    • On the impossibility of a (wholly) public language
    • Deciding to mean
    • Truth, verification, and meaning
    • Meaning and argument
    • III. Knowledge. Knowledge and truth
    • Proof of an external world
    • The simulation came
    • The riddle of knowledge
    • Does knowledge imply truth?
    • Everything is hidden
    • Light and our knowledge of matter
    • Seeing the light
    • IV. Metaphysics. Knowing and necessity
    • Antirealism refuted
    • The puzzle of paradox
    • The secret cement
    • Analysis and mystery
    • Explanation and necessity
    • Against possible worlds
    • The concept of a person
    • The question of being
    • Science as metaphysics
    • Logic without propositions (or sentences)
    • V. Biology. Selfish genes and moral parasites
    • The evolution of color
    • The language of evolution
    • Immaterial Darwinism
    • Trait selection
    • VI. Ethics. The trouble with consequentialism
    • Absurd utilitarianism
    • Why is it good to be alive?
    • Physical noncognitivism
    • Child liberation
    • Modesty and self-knowledge
    • Is romantic self-love possible?
    • Against laughter
    • VII. Religion. A deontological theodicy
    • God and the devil
    • A religion of hate.
    ISBN
    • 9780262036191 ((hardcover ; : alk. paper))
    • 0262036193 ((hardcover ; : alk. paper))
    LCCN
    2016046174
    OCLC
    978539882
    Statement on language in description
    Princeton University Library aims to describe library materials in a manner that is respectful to the individuals and communities who create, use, and are represented in the collections we manage. Read more...
    Other views
    Staff view

    Supplementary Information