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The idea that students can be taught a set of skills which will enable them to tackle any intellectual problem with confidence and success is an increasingly popular one, but little work has been done on its theoretical foundations. In this volume, John McPeck casts doubt on the whole idea that it is possible to teach "thinking skills" in isolation from particular subjects. He then invites three leading figures from the mainstream of the critical thinking movement: Stephen Norris, Harvey Siegel and Richard Paul, to attack his position and defend their own. In the lively exchange which follows the specific arguments of each author are engaged on a point by point basis, so that readers can follow the debate for themselves and draw their own conclusions. ... Read more

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In this paper, I would like to discuss 4 areas in regard to critical thinking and reflection. The 4 areas are critical reflection, critical reading, engaging in praxis, and leadership voice. The
purpose of discussing the 4 areas is to document and evaluate my expansion of thought during the week of residency. During the week of residency, my thought has expanded, and I have
observed a synergistic process of expansion and integration.

Critical Reflection

The process of critical reflection (Cunliffe, 2004) involves reflective analysis, reflectiveinteraction, and critical reflective questioning. With the preparedness for a doctorate, I included the ability to paraphrase and two examples by Morita (1998) and Campbell (1988). Questioning
why paraphrasing is important is because paraphrasing allows another approach to express an idea and to keep within the current definition and practice scope of an idea or practice. Why did I include Morita (1998) and Cambell (1988) as figures for preparedness for my doctorate is that Morita discussed leadership and management skills that are innovative, even today; Campbell (1988) discussed the philosophy of continuing a mission and vision which is important in the scholarship, leadership, and practice model of the doctoral community. The examination of the myths of various cultures helps to understand the situatedness of the culture and to help construct meaning from multiple sources.
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John McDowell's "Mind and World" has, since its publication in 1994, become a seminal text, putting forward many new ideas on the manner in which concepts mediate the relation between minds and the world. Yet McDowell's ideas are not easy to comprehend. In this book Sandra Dingli both elaborates and simplifies McDowell's ideas in order to give greater clarity to them and to assist in the understanding and appreciation of his work. Dingli selects five particular contemporary philosophical topics which McDowell deals with and investigates in detail the implications of particular points of view, analysing the current literature on each topic and drawing out shortcomings and possibilities for overcoming them. This work is, then, both a critique and complement to McDowell's text. McDowell's project is to dissolve a number of dualisms such as sensibility and understanding, conceptual and non conceptual content, scheme and content, and reason and nature.Dingli critically analyses each of these and claims that a proper understanding of the philosophical method of quietism is important for a correct understanding of this text, concluding that McDowell does not go far enough in his attempt to attain peace for philosophy as traditional dichotomies such as that of realism and anti-realism still appear to exert a grip on his thinking. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Understanding reality
Certainly the discussions about reality abound in philosophy. I consider this book to be a further contribution to this on-going complex discussion. Though the author's main aim is to analyse and interpret McDowells' philosophy, it goes a bit further by sifting through the available information, and indicating possible directions in interpreting the world. What I found particularly interesting are the parts dealing with quietism, that area of activity that is a sort of perfection of philosophy; when the word becomes an eloquent silence. Furthermore, the study is thorough and sifficiently clear. ... Read more

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What is brain death? At what point does a human life begin or end? Thomas Russell presents his concept of death, viewing death as death of the organism as a whole and answering the question "what is death?" with an examination of what constitutes life. Drawing on philosophical arguments, Russell argues that all current concepts of brain death are conceptually inadequate, but a new concept of death, applicable to all living entities, can encompass the traditional criteria and tests for death and does not entail any significant operational changes in the way in which death is diagnosed. From an historical review and examination of concepts of death, Russell considers key topics including: different brain states; conditions for life; biological concepts; and the moment of death. ... Read more

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This volume explores the philosophical, psychological and political assumptions that underpin a concern for nature, offering specific suggestions on how the domination of humans and nature may be overcome. It is primarily intended as an introduction to the philosophy of ecology, known as deep ecology, and to the way Spinoza's philosophy has been put to this aim. Only a self-realization, along the lines of Spinoza's philosophy, can afford a philosophy of care which is inclusive of humans and the non-human world, which recognizes the need for civil laws and democratic politics for human flourishing. ... Read more

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"From Concept to Objectivity" uncovers the nature and authority of conceptual determination by critically thinking through neglected arguments in Hegel's "Science of Logic" pivotal for understanding reason and its role in philosophy. Winfield clarifies the logical problems of presuppositionlessness and determinacy that prepare the way for conceiving the concept, examines how universality, particularity, and individuality are determined, investigates how judgment and syllogism are exhaustively differentiated, and, on that basis, explores how objectivity can be categorized without casting thought in irrevocable opposition to reality. Winfield's book will be of interest to readers of Hegel, as well as anyone wondering how thought can be objective. ... Read more

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This book asks specific philosophical questions about the underlying structure of Kant, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche's thoughts on atheism and agnosticism; thoughts that represent one of the most concerted attacks on monotheistic religion in modern philosophy. Yet commentators interested in philosophical atheism have frequently ignored this tradition. Matthew Ray concludes that Kant's moral theology is largely undersupported; Schopenhauer's metaphysical and ethical atheism is flawed in several areas; and Nietzsche's naturalistic attack on Christianity is only partially successful. Taking a critical stance toward the atheistic orthodoxy in modern philosophy, Ray argues that the question of God's existence remains characteristically unresolved in post-Kantian philosophy. ... Read more

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Developing a reading of some of Beauvoir and Sartre's most influential writings in philosophy, Max Deutscher explores contemporary philosophy in the light of the phenomenological tradition within which "Being and Nothingness" and "The Second Sex" occurred as striking events operating on the border of the modern and the "postmodern". Deutscher traces the shifts of genre that produce their gendered philosophies, and responds in terms of contemporary experience to the mood and the arguments of their works. Drawing upon the writings of two contemporary critics in particular - Michele Le Deouff and Luce Irigaray - Deutscher re-works this part of philosophy's history in order to advance thinking in contemporary philosophy, generate renewed philosophical reflection on consciousness, freedom and one's relation to others, and to return a look still cast in our direction from an earlier time. ... Read more

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"Living Without Domination" defends the bold claim that humans can organise themselves to live peacefully and prosperously together in an anarchist utopia. Clark refutes errors about what anarchism is, about utopianism, and about human sociability and its history. He then develops an analysis of natural human social activity which places anarchy in the real landscape of sociability, along with more familiar possibilities including states and slavery. The book is distinctive in bringing the rigour of analytic political philosophy to anarchism, which is all too often dismissed out of hand or skated over in popular history. ... Read more

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Thomas Kuhn's celebrated work, "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" revolutionized thinking in the philosophy of science and to a large extent his 'paradigm shift' view has replaced logical positivism and the philosophy of Karl Popper. This book goes beyond Kuhn by explicating the non-deductive notion of 'paradigm shift' in terms of the new concept of representational space. In doing so, Edwin Hung is able to produce the first-ever unitary theory that solves the five central problems in the philosophy of science: scientific explanation, the structure of scientific theories, incommensurability, scientific change and physical necessity. The book identifies the main task of science as representing reality. This involves the construction of a representational space and the subsequent modeling of reality with configurations of 'objects' in that space. Newton's mechanics, Einstein's relativity and quantum mechanics, then, all serve as representational spaces. "Beyond Kuhn" is a significant progression in scientific methodology.Other than serving as a sequel to Kuhn's "Scientific Revolutions", it will be of great use in the fields of artificial intelligence, cognitive psychology and education. ... Read more

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The connections between death, contemplation and the contemplative life have been a recurrent theme in the canons of both western and eastern philosophical thought. This book examines the classical sources of this philosophical literature, in particular Plato's "Phaedo" and the "Katha Upanishad" and then proceeds to a sustained analysis and critical assessment of the sources and standpoints of a single thinker, Arthur Schopenhauer, whose work comprehensively pursues this problem. Going beyond the well examined western influences on Schopenhauer, Singh offers an in-depth account of Schopenhauer's references to eastern thought and a comprehensive examination of his eastern sources, particularly Vedanta and Buddhism. The book traces the pivotal issue of death through the whole range of Schopenhauer's writings uncovering the deeper connotations of his crucial notion of the will-to-live. ... Read more

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The purpose of this book is to provide the reader with an accessible guide to the most significant developments in Hume's scholarship, while, at the same time, defending a general interpretatation of Hume's philsophy.The main contention of the work is that by seeing Hume's metaphysical and epistemological arguments from this general perspective we can resolve certain interpretive controversies in Hume literature. It is possible to see Hume not as the arch-sceptic whose main contribution to the history of philosophy was to awaken Kant from his "dogmatic slumbers", but as an original and important theorist of human nature, whose true significance to the history of ideas is yet to be reckoned with. As the title suggests, this book is concerned with the relationship between Hume's scepticism and his theory of human nature. This, the author suggests, is the is the central interpretive issue of Hume scholarship. ... Read more

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Drawing on recent work in the philosophy of psychoanalysis and on considerations of the nature of psychoanalytic theory itself, this text aims to reveal new possibilities that psychoanalysis offers for an understanding of the mind and its relation to the world. David Snelling argues that the most consistent version of psychoanalytic theory is provided by the Kleinian school, and he shows that the claims made about the mind by this school - particularly claims about pre-linguistic mental representation require a radical philosophical treatment which entails a re-examination of an approach embedded in the work of certain continental thinkers, notably Heidegger and Hegel. The connections between philosophy and psychoanalysis represented in the book represent a departure. Linking Kleinian notions of an "inner world" of unconscious "phantasy" to philosophical conceptions of non-linguistic meaning whose significance for the psychoanalytic understanding of subjectivity has been hitherto overlooked, Snelling argues that psychoanalysis demands a significant place in our philosophical understanding of ourselves. ... Read more

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Answering the question 'How is fruitful discussion possible?', this book addresses the central philosophical issue of how reason shall be understood and how it is limited. This study argues that the understanding of discussion according to which it necessarily starts from putative universal norms and rules for argumentation is problematic, among other reasons since such rules are unfruitful in contexts where there are vast disagreements such as religion. Inspired by Wittgensteinian ideas, Strandberg develops instead a new way of understanding discussion, truth and rationality which escapes these problems, and shows how this solution can be used to answer the accusation against Wittgensteinian philosophy for being conservative and resulting in fideism. ... Read more

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This volume examines the place of idealism in contemporary philosophy, and its relation to problems of metaphysics, political thought and the study of the history of philosophy. Drawing together contributions from philosophers from several distinct traditions, the book presents a range of perspectives - revealing areas of agreement and disagreement, addressing topics of contemporary discussion and providing insights into philosophical idealism. Following an extensive introduction by the editor and drawing on the work of the Canadian idealist, Leslie Armour, the book is divided into three main parts: the first focuses on the British idealist, F.H. Bradley; the second examines metaphysical issues and idealism, such as the realism/anti-realism debate, the relation of classical and idealist metaphysics, rational psychology, time and eternity, and the divine; the third draws on idealism to address contemporary concerns in ethical theory, political philosophy, social philosophy and culture, and the history of philosophy.Aiming to present new insights into the work of classical authors as well as contemporary philosophers, the book provides an understanding of classical idealism and addresses important areas of contemporary philosophical, social and political concern. ... Read more

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This work challenges prevalent assumptions regarding questions and enquiry. It argues that instead of trying to understand questions by reference to knowledge, knowledge can be conceived by reference to the distinctive logical form exhibited by questions. Interrogative logical form has not hitherto been recognised by logicians or philosophers generally. By providing an analysis which can serve as the basis for a fresh start in epistemology, this book aims to break new ground. ... Read more

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This work has two principal aims, firstly it intends to defend metaphysics, chiefly against logical positivists, and secondly to defend objective non-logical necessity and possibility against empiricist views which hold that these very notions are unintelligible. The book contains four chapters. In chapter one the author examines philosophies which have been thought to seek the elimination of metaphysics. He argues that that the common view that Hume considered all metaphysics meaningless and sought its elimination is the misguided result of the positivist appropriation of Hume. Chapter two is informed by developments in contemporary anti-realism and puts forward the argument that the initial issue is not that of realism/anti-realism about modality, but that of primitivism/anti-primitivism. Chapter three attempts to illustrate how modal projectivism is ill-placed to account for "de re" modality, the author then goes on to expand upon the distinction between logical and mataphysical modality. Finally, chapter four expands further upon the "de re/de dicto" distinction.It discusses the conceptions of the modality involved in the notion of verifiability in principle which can be extracted from the works of the logical positivists themselves. The work concludes with a brief comment on empiricism and essentialism in relation to the conflation of logical possibility and substantive possibility "de re". ... Read more

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Isaiah Berlin made a now classic distinction between negative and positive conceptions of freedom. In this book Yildiz Silier introduces a fresh way of looking at these conceptions and presents a new defence of the positive conception of freedom. Revealing how the internal debate between various versions of negative freedom give rise to hybrid conceptions of freedom which in turn are superseded by various versions of the positive conception of freedom, Silier concludes that Marx's concrete historical account of positive freedom resolves many of the key debates in this area and provides a fruitful framework to evaluate the freedoms and unfreedoms that are specific to capitalism.

This book examines the thought of the paradigm thinkers in this debate, F.A. Hayek on negative freedom and T.H. Green on positive freedom and then ranges over the contributions to this debate made by both classical thinkers such as Kant, Hegel, and Marx, and those involved in contemporary debates on communitarianism, capitalism and self-determination, such as C. Taylor, D. Miller, F. Oppenheim and C.B. Macpherson. ... Read more

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A dominant epistemological assumption behind Western philosophy is that it is possible to locate some form of commonality between languages, traditions, or cultures - such as a common language or lexicon, or a common notion of rationality - which makes full linguistic communication between them always attainable. Xinli Wang argues that the thesis of incommensurability challenges this assumption by exploring why and how linguistic communication between two conceptually disparate languages, traditions, or cultures is often problematic and even unattainable. According to Wang's presuppositional interpretation of incommensurability, the real secret of incommensurability lies in the ontological set-ups of two competing presuppositional languages. This book provides many original contributions to the discussion of incommensurability and related issues in philosophy and offers valuable insights to scholars in other fields, such as anthropology, communication, linguistics, scientific education, and cultural studies. ... Read more

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This work challenges the textbook assessment of Schopenhauer as militant atheist and absolute pessimist. In examining Schopenhauer's grappling with religion, theology and Kant's moral philosophy, Mannion suggests we can actually discern a "religious" humility in method in Schopenhauer's work, seen most clearly in his ethics of compassion and his doctrine of salvation. Given Schopenhauer's opinion of religion as the "metaphysics of the people", his utilisation of and affinity with many religious ideas and doctrines, and the culmination of his philosophy in a doctrine of salvation that ends in the "mystical", Mannion suggests that Schopenhauer's philosophy is an explanatory hypothesis which functionally resembles religious belief systems in many ways. Mannion further argues that Schopenhauer cannot claim to have gone any further than such religious systems in discerning the "true" nature of ultimate reality, for he admits that they also end in the "mystical", beyond which we must remain silent.Indeed, Schopenhauer offers an interpretation, as opposed to outright rejection of religion and his system gains the coherence that it does through being parasitic upon religious thought itself". ... Read more