4AANA004 METAPHYSICS Syllabus Academic year 2016/17. Basic information Credits: 15 Module tutor: Jessica Leech Office: 707 Consultation time: Monday 1-2, Wednesday 11-12. Semester: 2 Lecture time and venue*: Monday 3-5, K6.29 *Please note that tutorial times and venues will be organised independently with your teaching tutor. Module Description The aim of this module is to introduce students to metaphysics. First, we will consider quite generally what metaphysics is, and how philosophers do it. Then we will explore a range of classic problems in metaphysics. The module will finish with a second, deeper, look at what metaphysics is all about. Aims The module aims to give students the intellectual equipment to investigate for themselves the issues mentioned in the module description above on the basis of careful reading of and critical reflection upon the key writings in the area. Objectives By the end of the module, students will be able to demonstrate intellectual, transferable, and practicable skills appropriate to a level 4 module and in particular they will have: developed a capacity for philosophical argument concerning central metaphysical topics acquired a knowledge of some of the key philosophical writings concerning these topics understood the nature of some of the central problems in metaphysics encountered and evaluated a number of attempts to solve the philosophical problems under discussion acquired an understanding of how problems in metaphysics relate to broader philosophical debates in areas of logic, epistemology, philosophy of mind, and ethics acquired an ability to relate the questions discussed to the work of philosophers studied in other modules been encouraged to read with great care and reflect upon some difficult texts as well as introductory and secondary material 1
Assessment methods and deadlines Formative assessment 1 x 1500 word essay, due Monday 27 February 2017, by 16.00. Formative essays must be completed by the deadline in order to receive feedback. This feedback is crucial for your summative assessment. Summative assessment 1 x 2 hour exam (100%). Outline of lecture topics (plus suggested readings) Tutorial readings are required preparation for your tutorial each week. Additional readings are suggestions for further study. All reading should either be available online or in the library. If you have difficulty accessing reading please ask the lecture or your teaching tutor for help. Week 1: What is metaphysics? How do you do metaphysics? Paul, L. A. (2012) Metaphysics as modelling: the handmaiden s tale. Philosophical Studies, 160:1-29. Ney, A. (2014) Metaphysics: An Introduction (Routledge). Chapter 1: An Introduction to Ontology. Quine, W. V. O. (1948) On What There Is, in Quine (1961) From a Logical Point of View, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.: 1 19. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/metaphysics/ Week 2: Personal identity: the traditional debate. Williams, B. (1970) The Self and the Future, Philosophical Review, 79(2): 161 180: reprinted in his Problems of the Self, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973. 2
John Locke (1690) An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Of Identity and Diversity, Book II, Chapter 27. Martin, R. and Barnes, J. eds. (2002) Personal Identity (Wiley). Noonan, H. (2003) Personal Identity (Routledge). Parfit, D. (1971) Personal Identity, Philosophical Review, 80: 3 27. Parfit, D. (1984) Reasons and Persons. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Parfit, D. (1995) The Unimportance of Identity, in Identity, H. Harris (ed.), Oxford: Oxford University Press. Shoemaker, S. (1984) Personal Identity: A Materialist's Account, in Shoemaker and Swinburne, Personal Identity, Oxford: Blackwell. Snowdon, P. (1996) Persons and Personal Identity, in Essays for David Wiggins: Identity, Truth and Value, S. Lovibond and S. G. Williams (ed.), Oxford: Blackwell. van Inwagen, P. (1990) Material Beings, Ithaca: Cornell University Press. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/identity-personal/ Week 3: Personal identity: what am I? Olson, E. (2003) An Argument for Animalism, in Martin and Barnes (2002). Campbell, S., 2006, The Conception of a Person as a Series of Mental Events, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 73: 339 358. Johnston, M. (2007) Human Beings Revisited: My Body is not an Animal, in D. Zimmerman (ed.), Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, 3, Oxford University Press. Lewis, D., (1976) Survival and Identity, in A. Rorty (ed.), The Identities of Persons, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press; reprinted in his Philosophical Papers vol. I, New York: Oxford University Press, 1983. Mackie, D. (1999) Personal Identity and Dead People, Philosophical Studies, 95: 219 242. Martin, R. and Barnes, J. eds. (2002) Personal Identity (Wiley). Olson, E. (1997) The Human Animal: Personal Identity Without Psychology, New York: Oxford University Press. Olson, E. (2007) What are we? A study in personal ontology. (Oxford). Parfit, D. (2012) We Are Not Human Beings, Philosophy, 87: 5 28. Snowdon, P. (1990) Persons, Animals, and Ourselves, in The Person and the Human Mind, C. Gill. (ed.), Oxford: Clarendon Press. Unger, P. (1979) I do not Exist, in Perception and Identity, G. F. MacDonald (ed.), London: Macmillan. Week 4: More puzzles about identity: the Ship of Theseus. 3
Smart, B. (1972) How to Re-identify the Ship of Theseus, Analysis 32:5. Fine, K. (2003) The Non-identity of a Material Thing and Its Matter, Mind, 112: 195 234. Lowe, E. J. (2002) A Survey of Metaphysics (Oxford) Chapter 2 Identity over time and change of composition. Ney, N. (2014) Metaphysics: An Introduction (Routledge). Chapter 6: Persistence Noonan, H. (1985) The Closest Continuer Theory of Identity. Inquiry, 28, pp. 195 229 Week 5: Time and change Le Poidevin, R. (2012) Time Without Change (In Three Steps), American Philosophical Quarterly, 47:2. Coope, U. (2001) Why Does Aristotle Say That There Is No Time Without Change? Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 101: 359 367. Lowe, E. J. (2002) A Survey of Metaphysics (Oxford) Chapter 3: Qualitative change and the doctrine of temporal parts. Lowe, E. J. (2002) A Survey of Metaphysics (Oxford) Chapter 4: Substantial change and spatiotemporal coincidence. Shoemaker, S. (1969) Time Without Change, Journal of Philosophy, 66: 363 381. READING WEEK Week 6: Time continued Dyke, H. (2002) McTaggart and the Truth About Time, in Craig Callender (ed.), Time, Reality and Experience, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Le Poidevin, R (ed.), (1998) Questions of Time and Tense, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Lowe, E. J. (2002) A Survey of Metaphysics (Oxford) Chapter 17: Tense and the reality of time. Mellor, D. H. (1993) The Unreality of Tense in Robin Le Poidevin & Murray MacBeath (eds.), The Philosophy of Time. (Oxford). Mellor, D.H. (1998) Real Time II, London: Routledge. 4
Ney, A. (2005) Metaphysics: An Introduction (Routledge). Chapter 5: Time Zimmerman, D. (2005) The A-theory of Time, the B-theory of Time, and 'Taking Tense Seriously', Dialectica, 59: 401 457. Week 7: Causation I Anscombe, G. E. M. (1975) Causality and Determination, in E. Sosa (ed.), Causation and Conditionals, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 63 81. Beebee, H. (2006) Hume on Causation, Routledge. Black, M. (1956) Why Cannot an Effect Precede its Cause, Analysis, 16: 49 58. Hume, D. (1739-40) A Treatise of Human Nature, Book I, Part III, Chapter XIV, Of the idea of necessary connection. Kim, J. (1973) Causation, Nomic Subsumption, and the Concept of Event, Journal of Philosophy, 70: 217 36. Mackie, J. L. (1965) Causes and Conditions, American Philosophical Quarterly, 2: 245 64. Ney, A. (2014) Metaphysics: An Introduction (Routledge). Chapter 8: Causation Russell, B. (1912) On the Notion of Cause, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 13:1-26. Tooley, M. (2004) Probability and causation, in P. Dowe and P. Noordhof (eds.), Cause and Chance: Causation in an Indeterministic World, London: Routledge, pp. 77 119. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/causation-metaphysics/ Week 8: Causation II Lewis, D. (2000) Causation as Influence, Journal of Philosophy, 97: 182 97. Beebee, H., Hitchcock, C. and Menzies, P. (2009) The Oxford Handbook of Causation, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Collins, J. (2000) Preemptive Preemption, Journal of Philosophy, 97: 223 34. Hall, N. (2004) Two Concepts of Causation, in Collins, Hall, and Paul (2004), pp. 225 76. Kvart, I. (2001) Counterexamples to Lewis' Causation as Influence, Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 79: 411 23. Lewis, D. (1973) Causation, Journal of Philosophy, 70: 556 67. Reprinted in his (1986). ----- (1979) Counterfactual Dependence and Time's Arrow, Noûs, 13: 455 76. Reprinted in his (1986). ----- (1986). Philosophical Papers: Volume II, Oxford: Oxford University Press. 5
Paul, L. A. (2009) Counterfactual Theories of Causation in The Oxford Handbook of Causation edited by Helen Beebee, Christopher Hitchcock, and Peter Menzies (Oxford). Paul, L. A. and Hall, N. (2013) Causation: A User's Guide, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Price, H. and Weslake, B. (2009) The Time-Asymmetry of Causation, in Beebee, Hitchcock,and Menzies 2009, pp. 414 43. Schaffer, J. (2000) Trumping Preemption, Journal of Philosophy, 9: 165 81. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/causation-counterfactual/ Week 9: Freedom and determinism Frankfurt, H. (1969). Alternate Possibilities and Moral Responsibility, Journal of Philosophy 66, 829 39. van Inwagen, P. (1975) The Incompatibility of Free Will and Determinism, Philosophical Studies, 25: 185 99. Clarke, R. ((2009). Dispositions, Abilities to Act, and Free Will: The New Dispositionalism, Mind 118 (470), 323-351. Kane, R. (ed.) (2002). Oxford Handbook on Free Will. New York: Oxford University Press. Levy, N. and McKenna, M. (2009). Recent Work on Free Will and Moral Responsibility, Philosophy Compass 4(1), 96 133. Ney, A. (2014) Metaphysics: An Introduction (Routledge). Chapter 9: Free will Pink, T. (2004). Free Will: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Strawson, P. (1982). Freedom and Resentment, in Watson (1982), ed., 59 80. van Inwagen, P. (1998) The Mystery of Metaphysical Freedom, in Peter van Inwagen and Dean W. Zimmerman (eds.), Metaphysics: The Big Questions, Malden, MA: Blackwell: 365 374. Week 10: Metametaphysics Haslanger, S. (2000) Feminism and Metaphysics: Negotiating the Natural. in The Cambridge Companion to Feminism in Philosophy, ed., M. Fricker and J. Hornsby. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 107 126. Jenkins, C. S. I. (2014) Merely Verbal Disputes Erkenntnis, 79. Ney, N. (2014) Metaphysics: An Introduction (Routledge). Chapter 4: Critiques of Metaphysics Sider, T. (2012) Writing the Book of the World, Oxford: Oxford University Press. 6
Tahko, T. (2016) An Introduction to Metametaphysics, Cambridge University Press. Thomasson, A. (2009) Answerable and Unanswerable Questions, in Metametaphysics: New Essays on the Foundations of Ontology, David J. Chalmers, David Manley, and Ryan Wasserman (eds.), Oxford: Oxford University Press. Formative essay questions 1. What is the point, if any, of doing metaphysics? 2. If on Tuesday I suffer an accident and permanently lose all of my memories, on Wednesday am I still the same person as I was on Monday? If so, why? If not, why not? 3. Am I a human being? 4. The real ship of Theseus is the single best candidate of all the ships. Discuss. 5. Can time pass without any change occurring? 7