IN PRESS

IN PROGRESS

  Berkeley’s Argument for Idealism (monograph)

George Berkeley is famous for his embrace of four theses: (i) idealism, the view that physical objects are nothing but collections of ideas (first announced in A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge (1710)), (ii) immaterialism, the view that there is no such thing as material substance, (iii) anti-abstractionism, the view that abstract ideas are impossible, and (iv) the likeness principle, the thesis that an idea can be like nothing but an idea.  Although the structure of Berkeley’s world view is fairly well understood, it remains a matter of controversy why he takes idealism to be true.  While some hold that Berkeley’s argument rests on immaterialism, others hold that the argument rests on anti-abstractionism, and yet others hold that the argument rests on the likeness principle.  In this book, I argue that Berkeley’s argument rests neither on immaterialism nor on the likeness principle.  I also argue that Berkeley distinguishes between two kinds of abstraction, “singling” abstraction and “generalizing” abstraction, and that his argument for idealism depends on the impossibility of singling abstraction (but not on the impossibility of generalizing abstraction).  The heart of the argument, which does not appear in full until the publication of Three Dialogues Between Hylas and Philonous (1713), rests on the distinction between mediate and immediate perception (a distinction that plays a crucial role in An Essay Towards a New Theory of Vision (1709)), and in particular on the thesis that everything that is perceived by means of the senses is immediately perceived.  After analyzing the argument, I conclude that it is valid and may well be sound.  This is Berkeley’s most enduring philosophical legacy.

WORK IN PREPARATION

Locke (monograph, under contract with Blackwell, part of the Great Minds Series, edited by Steven Nadler)

Locke is one of the most important figures in the history of western philosophy.  Along with Descartes, he is largely responsible for setting the terms of numerous debates that engaged his immediate philosophical successors and that remain live to this day.  His metaphysics, ethics, political philosophy, and even his philosophy of language (though, interestingly, not his epistemology), continue to inspire contemporary scholars of these fields.  It is impossible to consider the problem of personal identity over time, the distinction between primary and secondary qualities, the question of free will, the content of natural rights, the justification for the state, and the meaning of natural kind terms without turning first to Locke’s thoughts on these matters.  It is also impossible to understand the development of western philosophy after Locke without understanding the theory of ideas that is central to every aspect of his work.  The point of this book is to introduce and examine the most important of Locke’s philosophical contributions in these areas, with particular emphasis on his two great masterpieces, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding and the Second Treatise on Government.

PUBLICATIONS

Access to some of the papers listed below requires a personal or university subscription to Blackwell Synergy, JSTOR, Lexis-Nexis, and other commercial databases.  If access is blocked, please contact me and I will be glad to email you a copy of the relevant paper.