Bøker av Nicholas Rescher

Offers Nicholas Rescher's perspectives on many of the foundational concerns of philosophy. He argues that the need to inquire is an evolutionary tool for adapting to a hostile environment and shows how philosophy has developed in an evolutionary fashion,

Expounds a pragmatic metaphysics that offers an approach to this subject's traditional objective of providing us with a secure cognitive grip on the nature of reality. The characteristic nature of this metaphysical approach lies in its commitment to the idea that the requisite security is best.

Nicholas Rescher's book Axiogenesis: An Essay in Metaphysical Optimalism is a detailed exposition of axiogenerts: the philosophical theory seeking to explain the world's facts on the basis of evaluative considerations. In classical antiquity, this theory was espoused by Plato (in the Timaeus) and neo-Platonic tradition; in early modern times, it was revived by Leibniz and continued to find favor in the development of rational mechanics from Maupertuis to William Hamilton. However, since then the principles behind axiogenesis and similar theories have fallen out of fashion. This book is therefore unique in that it argues in detail that this metaphysical approach still has traction and endeavors to formulate the theory in a manner that makes it available as a live option for contemporary thinkers. Advanced students of philosophy and professionals in this field, as well as anyone interested in the issue of speculative metaphysics, will find Rescher's contemporary refashioning of axiogenesis a distinctly compelling read.

The studies collected here are united both by a common methodology of probative investigation and by their common purpose of providing instructive insight into a varied spectrum of important philosophical issues.

Nicholas Rescher undertakes a systematic survey of the role and utility of thought experiments in philosophy. After surveying the historical issues, Rescher examines the principles involved, and explains the conditions under which thought experimentation can validly yield instructive results in philosophy.

Philosophical anthropology is the study of the conditions of human existence and the issues that confront everyday life. This text surveys, from a contemplative, philosophical point of view, a wide variety of human-interest issues, including happiness, luck, ageing and the meaning of life.

This volume explores the nature of complexity and considers its bearing on our world and how we manage our affairs within it. Although offering a sobering outlook, Rescher also believes that complexity entails mixed blessings: our imperfect knowledge provides a rationale for putting forth our best efforts.

The realities of mankind's cognitive situation are such that our knowledge of the world's ways is bound to be imperfect. None the less, the theory of unknowability-agnoseology as some have called it-is a rather underdeveloped branch of philosophy. In this philosophically rich and groundbreaking work, Nicholas Rescher aims to remedy this. As the heart of the discussion is an examination of what Rescher identifies as the four prime reasons for the impracticability of cognitive access to certain facts about the world: developmental inpredictability, verificational surdity, ontological detail, and predicative vagrancy. Rescher provides a detailed and illuminating account of the role of each of these factors in limiting human knowledge, giving us an overall picture of the practical and theoretical limits to our capacity to know our world.

This work aims to show how the idea of distributive equity forms the core of the concept of fairness in distributive justice. It concludes that fairness is a fundamentally ethical conception whose distinctive modus operandi contrasts sharply with the aims of paternalism or economic advantage.

For teaching Leibniz - a philosopher as difficult as he is important - this is as good a work as we are ever likely to get. It gives good guidance throughout.' - Robert E. Butts, University of Western Ontario