Thinking harder: idealism and the cause of our perceptions.
Cover; Title; Copyright; Contents; List of illustrations; Introduction; How to use this book; How to do philosophy; Following the syllabus; Additional features; Set texts; Glossary; Companion website and further resources; Acknowledgements; 1 How to do philosophy; Philosophical argument; Deductive argument; Inductive argument; HYPOTHETICAL REASONING; Understanding arguments and argument maps; Evaluating arguments; Evaluating claims; An aside: why reason?; Fallacies; Reading philosophy; Approaching the text; Engaging with the text; Beyond the text; Writing philosophy; What you need to know.
Planning an essayWriting an essay; A standard essay structure; General advice; 2 Epistemology; I. What is knowledge?; A. Knowledge and its definition; Types of knowledge; PROPOSITIONAL KNOWLEDGE; The definition of knowledge; The purpose and nature of definition; Can propositional knowledge be defined?; Key points: knowledge and its definition; B. The tripartite view; The tripartite definition of knowledge; WHY JUSTIFIED TRUE BELIEF?; Thinking harder: a note on certainty; Are the conditions individually necessary?; JUSTIFICATION IS NOT A NECESSARY CONDITION OF KNOWLEDGE.
The argument from perceptual variationRESPONSES; The argument from illusion; Thinking harder: the argument from hallucination; The disjunctive theory of perception; The time-lag argument; Thinking harder: direct realism and openness; Key points: direct realism; B. Indirect realism; What are sense-data?; Why indirect realism?; Locke's distinction between primary and secondary qualities; Scepticism about the existence of mind-independent objects; The existence of the external world is the best hypothesis; TWO SUPPORTING ARGUMENTS.
Thinking harder: the existence of mind-independent objects is not a hypothesisRepresentation, resemblance and the nature of physical objects; BERKELEY'S ARGUMENT THAT MIND-DEPENDENT IDEAS CANNOT BE LIKE MIND-INDEPENDENT OBJECTS; Key points: indirect realism; C. Berkeley's idealism; Berkeley on primary and secondary qualities; Berkeley on secondary qualities; Berkeley's attack on the primary/secondary quality distinction; The immediate objects of perception are mind-dependent objects; Three arguments against mind-independent objects; Berkeley's 'master' argument; Idealism and God.
TRUTH IS NOT A NECESSARY CONDITION OF KNOWLEDGEThinking harder: relativism about truth; BELIEF IS NOT A NECESSARY CONDITION OF KNOWLEDGE; Gettier's objection: are the conditions jointly sufficient?; Key points: the tripartite view; C. Responses; Add a 'no false lemmas' condition (J+T+B+N); Infallibilism; Thinking harder: rejecting the argument for infallibilism; Reliabilism (R+T+B); TRUTH AND THE THIRD CONDITION; Virtue epistemology (V+T+B); ZAGZEBSKIS ANALYSIS OF KNOWLEDGE; Key points: responses; Summary: what is knowledge?; II. Perception as a source of knowledge; A. Direct realism.
0
8
8
8
8
Philosophy for AS and A Level is an accessible textbook for the new 2017 AQA Philosophy syllabus. Structured closely around the AQA specification this textbook covers the two units shared by the AS and A Level, Epistemology and Moral Philosophy, in an engaging and student-friendly way. With chapters on 'How to do philosophy', exam preparation providing students with the philosophical skills they need to succeed, and an extensive glossary to support understanding, this book is ideal for students studying philosophy.
Philosophy for AS and A Level : Epistemology and Moral Philosophy.