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A Survey of Metaphysics

E. J. Lowe

Price: £23.99 (Paperback)
ISBN-13: 978-0-19-875253-0
Publication date: 17 January 2002
416 pages, 234x156 mm

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Reviews

''E. J. Lowe, one of the UK's leading metaphysicians, has written a superb introduction to metaphysics. ... Lowe's book is the best introduction to metaphysics available.' THES' -

Description

E.J.Lowe is a leading contemporary metaphysician making this a well-informed and reliable guide to important recent developments in the subject
Offers comprehensive coverage of the subject and will serve well as the single core text for almost any metaphysics course
The survey is fully up-to-date with emphasis on contemporary views and issues enabling students to engage effectively with the latest literature on the subject
Provides an extensive bibliography of publications, most of which are recent, making this a very useful reference for further study

A Survey of Metaphysics provides a systematic overview of modern metaphysics, covering all of the most important topics likely to be encountered on a metaphysics course. The conception of metaphysics underlying the book is the fairly traditional and widely-shared one that metaphysics deals with the deepest questions that can be raised concerning the fundamental structure of reality as a whole. The book is divided into six main parts, each relatively self-contained, focusing in turn on the following major themes: identity and change, necessity and essence, causation, agency and events, space and time, and universals and particulars. In an introductory chapter, the conception of metaphysics underlying the book is explained and defended against the many and varied opponents of metaphysics those students are likely to encounter. While the book makes reference when necessary to the history of metaphysics, its emphasis is on contemporary views and issues. The author's approach is not narrowly partisan, but avoids bland neutrality in matters of controversy.

Readership: A core text for students studying Metaphysics, or Logic and Metaphysics, or Metaphysics and Epistemology. Supplementary on Philosophy of Science courses.

Contents

1. Introduction: The nature of metaphysics

Part I Identity and Change

2. Identity over time and change of composition

3. Qualitative change and the doctrine of temporal parts

4. Substantial change and spatiotemporal coincidence

Part II Necessity, Essence, and Possible Worlds

5. Necessity and identity

6. Essentialism

7. Possible worlds

Part III Causation and Conditionals

8. Conterfactual conditionals

9. Causes and conditions

10. Conterfactuals and event causation

Part IV Actions and Events

11. Event causation and agent causation

12. Actions and Events

13. Events, things, and space-time

Part V Space and Time

14. Absolutism versus relationalism

15. Incongruent conterparts and the nature of space

16. The paradoxes of motion and the possibility of change

17. Tense and the reality of time

18. Causation and the direction of time

Part VI Universals and Particulars

19. Realism versus nominalism

20. The abstract and the concrete

Authors, editors, and contributors

E. J. Lowe, Professor of Philosophy, University of Durham

Links to web resources and related information

More in the same subject area:
Metaphysics & ontology
Philosophy
Philosophy of science
Logic
Epistemology, theory of knowledge

The specification in this catalogue, including without limitation price, format, extent, number of illustrations, and month of publication, was as accurate as possible at the time the catalogue was compiled. Occasionally, due to the nature of some contractual restrictions, we are unable to ship a specific product to a particular territory. Jacket images are provisional and liable to change before publication.