Author: Henry Laycock
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0199281718
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 221
Book Description
A picture of the world as chiefly one of discrete objects, distributed in space and time, has sometimes seemed compelling. It is however one of two main targets of Henry Laycock's book; for it is seriously incomplete. The picture, he argues, leaves no space for stuff like air and water. With discrete objects, we may always ask 'how many?', but with stuff the question has to be 'how much?' Within philosophy, stuff of certain basic kinds is central to the ancient pre-Socraticworld-view; but it also constitutes the field of modern chemistry and is a major factor in ecology.Philosophers these days, in general, are unlikely to deny that stuff exists. But they are very likely to deny that it is ('ultimately') to be contrasted with things, and it is on this account that logic and semantics figure largely in the framework of the book. Elementary logic is a logic which takes values for its variables; and these values are precisely distinct individuals or things. Existence is then symbolized in just such terms; and this, it is proposed, creates a pressure for 'reducing'stuff to things. Non-singular expressions, which include words for stuff, 'mass' nouns, and also plural nouns, are 'explicated' as semantically singular.Here then is the second target of the book. The posit that both mass and plural nouns name special categories of objects (set-theoretical 'collections' of objects in the one case, mereological 'parcels' or 'portions' of stuff in the other) represents, so Laycock urges, the imposition of an alien logic upon both the many and the much.
Words Without Objects
Author: Henry Laycock
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0199281718
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 221
Book Description
A picture of the world as chiefly one of discrete objects, distributed in space and time, has sometimes seemed compelling. It is however one of two main targets of Henry Laycock's book; for it is seriously incomplete. The picture, he argues, leaves no space for stuff like air and water. With discrete objects, we may always ask 'how many?', but with stuff the question has to be 'how much?' Within philosophy, stuff of certain basic kinds is central to the ancient pre-Socraticworld-view; but it also constitutes the field of modern chemistry and is a major factor in ecology.Philosophers these days, in general, are unlikely to deny that stuff exists. But they are very likely to deny that it is ('ultimately') to be contrasted with things, and it is on this account that logic and semantics figure largely in the framework of the book. Elementary logic is a logic which takes values for its variables; and these values are precisely distinct individuals or things. Existence is then symbolized in just such terms; and this, it is proposed, creates a pressure for 'reducing'stuff to things. Non-singular expressions, which include words for stuff, 'mass' nouns, and also plural nouns, are 'explicated' as semantically singular.Here then is the second target of the book. The posit that both mass and plural nouns name special categories of objects (set-theoretical 'collections' of objects in the one case, mereological 'parcels' or 'portions' of stuff in the other) represents, so Laycock urges, the imposition of an alien logic upon both the many and the much.
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0199281718
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 221
Book Description
A picture of the world as chiefly one of discrete objects, distributed in space and time, has sometimes seemed compelling. It is however one of two main targets of Henry Laycock's book; for it is seriously incomplete. The picture, he argues, leaves no space for stuff like air and water. With discrete objects, we may always ask 'how many?', but with stuff the question has to be 'how much?' Within philosophy, stuff of certain basic kinds is central to the ancient pre-Socraticworld-view; but it also constitutes the field of modern chemistry and is a major factor in ecology.Philosophers these days, in general, are unlikely to deny that stuff exists. But they are very likely to deny that it is ('ultimately') to be contrasted with things, and it is on this account that logic and semantics figure largely in the framework of the book. Elementary logic is a logic which takes values for its variables; and these values are precisely distinct individuals or things. Existence is then symbolized in just such terms; and this, it is proposed, creates a pressure for 'reducing'stuff to things. Non-singular expressions, which include words for stuff, 'mass' nouns, and also plural nouns, are 'explicated' as semantically singular.Here then is the second target of the book. The posit that both mass and plural nouns name special categories of objects (set-theoretical 'collections' of objects in the one case, mereological 'parcels' or 'portions' of stuff in the other) represents, so Laycock urges, the imposition of an alien logic upon both the many and the much.
Words without Objects
Author: Henry Laycock
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191535915
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 222
Book Description
A picture of the world as chiefly one of discrete objects, distributed in space and time, has sometimes seemed compelling. It is however one of two main targets of Henry Laycock's book; for it is seriously incomplete. The picture, he argues, leaves no space for stuff like air and water. With discrete objects, we may always ask 'how many?', but with stuff the question has to be 'how much?' Within philosophy, stuff of certain basic kinds is central to the ancient pre-Socratic world-view; but it also constitutes the field of modern chemistry and is a major factor in ecology. Philosophers these days, in general, are unlikely to deny that stuff exists. But they are very likely to deny that it is ('ultimately') to be contrasted with things, and it is on this account that logic and semantics figure largely in the framework of the book. Elementary logic is a logic which takes values for its variables; and these values are precisely distinct individuals or things. Existence is then symbolized in just such terms; and this, it is proposed, creates a pressure for 'reducing' stuff to things. Non-singular expressions, which include words for stuff, 'mass' nouns, and also plural nouns, are 'explicated' as semantically singular. Here then is the second target of the book. The posit that both mass and plural nouns name special categories of objects (set-theoretical 'collections' of objects in the one case, mereological 'parcels' or 'portions' of stuff in the other) represents, so Laycock urges, the imposition of an alien logic upon both the many and the much.
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191535915
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 222
Book Description
A picture of the world as chiefly one of discrete objects, distributed in space and time, has sometimes seemed compelling. It is however one of two main targets of Henry Laycock's book; for it is seriously incomplete. The picture, he argues, leaves no space for stuff like air and water. With discrete objects, we may always ask 'how many?', but with stuff the question has to be 'how much?' Within philosophy, stuff of certain basic kinds is central to the ancient pre-Socratic world-view; but it also constitutes the field of modern chemistry and is a major factor in ecology. Philosophers these days, in general, are unlikely to deny that stuff exists. But they are very likely to deny that it is ('ultimately') to be contrasted with things, and it is on this account that logic and semantics figure largely in the framework of the book. Elementary logic is a logic which takes values for its variables; and these values are precisely distinct individuals or things. Existence is then symbolized in just such terms; and this, it is proposed, creates a pressure for 'reducing' stuff to things. Non-singular expressions, which include words for stuff, 'mass' nouns, and also plural nouns, are 'explicated' as semantically singular. Here then is the second target of the book. The posit that both mass and plural nouns name special categories of objects (set-theoretical 'collections' of objects in the one case, mereological 'parcels' or 'portions' of stuff in the other) represents, so Laycock urges, the imposition of an alien logic upon both the many and the much.
Writing Design
Author: Grace Lees-Maffei
Publisher: Berg
ISBN: 1847889557
Category : Design
Languages : en
Pages : 277
Book Description
Explains how important language is to understanding design, how a range of texts - from design criticism to instructions and labels - shape the appreciation and use of design.
Publisher: Berg
ISBN: 1847889557
Category : Design
Languages : en
Pages : 277
Book Description
Explains how important language is to understanding design, how a range of texts - from design criticism to instructions and labels - shape the appreciation and use of design.
Fewer, Better Things
Author: Glenn Adamson
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1632869667
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 273
Book Description
From the former director of the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, a timely and passionate case for the role of the well-designed object in the digital age. Curator and scholar Glenn Adamson opens Fewer, Better Things by contrasting his beloved childhood teddy bear to the smartphones and digital tablets children have today. He laments that many children and adults are losing touch with the material objects that have nurtured human development for thousands of years. The objects are still here, but we seem to care less and know less about them. In his presentations to groups, he often asks an audience member what he or she knows about the chair the person is sitting in. Few people know much more than whether it's made of wood, plastic, or metal. If we know little about how things are made, it's hard to remain connected to the world around us. Fewer, Better Things explores the history of craft in its many forms, explaining how raw materials, tools, design, and technique come together to produce beauty and utility in handmade or manufactured items. Whether describing the implements used in a traditional Japanese tea ceremony, the use of woodworking tools, or the use of new fabrication technologies, Adamson writes expertly and lovingly about the aesthetics of objects, and the care and attention that goes into producing them. Reading this wise and elegant book is a truly transformative experience.
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1632869667
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 273
Book Description
From the former director of the Museum of Arts and Design in New York, a timely and passionate case for the role of the well-designed object in the digital age. Curator and scholar Glenn Adamson opens Fewer, Better Things by contrasting his beloved childhood teddy bear to the smartphones and digital tablets children have today. He laments that many children and adults are losing touch with the material objects that have nurtured human development for thousands of years. The objects are still here, but we seem to care less and know less about them. In his presentations to groups, he often asks an audience member what he or she knows about the chair the person is sitting in. Few people know much more than whether it's made of wood, plastic, or metal. If we know little about how things are made, it's hard to remain connected to the world around us. Fewer, Better Things explores the history of craft in its many forms, explaining how raw materials, tools, design, and technique come together to produce beauty and utility in handmade or manufactured items. Whether describing the implements used in a traditional Japanese tea ceremony, the use of woodworking tools, or the use of new fabrication technologies, Adamson writes expertly and lovingly about the aesthetics of objects, and the care and attention that goes into producing them. Reading this wise and elegant book is a truly transformative experience.
Objects of Metaphor
Author: Samuel Guttenplan
Publisher: Clarendon Press
ISBN: 019153580X
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 316
Book Description
Objects of Metaphor contains a philosophical account of the phenomenon of metaphor radically different from those currently on offer. Yet for all that it is different, the underlying rationale of the account is genuinely ecumenical. If one adopts its perspective, one should be able to see how substantially correct many other accounts are, whilst at the same time seeing why they are not in the end completely correct. The book opens with a transparent classification of types of account, and concludes with detailed discussions of three important recent contributions to the subject. The origins of the account lie in our conception of predication. Unreflectively thought of as a task accomplished by words, it is argued that predication, or something very much like it, can also be accomplished by objects. So understood, predication becomes the genuinely equal partner of reference - a function no one doubts can be as easily accomplished by objects as by words - and, liberated in this way, predication becomes one central element in the account of metaphor. The other element is the move from language to objects which, adapting an idea of Quine's, is thought of as semantic descent. Whilst Samuel Guttenplan's account allows us to see other accounts in a new light, its main importance lies in what it tells us about metaphor itself. Powerful and flexible enough to cope with the syntactic complexity typical of genuine metaphor, it offers novel conceptions of both the relationship between simile and metaphor and the notion of dead metaphor. Additionally, it allows us to see why metaphor is a robust theoretic kind, related to certain other tropes, but not to be confused with tropes generally, or with the figurative and non-literal. Metaphor has often been thought merely an ornament to language. Whilst acknowledging the truth in this thought, Guttenplan shows the fundamental importance of metaphor to language. Rather than being a specialist topic in philosophy and related disciplines, he thus suggests that the study of metaphor is central to the study of language.
Publisher: Clarendon Press
ISBN: 019153580X
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 316
Book Description
Objects of Metaphor contains a philosophical account of the phenomenon of metaphor radically different from those currently on offer. Yet for all that it is different, the underlying rationale of the account is genuinely ecumenical. If one adopts its perspective, one should be able to see how substantially correct many other accounts are, whilst at the same time seeing why they are not in the end completely correct. The book opens with a transparent classification of types of account, and concludes with detailed discussions of three important recent contributions to the subject. The origins of the account lie in our conception of predication. Unreflectively thought of as a task accomplished by words, it is argued that predication, or something very much like it, can also be accomplished by objects. So understood, predication becomes the genuinely equal partner of reference - a function no one doubts can be as easily accomplished by objects as by words - and, liberated in this way, predication becomes one central element in the account of metaphor. The other element is the move from language to objects which, adapting an idea of Quine's, is thought of as semantic descent. Whilst Samuel Guttenplan's account allows us to see other accounts in a new light, its main importance lies in what it tells us about metaphor itself. Powerful and flexible enough to cope with the syntactic complexity typical of genuine metaphor, it offers novel conceptions of both the relationship between simile and metaphor and the notion of dead metaphor. Additionally, it allows us to see why metaphor is a robust theoretic kind, related to certain other tropes, but not to be confused with tropes generally, or with the figurative and non-literal. Metaphor has often been thought merely an ornament to language. Whilst acknowledging the truth in this thought, Guttenplan shows the fundamental importance of metaphor to language. Rather than being a specialist topic in philosophy and related disciplines, he thus suggests that the study of metaphor is central to the study of language.
Making Objects and Events
Author: Simon Evnine
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198779674
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 285
Book Description
Simon J. Evnine explores the view (which he calls amorphic hylomorphism) that some objects have matter from which they are distinct but that this distinctness is not due to the existence of anything like a form. He draws on Aristotle's insight that such objects must be understood in terms of an account that links what they are essentially with how they come to exist and what their functions are (the coincidence of formal, final, and efficient causes). Artifacts are the most prominent kind of objects where these three features coincide, and Evnine develops a detailed account of the existence and identity conditions of artifacts, and the origins of their functions, in terms of how they come into existence. This process is, in general terms, that they are made out of their initial matter by an agent acting with the intention to make an object of the given kind. Evnine extends the account to organisms, where evolution accomplishes what is effected by intentional making in the case of artifacts, and to actions, which are seen as artifactual events.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198779674
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 285
Book Description
Simon J. Evnine explores the view (which he calls amorphic hylomorphism) that some objects have matter from which they are distinct but that this distinctness is not due to the existence of anything like a form. He draws on Aristotle's insight that such objects must be understood in terms of an account that links what they are essentially with how they come to exist and what their functions are (the coincidence of formal, final, and efficient causes). Artifacts are the most prominent kind of objects where these three features coincide, and Evnine develops a detailed account of the existence and identity conditions of artifacts, and the origins of their functions, in terms of how they come into existence. This process is, in general terms, that they are made out of their initial matter by an agent acting with the intention to make an object of the given kind. Evnine extends the account to organisms, where evolution accomplishes what is effected by intentional making in the case of artifacts, and to actions, which are seen as artifactual events.
Subjects and Objects
Author: Jeffrey Strayer
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9047419324
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 410
Book Description
The subject matter of Subjects and Objects is the limits of Abstraction in art. The notion of Abstraction, its development in art history, and the relation of art and philosophy regarding Abstraction are considered in addition to identifying and examining things that are essential to artworks. Any artwork has an identity, and comprehension of that identity depends on a perceptual object. A subject’s apprehension of such an object creates an “artistic complex” of which the object, the subject, and the apprehension are constituents. The essential elements of this kind of complex are the subject of the final part of the work. Its concluding section considers these elements as ‘material’ to be used to determine the limits of Abstraction.
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9047419324
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 410
Book Description
The subject matter of Subjects and Objects is the limits of Abstraction in art. The notion of Abstraction, its development in art history, and the relation of art and philosophy regarding Abstraction are considered in addition to identifying and examining things that are essential to artworks. Any artwork has an identity, and comprehension of that identity depends on a perceptual object. A subject’s apprehension of such an object creates an “artistic complex” of which the object, the subject, and the apprehension are constituents. The essential elements of this kind of complex are the subject of the final part of the work. Its concluding section considers these elements as ‘material’ to be used to determine the limits of Abstraction.
Discovering Modernism
Author: Louis Menand
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199774714
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 240
Book Description
When Discovering Modernism was first published, it shed new and welcome light on the birth of Modernism. This reissue of Menand's classic intellectual history of T.S. Eliot and the singular role he played in the rise of literary modernism features an updated Afterword by the author, as well as a detailed critical appraisal of the progression of Eliot's career as a poet and critic. The new Afterword was adapted from Menand's critically lauded essay on Eliot in The Cambridge History of Literary Criticism, Volume Seven: Modernism and the New Criticism. Menand shows how Eliot's early views on literary value and authenticity, and his later repudiation of those views, reflect the profound changes regarding the understanding of literature and its significance that occurred in the early part of the twentieth century. It will prove an eye-opening study for readers with an interest in the writings of T.S. Eliot and other luminaries of the Modernist era.
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199774714
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 240
Book Description
When Discovering Modernism was first published, it shed new and welcome light on the birth of Modernism. This reissue of Menand's classic intellectual history of T.S. Eliot and the singular role he played in the rise of literary modernism features an updated Afterword by the author, as well as a detailed critical appraisal of the progression of Eliot's career as a poet and critic. The new Afterword was adapted from Menand's critically lauded essay on Eliot in The Cambridge History of Literary Criticism, Volume Seven: Modernism and the New Criticism. Menand shows how Eliot's early views on literary value and authenticity, and his later repudiation of those views, reflect the profound changes regarding the understanding of literature and its significance that occurred in the early part of the twentieth century. It will prove an eye-opening study for readers with an interest in the writings of T.S. Eliot and other luminaries of the Modernist era.
Bulletin of the Philosophical Society of Washington
Author: Philosophical Society of Washington (Washington, D.C.)
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 632
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 632
Book Description
Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections
Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 818
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 818
Book Description