Philosophical Investigations – Free Special Issue

Virtual Issue: Philosophical Investigations from past to present

Founded in 1978 and associated with the British Wittgenstein Society, Philosophical Investigations is published quarterly by Wiley-Blackwell. This international journal features articles, discussions, critical notices and reviews covering every branch of philosophy. Whether focusing on traditional or on new aspects of the subject, it offers thought-provoking articles and maintains a lively readership with an acclaimed discussion section and wide-ranging book reviews.

In this exciting virtual issue, the editorial team have selected some of the best articles, critical notices and reviews published in Philosophical Investigations from 1980 to the present day. We are confident that you will find this virtual issue interesting and informative. See below for a full list of articles, critical notices and reviews.

Students Possess Psychic Abilities!

Why study when you can foresee what the questions will be?

Apparently students possess psychic abilities, but only when it comes to porn. A study is soon to be published revealing statistically significant evidence that supports the existence of precognition, the ability to see into the future. Precise details are not yet available, but we can get a good impression of the experiment from the media reports. Each student was shown an image, and then a picture of two curtained screens on a computer monitor; behind one curtain was an image, behind the other a blank wall. The students were asked to click on the curtain that they thought had the image behind it. Some of the students were shown an “erotic” image beforehand, one assumes that others were shown “non-erotic” images of some description. Some, but not all, of the images behind the curtain were also of an erotic nature. The theory seems to be that if the participants were ‘primed’ erotically (i.e. by being shown an erotic image), and the end result is an erotic one (i.e. they see another erotic image if they successfully select the correct curtain) they might perform better at the task. Prof. Emeritus Daryl Bem hypothesised that 50% of participants would select the right curtain, but that those shown an erotic image would show a higher success rate. And indeed, it seems that his hypothesis was satisfied…statistically.

The Scientific Method

“It’s Sunday evening, I’ve worked all weekend, and just when I thought it was done I’m hitting yet another problem that’s based on the hopeless state of our databases. There is no uniform data integrity, it’s just a catalogue of issues that continues to grow as they’re found.”

This email, one of many stolen from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia, gives us reason to reflect on the scientific method and the (all-too) human researchers that might (or might not) use it.  For climate change skeptics, such as Patrick Michaels, a Cato fellow and former Virginia state climatologist, these emails constitute “not a smoking gun” but “a mushroom cloud” indicating fraud and deception.  For others,

FREE syllabus: Locke on Language

Teaching & Learning Guide for: Locke on Language
By Walter Ott, Virginia Tech

Keywords

Section: History of Philosophy
Subjects: Philosophy, History of Philosophy, Modern (C17th – C19th), Logic and Language, Philosophy of Language
People: Locke, John
Key Topics: meaning, empiricism

(See all Philosophy Compass ‘Teaching & Learning Guides‘)

Neglecting the philosophical baby

Have philosophers neglected the mind of the child? Yes they have, if we are to believe psychologist, Alison Gopnik. In her latest book The Philosophical Baby, she presents a raft of examples aimed to show that babies’ minds are more sophisticated than has (she says) been supposed.

One contemporary philosopher who has been attacked on just this basis is John McDowell. He has put forward the thesis that animals and young infants do not perceive or indeed think….

FREE Syllabus: The Analytic/Synthetic Distinction

Teaching & Learning Guide for: The Analytic/Synthetic Distinction
By Gillian Russell, Washington University in St Louis (December 2007)

Keywords:

Section: Logic & Language
Subjects: Philosophy, Logic and Language, Logic.
People: Quine, Willard , Kant, Immanuel , Frege, Gottlob , Hume, David
Key Topic: empiricism