The second volume in the Blackwell Brown Lectures in Philosophy, this volume offers an original and provocative take on the nature and methodology of philosophy: Based on public lectures at Brown University, given by the pre-eminent philosopher, Timothy Williamson; Rejects the ideology of the ‘linguistic turn’, the most distinctive trend of 20th century philosophy; Explains the method of philosophy as a development from non-philosophical ways of thinking; Suggests new ways of understanding what contemporary and past philosophers are doing. ~ Book Description

Table of Contents

• • Preface     ix
  • Acknowledgments     xi
  • Introduction     1
  • The Linguistic Turn and the Conceptual Turn     10
  • Taking Philosophical Questions at Face Value     23
  • Metaphysical Conceptions of Analyticity     48
  • Epistemological Conceptions of Analyticity     73
  • Knowledge of Metaphysical Modality     134
  • Thought Experiments     179
  • Evidence in Philosophy     208
  • Knowledge Maximization     247
  • Afterword: Must Do Better     278
  • Modal Logic within Counterfactual Logic     293
  • Counterfactual Donkeys     305
  • Bibliography     309
  • Index     322