Kirjahaku

Beneath metaphysical problems there often lies a conflict between what we want to be true and what we believe to be true. Dr Nathan shows how these conflicts can be systematically thought through, and proposes their resolution as a general philospohical objective. he then studies in detail a set of interrelated oppositions about the freedom and the reality of the will. He shows how difficult it is to find a freedom either of decision or of action which is both an object of reflective desire and an object of rational dis belief. He also examines conflicts about volition as such, contending that the veridicality of volitional experience is no less easy to doubt than the veridicality of our experience of colours. In this context, arguments emerge for a voluntarist theory of the self.

A systematic study of rational or justified belief, which throws fresh light on current debates about foundations and coherence theories of knowledge, the validation of induction and moral scepticism. Dr Nathan focuses attention on the largely unsatisfiable desires for active and self-conscious assurance of truth liable to be engendered by philosophical reflection about total belief-systems and the sources of knowledge. He extracts a kernel of truth from the doctrine that a regress of justification is both necessary and impossible, contrasts the resultant scepticism with more familiar complaints about the inapplicability of supposedly essential cognitive concepts and explores the feasibility of non-Humean modes of consolation. This is an original and carefully constructed book, which will interest professional philosophers and advanced students of epistemology.