New Books in Philosophy

Philip Goff argues for cosmic purposivism, the idea that the universe has a purpose separate from an all-powerful God. He discusses the evidence for cosmic purpose, including fine-tuning in physics and the role of dark energy. Goff explores the connection between cosmic purpose and the meaningfulness of life. He also talks about the conventionality in familiar structures revealed through great art and discusses his involvement in promoting his book and upcoming research projects.

Fabrizio Cariani challenges the traditional view of the word 'will' and proposes an asymmetric semantics. He explores the similarities between future-directed and counterfactual discourse, defends an extended version of Stalnaker's selectionist semantics, and examines connections to speech act theory and knowledge about the future.

Frederick Douglass’s 1852 speech “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July” is notoriously fiery. No doubt part of what’s gripping about it is its internal tension. Douglass begins by sincerely praising the founders and their philosophical principles, and then turns to a devastating critique of the hypocrisy of the United States. Underlying Douglass’s argument is a commitment to the democratic project in the United States that one imagines could be sustained only with extraordinary effort. What prevented Douglass from embracing the understandable, warranted pessimism that the democratic experiment in the United States had failed – or perhaps had never really been taken up?In The Darkened Light of Faith: Race, Democracy, and Freedom in African American Political Thought (Princeton University Press, 2023), Melvin Rogers takes his reader on a journey through the efforts of African American philosophers, social critics, and artists to make sense of the United States.Robert Talisse is the W. Alton Jones Professor of Philosophy at Vanderbilt University. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/philosophy

Late Classical Chinese Thought (Oxford University Press, 2023) is Chris Fraser's topically organized study of the Warring States period of Chinese philosophy, the third century BCE. In addition to well-known texts like the Zhuangzi, Xunzi, and Mencius, Fraser's book introduces readers to Lu's Annals, the Guanzi, the Hanfeizi, the Shangjun Shu, and excerpts from the Mawangdui silk manuscripts. Beginning with a chapter on "The Way," or the dao, Late Classical Chinese Thought explores topics in metaphysics, metaethics, ethics, political philosophy, epistemology, and philosophy of language and logic. By focusing on topics rather than texts, the book aims to show how philosophical discourse happened in the philosophically productive period of the third century.Malcolm Keating is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Yale-NUS College. His research focuses on Sanskrit works of philosophy in Indian traditions, in the areas of language and epistemology. He is the author of Language, Meaning, and Use in Indian Philosophy (Bloomsbury Press, 2019) and host of the podcast Sutras & Stuff. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/philosophy

Emily McTernan, a researcher specializing in moral, political, and legal theory, discusses her book 'On Taking Offense.' She challenges the common belief that taking offense is morally and socially pernicious, instead arguing that it is an essential part of our moral and social repertoire. The podcast delves into topics such as the concept of social standing, limits on appropriate offense taking, the relationship between humor and offense, and the virtue of taking offense as a way of correcting social inequalities.

In Vatsyayana's Commentary on the Nyaya-Sutra: A Guide (Oxford University Press, 2023), Matthew Dasti unpacks a canonical classical Indian text, the Nyayabhasya, while simultaneously demonstrating its relevance to contemporary philosophy. The commentary, the earliest extant on the Nyayasutra, ranges over topics in metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language, dialectics, and value theory. Dasti's guide includes his own translations of selections of the text and engagement with select interpretive controversies, such as a focused treatment of Vatsyayana's approach to logic in an appendix. Another appendix includes a reading plan and survey of relevant scholarship for readers looking to learn more about Vatsyayana and early Nyaya.Malcolm Keating is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Yale-NUS College. His research focuses on Sanskrit works of philosophy in Indian traditions, in the areas of language and epistemology. He is the author of Language, Meaning, and Use in Indian Philosophy (Bloomsbury Press, 2019) and host of the podcast Sutras & Stuff. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/philosophy

Adam Toon, a philosopher arguing against folk psychology, challenges the standard view of mental representation, arguing that our concept of mind is a fiction. He discusses the concept of mind as a metaphor, explores the connection between computationalism and representationism, and examines the relationship between metaphor and mental fictionalism. The podcast also delves into the history, philosophy, and science, as well as the metaphorical representations of the mind and patterns of behavior.

Bookshop.org is an online book retailer that donates more than 80% of its profits to independent bookstores. Launched in 2020, Bookshop.org has already raised more than $27,000,000. In this interview, Andy Hunter, founder and CEO discusses his journey to creating one of the most revolutionary new organizations in the book world. Bookshop has found a way to retain the convenience of online book shopping while also supporting independent bookstores that are the backbones of many local communities. Andy Hunter is CEO and Founder of Bookshop.org. He also co-created Literary Hub.Caleb Zakarin is the Assistant Editor of the New Books Network. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/philosophy

When someone close to us dies, intense grief is an expected and reasonable response. But while the reason for our grief – the loss of the person who is the object of our grief – doesn’t change, our grief itself diminishes. This diminishment is also expected, but how can it be reasonable if the reason for the grief hasn’t changed? In On the Temporality of Emotions: An Essay on Grief, Anger, and Love (Oxford UP, 2022), Berislav Marusic articulates this puzzle of accommodation as a general feature of our mental lives, and considers a number of different to attempts to resolve it. Marusic, who is senior lecturer of philosophy at the University of Edinburgh, defends the idea that the puzzle can’t be satisfactorily dissolved – while the diminishment is reasonable, it is so in a way that we can never fully grasp.Carrie Figdor is professor of philosophy at the University of Iowa. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/philosophy

It is common to think that rational agency involves acting in ways that, given one’s options, maximize the satisfaction of one’s preferences. This intuitive understanding has generated a wide-ranging literature about the ways in which individuals routinely fail to be rational in the proposed sense: they make choices that not only do not maximize their preference satisfaction, but actually undermine or defeat their aims. Maybe we’re not rational animals after all?In Choosing Well: The Good, The Bad, and The Trivial (Oxford University Press 2023), Chrisoula Andreou explores certain cases of purported irrationality and argues that they involve disorderly preferences but need not involve irrationality on the part of agents. Chrisoula argues that there are cases where, although our preferences may be disorderly, we can preserve our practical rationality by taking care to attend to the patterns of choice we instantiate. Along the way, Chrisoula proposes intriguing ideas about how we assess our choices, how to understand temptation, and when it’s rational to regret our choices. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/philosophy