First published in 1997, this volume expands the analytical philosophical tradition in the face of parochial Anglo-American philosophical interests. The essays making up the section on ‘Antiquity’ share one concern: to show that there are largely unrecognised but radical differences between the way in which certain fundamental questions – concerning the nature of number, sense perception, and scepticism – were thought of in antiquity and the way in which they were thought of from the 17th century onwards. Part 2, on early modern thought, explores the theoretical characterisation of the role of experiment in early modern physical theory through Galileo’s embracing of experiments, along with Descartes’ automata and issues in a relatively neglected but especially intractable part of Descartes’ philosophy: how he conceives of what a successful inference consists in and what it is that makes it successful. The final section deals with the philosophical foundations of physical theory, the distinction between the human and the natural sciences, the philosophical-cum-scientific foundations of Marx’s idea of socialism, and Nietzche’s criticisms of the very notion of science, concluding that Nietzsche’s probing questions cannot be dismissed, as he has opened up some genuinely challenging issues which we ignore at our peril.

A Companion to Intellectual History provides an in-depth survey of the practice of intellectual history as a discipline. Forty newly-commissioned chapters showcase leading global research with broad coverage of every aspect of intellectual history as it is currently practiced. Presents an in-depth survey of recent research and practice of intellectual history Written in a clear and accessible manner, designed for an international audience Surveys the various methodologies that have arisen and the main historiographical debates that concern intellectual historians Pays special attention to contemporary controversies, providing readers with the most current overview of the field Demonstrates the ways in which intellectual historians have contributed to the history of science and medicine, literary studies, art history and the history of political thought Named Outstanding Academic Title of 2016 by Choice Magazine, a publication of the American Library Association

Viewing Foucault in the light of work by Continental and American philosophers, most notably Nietzsche, Habermas, Deleuze, Richard Rorty, Bernard Williams, and Ian Hacking, Genealogy as Critique shows that philosophical genealogy involves not only the critique of modernity but also its transformation. Colin Koopman engages genealogy as a philosophical tradition and a method for understanding the complex histories of our present social and cultural conditions. He explains how our understanding of Foucault can benefit from productive dialogue with philosophical allies to push Foucaultian genealogy a step further and elaborate a means of addressing our most intractable contemporary problems.

Michel Foucault has become famous for a series of books that have permanently altered our understanding of many institutions of Western society. He analyzed mental institutions in the remarkable Madness and Civilization; hospitals in The Birth of the Clinic; prisons in Discipline and Punish; and schools and families in The History of Sexuality. But the general reader as well as the specialist is apt to miss the consistent purposes that lay behind these difficult individual studies, thus losing sight of the broad social vision and political aims that unified them. Now, in this superb set of essays and interviews, Foucault has provided a much-needed guide to Foucault. These pieces, ranging over the entire spectrum of his concerns, enabled Foucault, in his most intimate and accessible voice, to interpret the conclusions of his research in each area and to demonstrate the contribution of each to the magnificent -- and terrifying -- portrait of society that he was patiently compiling. For, as Foucault shows, what he was always describing was the nature of power in society; not the conventional treatment of power that concentrates on powerful individuals and repressive institutions, but the much more pervasive and insidious mechanisms by which power "reaches into the very grain of individuals, touches their bodies and inserts itself into their actions and attitudes, their discourses, learning processes and everyday lives" Foucault's investigations of prisons, schools, barracks, hospitals, factories, cities, lodgings, families, and other organized forms of social life are each a segment of one of the most astonishing intellectual enterprises of all time -- and, as this book proves, one which possesses profound implications for understanding the social control of our bodies and our minds.

The book analyses the procedures, difficulties, and challenges of genealogical research in Early Modern Europe. Archives had to be visited, stone inscriptions had to be deciphered, and countless individuals had to be identified. The results often re

These case studies link genealogical knowledge to particular circumstances in which it was created, circulated and promoted. They stress the malleability of kinship and memory, and the interests this malleability serves. From the Prophet's family tree to the present, ideas about kinship and descent have shaped communal and national identities in Muslim societies. So an understanding of genealogy is vital to our understanding of Muslim societies, particularly with regard to the generation, preservation and manipulation of genealogical knowledge.

Chris Buskes's The Genealogy of Knowledge provides a comprehensive and critical defense of evolutionary approaches to epistemology and philosophy of science. Buskes shows that, until recently, many philosophers had a keen interest in physics and mathematics, but they tended to neglect the findings and important implications of evolutionary biology. By trying to rectify this omission, the author convincingly demonstrates that neo-Darwinian theory is simply indispensable for a proper understanding of the various cognitive processes found in animals and man. He also shows that, from a biological point of view, we are forced to broaden our concept of knowledge: all instances of adaptive evolution are instances in which knowledge about the natural world has been gained. Finally, The Genealogy of Knowledge explores the many parallels between biological and scientific evolution. It is claimed that Darwin's scheme of explanation can be applied successfully to the epistemic domain, which means that scientific and methodological change can be understood as analogous to biological evolution.

The humanities and social science disciplines are increasingly expected to prove their relevance faced with the politics of knowledge in the knowledge economy. This tendency is investigated in this book regarding the discipline of the history of education in America and Europe.

Uncertainty is critical to economic theory, mainly because it either supports, or undermines, many significant debates within economic theory. Despite the significance of uncertainty, this book represents the first attempt to comprehensively trace the genealogy of uncertainty, which is a procedure that Nietzsche used in relation to morality; one of the subjects that become logically redundant in the absence of uncertainty. On the one hand, this logical redundancy is problematic when considered in isolation, given the practical importance of morality. On the other hand, this logical redundancy becomes even more problematic, given that, at one time, uncertainty was widely accepted as an important part of the philosophical system. Here uncertainty played a pivotal role, in terms of explaining practical decision-making. Such an appreciation of uncertainty has recently been set aside by modern philosophy, which argues quantities of human labour provide virtually all economic value. Such an explanation of economic value excludes uncertainty, the many qualitative contributions of nature, and morality, even when one acknowledged the contribution to the understanding of uncertainty, as proposed by Frank Knight, in 1921. However, in contrast to Knight, who looked toward recent philosophy so as to support the existence of uncertainty, this genealogy looks to support the significance of uncertainty by understanding the philosophy that supported the idea of uncertainty for thousands of years, before the philosophy of John Locke. Specifically, Locke excludes uncertainty from the analysis of practical decision-making in general, and from economic decision-making in particular. Accordingly, it can be anticipated that the enclosed genealogy will assist economists to more adequately develop the idea of uncertainty within economic theory.

In On the Genealogy of Color, Zed Adams argues for a historicized approach to conceptual analysis, by exploring the relevance of the history of color science for contemporary philosophical debates about color realism. Adams contends that two prominent positions in these debates, Cartesian anti-realism and Oxford realism, are both predicated on the assumption that the concept of color is ahistorical and unrevisable. Adams takes issue with this premise by offering a philosophical genealogy of the concept of color. This book makes a significant contribution to recent debates on philosophical methodology by demonstrating the efficacy of using the genealogical method to explore philosophical concepts, and will appeal to philosophers of perception, philosophers of mind, and metaphysicians.