Book Discussion Group
There are currently no book reading groups meeting
Please email [email protected] for more information.
Previous Book Discussions
Summer 2023
Essays on Philosophical Subjects
by Adam Smith, edited by W.P.D. Wightman and J.C. Bryce.
Published by LibertyFund in 1982. Paperback.
Readings
June 16th: General Introduction, Introduction, History of Astronomy (pp. 1-47) pdf
June 30th: The History of Astronomy Cont’d (pp. 47-105)
July 21st: Ancient Physics and Logic (pp. 106-129), On the External Senses (pp. 134-168)
August 4th: On the Imitative Arts (pp. 171-213)
Fall 2022
Neal Jahren led a bi-weekly interdisciplinary discussion on Jessica M Wilson's recent book, Metaphysical Emergence (Oxford, 2021), which presents a systematic and unified approach to issues surrounding emergent properties and phenomena as being metaphysically distinct from the base phenomena on which they depend. Her account is based on a causal powers metaphysics and draws primarily from physics.
Readings:
September 23: Chapter 1 (pp. 1-38) Key issues and questions
October 7: Chapter 2 (pp. 39-74) Two schemas for metaphysical emergence
October 21: Chapter 3 (pp. 75-119) The viability of Weak emergence
November 4: Chapter 4 (pp. 120-154) The viability of Strong emergence
November 18: Chapter 7 (pp. 214-251) Consciousness
December 2: Chapter 8 (pp. 252-281) Free will
Summer 2022
Alan Love and Ben McMyler led a bi-weekly interdisciplinary discussion on Kim Sterelny's recent book, The Pleistocene Social Contract (April 2021), which presents a novel evolutionary framework for understanding the evolution of human cooperation and its evolutionary relationship to human cultural learning.
Readings:
June 24: Chapter 1 (pp. 1-34)
July 8: Chapter 1 (pp. 34-53)
July 22: Chapter 2 (pp. 54-92)
August 5: Chapter 3 (pp. 93-123)