William Lycan on Mind, Meaning, and Method

William Lycan is an internationally renowned American philosopher whose work since the late 1960s has been not only extensive but also influential, particularly in the areas of philosophy of mind, epistemology, philosophy of language, metaphysics, and more recently metaphilosophy. This contributed volume features high-quality contributions by prominent or up-and-coming philosophers who critically examine many aspects of Lycan’s work; it also contains an essay by Lycan responding to these contributions. In this way, not only is the importance of William Lycan’s work appreciated, it is also made accessible for further research. The book is also suitable for teaching purposes at universities.

Chapter 1: ‘Introduction to William Lycan on Mind, Meaning, and Method’.- PART I. Mind.- Chapter 2. ‘It’s All About the Layers: Lycan on Olfactory Representation’.- Chapter 3. ‘A Whiff of Morality’.- Chapter 4. ‘Three Perspectives on Perspective: Lycan on Representationalism and Perspectival Experience’.- Chapter 5. ‘Pascal’s Wager Revisited’.- PART II. Meaning.- Chapter 6: ‘Modal Conditionals and Relative Morality’.- Chapter 7. ‘Discoveries and the Paronymy of General Terms’.- Chapter 8. ‘A Neglected Dimension of Language’.- Chapter 9. ‘If Clauses and Conditional Meaning’.- PART III. Method.- Chapter 10. ‘On Progress in Philosophy’.- Chapter 11. ‘Intuitions as Evidence in Philosophy’.- Chapter 12. ‘Philosophy is a Great Success, and We are Fooled into Thinking Otherwise’.- Chapter 13. ‘Replies to Contributors’.

Mitchell Green is a professor of philosophy at the University of Connecticut. His research interests are in philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, and aesthetics. 

Jan G. Michel is a privatdozent at the University of Düsseldorf, Germany. The focus of his research is at the intersection of philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, and philosophy of science, in particular on AI and discovery. He also works on environmental philosophy.