A Bibliography
Compiled by
Eddie Yeghiayan
"On the so-called ‘Naïve Interpretation’ of ‘cogito, ergo, sum'." Acta Philosophica Fennica (1981), 32:9-29.
1982
Studies in Cartesian Epistemology and Philosophy of Mind.
Acta
Philosophica Fennica, 33. Helsinki: Philosophical Society of Finland,
1982.
Includes 2 essays: "Descartes on the
Essence of Mind and the Real Distinction between Mind and Body," pp.
9-103, and "On the Role and Nature of Descartes' First Principle," pp. 105-170.
1984
"Philosophie de l'humanisme." Ajatus (1984), 41:141-167.
Edited (with Esa Saarinen and Ilkka Niiniluoto.) Rakkauden filosofia. Porvoo: Soderstrom, 1984.
"Descartes, Duns Scotus and Ockham on Omnipotence and
Possibility." Franciscan Studies (1985), 45(23):157-188.
William of Ockham (1285-1347).
Commemorative Issue, Part II.
"Ockham and Descartes have been called voluntarists, Ockham has
also been taken to anticipate Cartesian views on omnipotence and
eternal truths, here examined against theories Descartes opposes. I
argue that Duns Scotus, Ockham and Suarez define God's absolute power
by absence of logical contradiction and take possibility to depend on
things themselves, not on God. This, for Descartes, restricts God's
infinite power to the sphere of conceivability determined by logical
principles to which created intellects are bound. Descartes holds
these
principles to be made by God, hence, I conclude, they cannot be
standards 'for' God, nor can voluntarism be applied to Descartes
without qualification."
"On Descartes’s Argument for Dualism." In Simo Knuuttila and Jaako Hintikka, eds., The Logic of Being: Historical Studies, pp. 223-248. Synthese Historical Library, 28. Dordrecht & Boston: Reidel, 1986.
1988
"Descartes, Omnipotence, and Kinds of Modality." In Peter H. Hare, ed., Doing Philosophy Historically, pp. 182-196. Frontiers of Philsophy. Buffalo, NY: Prometheus, 1988.
"The Foundations of Modality and Conceivability in Descartes and
His Predecessors." In Simo Knuuttila, ed., Modern Modalities:
Studies of the History of Modal Theories from Medieval Nominalism to Logical
Positivism, pp. 1-69. Synthese Historical Library, 33.
Dordrecht & Boston: Kluwer, 1988.
"Descartes's view of modality is analyzed by contrast to two earlier
models: the ancient realist one, defended by Boethius, where
possibility
and necessity are connected to natural potency, and the modern
intensionalist one, which dissociates necessary and possible truths
from any ontological foundation, treating them as conceptual, a
priori given preconditions for any intellect. The emergence of this
view
is traced from Gilbert of Poitiers to Duns Scotus, Ockham and Suarez.
The Cartesian theory of the creation of eternal truths, it is argued,
involves a rejection of this idea of absolute conceivability and can
be
seen as a constructivist view of intelligibility and rationality."
"Descartes’s Dualism and the Philosophy of Mind."
Revue de
Métaphysique et de Morale (July-September 1989),
94(3):391-413.
"This paper examines Descartes's view of man and the understanding
involved in the notion of the mind-body union. The aim is to spell out
the
implications of Descartes's distinction between different and
incomparable primary notion and related kinds of knowledge, which
due to the misleading but influential Rylean version of Descartes's
mind-body dualism have remained largely unnoticed in the
contemporary Anglo-American debate."
Review of John Cottingham’s Descartes. Journal of Philosophy (January 1989), 86(1):44-49.
1991
"Descartes, Conceivability, and Logical Modality." In Tamara Horowitz and Gerald J. Massey, eds., Thought Experiments in Science.and Philosophy, pp. 65-84. CPS Publications in Philosophy of Science. Savage, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, 1991.
"Cartesian Ideas and Intentionality." Acta Philosophica Fennica
(1990), 49:344-369.
This issue is entitled "Language, Knowledge, and Intentionality: Perspectives on the Philosophy of Jaako Hintikka."
"Thought-Talk: Descartes and Sellars on Intentionality."
American Philosophical Quarterly (January 1992), 29(1):19-34.
"Descartes's concept of thought is
often interpreted as internalist, in that
thoughts are described as intentional inner states logically and
causally
prior to language. These thoughts are often identified with
propositions.
The externalist view, as described by Wilfrid Sellars, maintains that
language is logically but not causally prior to thought. Descartes's
actual
position is neither internalism nor externalism."
"Une certaine fausseté matérielle: Descartes et Arnauld sur l'origine de l'erreur dans la perception sensorielle." In Jean-Marie Beyssade, Jean-Luc Marion, and Lia Levy, eds., Descartes: Objecter et répondre. Actes du colloque 'Objecter et répondre' organisé par le Centre d'études cartesiennes à la Sorbonne et à l'Ecole normale supérieure du 3 au 6 octobre 1992, à l'occasion du 350e anniversaire de la seconde édition des 'Meditationes'. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1994.
"Automata, Agency and Human Thinking--A Cartesian Meditation." Acta Philosophica Fennica (1995), 58:171-205.
"Reconsidering Descartes’s Notion of the Mind-Body Union."
Synthese (January 1996), 106(1):3-20.
This issue is entitled "Descartes and
Contemporary Philosophy of Mind."
"Sensory Ideas, Objective Reality, and Material Falsity." In John Cottingham, eds., Reason, Will, and Sensation: Studies in Descartes's Metaphysics. Oxford: Clarendon Pess, 1994.
1997
"Introduction." In Lilli Alanen, Sara Heinäma and Thomas Wallgren, eds., Commonality and Particularity in Ethics, pp. 1-13. Basingstoke: Macmillan; New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997.
Edited (with Sara Heinamaa, and Thomas Wallgren.) Commonality and Particularity in Ethics. Basingstoke: Macmillan; New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997.
(with Mikko Yrjonsuuri.) "Intuition, jugement et évidence chez Ockham et Descartes." In Joel Biard and Roshdi Rashed. Descartes et le Moyen Âge: Actes du colloque Descartes et la philosophie médiévale, pp. 155-173. Paris: Vrin, 1997.
"Intuition, Assent and Necessity: The
Question of Descartes's Pyschologism."
Acta Philosophica Fennica (1999), 64:99-121.
This issue is entitled "Norms and
Modes of Thinking in Descartes."
"I discuss some psychologistic interpretations of Descartes's theory and
the problems they pose. How
should the freedom Descartes attributes to the will both in directing
the attention and in giving the assent
required for true judgment be understood? Is that freedom compatible
with a psychologistic reading of
Descartes's theory of assent? I try to shed some light on these
questions by examining Descartes's view of
intuition, its object and of the mechanisms of assent in the formation
of judgment, and by contrasting it,
tentatively, with some earlier views. I will also suggest an
alternative reading which understands Descartes's
account of judgment and rational inference in terms of voluntary
normative commitment rather than in terms
of psychological causation."
"Logical Modality and Attitudes to Propositions." In Georg Meggle, ed.,
Actions, Norms, Values: Discussions with Georg Henrik von Wright, pp. 211-226.
Perspectives in Analytical Philosophy, 21. Berlin & New York: de Gruyter, 1999.
"In discussing the nature and foundation of logical necessity Georg Henrik
von Wright fights against a
tendency to mystify necessity which Wittgenstein was fighting in
criticizing the prejudice of the 'crystalline
purity of logic' and the idea of the 'hardness of the logical must'.
The necessity attributed to the principles
or laws of logic is not founded on any preformed logical structure of
the world but stems, von Wright
argues, from an attitude we take to some propositions. This paper
examines the view of logic and logical
necessity that emerges from his paper on 'Logical Modality' and some
of its implications. It outlines some
traditional conceptions of modality and compares von Wright's view
more particularly to Descartes's
radical view of modality as dependent on the divine will and also to
some contemporary views Descartes
has been seen as anticipation. It purports to show that von Wright's
way of detranscendentalizing modality
by relating necessity to our attitudes or ways of treating sentences
does not commit him to conventionalism
or subjectivism."
"Cartesian Doubt and Scepticism."
Acta Philosophica Fennica (2000), 66:255-270.
This issue is entitled "Ancient
Scepticism and the Sceptical Tradition."
Descartes's Concept of Mind.