Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

Because it is the most central and general subdivision of philosophy, and because it is among the oldest and most persistently cultivated parts of the field, metaphysics raises special difficulties of selection for a companion such as this. The difficulties are compounded, moreover, by two further facts. First, metaphysics is not only particularly old among fields of philosophy; it is also particularly widespread among cultures and regions of the world. And, second, metaphysics has provoked levels of skepticism unmatched elsewhere in philosophy; including skepticism as to whether the whole subject is nothing but a welter of pseudo-questions and pseudo-problems. In light of this a project such as ours needs to delimit its approach. In accomplishing this, we had to bear in mind the space limitations established by the series, and also the fact that other volumes in the series would be sure to cover some questions traditionally viewed as metaphysical. These considerations led to our including some such questions, which we thought would be covered more extensively in Samuel Guttenplan's A Companion to the Philosophy of Mind , for example, or in Peter Singer's A Companion to Ethics , but which should be treated in this Companion , if only briefly and for the sake of a more complete and self-contained Companion to Metaphysics . In addition, we tried to give a good sense of the sorts ... log in or subscribe to read full text