Formal Philosophy, a collection of interviews with 21 logicians and philosophers edited by Vincent Hendricks and John Symons is now available. The website contains a number of interesting excerpts.
Interviews with
Johan van Benthem, Brian F. Chellas, Anne Fagot-Largeault, Melvin Fitting, Dagfinn Føllesdal, Haim Gaifman, Clark Nøren Glymour, Adolf Grünbaum, Susan Haack, Sven Ove Hansson, Jaakko Hintikka, H. Jerome Keisler, Isaac Levi, Ruth Barcan Marcus, Rohit Parikh, Jeff Paris, Gabriel Sandu, Krister Segerberg, Wolfgang Spohn, Patrick Suppes, Timothy Williamson.
Formal Philosophy is a collection of short interviews based on 5 questions presented to some of the most influential and prominent scholars in formal philosophy. We hear their views on formal philosophy, its aim, scope and how their work fits in these respects.
This is a fabulous collection. Hendricks and Symons have performed an important service to the entire philosophical community. The interviews are not only rewarding in and of themselves but they will help the reader understand what has been going on and has been achieved in the past fifty years.
Ernie Lepore, Rutgers, NJ, USAWhy do you do philosophy that way? Do you believe all philosophy could be done that way? Do you think it should be done that way? These are questions one seldom asks, except perhaps at dinner. Yet there is a lot one could learn from the answers, especially when they come from philosophers who do have a distinguished way of doing their job. Formal Philosophy identifies one such way and collects the answers of its eminent practitioners—not the quick answers one might give over an entrecôte, but the answers one gives when seriously prompted to reflect upon their daily profession. An enticing, provocative, completely novel way of surveying the landscape of contemporary philosophy.
Achille Varzi, Columbia University, NY, USA