--- title: Further Reading section-id: conclusion sort: 110 author: Prof. James Okafor created: 2026-03-12 09:00 modified: 2026-04-18 10:00 language: en description: Annotated reading list for each section of the book. --- # Further Reading What follows is a selective guide to further reading, organised by chapter. The aim is to provide accessible entry points into the primary literature and the best secondary sources, not to be exhaustive. ## Epistemology ### What is Knowledge? - **Edmund Gettier**, ‘Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?’ (1963) — three pages that changed the field. Available freely online. - **Alvin Goldman**, ‘What is Justified Belief?’ (1979) — the classic statement of reliabilism - **Ernest Sosa**, *A Virtue Epistemology* (2007) — sophisticated virtue-theoretic approach - **Jonathan Jenkins Ichikawa and Matthias Steup**, ‘The Analysis of Knowledge,’ *Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy* — comprehensive and freely available ### Perception and Reality - **John Locke**, *An Essay Concerning Human Understanding*, Book II (1689) — the original representative realist account - **George Berkeley**, *Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous* (1713) — more accessible than the *Principles* - **A.D. Smith**, *The Problem of Perception* (2002) — thorough survey of the main positions ### Reason and Rationalism - **René Descartes**, *Meditations on First Philosophy* (1641) — the canonical starting point - **Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz**, *New Essays on Human Understanding* (1704, pub. 1765) — rationalist response to Locke - **Laurence BonJour**, *In Defense of Pure Reason* (1998) — contemporary defence of a priori knowledge ### Empiricism - **David Hume**, *An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding* (1748) — accessible presentation of Hume’s empiricism - **A.J. Ayer**, *Language, Truth and Logic* (1936) — logical positivism’s most readable statement - **W.V.O. Quine**, ‘Two Dogmas of Empiricism’ (1951) — influential attack on the analytic-synthetic distinction ### Scepticism and Its Responses - **René Descartes**, *Meditations* (1641) — source of the dream argument and evil demon - **Ludwig Wittgenstein**, *On Certainty* (1951) — the hinge propositions account - **Barry Stroud**, *The Significance of Philosophical Scepticism* (1984) — the most serious treatment of scepticism as a genuine challenge ### Theories of Truth - **William James**, *Pragmatism* (1907) — accessible statement of pragmatist truth - **Paul Horwich**, *Truth* (1990) — the minimalist theory - **Michael Lynch**, *True to Life: Why Truth Matters* (2004) — accessible defence of truth pluralism ## Metaphysics ### Existence and Being - **Bertrand Russell**, ‘On Denoting’ (1905) — the theory of descriptions - **W.V.O. Quine**, *From a Logical Point of View* (1953) — ontological commitment and naturalism - **David Armstrong**, *Universals: An Opinionated Introduction* (1989) — accessible introduction to the universals debate ### Identity and Persistence - **Derek Parfit**, *Reasons and Persons* (1984), Part III — the most important modern treatment of personal identity - **David Lewis**, *On the Plurality of Worlds* (1986) — four-dimensionalism and modal realism - **Eric Olson**, *The Human Animal* (1997) — defence of animalism ### Causation - **David Hume**, *An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding*, Section 7 (1748) - **David Lewis**, ‘Causation’ (1973) — the classic counterfactual account - **Judea Pearl**, *Causality* (2009) — the interventionist framework with formal rigour ### Free Will and Determinism - **Peter van Inwagen**, *An Essay on Free Will* (1983) — the consequence argument - **Harry Frankfurt**, ‘Alternate Possibilities and Moral Responsibility’ (1969) — Frankfurt cases - **P.F. Strawson**, ‘Freedom and Resentment’ (1962) — the reactive attitudes ### Philosophy of Mind - **David Chalmers**, *The Conscious Mind* (1996) — the hard problem and property dualism - **Daniel Dennett**, *Consciousness Explained* (1991) — the deflationary/illusionist view - **Frank Jackson**, ‘Epiphenomenal Qualia’ (1982) — Mary’s room ### The Nature of Time - **J.M.E. McTaggart**, ‘The Unreality of Time’ (1908) — the A-series/B-series distinction - **D.H. Mellor**, *Real Time II* (1998) — B-theorist account - **Craig Callender** (ed.), *The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Time* (2011) — comprehensive ## Ethics ### Foundations of Ethics - **J.L. Mackie**, *Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong* (1977) — error theory - **Simon Blackburn**, *Ruling Passions* (1998) — quasi-realism - **John Rawls**, *A Theory of Justice* (1971), Section 4 — reflective equilibrium as method ### Consequentialism - **John Stuart Mill**, *Utilitarianism* (1863) — the canonical text, short and readable - **Peter Singer**, *Practical Ethics* (1979) — applied consequentialism - **Samuel Scheffler**, *The Rejection of Consequentialism* (1982) — the integrity and agent-centred objections ### Deontological Ethics - **Immanuel Kant**, *Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals* (1785) — the source - **Robert Nozick**, *Anarchy, State, and Utopia* (1974) — rights as side constraints - **Judith Jarvis Thomson**, *The Trolley Problem* (1985) — the doing/allowing distinction ### Virtue Ethics - **Aristotle**, *Nicomachean Ethics* — Book I (eudaimonia), Book II (virtues as means), Book VI (practical wisdom) - **G.E.M. Anscombe**, ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’ (1958) — the essay that launched the revival - **Rosalind Hursthouse**, *On Virtue Ethics* (1999) — best systematic contemporary account ### Applied Ethics - **Peter Singer**, ‘Famine, Affluence, and Morality’ (1972) — the drowning child argument - **Tom Regan**, *The Case for Animal Rights* (1983) - **Frances Kamm**, *Morality, Mortality*, 2 vols. (1993, 1996) — fine-grained applied deontology ### Political Philosophy - **John Rawls**, *A Theory of Justice* (1971) — the most important work in twentieth-century political philosophy - **Robert Nozick**, *Anarchy, State, and Utopia* (1974) — libertarian response - **Isaiah Berlin**, ‘Two Concepts of Liberty’ (1958) — negative vs positive liberty ## Non-Western Philosophy: Entry Points The main text is weighted toward the Western analytic tradition. The following provide accessible entry points into other traditions: - **Mark Siderits**, *Personal Identity and Buddhist Philosophy* (2003) — Buddhist no-self and personal identity - **Bryan Van Norden**, *Introduction to Classical Chinese Philosophy* (2011) - **Kwame Gyekye**, *An Essay on African Philosophical Thought* (1987) — Akan philosophy - **Jonardon Ganeri**, *The Self: Naturalism, Consciousness, and the First-Person Stance* (2012) — Indian philosophy and analytic philosophy in dialogue