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"We talk and think about our beliefs both in qualitative terms-as when we say that we believe A, or disbelieve A, or are agnostic about A-and in quantitative terms, as when we say that we believe A to a certain degree, or are more strongly convinced of A than of B. Traditionally, analytic philosophers, especially epistemologists, have focused on categorical (all-or-nothing) beliefs, to the almost complete neglect of graded beliefs. On the other hand, the Bayesian boom that started in the late 1980s has led many philosophers to concentrate fully on graded beliefs; these philosophers have sometimes rejected talk about categorical beliefs as being unscientific and as therefore having no place in a serious epistemology. By now, many regard both approaches as misguided for being entirely one-sided. Both outright beliefs and graded beliefs occupy important places in the phenomenology of belief and they also both occur in much theoretically significant work. Once this is acknowledged, however, the question arises of how the two sorts of beliefs are connected. If anyone were to claim to believe A categorically while at the same time claiming that she deems not-A more likely than A, we would reject this as utterly unreasonable. This is enough to suggest that there must be a close connection between categorical and graded belief"--

Belief and doubt --- Rationalism --- Lotteries --- Miscellanea --- Theory of knowledge --- Logic

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We talk and think about our beliefs both in a categorical (yes/no) and in a graded way. How do the two kinds of belief hang together? The most straightforward answer is that we believe something categorically if we believe it to a high enough degree. But this seemingly obvious, near-platitudinous claim is known to give rise to a paradox commonly known as the 'lottery paradox' - at least when it is coupled with some further seeming near-platitudes about belief. How to resolve that paradox has been a matter of intense philosophical debate for over fifty years. This volume offers a collection of newly commissioned essays on the subject, all of which provide compelling reasons for rethinking many of the fundamentals of the debate.

Belief and doubt. --- Lotteries --- Rationalism. --- Knowledge, Theory of --- Religion --- Belief and doubt --- Deism --- Free thought --- Realism --- Gambling --- Conviction --- Doubt --- Consciousness --- Credulity --- Emotions --- Philosophy --- Psychology --- Will --- Agnosticism --- Rationalism --- Skepticism --- Miscellanea. --- Lotteries - Miscellanea

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This book contains ten papers that were presented at the symposium about the realism debate, held at the Center for Logic, Philosophy of Science and Philosophy of Language of the Institute of Philosophy at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven on 10 and 11 March 1995. The first group of papers are directly concerned with the realism/anti-realism debate in the general philosophy of science. This group includes the articles by Ernan McMullin, Diderik Batens/Joke Meheus, Igor Douven and Herman de Regt. The papers of the second group concentrate on specific problems arising from the realism/anti-realism debate. Theo Kuipers' contribution discusses the problem of truth-approximation. Roger Vergauwen's article pertains to the issue of realism in the philosophy of mind and semantics. Jaap van Brakel's article focusses on the relation between everyday concepts and scientific concepts, and on the theory-dependence of observation. Paul Cortois investigates the relation between the question of realism and Kuhn's concept of incommensurability between scientific theories. The final group contains two papers on the realism/anti-realism debate in the special sciences. James Cushing discusses the problem of underdetermination in quantum mechanics and Jean Paul van bendegem addresses the question of the possiblity of an empiricist philosophy of mathematics.

Realism. --- Science --- Philosophy.

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This book contains ten papers that were presented at the symposium about the realism debate, held at the Center for Logic, Philosophy of Science and Philosophy of Language of the Institute of Philosophy at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven on 10 and 11 March 1995. The first group of papers are directly concerned with the realism/anti-realism debate in the general philosophy of science. This group includes the articles by Ernan McMullin, Diderik Batens/Joke Meheus, Igor Douven and Herman de Regt. The papers of the second group concentrate on specific problems arising from the realism/anti-realism debate. Theo Kuipers' contribution discusses the problem of truth-approximation. Roger Vergauwen's article pertains to the issue of realism in the philosophy of mind and semantics. Jaap van Brakel's article focusses on the relation between everyday concepts and scientific concepts, and on the theory-dependence of observation. Paul Cortois investigates the relation between the question of realism and Kuhn's concept of incommensurability between scientific theories. The final group contains two papers on the realism/anti-realism debate in the special sciences. James Cushing discusses the problem of underdetermination in quantum mechanics and Jean Paul van bendegem addresses the question of the possiblity of an empiricist philosophy of mathematics.

Realism. --- Science --- Philosophy.