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A Survey of Metaphysics

E. J. Lowe


  • 'E. J. Lowe, one of the UK's leading metaphysicians, has written a superb introduction to metaphysics.… Lowe's book is the best introduction to metaphysics available.' THES

A systematic overview of modern metaphysics, covering all of the most important topics in the subject likely to be encountered on a metaphysics course. The emphasis is on contemporary views and issues rather than on the history of metaphysics.

1. Introduction: The nature of metaphysics Part IIdentity and Change 2. Identity over time and change of composition 3. Qualitative change and the doctrine of temporal parts 4. Substantial change and spatiotemporal coincidence Part IINecessity, Essence, and Possible Worlds 5. Necessity and identity 6. Essentialism 7. Possible worlds Part IIICausation and Conditionals 8. Conterfactual conditionals 9. Causes and conditions 10. Conterfactuals and event causation Part IVActions and Events 11. Event causation and agent causation 12. Actions and Events 13. Events, things, and space-time Part VSpace and Time 14. Absolutism versus relationalism 15. Incongruent conterparts and the nature of space 16. The paradoxes of motion and the possibility of change 17. Tense and the reality of time 18. Causation and the direction of time Part VIUniversals and Particulars 19. Realism versus nominalism 20. The abstract and the concrete
E. J. Lowe , Professor of Philosophy, University of Durham
`This is a great book. It will immediately become--and will remain for some time--one of the two or three books that are seriously considered for any metaphysics course that uses a textbook. ' Professor Trenton Merricks, University of Virginia, US