This book is undeservedly out of print. What Mozart is to the symphony, Salmon is to direct reference theory. Clearly one of the most rigorous and thorough texts in analytic philosophy of language of the latter twentieth century, written by one of the finest minds who ever graced either the UCLA or Princeton campus. UCSB is lucky to have him. And I understand that the original manuscript was styled in quite legible handwriting (not to mention correct logical notation).

This text is essential reading for anyone interested in the philosophy of language (even Quine said so!), and it is a superb defense of what has been called "The Theory of Direct Reference." It is a clear exposition and analysis of the specifics pertinent to the theory, especially helpful is Section 3 in Ch 1 on Rigid Designation. And you thought 'obstinacy' was peculiar to feminism!

The first 150 pages of this book reads like the first 150 pages of Joyce's Ulysses--what a masterpiece! However, I must say that I think the formalizations in Part Four (on Putnam's Theory) are a bit showy.

If ever you require a text that discusses the fundamentals of Donnellan's Elucidations on (T9) or "The General K-Mechanism and the I-Mechanism," then this is the book for you.

Lastly, Salmon's book clearly discusses Putnam's Paradox. Very sexy. But I daresay that Michael Fletcher's MA thesis (CSULB) is also a good place to start for that particular discussion (although it's a bit descriptive, requiring more formalizations of the significant arguments).

This text is required reading, continuous with Naming and Necessity, and Kalish, Montague, and Marr: Formal Logic.

Enjoy. And now try to find yourself a copy. Good luck.

This text can jump start one's study of the most advanced topics in the philosophy of language in the analytic tradition. Traditional theories of reference are contrasted with the new direct theory of reference. It is argued that the direct theory (the causal theory of reference) does not really support belief in essences.

In Representation and Reality, Putnam begins with Aristotle's definition of "mental", Quine's idea of the corporate nature of theories, and weaves a philosophic record that is stunningly reminiscent of Martha Stewart's new handbook of hors d'oeurves. Yes, the jig is up: what Putnam is really after here is to define what exactly makes a good cream puff and his argument is complete with a lemma that weighs the pros and cons of custard vs. whipped cream filling. Modern analytic philosophy is really a boring topic and one isn't surprised that Putnam really avoids such issues as whether or not language is a game with rules or really a television program that will soon be cancelled if ratings don't go up. This is what Putnam sees as the influence of the environment on the meaning of words and the the meaning of "meaning" (it's not spoiling the plot to tell you that "meaning" is also a word that is used in the English language; however, when I've asked people who only speak Mandarin Chinese if they know the meaning of "meaning", they usually just give me a blank look. Obviously this is a topic that needs to be ironed out). Yet, it isn't until the last chapter that Putman throws down the gauntlet, spills the beans, and reveals that his whole philosophic endeavor, or journey, is one vast voyage to discover the perfect guacamole dip (his idea of adding Ketalar as well as lime will no doubt raise a few eyebrows, but, let me assure you, I've mixed up a batch and it's very tasty). Finally, his critique of Fodor, while well-intentioned, is sure to remain incomprehesible to the vast majority of nonphilosophers who are certain that their brain is really a soft substance inside their skull that thinks and is conscious, and is not, as Fodor argues, a pilfered pack of cigarettes deftly taken from a fast food store when the clerk wasn't looking. While you need to know a lot about contemporary analytic philosophy to understand this book, you need to know very little of this same subject to leave it alone. Brilliant!

This book -- comprising Putnam's Dewey Lectures at Columbia University, and his Royce Lectures given at Brown -- is a tremendously engaging tour d'horizon of contemporary epistemology and philosophy of mind. Putnam, at the top of his profession for over three decades, remains a powerful and acute thinker, and 'The Threefold Cord' is full of insightful observations, and clear arguments, displaying the growing influence on Putnam's work of both the American Pragmatists, and of the later Wittgenstein.

Analytic philosophy is often forebidding, and Prof. Putnam is a quintessential analytic philosopher. But, for those wanting an accessible book to try their minds in the analytical tradition without being overwhelmed, this is a nice start. The "Brains in a Vat" chapter is a bit tiresome as an analytic tool, but the remainder of the book is less obscure and more provocative. The book covers metaphysics, value theory, ethics, and epistemology in a highly engaging manner. If only more analytic philosophers wrote with such clarity and easy style. Don't be fooled. This book will be a mental workout, but one you'll enjoy rather than belabor.

Preface, 1. Brains in a vat, 2. A problem about reference, 3. Two philosophical perspectives, 4. Mind and body, 5. Two conceptions of rationality, 6. Fact and value, 7. Reason and history, 8. The impact of science on modern conceptions of rationality, 9. Values, facts and cognition, Appendix, Index. (It referes paperback edition, 1995.)

If you didn't know, this book is hard. I am a first year engineering student, and I felt lost through most of it. I gather it was intended for full-fledged physicists, but I was intrigued to read it anyway because of a philosophical thread running through the work. But beware--get ready for some Immanuel Kant and Einstein in only the introduction. This book is as much about the physics of time as the philosophy concerning subjectivity of time. Even though I didn't understand a lot of the probability or almost any of the quantum mechanics math, I still got some pleasure out of some of the more bizzare conclusions of the book. Did you know that for an isolated system (one not interacting with any others), time can't be said to have any direction? Furthermore, time as we know it is just a statistic. Another interesting fact is that on the quantum mechanical level, there is no such thing as time! If these things intrigue you (and you know what a double Riemann sum is) go for this book. Otherwise, be very afraid...

It is a beautiful but exterememly difficult book. It covers the concept of time and direction of time from the beginning up to current thinking. Author, being one of the founding fathers of philosophical quantum theory first introduces a good understanding of Thermodaynamics and Statiastical Physics and defines the order of events to lead into statistical definition of arrow of time. A lot of difficult concepts from Classsical Statistical Physics, Probability Theory, Relativity and Mathematical Logic as well as a good understanding of Quantum Physics is assumed to be in the bag of the reader, after all this book is not a Popular Science book. Although the author claims that knowledge of derivations of the formulas used are not critical to understand this study yet time to time the language and logic becames exteremely difficult. This is a must read book in this subject, may be many times or time and time over after increasing the understanding in other subjects that only tools in this book.

H.Reichenbach is undoubtly one of the most remarkable scientists that the world has ever witnessed. The interested mind is to be very strongly urged to read the book 'The direction of time' by him. Time is an essential concept to every physics student, as without it nature would be meaningless, and therefore the study of nature would be an empty pursuit. Whenever we wish to understand why we are in the 'world', say rather than in the planet MARS we have to understand thoroughly what actually happenned in the past, beginning from The Big Bang, that is, from the beginning of time. The book gives us a clear understanding into this inquiry ('TIME') developing both classical and quantum mechanical content of the concept of time starting from the first principles. The book carefully clarifies many confusing conceptions about time. For instance, the author clearly explains the contradictions lying in the famous Zeno's paradox which attemts to prove that time does not exist, in such a way that the physics student is now much more confident with such essential concepts as displacement and velocity. Also in the book, another essential concept of statistical physics ENTROPY is developed in a very systematic way and through this concept the direction of time is decisively established. Moreover, the issue of DETERMINACY or INDETERMINACY , an issue which is simply ignored in the text books or mentioned briefly in a few sentences as if it is self-evident and therefore does not need further elaboration, is discussed in depth, so both theoretical and experimental physicists have now a strong ground in arguing their proposals. I, as a physicist of 18 years of university lecturing experience, strongly recommend it to every single physics student or actually every single mind (student or not) who cares about the future, and who needs a decisive explanation (justification) for their potential steps to save (before being too late) our home THE WORLD WHICH WE NOW LIVE IN, only home only home and only home for us and for our childeren including of course our organic bodies, the animals and the plants. The direction of time and equally of The ENTROPY are the key concepts to understand what technology actually is, and to understand why it is inevitable to face more and more polluted environment as technology advances.

Why or why not submit to (techincal) battery in the name of better health? Because intervention always works? Because we patients deeply want to believe intervention will help? Because providers want us to believe it will help? Because it's faster? Because it's better?

This book lays out the pieces of medical choice-making in the context of the probabilities that underlie all desision making. It suggests that principled gambling is seminal to medical choices and makes suggestions, via numerous clinical vignettes, of how medical practice needs to change so that patients and practitioners can make better choices rather than those based on blind faith, short-term clinical efficiency, and shamanistic egos.

In short, this book deconstructs the mechanistic (know-it-all) paradigm of medical practice and replaces it with a probabilistic (don't know it all) paradigm that would, in most cases, be fairer and kinder to all.

Medicine would be a better place if the suggestions in this book were adopted.

I only reed chapter 9, since this was what I had to read for my assignment. I found it interesting but very heavy. Maby someone else find the book better? I should add that I am not a native speaker of English.