Reconceptions in Philosophy and Other Arts and Sciences

This book takes further strides in an impressive course of thought that has already brought notable reconceptions in and beyond philosophy. In The Structure of Appearance, recognition of the relativity left open by legitimate criteria of constructional definition altered the nature of philosophical inquiry. In Fact, Fiction, and Forecast, questions concerning induction were wholly recast. In Languages of Art, the subject matter of aesthetics was transformed. In that book and With Reference to Reference, a novel, sensitive, and powerful theory of symbols clarified relationships among the arts, the sciences, and philosophy. And in Ways of Worldmaking, construction replaced discovery as the main business of scientific and philosophical inquiry.

After briefly surveying this course of thought, Reconceptions carries it far forward with brilliant new studies of representation, interpretation, variation, and other topics in the theory of architecture, painting, music, psychology. These studies not only illustrate how the general theoretical approach and apparatus can interrelate and illuminate diverse fields, they also serve as tests that sometimes call for such improvements in the general theory as the invention of a new concept of ‘contrastive exemplification’.