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    The image next to Wittgenstein is actually John Turturro saying ‘If pasta could talk, I’d understand it’.–On a lighter note:…

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    And the image of eyeglasses in the linguistic turn panel are not eyeglasses. (oh wait, I thought we were playing…

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    Like the image next to Kripke’s name, that is in fact not an image of G. E. Moore, either.

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    The image next to Quine is not Quine, either, although at least it bears some resemblance to him, unlike the…

Open access philosophy books, a thread: Part IV

Brian Leiter

The last thread had fewer entries than earlier ones, but several months have past, perhaps readers can supply some new links. The instructions, as before:

In light of the growing number of these volumes, I am going to run a thread periodically in which I invite authors or readers to share links to philosophical works that are currently or permanently “open access.”  Please use your full name and a valid email address (the latter will not appear) and include the URL for the book (give the title and the author, if you are not the author).  Authors or readers can only say something about the work and what it tries to do.  Please indicate if the “open access” period is limited.

Submit your comment only once, it may take awhile to appear.  Do not post about books that have appeared in earlier iterations of these threads.

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7 responses to “Open access philosophy books, a thread: Part IV”

  1. Jonathan Cohen

    OUP has made open access (i believe permanently) my 2009 book, The Red and the Real: An Essay on Color Ontology.
    link: https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/112440
    publisher’s book abstract: This book offers a new approach to longstanding philosophical puzzles about what colors are and how they fit into the natural world. The author argues for a role-functionalist treatment of color — a view according to which colors are identical to certain functional roles involving perceptual effects on subjects. The author first argues (on broadly empirical grounds) for the more general relationalist view that colors are constituted in terms of relations between objects, perceivers, and viewing conditions. He responds to semantic, ontological, and phenomenological objections against this thesis, and argues that relationalism offers the best hope of respecting both empirical results and ordinary belief about color. He then defends the more specific role-functionalist account by contending that the latter is the most plausible form of color relationalism.

    Reply
  2. Scott Wisdom

    WINDSOR STUDIES IN ARGUMENT (WSIA) aims to publish timely works in the theory of argumentation — understood broadly, in a way that encompasses informal logic, rhetoric, dialectics, and related fields.

    The University of Windsor’s Digital Press, under the auspices of the Leddy Library, publishes WSIA through the Open Monograph Press and the Public Knowledge Project (PKP) – a multi-university initiative developing open source software and conducting research to improve the quality and reach of scholarly publishing.

    All 16 volumes in the WSIA series are available in multiple formats (PDF, EPUB, MOBI) from the Windsor Studies in Argumentation website:

    https://windsor.scholarsportal.info/omp/index.php/wsia/catalog

    Copies may be printed from the website. Bound volumes are available through commercial booksellers like Amazon.

    Reply
  3. Andre Santos Campos

    The Semi-Future Democracy. A Liberal Theory of the Long-Term View (Edinburgh University Press, 2024)
    Permanent Open Access. URL: https://edinburghuniversitypress.com/pub/media/ebooks/9781399534307.pdf

    Publisher’s book abstract: Traditional institutions are often considered inadequate to govern for the long term as their politicians promote short-term thinking which can harm the future. This book proposes a novel theory of social time perception to address the short-term thinking of traditional institutions which threaten to stifle liberal democracies. The semi-future reconfigures liberal democracies’ franchises, representative instruments, deliberative practices, accountability mechanisms, and policymaking to include in the demos all citizens, regardless of age, and holders of representable objective interests in the future. The result is not only a way to legitimise long-term governance but also to improve the quality of current democracies.

    Reply
  4. Justin Khoo

    The Meaning of If (OUP, 2022) is now open access and available at the OUP site: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-meaning-of-if-9780190096700?cc=us&lang=en&

    From OUP: “According to Khoo’s theory, conditionals form a unified class of expressions which share a common semantic core that encodes inferential dispositions. Thus, rather than represent the world, conditionals are devices used to communicate how we are disposed to infer. Khoo shows that this theory can be extended to predict the probabilities of conditionals, as well as how different kinds of conditionals differ both semantically and pragmatically.”

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  5. Bryan Reece

    Aristotelian Ontological Priority and Metaphysical Grounding (Cambridge University Press, 2026) is open access until May 20, 2026 on Cambridge’s site:

    https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/2E8391BEB35AEDE055FE5868B6A86CC4/9781009547963AR.pdf/aristotelian-ontological-priority-and-metaphysical-grounding.pdf

    Abstract: Many think that reality is structured such that some beings are more fundamental than others and characterize this structure in terms of “grounding.” Grounding is typically regarded as explanatory and as exhibiting certain order-theoretic properties: asymmetry, irreflexivity, and transitivity. Aristotle’s notion of ontological priority, which inspired discussions of grounding, also has these features. This Element clarifies Aristotle’s discussions of ontological priority, explores how it relates to other kinds of priority, and identifies important connections to metaphysical grounding. Aristotle provides numerous examples that appear to impugn ontological priority’s order-theoretic coherence. This is Aristotle’s “Priority Problem.” But Aristotle has an independently motivated solution that eliminates the threat from each of the apparently problematic examples and explains why such examples are ubiquitous. The Element argues that a ground-theoretic analog of Aristotle’s solution to the Priority Problem addresses recent challenges to grounding.

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  6. Gino Zaccaria

    Science Under the Yoke of Value: A Phenomenological Inquiry into the Evaluation Machinery, by Maurizio Borghi, Ivo De Gennaro, and Gino Zaccaria (Routledge, 2025). The book asks why no amount of criticism of metrics, rankings, and audit culture ever seems to change anything. Its answer sounds as follows: the Evaluation Machinery is not itself the disease which threatens scientific research; rather, — it is what prevents us from seeing that disease — which might explain why so many, against their better instincts, prefer to go along with it it. Drawing on Plato, Aristotle, Galilei, Einstein, Husserl, Heidegger, and Arendt, the authors trace two deeper transformations of modern science — i.e.. its “technicization” and its “societization” — and argue that evaluative practices mark on functions as the seal on a progressive de-philosophization of science that scholars can no longer see, let alone resist. The book also includes an in-depth striking analysis of anonymity in peer review and concludes ends with a philosophical dialogue that sums up the main insights it brings to the table. Permanently open access (CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0).
    https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/oa-edit/10.4324/9781003134497/science-yoke-value-maurizio-borghi-ivo-de-gennaro-gino-zaccaria

    Reply
  7. Rob

    Thomas Grundmann’s Expert Authority and the Limits of Critical Thinking
    https://academic.oup.com/book/62490

    Saul Smilanksy’s Paradoxical Ethics
    https://academic.oup.com/book/62721

    Reply

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