Customer Reviews

Ontology, Identity, and Modality: Essays in Metaphysics (Cambridge Studies in Philosophy)

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Peter van Inwagen is one of the best metaphysicians writing today, and this book includes some of his best work previously available only in journals. It includes his defense of three-dimensionalism (and attack on four-dimensionalism), his attack on the idea that there are multiple levels of being (a view often attributed to Meinong), his defense of a moderate modal skepticism of a sort, and lots of other work from one of the most influential and creative metaphysicians of our time.

The introduction includes a great summary of van Inwagen's work up to the time of publication and some detailed thoughts on the papers reprinted here. Many of these thoughts indicate his further thoughts on the matter or even in some cases where he's changed his mind in a substantive way or changed how he thinks the material would best be presented. In some ways this introduction is like some of David Lewis' postscripts to papers in his two volumes of collected papers entitled Philosophical Papers. So the introduction itself is worth having for his continued thoughts on some of these issues.

All said, this collection is definitely worth having.