Browsing Philosophy by Type "Master Thesis"
Now showing items 41-60 of 77
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Logic in Pictures: An Examination of Diagrammatic Representations, Graph Theory and Logic
(University of Waterloo, 1994)This thesis explores the various forms of reasoning that are associated with diagrams. It does this by a logical analysis of diagrammatic symbols. The thesis is divided into three sections dealing with different aspects ... -
Mathematical Actualism: An Alternative Realist Philosophy of Mathematics
(University of Waterloo, 2022-09-23)The present thesis argues for a philosophy of mathematics, herein dubbed Actualism, which is contrasted with several existing views on the philosophy of mathematics. It begins with a brief introduction to the classical ... -
The Measure Of Meaning
(University of Waterloo, 2007-09-27)There exists a broad inclination among those who theorize about mental representation to assume that the meanings of linguistic units, like words, are going to be identical to, and work exactly like, mental representations, ... -
A Misleading Tendency
(University of Waterloo, 2023-08-28)Communication is a powerful tool. We use it to share information, express how we feel, coordinate in cooperative endeavors, and so much more. However, we regularly use standard communicative devices like speech and gesture ... -
Moral Encroachment
(University of Waterloo, 2011-10-28)Can practical factors influence a subject's position to know? Traditionally this question has been answered in the negative. A subject's position to know proposition p is not thought to improve merely because the subject ... -
Moral Fictionalism and Moral Reasons
(University of Waterloo, 2008-08-28)One major problem with moral discourse is that we tend treat moral utterances as if they represent propositions. But complex metaphysical problems arise when we try to describe the nature of the moral facts that correspond ... -
Moral Responsibility and the Self
(University of Waterloo, 2011-08-31)Moral responsibility is an issue at the heart of the free-will debate. The question of how we can have moral responsibility in a deterministic world is an interesting and puzzling one. Compatibilists arguments have left ... -
Naturalizing Moral Judgment
(University of Waterloo, 2006-12-18)Philosophers have traditionally attempted to solve metaethical disputes about the nature of moral judgment through reasoned argument alone. Empirical evidence about how we do make moral judgments is often overlooked in ... -
The Nature of Pluralism in Economics: A Case Study of the Gender Wage Gap
(University of Waterloo, 2015-10-02)Understanding and measuring a socially relevant and complex phenomenon like the gender wage gap requires a thorough understanding of the causal factors arising in the real world. This thesis investigates the Marxist and ... -
ON BRANDS | An Investigation into the Nature of Consumer Brands | Are they real or constructed?
(University of Waterloo, 2014-10-08)This thesis investigates the nature of consumer brands in the context of the contemporary realism debate. It comprises three chapters. The first chapter introduces the what, the why and the how of brands, to wit: I describe ... -
The Phenomenological Origins of Property
(University of Waterloo, 2018-09-26)This thesis delineates the phenomenological basis of ownership and property. The phenomenological theory of property has three main elements: the minimal self, the relationship between the sense of agency and the sense of ... -
Practical Reasoning and Rationality
(University of Waterloo, 2009-04-30)Theories of practical reasoning and rationality have been expounded at least as far back as the Greeks. Beginning with several historical perspectives, I attempt to answer the descriptive and normative questions of practical ... -
The Pregnant Self
(University of Waterloo, 2009-10-02)Pregnancy, a human phenomenon experienced throughout the world and throughout history, has been largely ignored by the philosophical community. A preference for the abnormal and the extraordinary has left this common yet ... -
A Preservationist Approach to Relevant Logic
(University of Waterloo, 2014-08-29)The semantics I develop extend an approach to logic called preservationism. The preservationist approach to logic interprets non-classical consequence relations as preserving something other than truth. I specifically ... -
Private Property Rights: An Indispensable Moral Foundation of Society
(University of Waterloo, 2014-09-05)The philosophic justifications of private property reach back to the ancient world. Aristotle regarded secure possessions as necessary for successful social functioning, and Cicero understood government’s function to be ... -
Psychological and Phenomenological Perspectives on the Hard Problem of Consciousness
(University of Waterloo, 2017-01-19)In reexamining the hard problem of consciousness through the history of the concept of mind, I argue that psychologists, cognitive scientists, and analytic philosophers of mind should return to the first-person perspective ... -
Quantum Field Theory: Motivating the Axiom of Microcausality
(University of Waterloo, 2012-09-19)Axiomatic quantum field theory is one approach to the project of merging the special theory of relativity with that of ordinary quantum mechanics. The project begins with the postulation of a set of axioms. Axioms should ... -
Rationality and Group Decision-Making in Practical Healthcare
(University of Waterloo, 2006)In this paper, a view of non-compliance in practical healthcare is provided that identifies certain non-compliant behaviours as rational. This view of rational non-compliance is used to update a current form of doctor ... -
A Realist Critique of Structural Empiricism
(University of Waterloo, 2009-11-04)In his latest work, Scientific Representation: Paradoxes of Perspective, Bas van Fraassen has argued for a position he describes as empiricist structuralism. This position embraces a structuralist view of science which ... -
Reducing the Emergence of the Gaps: Computation for Weak Emergence
(University of Waterloo, 2014-09-29)This thesis contributes to the growing literature surrounding the importance of weak emergence by showing it can account for more phenomena than originally conceived via the use of computational reduction. Weak emergence ...