Abstract
This discussion concerns whether philosophical materialism is false or not. The exchange between Graham Harman and Javier Pérez-Jara goes to the core of the present book: what is materialism, how many varieties are there, and what use are they today? While Harman identifies materialism with reductionism, Pérez-Jara offers a broader definition that includes non-reductionist materialisms. It might seem to be just as a matter of differing definitions. And yet, each approach gives rise to a whole different way of reconstructing the history of philosophy as well as of deciding which are the current available options in metaphysics.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Aristotle. 1999. Metaphysics. Trans. J. Sachs. Santa Fe: Green Lion Press.
Bennett, J. 2010. Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things. London: Duke University Press.
Bennett, J. 2012. Systems and things: A response to Graham Harman and Timothy Morton. New Literary History 43:225–233.
Berkeley, G. 1992. A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge. Indianapolis: Hackett.
Boyle, R. 2008[1674]. The Excellencies of Robert Boyle: The Excellency of Theology and The Excellency and Grounds of the Mechanical Hypothesis. Peterborough: Broadview Press.
Bryant, L.R. 2014. Onto–Cartography: An Ontology of Machines and Media. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Bueno, G. 1970. El papel de la filosofía en el conjunto del saber. Madrid: Editorial Ciencia Nueva.
Bueno, G. 1972. Ensayos Materialistas. Madrid: Taurus.
Bueno, G. 1979a. Operaciones autoformantes y heteroformantes. Ensayo de un criterio de demarcación gnoseológica entre la Lógica formal y la Matemática (I). El Basilisco 7:16–39.
Bueno, G. 1979b. Operaciones autoformantes y heteroformantes ensayo de un criterio de demarcación gnoseológica entre la Lógica formal y la Matemática (II). El Basilisco 8:4–25.
Bueno, G. 1993. Teoría del cierre categorial. Vol 5: El sistema de las doctrinas gnoseológicas. Adecuacionismo. Circularismo Oviedo: Pentalfa.
Bueno, G. 2007. La fe del ateo. Madrid: Temas de Hoy.
Bueno, G. 2016. El ego trascendental. Oviedo: Pentalfa.
Bueno, G. 2019. The Happiness Delusion. Debunking the Myth of Happiness. Oviedo: Pentalfa.
Bunge, M. 1977. Treatise on Basic Philosophy. Vol. 3: The Furniture of the World. Dordrecht: Reidel Publishing Company.
Bunge, M. 1979. Treatise on Basic Philosophy. Vol 4: Ontology II: A World of Systems. Dordrecht: Reidel Publishing Company.
Bunge, M. 1985. Treatise on Basic Philosophy. Vol. 7: Epistemology & Methodology III: Philosophy of Science and Technology Part I: Formal and Physical Sciences. Dordrecht: Reidel Publishing Company.
Bunge, M. 1996. Finding Philosophy in Social Science. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Bunge, M. 2010. Matter and Mind: A Philosophical Inquiry. New York: Springer.
Caroll, L. 1993[1898]. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. United States: Dover.
Eddington, A.S. 1929. The Nature of the Physical World, New York: MacMillan.
Gabriel, M. 2015. Why the World Does Not Exist. Cambridge: Polity.
Gabriel, M. 2017. I am Not a Brain: Philosophy of Mind for the 21st Century. Cambridge: Polity.
Harman, G. 2011. On the undermining of objects: Grant, Bruno, and radical philosophy. In The Speculative Turn: Continental Materialism and Realism, eds. L. Bryant, N. Srnicek, and G Harman, 21–40. Melbourne: re.press.
Harman, G. 2012. The third table. In The Book of Books, ed. C. Christov-Bakargiev, 540–542, Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz Verlag.
Harman, G. 2013. Undermining, overmining, and duomining: A critique. In ADD Metaphysics, 40–51. J. Sutela, Aalto: Aalto University Design Research Laboratory.
Kant, I. 1996. Critique of Pure Reason. Trans. W. Pluhar. Indianapolis: Hackett.
Latour, B. 2007a. Can we get our materialism back, please? Isis 98:138–142.
Latour, B. 2007b. Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor–Network Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Martin, M. 1989. Atheism: A Philosophical Justification. Philadelphia: Temple University.
Martin, M., and R. Monnier. (eds.). 2003. The Impossibility of God. New York: Prometheus.
Meillassoux, Q. 2015. Appendix: Excerpts from L’inexistence Divine. Trans. G. Harman. In Quenting: Meillassoux: Philosophy in the Making. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, ed. by Graham Harman, 224–287.
Ongay, Í. 2020. New (and Old) atheism(s) reconsidered. In Atheism Revisited. Rethinking Modernity and Inventing New Modes of Life, ed. by Szymon Wróbel and Krzysztof Skonieczny. New York: Springer.
Pérez Jara, J. 2005. Materia y racionalidad: sobre la inexistencia de la Idea de Dios. El Basilisco 36:27–64.
Pérez Jara, J. 2011. La importancia del cuerpo como “constitutivo formal” de todo viviente en la filosofía de Schopenhauer. Thémata. Revista de Filosofía 44:424–438.
Pérez Jara, J. 2014. La Filosofía de Bertrand Russell. Oviedo: Pentalfa.
Romero, G.E. 2018. Scientific Philosophy. Cham, Switzerland: Springer.
Sellars, W. 2007. Philosophy and the scientific image of man. In In the Space of Reasons, 369–408. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Whitehead, A.N. 1978. Process and Reality. New York: Free Press.
Žižek, S., and D. Glyn. 2003. Conversations with Žižek. Cambridge: Polity.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2022 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Harman, G., Pérez-Jara, J. (2022). Materialism Is False/Materialism Is Not False. In: Romero, G.E., Pérez-Jara, J., Camprubí, L. (eds) Contemporary Materialism: Its Ontology and Epistemology. Synthese Library, vol 447. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-89488-7_13
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-89488-7_13
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-89487-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-89488-7
eBook Packages: Religion and PhilosophyPhilosophy and Religion (R0)