Author Description

Contemporary Essentialism And Real Essentialism -- Against Modalism: Possible Worlds -- Against Modalism: Fine's Critique -- Reductionism: The Illusory Search For Inner Constitution -- Why Real Essentialism? -- Some Varieties Of Anti-essentialism -- Empiricist Anti-essentialism -- Quinean Animadversions -- Popper: Avoiding 'what-is?' Questions -- Wittgenstein: The Shadow Of Grammar -- The Reality And Knowability Of Essence -- Why Essences Are Real -- The 'problem Of The Universal Accidental -- An Empirical Test For Essence? -- Coming To Know Essence -- 'paradigms', 'stereotypes', And Classification -- The Structure Of Essence -- Hylemorphism: Act And Potency -- Substantial Form -- Prime Matter -- Substance -- The Immanence Of Essence -- Essence And Identity -- Real Definition And The True Law Of Identity -- The Porphyrian Tree -- The Analogy Of Being -- Individuation -- Identity Over Time -- Essence And Existence -- The Real Distinction In Contingent Beings -- Everything Is Contingent, Almost -- Powers -- Laws Of Nature -- Aspects Of Essence -- Kinds Of Accident -- The Nature Of Properties -- Knowledge Of Essence Via Properties -- Artefacts -- Origin And Constitution -- Life -- The Essence Of Life -- Kinds Of Organism -- Against Emergence -- Species, Biological And Metaphysical -- Is Biological Essentialism Dead? -- Against The Cladistic Species Concept -- Vagueness -- A Plea For Morphology -- The Person -- The Essence Of Personhood -- Hylemorphic Dualism -- Consciousness, Psychology, And The Person -- Form, Body, And Soul -- Soul, Intellect, And Immateriality -- Soul, Identity, And Material Dependence. David S. Oderberg. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [295]-308) And Index.