Searle, John : University of California at Berkeley
John R. Searle was born in Denver, Colorado, in 1932. He attended the University of Wisconsin from 1949 to 1952
and studied at Oxford University, where he received his BA, MA, and Ph.D. Phil and was a Rhodes Scholar. He taught
as a lecturer in philosophy at Christ Church in Oxford from 1956 to 1959 and since then has been a professor of
philosophy at the University of California at Berkeley. He has also been a visiting professor at many universities,
both in the US and abroad, including the universities of Syracuse, Rutgers, Colorado, SUNY Buffalo, Washington,
Michigan, Venice, Florence, Frankfurt, Toronto, Campinas (Brazil), Oslo, Berlin, and Oxford.
Review
"A remarkable feat. This is the book for anyone who wants to learn about the big philosophical questions."
--Owen Flanagan, Duke University
"This book is a major event. John Searle has brought together and elucidated forty years of brilliant work
on Mind, Language, and Society. Bravo!"
--Jerome Bruner, New York University
Perseus Books Group Web Site, August, 2001
Summary
Disillusionment with psychology is leading more and more people to formal philosophy for clues about how to
think about life. But most of us who try to grapple with concepts such as reality, truth, common sense, consciousness,
and society lack the rigorous training to discuss them with any confidence. John Searle brings these notions down
from their abstract heights to the terra firma of real-world understanding, so that those with no knowledge of
philosophy can understand how these principles play out in our everyday lives. The author stresses that there is
a real world out there to deal with, and condemns the belief that the reality of our world is dependent on our
perception of it.
Table of Contents
Introduction
Basic Metaphysics: Reality and Truth
How We Fit into the Universe: The Mind as a Biological Phenomenon
The Essence of the Mind: Consciousness and Its Structure
How the Mind Works: Intentionality
The Structure of the Social Universe: How the Mind Creates an Objective Social Reality
How Language Works: Speech as a Kind of Human Action
