Explaining Explanation

Professor David-Hillel is Emeritus Professor of Philosophy, University of London. His most recent book is Action and Its Explanation (2003).

“This book offers a splendid critical discussion of philosophical work on explanation . . . of special interest is Ruben’s view of the place of laws in explanation, which has been substantially modified and sharpened in this second edition.” —Elliott Sober, University of Wisconsin–Madison Reviews from the first edition: “Explaining Explanation is what many books claim to be, but few actually are—a book that is both accessible to ‘the advanced undergraduate’ and of interest to professional philosophers. It presents a good overview of a wide spectrum of work on explanation with admirable clarity and concision.” —Mind “A thoughtful exploration rather than a manifesto. It shows someone hard at work wrestling with difficult problems and committed to helping others to do the same.” —Peter Lipton in The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science “Explaining Explanation contains a great many important and stimulating discussions. . . . I strongly recommend it to anyone with an interest in causation and explanation.” —James Woodward in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research “The volume succeeds admirably in being accessible to undergraduates and helpful to specialists in the field.” —Choice

• chapterOne Getting our Bearings; chapterTwo Plato on Explanation; chapterThree Aristotle on Explanation; chapterFour Mill and Hempel on Explanation; chapterFive The Ontology of Explanation; chapterSix Arguments, Laws, and Explanation; chapterSeven A Realist Theory of Explanation;