Is there such a thing as Scottish philosophy? The names of John Duns Scotus and John
Mair are not well-known today, yet they left a distinctively Scottish mark upon
European thought. Without these men and their tireless exploration of the problems
of thought of their own time, the better-known systems of David Hume, Adam Smith
and Dugald Stewart would never have evolved in the eighteenth century during the
Enlightenment. Professor Broadie shows how the basic insights of early Scottish
philosophy have led to the important perceptions of modern thinking and to the recognition
of an unmistakably Scottish strand in philosophical culture.
ALEXANDER BROADIE is Professor of Logic and Rhetoric at the University of Glasgow and
Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. He is the author of a dozen books, the most
recent being The Scottish Enlightenment: an Anthology (1997). In 1991 he was the
first recipient of the triennial Henry Duncan Prize Lectureship in Scottish Studies awarded
by the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and in 1994 was Gifford Lecturer in Natural Theology
at the University of Aberdeen.
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