David Armstrong: A Reader’s Guide

Between 1960 and 2010, David Armstrong published 19 books. All are on issues in epistemology and metaphysics, two core areas of traditional philosophy. Together they amount to a robust defence of physicalism, the view that the world consists of a single spatio-temporal causal system populated by nothing more than physical objects, their properties and their relations.

Berkeley’s Theory of Vision: A Critical Examination of Bishop Berkeley’s Essay Towards a New Theory of Vision (Melbourne University Press, 1960). Armstrong’s refutation of George Berkeley’s anti-materialist theory of perception. Berkeley famously held that sensations, whether visual, aural or tactile, are never evidence of a physical world existing independently of the mind. In this critical yet generous essay – which is as much about Hume as it is about Berkeley – Armstrong argues the contrary, that physical qualities can be perceived and that sensations often, although not always, coincide with perceptions.

Perception and the Physical World (Routledge & Kegan Paul and The Humanities Press, 1961; translated into Spanish in 1966). Armstrong’s positive defence of direct realism, the common-sense view that sense perception gives us direct awareness of the physical world. Much of the book focuses on representation theories – theories that identify sense perceptions with mere copies or representations of those things being perceived – and why they fail.

Bodily Sensations (Routledge & Kegan Paul and Humanities Press, 1962). Armstrong’s third book developing a realist theory of human perception. This time Armstrong focuses primarily on the sensation of events internal to, rather than external to, the human body. Because of the title, distribution to bookstores in Singapore was delayed until at least one feckless customs agent was able to find the time to read the book to ensure that it contained no pornography.

Berkeley‘s Philosophical Writings (Collier Books and Collier-Macmillan Ltd, 1965). An edited collection especially for students. The book contains Bishop Berkeley’s most famous essays, including The Principles of Human Knowledge and Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous.

Locke and Berkeley: A Collection of Critical Essays with C.B. Martin (Macmillan, [1968]). An edited anthology of essays discussing John Locke and George Berkeley. Contributors include Gilbert Ryle, Jonathan Bennett, Antony Flew, C.D. Broad and others.

A Materialist Theory of the Mind (Routledge & Kegan Paul and Humanities Press, 1968; translated into Polish in 1982 and into Japanese in 1996). The book that made Armstrong famous. Building on the work of earlier materialists such as U.T. Place, Herbert Feigl and J.J.C. Smart, Armstrong not only defends the identity of mind and brain, he also offers the first detailed physical account of many major mental concepts, including belief, sensation and will.

Belief, Truth and Knowledge (Cambridge University Press, 1973). The book that introduces Armstrong’s famous thermometer model of non-inferential knowledge. According to Armstrong, such knowledge need not depend on a complicated process of epistemic justification. The only thing necessary for A to know that B is that A’s beliefs about B must reliably track (or accurately follow) B, just as a thermometer tracks (or follows) changes in temperature. Epistemologists were scandalized.

Nominalism and Realism (Cambridge University Press, 1978; translated into Spanish in 1988). Volume 1 of the two-volume work, Universals and Scientific Realism. This is Armstrong’s first major defence of the view that physical objects are composed in part of universal (or repeatable) properties and relations, that these properties and relations (also called universals) are physical (not Platonic), and that they are discovered through science (not a priori).

A Theory of Universals (Cambridge University Press, 1978; translated into Spanish in 1988). Volume 2 of Universals and Scientific Realism. Building on the critical arguments offered against nominalism and Platonism in the first volume, this volume develops a positive account of resemblance (A resembles B if and only if A and B share some or all of their properties) and of higher-order universals (e.g., properties of properties).

The Nature of Mind, and Other Essays (University of Queensland Press, 1980). A collection of essays focusing on mind, perception and action. The book contains Armstrong’s intellectual manifesto, “Naturalism, Materialism and First Philosophy.”

What is a Law of Nature? (Cambridge University Press, 1983). An extension of Armstrong’s theory of universals. What does it mean for something to be a law of nature? Does it mean only that a given type of event always happens? Or that it has to happen? In this book Armstrong develops the idea that laws of nature are more than mere regularities, being instead relations of necessity between universals.

Consciousness and Causality: A Debate on the Nature of Mind with Norman Malcolm (Basil Blackwell, 1984; translated into Japanese in 1986). A debate between Armstrong and Norman Malcolm over the nature of mind and consciousness. Armstrong defends the traditional view that there exists a two-way causal interaction between the mind and body, but with the proviso that the mind is to be identified with the body’s brain and central nervous system.

A Combinatorial Theory of Possibility (Cambridge University Press, 1989). A defence of the view that non-actual possibilities are to be identified with re-combinations of actually existing elements of the (physical) world. The view is problematic since it appears at some level to be circular, admitting only possible re-combinations of actually existing elements as the basis for explaining possibility.

Universals: An Opinionated Introduction (Westview Press, 1989). A short re-stating of Armstrong’s theory of properties and relations as developed in his earlier two-volume work, Universals and Scientific Realism. In this book, Armstrong takes more seriously the rival theory that physical properties and relations might exist even though they are not themselves universal or repeatable.

Dispositions: A Debate with C.B. Martin and U.T. Place, edited by Tim Crane (Routledge, 1996). A debate over the nature of dispositions. What does it mean to say that a window is disposed to break if hit by a stone? Do the stone and glass have dispositional powers in addition to their categorical properties? Unlike his opponents, Armstrong identifies dispositions with simple physical properties. A round peg is disposed to fit into a round hole simply because they share the requisite properties: they’re both round!

A World of States of Affairs (Cambridge University Press, 1997). A comprehensive statement of Armstrong’s mature theory of properties and relations, but with some modifications and relating it to a wider range of applications, including dispositions, modality, number, classes and laws.

The Mind-Body Problem: An Opinionated Introduction (Westview Press, 1999). A short re-stating of Armstrong’s theory of the mind as developed in A Materialist Theory of the Mind and elsewhere. The book contains an impressive blend of contemporary philosophical argument and historical insight.

Truth and Truthmakers (Cambridge University Press, 2004). A defence of the idea that for every truth there must be a truthmaker, some fact in the world that makes the truth true. Originally introduced by Aristotle, the idea was developed by Bertrand Russell and then by C.B. Martin, Kevin Mulligan, Peter Simons, Barry Smith and others. The basic claim is not as self-evident as it might at first seem. What thing or fact makes it true that a lack of fuel caused the engine to stop? Must we postulate lacks and absences as part of the furniture of the universe?

Sketch for a Systematic Metaphysics (Oxford University Press, 2010). A short and lively summing up of Armstrong’s metaphysical views about properties, relations, dispositions, laws of nature, possibility, absences, numbers, classes and minds. The book gives a clear summation of a half-century of intellectual work done by Australia’s most influential advocate of physicalism.

Three additional books provide helpful introductions to Armstrong’s thought. Stephen Mumford’s David Armstrong (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2007) gives the best short overview. John Bacon, Keith Campbell and Lloyd Reinhardt’s Ontology, Causality, and Mind: Essays in Honour of D.M. Armstrong (Cambridge University Press, 1993) includes a comprehensive bibliography of Armstrong’s publications up until 1993. Radu J. Bogdan’s D.M. Armstrong (D. Reidel Publishing Company, 1984) contains an informative and entertaining intellectual autobiography written by Armstrong in 1983, a version of which appeared in the January-February and March editions of Quadrant that same year. As Armstrong joked at the time, autobiography has always been one of the easiest forms of writing, since in no other type of writing does the author find such perfect coincidence of interest and expertise! Thirty years later, his informative “Self-Profile” remains a pleasure to read. Anyone wanting to obtain access to Armstrong’s philosophical papers and correspondence may do so at the National Library of Australia in Canberra.

Andrew Irvine is Professor and Head of Economics, Philosophy and Political Science at the University of British Columbia in Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada.