Putnam, Hilary (1926–2016)

List of works

Most of Putnam’s papers, and all of those cited in the text, are included in the collections – Philosophical Papers, volumes I–III and the two volumes edited by J. Conant. Where the title has been changed, the text cites the title appearing in these volumes.

	Putnam, H. and Benacerraf, P. (1964) Philosophy of Mathematics: Selected Readings, New Jersey: Prentice Hall. (Introduction by the editors. Includes classic works in the foundations of mathematics and the philosophy of mathematics by leading mathematicians such as Hilbert, Brouwer and Gödel.)
	Putnam, H. (1971) Philosophy of Logic, New York: Harper & Row. (Putnam argues for a realist position on the problem of the existence of mathematical objects.)
	Putnam, H. (1975a) Philosophical Papers, vol. I, Mathematics, Matter and Method, Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press. (This volume contains papers on the philosophy of mathematics and the philosophy of science. It includes ‘It Ain’t Necessarily So’, which develops the notion of relative necessity, ‘An Examination of Grünbaum’s Philosophy of Geometry’, which argues against a conventionalist interpretation of the theory of relativity, and ‘The Logic of Quantum Mechanics’, advocating quantum logic.)
	Putnam, H. (1975b) Philosophical Papers, vol. II, Mind, Language and Reality, Cambridge, and New York: Cambridge University Press. (This volume includes one of Putnam’s major contributions to the philosophy of language, ‘The Meaning of Meaning’, as well as ‘Explanation and Reference’ and ‘The Refutation of Conventionalism’, all of which expound a realist conception of meaning. It also includes papers in the philosophy of mind, in particular papers introducing functionalism, such as ‘Philosophy and Our Mental Life’ and ‘The Mental Life of Some Machines’.)
	Putnam, H. (1978) Meaning and the Moral Sciences, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. (Part One contains the John Locke Lectures, Oxford 1976, which explore the interconnections between explanation, theories of truth, and realism. Part Two marks the change in Putnam’s position from realism to ’internal realism’.)
	Putnam, H. (1981) Reason, Truth and History, Cambridge, and New York: Cambridge University Press. (The book propounds ’internal realism’, arguing that it avoids the difficulties of metaphysical realism on the one hand, and scepticism on the other.)
	Putnam, H. (1983) Philosophical Papers, vol. III, Realism and Reason, Cambridge, and New York: Cambridge University Press. (This volume reworks many of the themes previously dealt with by Putnam in the light of his new position. It includes ‘Models and Reality’, which pursues the implications of the Löwenheim–Skolem theorem; ‘Analyticity and Apriority: Beyond Wittgenstein and Quine’, which rejects some sceptical consequences of Quine’s and Wittgenstein’s positions; ‘Why Reason Can’t Be Naturalized’, which argues against naturalism; and ‘Quantum Mechanics and the Observer’, which argues for perspectivism, and abandons the earlier realist interpretation of quantum mechanics in terms of quantum logic.)
	Putnam, H. (1987) The Many Faces of Realism, La Salle, IL: Open Court. (The Paul Carus Lectures, Washington 1985. Putnam’s ’internal realism’ is examined here in the context of American pragmatism, in particular Peirce’s philosophy.)
	Putnam, H. (1988) Representation and Reality, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. (Putnam reconsiders functionalism, his early philosophy of mind, in the light of his views on meaning, and his critique of naturalism.)
	Putnam, H. (1990a) Realism with a Human Face, ed. J. Conant, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. (A collection of essays by Putnam, selected and introduced by the editor. The essays in this volume are divided into three groups: metaphysics; ethics and aesthetics; studies in American philosophy. The rejection of the fact/value dichotomy is a central theme of this collection.)
	Putnam, H. (1990b) The Meaning of the Concept of Probability in Application to Finite Sequences, New York: Garland. (Putnam's Ph.D. dissertation, submitted to the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1951.)
	Putnam, H. (1992) Renewing Philosophy, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. (This book grew out of the Gifford Lectures, St Andrews 1990. It takes issue with scientism in several areas such as artificial intelligence and ethics, while maintaining the possibility of a cognitive relation to reality.)
	Putnam, H. (1994) Words and Life, ed. J. Conant, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. (A collection of essays by Putnam, selected and introduced by the editor. Some of the essays in this volume, such as ‘Rethinking Mathematical Necessity’ reflect Putnam’s growing attraction to the later Wittgenstein. Others discuss pragmatism, logical positivism, the philosophy of mind and the role of philosophy in our lives.)
	Putnam, H. (1995) Pragmatism, Cambridge, MA, and Oxford: Blackwell. (First published in Italian as Il Pragmatismo: Una Questione Aperta, Rome, Bari: Gius Laterza & Figli Spa, 1992. Putnam’s version of pragmatism. Includes a bibliography.)
	Putnam, H. (1999) The Threefold Cord: Mind, Body, and World, New York: Columbia University Press. (The volume is based on the John Dewey Lectures given at Columbia University in 1994 and the Josiah Royce Lecture given in the same year at Brown University. Putnam clarifies the implications of his semantic externalism for the philosophy of mind. Arguing against the reduction of the mental to the physical, he examines a number of influential positions in this area such as Davidson's and Kim's and analyses the notions of causation and explanation they invoke.)
	Putnam, H. (2002) The Collapse of the Fact/Value Dichotomy, Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press. (As its title indicates, this volume, which includes the Rosenthal Lectures given at the Law School of Northwestern University, examines the entanglement of facts and values. It addresses the question of the relation between reason and morality and focusses, in particular, on the moral assumptions underlying current economic theories.)
	Putnam, H. (2004) Ethics without Ontology, Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press. (The first part includes the Hermes Lectures given at the University of Perugia and the second part the Spinoza Lectures given at the University of Amsterdam, both in 2001. The chapters based on the former critique the notion of ontological commitment and defend a notion of objectivity committed to the truth of statements rather than the existence of objects. The chapters based on the latter discuss the objectivity of values in traditions inspired by the Enlightenment, including Americam pragmatism.)
	Putnam, H. (2008) Jewish Philosophy as a Guide to Life, Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press. (The essays in this volume are based on the Helen and Martin Schwartz Lectures given at Indiana University in 1999. They discuss Rosenzweig, Buber and Levinas, sometimes in comparison with Kierkegaard and Wittgenstein. In the introduction Putnam describes his own road to engagement with the topics of this book.
	Putnam, H. (2012) Philosophy in an Age of Science, eds. Mario De Caro and David Macarthur, Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press. (The papers touch on all the major subjects in Putnam's philosophy and are divided into six parts: On the Relations between Philosophy and Science, Mathematics and Logic, Values and Ethics, Wittgenstein: Pro and Con, The Problems and Pathos of Skepticism, and Experience and Mind.)
	Putnam, H. (2016) Naturalism, Realism and Normativity, ed. Mario De Caro, Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press. (Putnam clarifies his position on naturalism--a notion which does not play a significant role in his previous writings—and its relation to realism. He develops a theory of perception and concludes with a retrospective on 65 years of doing philosophy.)

References and further reading

	Auxier, R. E., Anderson, D. R., and Hahn, L. E. (eds) (2015) The Philosophy of Hilary Putnam, The Library of Living Philosophers, XXXIV, Chicago, IL: Open Court. (This volume includes Putnam's scientific autobiography, 26 essays by philosophers engaged in critical dialogue with Putnam, and his replies to these essays.)
	Baghramian, M. (ed.) (2012) Reading Putnam, New York: Routledge. (The essays in this volume are based on a 2007 conference in Dublin, celebrating Putnam's 80 birthday. It includes 13 papers, among them papers by Charles Parsons, Stanly Cavell and John McDowell, and replies by Putnam.)
	Ben-Menahem, Y. (ed.) (2005) Hilary Putnam, Contemporary Philosophy in Focus Series, New York: Cambridge University Press. (Includes ten interpretative essays on meaning, realism, quantum mechanics, perception, functionalism, pragmatism, and skepticism.)
	Clark, P. and Hale, B. (1994) Reading Putnam, Oxford: Blackwell. (Essays by S. Blackburne, G. Boolos, M. Dummett, M. Hallett, C. Fuhl and C. Glymour, M. Redhead, T. Ricketts, D. Wiggins, and C. Wright, and replies by Putnam.)
	Hill, C.S. (1992) ‘The Philosophy of Hilary Putnam’, Philosophical Topics 20 (1). (Essays by D.A. Anderson, A. Bilgrami, N. Chomsky, J. Conant, B. Dreben, G. Ebbs, R. Healey, G.J. Massey, J. McDowell, R.W. Miller, and A. Sidelle, and replies by Putnam.)
	Pessin, P. and Goldberg, S. (eds) (1996) The Twin Earth Chronicles, Armonk NY and London; M.E. Sharpe. (The volume includes Putnam's seminal paper 'The Meaning of 'Meaning''—in which the Twin Earth thought experiment appeared—and 20 papers by philosophers who examine the implications of Putnam's theory of meaning for central issues in the philosophy of language and the philosophy of mind such as intentionality, natural kinds, functionalism, mental content, and mental causation.)