Locke on Knowledge, Politics and Religion: New Interpretations from Japan

Description

Locke scholarship has been flourishing in Japan for several decades, but its output is largely unknown to the West. This collection makes available in English for the first time the fruits of recent Japanese research, opening up the possibility of advancing Locke studies on an international scale. Covering three important areas of Locke's philosophical thought - knowledge and experimental method, law and politics, and religion and toleration - this volume criticizes established interpretations and replaces them with novel alternatives, breaking away from standard narratives and providing fresh ways of looking at Locke's relationship with philosophers such as Boyle, Berkeley and Hume. The specific topics that have been selected are ones that continue to have important contemporary moral and political implications, from constitutionalism and toleration to marriage and the death penalty. Applying Locke's views to 21st-century questions, this collection presents provocative readings of the defining aspects of Locke's philosophical thought, stimulating current debates and heralding a new era of collaborative work for Locke scholars around the world.

Peter R. Anstey is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Sydney, Australia. He specialises in early modern philosophy with a particular focus on the philosophy of John Locke. He is author of John Locke and Natural Philosophy (2011) and The Oxford Handbook of British Philosophy in the Seventeenth Century 2013). He manages the Early Modern Experimental Philosophy blog. Kiyoshi Shimokawa is Professor of Philosophy at Gakushuin University, Japan. He specialises in modern philosophy with a particular reference to the philosophy of John Locke. He is author of John Locke no Jiyushugi Seijitetsugaku (2000) and co-authored several books in English and Japanese, on early modern ethics, natural rights and political philosophy, discussing Locke, Grotius and Hume.

This exciting new collection introduces English readers to a previously inaccessible world of Locke scholarship in Japan. By bringing together a set of excellent chapters on Locke's engagement with experimental science, politics and law, and religion and toleration, Anstey and Shimokawa show how viewing a canonical author from different religious and cultural perspectives can reveal surprising and provocative new insights. * Douglas Casson, Professor of Political Science, St Olaf College, USA *