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Peter Hacker
Peter Hacker
Peter Hacker
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Peter Michael Stephan Hacker (born 15 July 1939)[1] is a British philosopher. His principal expertise is in the philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, and philosophical anthropology. He is known for his detailed exegesis and interpretation of the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein, his critique of cognitive neuroscience, and for his comprehensive studies of human nature.[2]

Key Information

Professional biography

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Hacker studied philosophy, politics and economics at The Queen's College, Oxford, from 1960 to 1963. In 1963–65, he was senior scholar at St Antony's College, Oxford, where he began graduate work under the supervision of H. L. A. Hart. His D.Phil. thesis "Rules and Duties" was completed in 1966 during a junior research fellowship at Balliol College, Oxford.

Since 1966, Hacker has been a fellow of St John's College, Oxford, and a member of the Oxford University philosophy faculty. His visiting positions at other universities include Makerere College, Uganda (1968); Swarthmore College, US (1973 and 1986); University of Michigan, (1974); Milton C. Scott visiting professor at Queen's University, Kingston, Canada (1985); visiting fellow in humanities at University of Bologna, Italy (2009). From 1985 to 1987 he was a British Academy Research Reader in the Humanities. In 1991–94 he was a Leverhulme Trust Senior Research Fellow. Hacker retired from Oxford in 2006, and was appointed to an emeritus research fellowship from 2006 to 2015, since when he has been an emeritus fellow. He was made an honorary fellow of The Queen's College, Oxford, in 2010. He was a part-time professor of philosophy at the University of Kent at Canterbury from 2013 to 2016. He was appointed to an honorary professorship at the Institute of Neurology at University College, London, for the period 2019–2024.

Philosophical views

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Hacker is one of the most important contemporary exponents of the linguistic-therapeutic approach to philosophy pioneered by Ludwig Wittgenstein. In this approach, the words and concepts used by the language community are taken as given, and the role of philosophy is to resolve or dissolve philosophical problems by giving an overview of the uses of these words and the structural relationships between these concepts. Philosophical inquiry is therefore very different from scientific inquiry, and Hacker maintains that: "philosophy is not a contribution to human knowledge, but to human understanding."[3] He believes that empirical observation and research is a categorically distinct kind of activity from conceptual investigation and clarification, even though there is sometimes no sharp dividing line between the two. These are two different kinds of intellectual activity, which may be conducted by the same person (as in the case of Einstein) or by different people. This has led him into direct disagreement [citation needed] with "neuro-philosophers": neuroscientists or philosophers such as Antonio Damasio and Daniel Dennett who think that neuroscience can shed light on philosophical questions such as the nature of consciousness or the mind-body problem. Hacker argues that these are indeed problems, only not empirical ones [citation needed]. They are conceptual problems and puzzlements that are to be dissolved or resolved by logico-linguistic analysis. It follows that scientific inquiry (learning more facts about humans or the world) does not help to resolve them anymore than discoveries in physics can help to prove a mathematical theorem. His 2003 book Philosophical Foundations of Neuroscience, co-authored with neuroscientist Max Bennett, contains an exposition of these views, and critiques of the ideas of many contemporary neuroscientists and philosophers, including Francis Crick, Antonio Damasio, Daniel Dennett, John Searle, and others.

Hacker in general finds many received components of current philosophy of mind to be incoherent [original research?]. He rejects mind-brain identity theories, as well as functionalism, eliminativism and other forms of reductionism. He advocates methodological pluralism, denying that standard explanations of human conduct are causal, and insisting on the irreducibility of explanation in terms of reasons and goals. He denies that psychological attributes can be intelligibly ascribed to the brain, insisting that they are ascribable only to the human being as a whole. He has endeavoured to show that the puzzles and 'mysteries' of consciousness dissolve under careful analysis of the various forms of intransitive and transitive consciousness, and that so-called qualia are no more than a philosopher's fiction.

Since 2005, Hacker has completed an ambitious tetralogy on human nature [citation needed]. He conceives of this to be philosophical anthropology – a study of the conceptual forms and relations in terms of which we think about ourselves and our theoretical and practical powers. The first volume, The Categorial Framework: a Study of Human Nature, surveys the most general concepts: substance, causation, powers, agency, teleology and rationality, mind, body and person. The second, The Intellectual Powers: A Study of Human Nature, investigates consciousness, intentionality and mastery of a language as marks of the mind. This is followed by detailed logico-grammatical studies of human cognitive and cogitative powers, ranging from perception through knowledge and belief to memory, thought and imagination. The third volume, The Passions: a Study of Human Nature, is dedicated to the study of the emotions, ranging from pride, shame, jealousy and anger to love, friendship, and sympathy. It draws extensively on literary, dramatic and poetic sources. The concluding volume, The Moral Powers: a Study of Human Nature, is concerned with good and evil; freedom, determinism, and responsibility; pleasure and happiness; finding meaning in life and the place of death in life. Hacker's methodology is connective analysis in which the wide range of conceptual and logical features of the relevant subjects is laid bare [vague].

Hacker has frequently collaborated with fellow Oxford philosopher G. P. Baker, and Australian neuroscientist Max Bennett.

Works

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Books

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  1. Insight and Illusion: Wittgenstein on Philosophy and the Metaphysics of Experience (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1972) (ISBN 0198243693, 978-0198243694)
  2. Insight and Illusion – themes in the philosophy of Wittgenstein (extensively revised edition) (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1986) (ISBN 0-19-824783-4)
  3. Wittgenstein : Understanding and Meaning, Volume 1 of an analytical commentary on the Philosophical Investigations (Blackwell, Oxford, and Chicago University Press, Chicago, 1980)(ISBN 0-631-12111-0)(ISBN 0226035263)(ISBN 0226035409), co-authored with G.P. Baker. It was extensively revised in 2009 and published in two parts by Wiley-Blackwell(ISBN 1405199245)(ISBN 1405199253).
  4. Frege : Logical Excavations, (Blackwell, Oxford, O.U.P., N.Y., 1984) (ISBN 0-19-503261-6) co-authored with G.P. Baker.
  5. Language, Sense and Nonsense, a critical investigation into modern theories of language (Blackwell, 1984) (ISBN 0-631-13519-7) co-authored with G.P. Baker.
  6. Scepticism, Rules and Language (Blackwell, 1984) (ISBN 0-631-13614-2) co-authored with G.P. Baker.
  7. Wittgenstein : Rules, Grammar, and Necessity – Volume 2 of an analytical commentary on the Philosophical Investigations (Blackwell, Oxford, UK and Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1985) (ISBN 0-631-13024-1)(ISBN 0-631-16188-0) co-authored with G.P. Baker. It was extensively revised in 2014 (ISBN 1-118-85459-4)
  8. Appearance and Reality – a philosophical investigation into perception and perceptual qualities (Blackwell, 1987) (ISBN 0-631-15704-2)
  9. Wittgenstein : Meaning and Mind, Volume 3 of an Analytical Commentary on the Philosophical Investigations (Blackwell, Oxford and Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1990) (ISBN 0-631-18739-1). It was extensively revised in 2019 and published in two parts by Wiley-Blackwell (ISBN 1118951808)(ISBN 1118951751).
  10. Wittgenstein: Mind and Will, Volume 4 of an Analytical Commentary on the Philosophical Investigations (Blackwell, 1996) (ISBN 0-631-18739-1)
  11. Wittgenstein's Place in Twentieth Century Analytic Philosophy (Blackwell, Oxford, UK and Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1996) (ISBN 0-631-20098-3)
  12. Wittgenstein on Human Nature (Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1997) (ISBN 0-7538-0193-0)
  13. Wittgenstein: Connections and Controversies (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 2001) (ISBN 0-19-924569-X)
  14. Philosophical Foundations of Neuroscience (Blackwell, Oxford, and Malden, Mass., 2003) (ISBN 1-4051-0855-X), co-authored with Max Bennett. A second edition with 80,000 extra words was released in 2022 (ISBN 978-1119530978)
  15. Neuroscience and Philosophy: Brain, Mind, and Language (Columbia University Press, New York, 2007) (ISBN 978-0-231-14044-7), co-authored with Max Bennett, D. Dennett, and J. Searle
  16. Human Nature: The Categorial Framework (Blackwell, 2007) (ISBN 1405147288)
  17. History of Cognitive Neuroscience (Wiley, Blackwell, 2008) (ISBN 978-1-4051-8182-2), co-authored with Max Bennett
  18. The Intellectual Powers: A study of Human Nature (Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, 2013) ISBN 978-1-4443-3247-6 pb. ed.[4]
  19. Wittgenstein: Comparisons & Context (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2013) ISBN 978-0-19-967482-4[5]
  20. The Passions: A study of Human Nature (Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, 2017) ISBN 978-1-119-44046-8
  21. Intellectual Entertainments: Eight Dialogues on Mind, Consciousness and Thought (Anthem Press, London, 2020) ISBN 1785271520
  22. The Moral Powers: a Study of Human Nature (Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, 2020) ISBN 1119657776
  23. A Beginner's Guide to the Later Philosophy of Wittgenstein: Seventeen Lectures and Dialogues on the Philosophical Investigations (Anthem Press, London & New York, 2024) ISBN 9781839991134
  24. The Representational Fallacy in Neuroscience and Psychology: A Critical Analysis Co-authored with M. R. Bennett (Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2024) ISBN 9783031575587
  25. Solving, Resolving, and Dissolving Philosophical Problems: Essays in Connective, Contrastive and Contextual Analysis (Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford, 2025) ISBN 9781394278817

References

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Peter Hacker

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Peter Michael Stephan Hacker (born 15 July 1939) is a British philosopher specializing in the , , , and Wittgensteinian thought, with a particular emphasis on critiquing neuroscientific explanations of mental phenomena and elucidating through conceptual analysis. Born in , Hacker studied at , from 1960 to 1963, graduating with a congratulatory first-class degree. He then pursued a DPhil at , completing his doctoral dissertation on Rules and Duties under the supervision of in 1966. From 1966 to 2006, he served as Tutorial Fellow in at , where he also held administrative roles as College Librarian (1986–2006) and Keeper of College Pictures (1986–1998); he became an Emeritus Research Fellow there from 2006 to 2015. Hacker has held visiting positions at institutions including Makerere College in (1968), (1973 and 1986), the (1974), Queen's University in Canada (1984), the (2009), and the (2013–2016). In 2019, he was appointed Honorary Professor at the UCL Institute of Neurology in , a position he held until 2024. His academic honors include a Research Readership (1985–1987), a Leverhulme Senior Research Fellowship (1991–1994), and an Honorary Fellowship at (2010). Hacker's scholarly output is extensive, comprising numerous authored books (over 25), several edited volumes, and over 170 papers, with a focus on Wittgenstein's later , the conceptual foundations of , and the of human morality and agency. He is best known for his multi-volume analytical commentary on Wittgenstein's , co-authored with G.P. Baker, which provides a definitive interpretation of Wittgenstein's ideas on meaning, understanding, and rule-following; the series includes Wittgenstein: Understanding and Meaning (Volume 1, first edition 1980; second edition 2005) and subsequent volumes covering rules, , and . In collaboration with Maxwell R. Bennett, Hacker has critically examined the philosophical underpinnings of , notably in Philosophical Foundations of (2003; second edition 2022), where they argue against reductionist views that conflate brain processes with mental states. Recent works include The Moral Powers: A Study of (2021), part of a on human nature, The Representational Fallacy in and (2024, with Bennett), A Beginner's Guide to the Later of Wittgenstein (2024), and Solving, Resolving, and Dissolving Philosophical Problems (2025). Through these contributions, Hacker has established himself as a leading figure in , advocating for conceptual clarity over scientistic overreach in understanding the mind and .

Biography

Early Life and Education

Peter Hacker was born on 15 July 1939 in , . At the age of 11, his family relocated to , , where he lived from 1950 to 1960 and attended school. During his time in Haifa, Hacker developed an early interest in at around age 14, inspired by books from his older sister's collection, including Plato's , C.E.M. Joad's A Guide to Philosophy, and Bertrand Russell's History of . This sparked a lifelong engagement with the subject, leading him to form a philosophy reading group with fellow student , through which they explored works by , , Berkeley, and Spinoza. In 1960, Hacker returned to to pursue undergraduate studies at , where he read (PPE), earning a congratulatory first-class degree in 1963. He then held a senior scholarship at , from 1963 to 1965, during which he worked toward his D.Phil. under the supervision of the legal philosopher . After this, he held a Junior Research Fellowship at , from 1965 to 1966. Hart, whose own thinking was significantly influenced by , guided Hacker's doctoral research on themes of rules and obligations. Hacker completed his D.Phil. in 1966 with a thesis titled "Rules and Duties," which examined legal philosophy in a manner attuned to Wittgensteinian ideas about rule-following and social practices. This period at marked the beginning of his deep immersion in , with Wittgenstein's later works—particularly the Philosophical Investigations—emerging as a key influence on his developing research interests shortly after his graduate studies.

Academic Career

In 1966, Peter Hacker was elected as a Fellow and Tutor in Philosophy at , a position he held until his retirement in 2006. During this period, he served as College Librarian from 1986 to 2006 and Keeper of the College Pictures from 1986 to 1998, while focusing primarily on philosophical teaching and research. Following his retirement, Hacker was appointed Emeritus Research Fellow at St John's College from 2006 to 2015, and Emeritus Fellow thereafter, during which he continued to engage in research and supervise graduate students. In 2013, he took up a part-time professorship in at the at , serving until 2016. Later, from 2019 to 2024, he held an honorary professorship at the UCL Institute of Neurology in Queen's Square, , which supported his interdisciplinary engagements. Hacker also held several visiting positions throughout his career, including a visiting lectureship at Makerere College in in 1968, visiting professorships at in the United States in 1973 and 1986, a visiting professorship at the in Ann Arbor in 1974, the Milton C. Scott Visiting Professorship at Queen's University in , in 1984, a Visiting Fellowship at the in Bellagio, , in 2006, and a visiting research fellowship at the in in 2009. His research was further supported by prestigious fellowships, notably a Research Readership in the from 1985 to 1987 and a Senior Research Fellowship from 1991 to 1994. He was also awarded an Honorary Fellowship at , in 2010. After formal retirement, Hacker maintained an active status, delivering public lectures and participating in interviews on philosophical topics into 2024, such as a talk on Wittgenstein and psycho-physical parallelism in November 2024.

Philosophical Views

Wittgenstein Scholarship

Peter Hacker has been a prominent for interpreting Ludwig Wittgenstein's later as a form of linguistic aimed at dissolving philosophical confusions through careful analysis of use, rather than constructing theoretical edifices. In this view, 's primary task is to clarify the of our concepts to reveal how pseudo-problems arise from misunderstandings of linguistic practices, thereby achieving therapeutic resolution without advancing explanatory hypotheses. Hacker emphasizes that Wittgenstein's method targets the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of , promoting a descriptive approach that maps the logical structure of thought without positing hidden mechanisms or essences. In collaboration with G. P. Baker, Hacker produced detailed analytical commentaries that address apparent tensions between Wittgenstein's early work in the and his later , arguing for a coherent development in Wittgenstein's thought centered on linguistic clarification. These commentaries highlight how Wittgenstein's early evolves into a broader critique of philosophical theorizing, resolving inconsistencies by showing that both phases reject metaphysics in favor of elucidating the limits of language. Through this partnership, Hacker and Baker demonstrated that Wittgenstein's philosophy maintains continuity in its anti-theoretical stance, using exegetical precision to unpack how early doctrines like picture theory inform later insights into meaning as use. Hacker's exegeses particularly stress Wittgenstein's private language argument, which rejects the possibility of meaning being grounded in private sensations or inner states but must be public and rule-governed within a shared form of life. He argues that rule-following paradoxes, often misinterpreted as skeptical challenges to meaning, are instead clarifications of how rules are embedded in communal practices, not individual mental processes, thereby underscoring the social dimension of language. This interpretation counters individualistic readings, such as Saul Kripke's, by insisting that Wittgenstein's discussion serves to dissolve illusions of privacy rather than to affirm epistemological skepticism about norms. Hacker has critiqued "resolute" readings of Wittgenstein, which seek to eliminate all from the Tractatus by treating its propositions as therapeutically disposable, maintaining instead that Wittgenstein's early philosophy articulates substantive insights into logic and that persist as meaningful doctrines. He contends that such resolute approaches misrepresent the Tractatus by retroactively applying later therapeutic methods, thereby undermining the text's original aim to delineate the boundaries of sense through a positive account of representation. In Hacker's assessment, this preserves the Tractatus as a genuine philosophical achievement, not merely a ladder to be discarded. Overall, Hacker's scholarship has profoundly shaped understandings of Wittgenstein's method as one of conceptual clarification, distinct from empirical hypothesis-testing, by illustrating how philosophical problems stem from linguistic misuse and can be resolved through descriptive reminders of ordinary usage. This approach reinforces Wittgenstein's vision of philosophy as an activity of assembly and overview, freeing thought from the grip of misleading pictures. More recently, Hacker edited and translated a new edition of Wittgenstein's On (2025), providing fresh insights into themes of and certainty.

Critiques of Neuroscience

Hacker's critiques of neuroscience center on what he terms the "mereological fallacy," the erroneous attribution of psychological predicates—such as seeing, thinking, or believing—to subpersonal parts of the organism, like the brain, rather than to the whole person. In this view, statements like "the brain sees" or "the prefrontal cortex decides" misapply concepts that logically pertain only to sentient beings in their entirety, leading to conceptual confusion in neuroscientific discourse. This fallacy, Hacker argues, permeates much of cognitive neuroscience, where researchers personify neural structures and thereby obscure the distinction between causal mechanisms and the normative, intentional features of human mentality. Rejecting mind-brain identity theory and reductionist approaches, Hacker contends that neuroscience conflates causal explanations of behavior with the conceptual elucidation of mental states, treating thoughts and emotions as identical to neural processes when they are not. For instance, he criticizes claims like Francis Crick's "astonishing hypothesis" that human attributes are merely the activities of nerve cells, dismissing such reductions as metaphysical nonsense that fails to account for the contextual and intentional nature of mental phenomena. Mental concepts, in Hacker's analysis, are holistic and normative, embedded in the public language of folk psychology, and cannot be reduced to biological states without losing their meaning; neuroscience provides valuable causal insights but overreaches into philosophical territory by purporting to explain intentionality through brain scans alone. Hacker further critiques the scientistic ambitions of , which he sees as illegitimately extending empirical findings to resolve conceptual problems, such as the nature of or epistemological questions, that are better addressed through philosophical clarification. Techniques like (fMRI) reveal correlations between brain activity and mental events—such as heightened activity in the during —but these do not establish identities or causal necessities for thoughts and emotions, as the same neural patterns can occur without corresponding mental states in unconscious processes. In defense of folk psychology against eliminativist challenges, Hacker employs Wittgensteinian conceptual analysis to argue that intentionality and psychological predicates are irreducible to neurobiology, forming an indispensable framework for understanding human action and social life. Eliminativists like Daniel Dennett, who seek to replace everyday mental talk with neuroscientific alternatives, commit errors by heterophenomenologically interpreting beliefs as mere reports rather than genuine intentional states, undermining the very concepts they aim to supplant. Folk psychology, Hacker maintains, is not a defective theory awaiting replacement but a logically prior conceptual scheme that neuroscience must respect rather than dismantle. Hacker continued these critiques in 2024 with Bennett in The Representational Fallacy in Neuroscience and Psychology.

Philosophy of Human Nature

Peter Hacker develops a categorial framework for conceptualizing that eschews Cartesian dualism, positing instead a non-reductive understanding of the human being as an integrated entity. In this view, the —drawing from Aristotelian —refers to the whole animate being, encompassing all vital capacities and powers of a living , rather than an immaterial substance separate from the body. The mind, by contrast, denotes specifically the rational faculties of this animate being, including abilities such as reasoning, understanding, and judgment, which are not localized in any physical organ but are attributes of the person as a whole. The body is understood as the material that the person is, animated by these capacities, avoiding any bifurcation into res cogitans and res extensa. This tripartite distinction emphasizes grammatical and conceptual clarity over metaphysical speculation, highlighting how ordinary language delineates human categories without invoking ghostly entities or reductive . Central to Hacker's analysis are the powers or faculties that constitute human nature, categorized into intellectual, appetitive, and volitional dimensions. Intellectual powers involve perception, thought, and reason, enabling humans to apprehend the world conceptually and engage in abstract deliberation. Appetitive powers encompass desires, emotions, and affective responses, which motivate behavior through feelings of pleasure, pain, or inclination, distinct from mere physiological drives. Volitional powers pertain to the will and purposeful action, allowing for deliberate choice and self-directed conduct informed by rational evaluation. These faculties are not modular components but interdependent aspects of the human form of life, exercised by the person in context, underscoring the teleological orientation of human capacities toward flourishing and understanding. Hacker firmly rejects both substance dualism, which posits mind and body as distinct entities interacting causally, and , which reduces mental phenomena to brain states or physical processes. Instead, he characterizes humans as rational animals—embodied beings whose essence lies in their capacity for and , which cannot be explained or eliminated by scientific description alone. Intentional states, such as beliefs and desires, are inherently directed toward objects and governed by norms of correctness, irreducible to causal mechanisms in the . Normative capacities, including and aesthetic judgment, similarly defy materialist assimilation, as they presuppose a holistic agent capable of and responsibility. This position affirms the unity of the human being while preserving the irreducibility of psychological concepts to biology. The implications of Hacker's framework extend to the understanding of mental disorders, which he views not as malfunctions of the brain but as disorders of the person, affecting their faculties and form of life. For instance, depression is conceptualized as a profound disturbance in the appetitive and volitional powers, manifesting in pervasive sadness, loss of motivation, and impaired agency, rather than a discrete neurological defect amenable solely to biomedical intervention. Such conditions disrupt the individual's rational and emotional equilibrium, requiring therapeutic approaches that address the whole person within their social and conceptual context, rather than pathologizing neural correlates. Hacker integrates Aristotelian elements, such as the teleological conception of the as of life and purpose, with Wittgensteinian insights into the grammar of ordinary language, to advocate a holistic that counters . Aristotle's hylomorphic view of humans as composite beings with inherent ends is reinterpreted through Wittgenstein's method of conceptual clarification, revealing how scientific explanations misapply categories when they neglect the normative and intentional dimensions of . This synthesis yields a descriptive that locates within the shared forms of description and life, resisting reduction to empirical laws and affirming the richness of psychological predicates against overly narrow scientistic paradigms.

Major Works

Publications on Wittgenstein

Peter Hacker's seminal contributions to Wittgenstein scholarship began with Insight and Illusion: Themes in the Philosophy of Wittgenstein, originally published in 1972 and revised in 1986. This book provides a detailed of Wittgenstein's early and later philosophies, particularly addressing themes such as illusions in , , and the metaphysics of experience, aiming to resolve apparent paradoxes through careful . In collaboration with G. P. Baker, Hacker co-authored Wittgenstein: Understanding and Meaning in 1980, which was extensively revised and expanded into two volumes in 2005. The work offers an analytical commentary on Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations, with Volume 1 focusing on sections §§1–184 and exploring key concepts of meaning, understanding, and their relation to linguistic use within forms of life. The partnership continued with Wittgenstein: Rules, Grammar and Necessity, published in 1985 and revised in 2009. This volume, also part of the analytical commentary series, examines Wittgenstein's discussions on rule-following, the grammar of language, necessary truths, and the arguments against a private language, clarifying how these elements underpin Wittgenstein's critique of traditional philosophical problems. The series continued with Wittgenstein: Meaning and Mind, published in 1990 and revised in 2019. This third volume covers sections §§243–427 of the Philosophical Investigations, addressing central topics in the , , and the nature of thought and understanding. The final volume, Wittgenstein: Mind and Will, was published in 1993 and revised in 2000. Covering pages 428–693, it analyzes Wittgenstein's remarks on , the will, , and , elucidating the conceptual grammar of mental concepts and behavior. Hacker's Wittgenstein's Place in Twentieth-Century Analytic Philosophy, published in 1996, situates Wittgenstein's thought within the broader landscape of analytic philosophy. It contrasts Wittgenstein's evolving ideas with logical positivism, realism, and ordinary language philosophy, highlighting his influence on and divergences from key figures and movements in the field. More recently, in 2024, Hacker published A Beginner’s Guide to the Later Philosophy of Wittgenstein, an accessible introduction structured as seventeen lectures and dialogues. The book elucidates Wittgenstein's therapeutic approach to philosophy, his method of dissolving conceptual confusions, and critiques of traditional metaphysics, making these ideas approachable for newcomers while drawing on the Philosophical Investigations. In 2025, Hacker released a new translation of Wittgenstein's On Certainty, featuring a facing-page German text and an improved rendering that restores features essential to Wittgenstein's arguments on , , and .

Collaborative Works

Peter Hacker's most prominent collaborative work is Philosophical Foundations of (2003), co-authored with neuroscientist Max R. Bennett, which systematically critiques conceptual confusions in neuroscientific theories through 20 chapters, notably introducing the "mereological fallacy"—the error of ascribing whole-organism capacities to the brain alone. The book examines key neuroscientific claims from figures like and , arguing for clearer distinctions between neural mechanisms and psychological predicates. Hacker and Bennett extended their collaboration to interdisciplinary volumes, such as contributions to Neuroscience and Philosophy: Brain, Mind, and Language (2007), which includes their joint excerpts critiquing neurophilosophical assumptions and promoting conceptual clarity in brain research ethics and methodology. The 2022 second edition of Philosophical Foundations of Neuroscience incorporates updates addressing post-2003 advances in cognitive neuroscience, including new discussions on the conceptual problems of fMRI, neuroplasticity, minimal states of consciousness, and models such as integrated information theory and global workspace theory, while reinforcing their original critiques against emerging neuroscientific overreach. These joint efforts have influenced discussions on the philosophy of human nature by underscoring the limits of reductionist neuroscience.

Independent Monographs on Mind and Nature

Peter Hacker's independent monographs on mind and nature form a significant body of work that systematically explores human faculties through , emphasizing conceptual clarification over empirical . These solo-authored texts, spanning from the late to the , build a framework for understanding , , , and as integral to , drawing on Aristotelian and Wittgensteinian traditions without relying on neuroscientific explanations. In Human Nature: The Categorial Framework (2007), Hacker lays the foundational structure for his inquiry into by delineating the fundamental categories—such as substance, causation, agency, , mind, self, body, and person—that underpin . This volume, the first in a projected trilogy (later expanded), critiques the scientific biases in and advocates for an autonomous philosophical approach to conceptual analysis, contrasting Platonic and Aristotelian conceptions of the , , and mind while highlighting linguistic nuances in debates like mind-body dualism. The Intellectual Powers: A Study of Human Nature (2013), the second volume in the series, provides a detailed connective analysis of human cognitive faculties, including , , sensation, , , thought, and . Hacker examines as a discriminatory power of the senses, as a reproductive and recognitive capacity, and rationality as the intellect's normative guidance, rejecting neurobiological accounts that conflate mental states with processes. The work integrates tree-diagrams and charts to map conceptual relations, underscoring these powers' role in forming and . Building on this, The Passions: A Study of Human Nature (2017), the third volume, investigates as appetitive powers within the broader canon of human passions, including affections, appetites, and attitudes. Hacker offers an analytic and dialectical examination of specific —such as , , , , , , , and —using literary examples to illustrate their conceptual and significance, while critiquing neuroscientific reductions that treat as mere physiological responses. The book positions as essential to human value and relationships, distinct from cognitive processes. The Moral Powers: A Study of (2021), concluding the , shifts to volition, , and , exploring the diversity of human values and the place of ethical goodness within them. Hacker analyzes moral potentialities as rooted in practical reason and social practices, addressing misconceptions of and among ethicists and psychologists, and emphasizing human propensity for moral discernment over deterministic explanations. This volume synthesizes the series by framing as a distinctive power of rational agents. Earlier, : A Philosophical Investigation into and Perceptual Qualities (1987) anticipates these themes by probing the metaphysics of , distinguishing sensory appearances from objective realities through a Wittgensteinian lens on perceptual judgments and qualities. Hacker argues against skeptical views of and , clarifying how affords of the world without invoking representational theories. In 2025, Hacker published Solving, Resolving, and Dissolving Philosophical Problems: Essays in Connective, Contrastive and Contextual Analysis, a collection of essays that equips readers with intellectual tools to address perennial philosophical issues through his method of conceptual clarification, building on Wittgensteinian and Aristotelian approaches to dissolve confusions in , mind, and .

References

  1. https://www.sjc.ox.ac.uk/discover/people/peter-hacker/
  2. http://www.pmshacker.co.uk/
  3. https://philpapers.org/rec/BAKWUA-11
  4. https://www.pmshacker.co.uk/biographical-notes
  5. https://dailynous.com/2021/07/16/interview-with-peter-hacker/
  6. https://royalinstitutephilosophy.org/event/wittgenstein-and-his-impact-upon-anglophone-philosophy/
  7. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTrRvhKv-U8
  8. https://philosophynow.org/issues/58/Peter_Hacker
  9. https://www.talisik.kritike.org/files/2019-FERNANDEZ.pdf
  10. https://academic.oup.com/book/49847
  11. https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/wgst.2012.45/html?lang=en
  12. https://ndpr.nd.edu/reviews/elucidating-the-tractatus-wittgenstein-s-early-philosophy-of-logic-and-language/
  13. https://philpapers.org/rec/HACOCT
  14. https://ndpr.nd.edu/reviews/philosophical-foundations-of-neuroscience/
  15. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-57559-4
  16. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/royal-institute-of-philosophy-supplements/article/sad-and-sorry-history-of-consciousness-being-among-other-things-a-challenge-to-the-consciousnessstudies-community/874ECAC6563322E636064CA907A10A39
  17. https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:b8eaa0cc-ccbc-47da-959b-4c4dbfaeea77/files/rmc87pr67q
  18. https://ndpr.nd.edu/reviews/human-nature-the-categorial-framework/
  19. https://philpapers.org/rec/HACTIP-3
  20. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/phin.12376
  21. https://joannamoncrieff.com/2019/05/08/the-uniqueness-of-life-a-review-of-peter-hackers-human-nature-the-categorial-framework-and-its-implications-for-the-mind-body-problem-and-our-understanding-of-mental-disorder/
  22. https://books.google.com/books/about/Insight_and_Illusion.html?id=lZMWAQAAMAAJ
  23. https://www.wiley.com/en-us/Wittgenstein%3A+Meaning+and+Mind+%28Volume+3+of+an+Analytical+Commentary+on+the+Philosophical+Investigations%29%2C+2nd+Edition-p-9781119290548
  24. https://www.wiley.com/en-us/Wittgenstein%3A+Mind+and+Will%3A+Volume+4+of+an+Analytical+Commentary+on+the+Philosophical+Investigations%2C+2nd+Edition-p-9780631219873
  25. https://anthempress.com/books/a-beginners-guide-to-the-later-philosophy-of-wittgenstein-hb
  26. https://www.amazon.com/Certainty-New-Translation-Ludwig-Wittgenstein/dp/1394324634
  27. https://www.wiley.com/en-us/Philosophical%2BFoundations%2Bof%2BNeuroscience%2C%2B2nd%2BEdition-p-9781119530978
  28. https://philpapers.org/rec/BENPFO-6
  29. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/226455247_Bennett_and_Hacker_on_Neural_Materialism
  30. https://cup.columbia.edu/book/neuroscience-and-philosophy/9780231140447/
  31. https://www.amazon.com/Neuroscience-Philosophy-Brain-Mind-Language/dp/0231140452
  32. https://www.amazon.com/Philosophical-Foundations-Neuroscience-M-Bennett/dp/1119530970
  33. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/282478056_The_philosophical-anthropological_foundations_of_Bennett_and_Hacker%27s_critique_of_neuroscience
  34. https://www.wiley.com/en-us/The+Moral+Powers%3A+A+Study+of+Human+Nature-p-9781119657774
  35. https://philpapers.org/rec/HACHNT-7
  36. https://www.wiley.com/en-us/The+Intellectual+Powers%3A+A+Study+of+Human+Nature-p-9781118651216
  37. https://www.wiley.com/en-be/The+Passions%3A+A+Study+of+Human+Nature-p-9781119440468
  38. https://philpapers.org/rec/HACTPA
  39. https://philpapers.org/rec/HACTMP
  40. https://philpapers.org/rec/HACAAR
  41. https://www.academia.edu/9103754/Review_Hacker_Appearance_and_Reality
  42. https://www.amazon.com/Solving-Resolving-Dissolving-Philosophical-Problems/dp/1394278810
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