George Sotiros Pappas is a professor of philosophy

Philosophy

Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...

 at Ohio State University

Ohio State University

The Ohio State University, commonly referred to as Ohio State, is a public research university located in Columbus, Ohio. It was originally founded in 1870 as a land-grant university and is currently the third largest university campus in the United States...

. Pappas specializes in epistemology, the history of early modern philosophy

Early modern philosophy

Early modern philosophy is a period in the history of philosophy at the beginning or overlapping with the period known as modern philosophy. The early modern period in history is roughly 1500-1800, but the label "early modern philosophy" is sometimes used to refer to a more specific period of...

, philosophy of religion

Philosophy of religion

Philosophy of religion is a branch of philosophy concerned with questions regarding religion, including the nature and existence of God, the examination of religious experience, analysis of religious language and texts, and the relationship of religion and science...

, and metaphysics

Metaphysics

Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...

. He is of Greek and English origin.

He is the author of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is a freely-accessible online encyclopedia of philosophy maintained by Stanford University. Each entry is written and maintained by an expert in the field, including professors from over 65 academic institutions worldwide...

 entry on Internalist versus Externalist

Internalism and externalism

Internalism and externalism are two opposing ways of explaining various subjects in several areas of philosophy. These include human motivation, knowledge, justification, meaning and truth. The distinction arises in many areas of debate with similar but distinct meanings...

 conceptions of epistemic justification

Theory of justification

Theory of justification is a part of epistemology that attempts to understand the justification of propositions and beliefs. Epistemologists are concerned with various epistemic features of belief, which include the ideas of justification, warrant, rationality, and probability...

.

He was co-editor (with Marshall Swain) of Essays on Knowledge and Justification (1978), regarded as a key anthology of essays relating to the Gettier problem

Gettier problem

A Gettier problem is a problem in modern epistemology issuing from counter-examples to the definition of knowledge as justified true belief . The problem owes its name to a three-page paper published in 1963, by Edmund Gettier, called "Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?", in which Gettier argues...

 and used as a core text in undergraduate epistemology courses.

George Pappas is an editorial consultant of Berkeley Studies

Berkeley Studies

Berkeley Studies is an annual on-line journal established in 1977. Berkeley Studies publishes scholarly articles on anything related to George Berkeley...

.

Studies in Berkeley's Philosophy

George S. Pappas is known to be a leading Berkeley scholar; his essay “Berkeley and Scepticism” was in 1993 awarded the International Berkeley Prize. Professor Pappas is a regular participant of International Berkeley Conferences. At one such conference, celebrating the 300th anniversary of George Berkeley’s birth, Mr. Pappas propounded a new approach to the relationship between Berkeley’s anti-abstractionism and "esse est percipi" principle. On Pappas reading, Berkeley’s two theses — that there are no abstract ideas and that sensible objects must be perceived in order to exist — entail one another.
Pappas' interpretation of Berkeley's ‘esse is percipi’ thesis has sparked much discussion. In 1989, the Garland Publishing Company brought out a 15-volume collection of major works on Berkeley; Pappas' paper “Abstract ideas and the 'esse is percipi' thesis” was included in the third volume, as it was considered to be a significant contribution to Berkeley scholarship.

Pappas developed his treatment of Berkeley’s “esse est percipi” principle to repudiate the "inherence interpretation of Berkeley", upon which Edwin E. Allaire, among others, elaborated

“That account is put forward to answer an extremely perplexing question in the history of philosophy: Why did Berkeley embrace idealism, i. e., why did he hold that esse est percipi, that to be is to be perceived? (Hausman, Alan. Op. cit. Pp. 421–422.)

After emerging in the early 1960s, the “inherence account” attracted numerous proponents and became an influential element of contemporary Berkeley scholarship. In his paper “Ideas, minds, and Berkeley” Pappas revealed some discrepancies between fountain-head evidences and Allaire’s approach to a reconstruction of Berkeley’s idealism. Pappas' critical examination of the “inherence account” is greatly appreciated by Berkeley scholars. Pappas’ penetrating remarks compelled Edwin B. Allaire to revise and improve his conception. Even those who share Allaire’s account of Berkeley’s idealism acknowledge Pappas’ article to be “an excellent review and critique of the IA [inherence account].”

In 2000 George Pappas published his monograph Berkeley's thought in which some parts were based on earlier papers of his. While writings by A. A. Luce

A. A. Luce

Arthur Aston Luce MC was professor of philosophy at Trinity College, Dublin and also Precentor of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin . Throughout his life he held many clerical appointments and was Vice-Provost of Trinity from 1946-1952. He was widely known as an authority on the philosopher George...

 or Geoffrey Warnock

Geoffrey Warnock

Sir Geoffrey James Warnock was a philosopher and Vice-Chancellor of Oxford University. Before his knighthood , he was commonly known as G. J. Warnock.- Life :...

 are long out dated, the book Berkeley's thought written by Dr Pappas is often included in lists of recommended literature on Berkeley

George Berkeley

George Berkeley , also known as Bishop Berkeley , was an Irish philosopher whose primary achievement was the advancement of a theory he called "immaterialism"...

’s philosophy.

Publications

• Pappas, George S. Berkeley’s Thought. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2000. ISBN 0801437008 ISBN 9780801437007