I should like to use this opportunity to thank various people whose help in bringing this book to the light of day has been indispensable. My Liverpool colleague Nicholas Nathan kindly offered to read a draft of the book and I was able to take advantage of almost all of his valuable comments. The suggestions of the reader for the Press, Tim Crane, resulted in the avoidance of many mistakes, and in a strengthening of the work as a whole.

Chief among those who have guided the text through several of its various resurrections and transfigurations is Joan Stevenson, my secretary for the four years during which I was seconded from teaching as Director of Staffing Services at the University of Liverpool. More recently Lourdes McGunigle has also provided assistance.

Part of chapter two first appeared as ‘Belief as action’ (Cogito, 3.2, 1989, 127–32), and part of chapter three as ‘On Pan-critical Irrationalism’ (Analysis, 47.1, 1987, 24–8). The bulk of the book was completed during a period of study leave in 1992–3 generously granted by the University of Liverpool.