This book provides an introduction to using quantitative methods in educational research. The author writes for non-mathematical students, avoiding the use of mathematical formulae wherever possible.

How is knowledge of the external world possible? How is knowledge of other minds possible? How is a priori knowledge possible? These are all examples of how-possible questions in epistemology. Quassim Cassam explains how such questions arise and how they should be answered.

versions of columns that appeared in the electronic journal Glot International, and partly of lectures and reviews that have either not been previously published or have been radically changed. They were initially addressed to an audience with some basic expertise in linguistics. As this cannot be expected of everyone reading this collection, and as I wish to make the essays as accessible as possible, I have provided a lengthy introduction to one version of current linguistics: that associated most closely with the work of Noam Chomsky.