ABSTRACT Education appears to bear responsibility on the one hand to do justice to society’s need for reproduction and continuation, and on the other to do justice to the individual’s capacity for and need to express resistance, critique and political action. How we navigate this problem is tied to how we understand justice. ‘Plastic justice’ is the suggestion that questions concerning justice and education might find a materialist expression instead of the usual transcendental ideals of justice. In this perspective, ‘justice’ (...) appears not as an achievable ideal but as a philosophical void that allows us to identify and react to injustice. An example of this is the void that allows for social selection – in the form of admissions or exams – that must be kept open if we wish to avoid encouraging social conformism and reproduction. (shrink)

Journal of Philosophy of Education, EarlyView.

Bildung has lost its critical potential, some thinkers worry, but I put forward that this might not necessarily be the case. Jan Masschelein and Norbert Ricken argue that modernity has seen Bildung and bio-power grow complicit, effectively negating Bildung’s critical edge by turning criticism into a necessary aspect of contemporary society. However, a development of this sort seems to demand a view of both Bildung and bio-power as sovereign entities that subvert the individuals who constitute them. I challenge this view (...) by reference to Catherine Malabou's philosophy. Malabou argues that bio-power seems to suffer from a residual sovereign element which upholds a separation between a material and a symbolic mode of life, even if bio-power was originally thought as a break with sovereign thinking altogether. Malabou’s engagement with the biological concept epigenesis by way of her own concept plasticity provides an ostensibly non-sovereign approach to bio-power, one that emphasizes change, creativity, accident, and reciprocal influence. I suggest that this point of view might challenge the apparent sovereignty of bio-power and open up for a non-sovereign formulation of Bildung. (shrink)

In this paper, I address the interdisciplinary character of development studies and ethics by discussing the relationship between Christian theology and development studies in general and development ethics in particular. I begin by presenting development theology, a kind of theology that critically reflects on the meaning and implications of the Christian faith with regard to improving the lives of people living in material poverty. This kind of theology is related to the better-known liberation theology, and I discuss the role of (...) this kind of theology in the works of Denis Goulet, the founder of development ethics as an academic discipline. I argue there is a fruitful, critical and constructive relationship between liberation theology and development ethics in the writings of Goulet. I then turn to how development issues are addressed in contemporary theology, with an emphasis on documents produced by two faith-based development organizations, Christian Aid UK and Norwegian Church Aid. I argue that development issues have been readdressed in Christian theology, relying less on the notion of liberation, but more on the concepts of reconstruction, ?diakonia?, human dignity and human relationships. I argue that there is a need to revisit the critical and constructive connections between Christian theology and development ethics and, more broadly, the related challenges of interdisciplinary inquiries, and I conclude by showing some of the ways of undertaking this task. (shrink)

This article investigates the communication of professional ethos, the ethical standards of a profession in training, from passing on ideas of patients’ welfare in medical schools to communicating values in military academies. The article examines this through a consideration of the consequences of Wittgenstein’s discussions on the nature of language: how words and sentences acquire meaning. Wittgenstein’s rule-following paradox, the paradox that any act can be brought into correspondence with a rule and thereby that any “meaning” might be applicable to (...) what is being taught, must make us re-evaluate assumptions about a professional ethos as a guide for professionals in their future practice. If, as Wittgenstein asserts, the meaning of a word is its use, we must abandon ideas of an essence of professional ethos encapsulated in words. Ethical standards of the professions are not reducible to a set of rules. Instead teachers must seek to expand the learner’s repertoire of responses and invite different answers rather than a pre-established correct answer. (shrink)

ZUSAMMENFASSUNGDer Artikel präsentiert den Versuch, Luthers berühmte Behauptung, dass der rechtfertigende Glaube den Menschen definiere, in der Perspektive der Gegenwart zu lesen. Die jüngste Entwicklung in den Gesellschaftswissenschaften und der Gender-Forschung bietet eine Reihe neuer Anhaltspunkte zum Verständnis von Identitätsbildung und Identitätserfahrung. Der Gedanke dessen, dass die Rechtfertigung die Identität definiere, muss folglich an dem anknüpfen, was wir sonst noch über die durch die menschliche Wechselwirkung konstruierte Identität wissen. Der Artikel erörtert dieses Thema und diskutiert die Frage, ob dies nicht (...) – theologisch verstanden – homosexuelle und lesbische Paare heterosexuellen Paaren gleichstellt.SUMMARYIn the thesis De homine from 1536, Luther famously stated that justification by faith alone gives a short definition of the human being. This article tries to defend such a definition under contemporary conditions, taking into account what we now know of the construction and inhabitation of human identity. Summing up seminal insights into the development of identity from the social sciences and from gender studies, the article discusses possible consequences for the theological understanding of homosexual cohabitation. A range of insights are brought into play, including the phenomenology of Knud Ejler Løgstrup, to understand the emergence of identity through human interaction, and its implications for the centre of evangelical belief and ethics. (shrink)

We have arrived at a situation in which policymakers and ethicists are considering abandoning informed consent in the governance of certain new technologies, many of which are related to large-scale information systems. A paradigm case is the problem with using individuals’ informed consent to regulate biobanks. As sometimes suggested, there is a need for “new ethical frameworks.”.

This article is an analytic register of recent European efforts in the making of ‘autonomous’ robots to address what is imagined as Europe’s societal challenges. The paper describes how an emerging techno-epistemic network stretches across industry, science, policy and law to legitimize and enact a robotics innovation agenda. Roadmap is the main metaphor and organizing tool in working across the disciplines and sectors, and in aligning these heterogeneous actors with a machine-centric vision along a path to make way for ‘new (...) kinds’ of robots. We describe what happens as this industry-dominated project docks in a public–private partnership with pan-European institutions and a legislative initiative on robolaw. Emphasizing the co-production of robotics and European innovation politics, we observe how well-known uncertainties and scholarly debates about machine capabilities and human–machine configurations, are unexpectedly played out in legal scholarship and institutions as a controversy and a significant problem for human-centered legal frameworks. European robotics are indeed driving an increase in speculative ethics and a new-found weight of possible futures in legislative practice. (shrink)

The paper argues that, counter to Walter Sinnott-Armostrong and Ewen Kingston’s view, we are morally required to refrain from joyguzzling, i.e., driving a fuel-inefficient car for no other purpose than having a good time. It is undisputed that joyguzzling is an example of a situation where the uncoordinated actions of a large group of individuals lead to an undesirable outcome. Additionally, it is highly unlikely that any one individual’s actions will have a significant impact on that outcome. But there are (...) morally relevant differences between cases that share these characteristics. The paper clarifies the debate by introducing and discussing three different types of cases: drop-in-the-ocean cases, overkill cases and emergence cases. We argue that we may have moral obligations in drop-in-the-ocean cases, and that emissions of GHGs are not examples of overkill cases. Then we demonstrate through counterexamples that there are moral obligations in a subgroup of emergence cases we call joyguzzling-like cases. After criticizing the soundness of Kingston and Sinnott-Armstrong’s arguments, we critically address their relevance. We argue that Sinnott-Armstrong and Kingston fail to distinguish between two concepts of moral obligation — namely, autonomous and heteronomous moral obligation; that their most important arguments do not have any relevance to heteronomous obligations; and, finally, that heteronomous moral obligations are essential for social change. (shrink)

The article aims to show that the theory of open and autopoietic systems may be applied in such a way as to transcend the sterile opposition between autonomy aesthetics and culturalism. A theory of contemporary and modern art as an observational system is outlined. Art is seen as specializing to an increasing degree in cannibalizing the discourses and modalities of media & communication industries. Art is thus a parasitical observer (Serres 1980). Why should one affect a shift in framework? What (...) are post-Luhmannian optics on contemporary arts and media able to do beyond what post-structuralist and postmodern optics already achieve? Post-structuralist aesthetics deal with contingency, insecurity, paradox and autoreflexivity, surplus meanings, and the complexity and decentering of the subject. Switching to systems theory allows us to treat such issues without building a wall of irrationality around the arts and the humanities. It handles these important issues in a systematic manner which links up with scientific discourse and with the advanced problem solving and criticality of other social domains, like politics, business and the media industries. Notably the rigueur and self-reflectivity of the conceptual framework allows us also to define limits of our approach. What is it about art which aesthetics cannot and should not explain? (shrink)

This book engages with post-truth as a problem of societal order and for scholarly analysis. It claims that post-truth discourse is more deeply entangled with main Western imaginations of knowledge societies than commonly recognised. Scholarly responses to post-truth have not fully addressed these entanglements, treating them either as something to be morally condemned or as accusations against which scholars have to defend themselves (for having somehow contributed to it). Aiming for wider problematisations, the authors of this book use post-truth to (...) open scholarly and societal assumptions to critical scrutiny. Contributions are both conceptual and empirical, dealing with topics such as: the role of truth in public; deep penetrations of ICTs into main societal institutions; the politics of time in neoliberalism; shifting boundaries between fact - value, politics - science, nature - culture; and the importance of critique for public truth-telling. Case studies range from the politics of nuclear power and election meddling in the UK, over smart technologies and techno-regulation in Europe, to renewables in Australia. The book ends where the Corona story begins: as intensifications of Modernity's complex dynamics, requiring new starting points for critique. (shrink)

Philosophical anthropologies that emphasise the role of the emotions can be used to expand existing notions of moral agency and learning in situations of great moral complexity. In this article we tell the story of one patient facing the tough decision of whether to be tested for Huntington’s disease or not. We then interpret her story from two different but compatible philosophical entry points: Aristotle’s conception of Greek tragedy and Karl Jaspers’ notion of Grenzsituationen (boundary situations). We continue by indicating (...) some ways in which these two positions may be used for reflecting upon different perspectives involved in clinical decision-making, those of patients, clinicians and bioethicists. We conclude that the ideas we introduce can be used as hermeneutic tools for situating learning and dialogue within a broader cultural field in which literature and art may also play important roles. (shrink)

In this article I consider some central aspects of the naturalist philosophy of science and science and technology studies in dealing with the contested status of technoscience in medicine. Focusing on the concepts of realism and representation, I argue that theories of science-as-practice in naturalist philosophy of science should expand their scope so as to reflect more thoroughly on the social and political context of technoscience. I develop a hermeneutic of technomedical objects in order to highlight the internal connectedness between (...) social action, material agency, and the actions of scientific communities. The framework thus developed is used to re-consider the genomic turn in medicine. Pointing to the discrepancies between socially dominant representations of genomic technology and the actual interventions brought about through those technologies, I raise the question of how and where to address problems of theory and policy. (shrink)

Many philosophers of science follow Hempel in embracing both substantive and methodological anti-psychologism regarding the study of explanation. The former thesis denies that explanations are constituted by psychological events, and the latter denies that psychological research can contribute much to the philosophical investigation of the nature of explanation. Substantive anti-psychologism is commonly defended by citing cases, such as hyper-complex descriptions or vast computer simulations, which are reputedly generally agreed to constitute explanations but which defy human comprehension and, as a result, (...) fail to engender any relevant psychological events. It is commonly held that the truth of the substantive thesis would lend support to the methodological thesis. However, the standard argument for the substantive thesis presumes that philosophers’ own judgments about the aforementioned cases issues from mastery of the lay or scientific norms regarding the use of ‘explanation.’ Here we challenge this presumption with a series of experiments indicating that both lay and scientific populations require of explanations that they actually render their targets intelligible. This research not only undermines a standard line of argument for substantive anti-psychologism, it demonstrates the utility of psychological research methods for answering meta-questions about the norms regarding the use of ‘explanation.’. (shrink)

Trenton Merricks has recently argued that substance dualist accounts of embodiment and humanness do not cohere well with the Incarnation. He has also claimed that physicalism about human persons avoids this problem, which should lead Christians to be physicalists. In this paper, I argue that there are plausible dualist accounts of embodiment and humanness that avoid his objections. Furthermore, I argue that physicalism is inconsistent with the Incarnation.

This paper offers an introduction to the philosophy and science of embodied learning, conceived as both the stabilizing and expansionary process that sustains order and novelty within learners’ worlds enacted through observing and describing. Embodied learning acknowledges stability and change as the purposeful conjoined characteristics that sustain learners. It is, in many respects, a composite theory that represents work from various disciplines. This ‘naturalized epistemology’ ( ) conceives a world of fact inevitably imbued with the values that our own structural (...) histories guarantee us observers, whether acknowledged or not within our reflective awareness. These values, however, are not simple sets of preferences, for they are constituted in our individual learning histories that, for good or bad, influence the course of future learning. This conservational element of our condition is only half the story, however. The more radical aspect resides in the expansionary capacity of embodied observers to change, to enact worlds that are not pre‐given ( ) but, rather, brought forth by learners as observers and describers. Furthermore, embodied learning seeks a grounding for understanding in the often‐unexplored epistemological terrain between positivist absolutism or its mirrored polar opposite, postmodern nihilism. Its epistemological stance derives from its ontology, which is grounded in the profound obviousness that ‘everything said is said by someone’ (, p. 27). (shrink)

Health care providers (HCPs) are routinely placed into morally challenging situations that have the potential to cause moral distress. This is especially true for HCPs working in the military, whether they are on deployment outside their typical contexts of practice such as in disaster relief (e.g., Haiti and the Ebola missions in West Africa), or in more typically military settings such as peace keeping or armed conflicts (e.g., Afghanistan, Syria). Moral distress refers to “painful feelings and/or psychological disequilibrium” (Nilsson, Sjöberg, (...) Kallenberg, & Larsson, 2011, p. 50) that occur when an individual is aware of a morally appropriate action in a moral dilemma but obstruction prevents them from carrying it out, or when in a situation where they must choose between upholding equally treasured but conflicting moral values. Similarly, moral distress can occur when faced with a ‘tragic choice’ where all available courses of action require something of moral significance to be given up, such as surgical triage in a mass casualty event (Hunt, Sinding, & Schwartz, 2012). In the literature, moral distress has been connected to negative psychological effects and even stress related mental health issues including compassion fatigue, burnout, and post-traumatic stress disorder (Owen & Wanzer, 2014; Gustafsson, Eriksson, Strandberg, & Norberg, 2010; Litz, et al., 2009). (shrink)

A brief poll of my scientific colleagues confirmed that, to a person, they regard addiction as a disease, whereas most non-science acquaintances consider it to be a failure of willpower. Reconciliation of these polarized views seems difficult and rather than finding a middle path, such as suggested by Foddy and Savulescu. I am an entrenched supporter of the view that addiction can be a disease. I first should declare my position as a card-carrying biologist, holding the view that behavior emanates (...) from the brain and, accordingly, that behavior and emotions result from brain function. This brain function also produces addiction and related behaviors, whereas Foddy and Savulescu seem to credit humans with a greater capacity to choose than biological evidence suggests. The second problem relates to definitions of disease: I argue that there are at least three ways addiction might be considered a disease. 1.? ? ? Addiction is a disease because it results in pathology. For example, hypertension is a disease. Hypertension per se does not cause dysfunction, but leads to pathologically definable conditions such as stroke and myocardial infarction. Smoking, like hypertension, can result in pathologies such as emphysema and cancer. The problem is not smoking per se, or even addiction to nicotine, rather it is the consequent diseases caused by tobacco. Nevertheless, if hypertension is a disease, so is smoking. The question of “choosing‘ to persist with smoking has no bearing on whether it is disease. Whether a person chooses to care for their hypertension or ignore it does not alter the fact that they have hypertension; it is still a disease and it will still harm them. Whether addiction affects the capacity to choose is not relevant because it does not alter the fact that smoking causes pathology and hence is a disease. 2.? ? ? Foddy and Savulescu argue that addiction leaves no tell-tale pathology to set it aside from. (shrink)

Trenton Merricks has recently argued that substance dualist accounts of embodiment and humanness do not cohere well with the Incarnation. He has also claimed that physicalism about human persons avoids this problem, which should lead Christians to be physicalists. In this paper, I argue that there are plausible dualist accounts of embodiment and humanness that avoid his objections. Furthermore, I argue that physicalism is inconsistent with the Incarnation.

This paper maintains that, for all his ethical interests, his philosophical and theological essays, political treatises and linguistic studies, Dante was primarily a poet; a poet who, moreover, believed that poetry could change the world, and that the Comedy must be read, first, as a poem. This is not a trivial point, because the Comedy remains a text that is endlessly fascinating to philosophers and theologians as well as moralists who read it for its philosophy, theology and ethics and who (...) sometimes fail to see that a poet's imagination, even one as egregiously rational as Dante's, is synthetic rather than analytic. This paper offers an examination of the moral universe of the Comedy, paying particular attention to his presentation of the virtues. It endeavours to show how Dante's entry into the moral universe is by way of beauty through the operation of love, and considers how, for Dante, the inevitability of beauty, when properly understood, opens out on to truth and goodness, which, in turn, fold back upon beauty as the Beatific Vision is reached. (shrink)

In light of the already-here disasters of the Anthropocene, what might it mean to define “ground” phenomenologically? That is, if one is to get beyond the ‘merely rational’ and enter into the ‘dustier’ matters of ecological philosophizing, how might one phenomenologically consider the ground? This article will dwell on the nature of the earth-ground—or, soil—as a rematerialized grounding principle for phenomenology in this age of climate crisis. Contending with Heidegger, among others, this poietic article limns possibilities for a ‘grounded’ phenomenology.

Over the past forty years, economists associated with the University of Chicago have won more than one-third of the Nobel prizes awarded in their discipline and have been major influences on American public policy. Building Chicago Economics presents the first collective attempt by social science historians to chart the rise and development of the Chicago School during the decades that followed the Second World War. Drawing on new research in published and archival sources, contributors examine the people, institutions and ideas (...) that established the foundations for the success of Chicago economics and thereby positioned it as a powerful and controversial force in American political and intellectual life. (shrink)

Introduction: Religious experience in modernity : faith itself as the "unknown God" -- Fides qua creditur : the Enlightenment mind and the theology of the heart -- Within the bounds of reason alone : the subjective justification of religious belief in the thought of Immanuel Kant -- Schleiermacher's "higher order Pietism" : subjectivity and Protestant liberal thought -- Søren Kierkegaard and the paradox of faith : subjectivity in Christian existentialism -- Subjectivity and religious belief in Anglo-American revivalism : Jonathan Edwards (...) and John Wesley -- Subjectivity and religious belief in Anglo-American revivalism : George Whitefield and Charles G. Finney. (shrink)

This book offers a unique synthesis of past and current work on the structure, meaning, and use of negation and negative expressions, a topic that has engaged thinkers from Aristotle and the Buddha to Freud and Chomsky. Horn's masterful study melds a review of scholarship in philosophy, psychology, and linguistics with original research, providing a full picture of negation in natural language and thought; this new edition adds a comprehensive preface and bibliography, surveying research since the book's original publication.