Call generalism about children’s and adults’ wellbeing the thesis that the same theory of wellbeing applies to both children and adults. Our goal is to examine whether generalism is true. While this question has not received much attention in the past, it has recently been suggested that generalism is likely to be false and that we need to elaborate different theories of children’s and adults’ wellbeing. In this paper, we defend generalism against the main objections it faces and make a (...) positive case for it. (shrink)

Andrée-Anne Cormier and Harry Brighouse explore the question of whether there are good reasons for schools to try and produce citizens disposed to use, and practiced in, civil discourse and behavior, and if so, what this implies for schools. First, the authors propose an account of the value (and disvalue) of civility, drawing on Cheshire Calhoun’s conception. They argue that civility is good in many circumstances, but not always. In some circumstances, it is neither beneficial nor morally required. (...) Second, they elucidate the reasons for teaching civility in schools and what they think that doing so would involve, what demands it would make on teachers, and how the aim of promoting civility would shape the structure of schools. Finally, they identify some reasons for pessimism that schools can be very successful in promoting civility. They do not think that these are conclusive reasons against teaching civility in schools, but they suggest that civility can only be taught well if educators are clear-eyed about the hurdles they will have to overcome. (shrink)

In this article, we argue that the phenomenon of predation is the source of several problems for Donaldson and Kymlicka's account of our duties towards wild and liminal animals. According to them, humans should adopt a general policy of non-intervention with respect to predatory behaviour involving wild and liminal animals. They justify this recommendation by appealing to the status of those animals as, respectively, members of sovereign communities and denizens of human-animal societies. Our goal is not to question their recommendation, (...) but to challenge the reasons given in its support. On the one hand, we argue that, insofar as wild animal communities are incapable of dealing with massive predation, they do not possess the competence required for sovereignty. Moreover, we argue that, even if we leave the issue of competence aside, attributing sovereignty rights to communities including both predators and preys may not be the best way to protect wild animals’ fundamental interests. On the other hand, we argue that there exist two important disanalogies between human denizens and liminal animals, which render Donaldson and Kymlicka's denizenship framework problematic. We suggest that the ultimate justification for a general policy of non-intervention lies in the significant risk of causing greater harm by acting otherwise, due to our limited knowledge and resources. (shrink)

This chapter argues that school should cease to be compulsory at age 16 and that an education resource account (ERA) should be established for students who leave school at that age. The ERA would be sufficient to cover three years of full-time education. It could be linked to inflation and early school leavers could use it in accredited non-profit educational institutions at any later point in their lives. Two sets of arguments are discussed in support of the proposal. The first, (...) building on the empirical literature, focuses on efficiency and highlights the advantages of an ERA with respect to the ‘disruptive’ students issue in particular. The second set of arguments is anti-paternalistic. The chapter distinguishes three anti-paternalistic arguments: the view that individuals are the best judges of their own welfare, the idea that autonomous decision-making is a component of well-being, and a respect-based view of what renders anti-paternalism wrong. (shrink)

This article explores the question of whether it is morally permissible for the liberal state to require schools to teach religions “neutrally” to children. I examine this question through the normative analysis of Canadian Supreme Court case Loyola High School v. Quebec. I argue that it is in principle morally impermissible for the liberal state to oblige all schools to adopt a neutral approach to teaching children about religious diversity. I propose a normative framework for evaluating the legitimacy of such (...) an imposition and identify a strategy in support of accommodating schools like Loyola that does not appeal to the existence of a strong parental right to control their children’s education. (shrink)

Andrée-Anne Cormier | : Cet article explore la question des implications de l’exclusion des animaux de la catégorie des sujets de justice dans le cadre du libéralisme politique de John Rawls. Plus spécifiquement, j’examine et critique les lectures de Ruth Abbey et de Robert Garner. Abbey suggère que le libéralisme politique est incompatible avec la thèse selon laquelle nous avons des devoirs moraux universels envers les animaux. Garner, pour sa part, avance que la théorie de Rawls n’autorise pas (...) l’État libéral à adopter des mesures de protection des animaux. Dans cet article, je démontre que ces lectures sont erronées, car elles sont fondées sur des interprétations du libéralisme politique qui ne sont pas plausibles. Je soutiens, d’une part, que le libéralisme politique est neutre eu égard à la question de la nature de nos devoirs moraux envers les animaux et, d’autre part, qu’il permet de justifier une gamme considérable d’interventions étatiques visant la protection des animaux. Je suggère donc que la tension entre le libéralisme politique et l’éthique animale est moins forte que ne l’affirment ces auteurs. Enfin, j’identifie des stratégies possibles, cohérentes avec le cadre théorique rawlsien, pour élargir la sphère des sujets de justice de manière à y intégrer les animaux. | : What are the implications of John Rawls’s Political Liberalism for animal ethics? In this paper, I examine Ruth Abbey’s and Robert Garner’s answers to this question. Abbey claims that Political Liberalism is incompatible with the view that there exist universal moral duties toward animals. Garner contends that Rawls’s theory cannot justify state interventions designed to protect animals. I show that these readings are based on implausible interpretations of Rawls’s theory. I argue, on the one hand, that Political Liberalism is neutral with respect to the question of the nature of our moral duties toward animals and, on the other hand, that the theory can potentially justify a significant range of state interventions in the interest of animals. This indicates that the tension between Rawls’s theory and animal ethics is less sharp than Abbey and Garner suggest. Finally, I identify possible strategies, consistent with the Rawlsian framework, for including animals among the subjects of justice. (shrink)

In recent years, many scholars have offered innovative accounts of social categories such as gender, race, and disability. By contrast, comparatively little work has been done on the category of children. The goal of our paper is to offer a new account of what children are. We start by discussing the two main accounts that have been put forward so far in the literature: naturalistic accounts and normative accounts. According to the former, to be a child is a matter of (...) possessing, or lacking, some ‘natural’ and ‘objective’ properties. According to the latter, to be a child is to possess a particular normative status. We argue that both naturalistic and normative accounts are subject to a variety of objections. We then propose our own social constructivist account. According to it, to be a child in any given society is to be regarded by the dominant ideology of that society as the target of a set of broadly paternalistic norms, in virtue of the possession of a cluster of natural properties such that, according to the dominant ideology of that society, it is justified to subject that individual to such norms. We conclude our paper by showing that our account meets the criteria of success for an account of what it is to be a child and by addressing some objections. (shrink)

Cet article considère la question de la légitimité du financement public des écoles dites ethnoreligieuses à la lumière du modèle interculturaliste de citoyenneté. La première section dresse un bref portrait historique du débat autour de cette question tel qu’il s’est présenté au Québec. Ensuite, elle explique en quoi cette problématique révèle une tension inhérente aux principes clés de l’interculturalisme. La seconde partie propose une critique de l’approche standard pour aborder l’enjeu du financement public des écoles ethnoreligieuses et défend une approche (...) alternative fondée sur une vision plus globale des finalités politiques de l’interculturalisme. La troisième et dernière section propose, en s’appuyant sur le modèle alternatif défendu, quatre mesures régulatrices visant à répondre aux difficultés que posent les politiques de financement public des écoles ethnoreligieuses. (shrink)

In this essay, Bruce Maxwell, David Waddington, Kevin McDonough, Andrée-Anne Cormier, and Marina Schwimmer compare two competing approaches to social integration policy, Multiculturalism and Interculturalism, from the perspective of the issue of the state funding and regulation of conservative religious schools. After identifying the key differences between Interculturalism and Multiculturalism, as well as their many similarities, the authors present an explanatory analysis of this intractable policy challenge. Conservative religious schooling, they argue, tests a conceptual tension inherent in Multiculturalism (...) between respect for group diversity and autonomy, on the one hand, and the ideal of intercultural citizenship, on the other. Taking as a case study Québec's education system and, in particular, recent curricular innovations aimed at helping young people acquire the capabilities of intercultural citizenship, the authors illustrate how Interculturalism signals a compelling way forward in the effort to overcome the political dilemma of conservative religious schooling. (shrink)

Animal and human studies suggest that parenting style is transmitted from one generation to the next. The hypotheses of this study were that a mother’s rearing experiences would predict her own parenting resources and current maternal mood, motivation to care for her offspring, and relationship with her parents would underlie this association. In a subsample of 201 first-time mothers participating in the longitudinal Maternal Adversity, Vulnerability and Neurodevelopment project, we assessed a mother’s own childhood maltreatment and rearing experiences using the (...) Childhood Trauma Questionnaire and the Parental Bonding Instrument. At 6 months postpartum, mothers completed questionnaires on parenting stress, symptoms of depression, maternal motivation, and current relationship with their own parents. The sample consisted of mostly high socioeconomic status mothers recruited from Montréal or Hamilton, Canada, with an age range from 18 to 43 years. More severe maltreatment and less supportive rearing by the mother’s parents predicted increased parenting stress at 6 months. These associations were mediated through distinct psychosocial pathways: maltreatment on parenting stress through symptoms of depression ; maternal rearing on parenting stress through maternal motivation and symptoms of depression ; and paternal rearing on parenting stress through current relationship with the father. Maternal rearing experiences predict a mother’s own parenting resources though distinct psychosocial pathways, including depressed mood, maternal motivation, and social support. (shrink)

Animal and human studies suggest that parenting style is transmitted from one generation to the next. The hypotheses of this study were that a mother’s rearing experiences would predict her own parenting resources and current maternal mood, motivation to care for her offspring, and relationship with her parents would underlie this association. In a subsample of 201 first-time mothers participating in the longitudinal Maternal Adversity, Vulnerability and Neurodevelopment project, we assessed a mother’s own childhood maltreatment and rearing experiences using the (...) Childhood Trauma Questionnaire and the Parental Bonding Instrument. At 6 months postpartum, mothers completed questionnaires on parenting stress, symptoms of depression, maternal motivation, and current relationship with their own parents. The sample consisted of mostly high socioeconomic status mothers recruited from Montréal or Hamilton, Canada, with an age range from 18 to 43 years. More severe maltreatment and less supportive rearing by the mother’s parents predicted increased parenting stress at 6 months. These associations were mediated through distinct psychosocial pathways: maltreatment on parenting stress through symptoms of depression ; maternal rearing on parenting stress through maternal motivation and symptoms of depression ; and paternal rearing on parenting stress through current relationship with the father. Maternal rearing experiences predict a mother’s own parenting resources though distinct psychosocial pathways, including depressed mood, maternal motivation, and social support. (shrink)

During the co-evaluation of student teacher of trainees’ learning with the associate teacher, several supervisors experience a discomfort with their role, their actions and their posture. For some, this discomfort is due to a lack of continuous training preventing their professional development. By creating a community of practice, we supported the reflection and analysis of student teaching supervision that take place within triads, made up of the trainees’, the associate teacher and the supervisors. Our objective was to study the contributions (...) of this community to their practices. In this article, we first present the problematic. We then present the conceptual framework consisting of experiential learning, professional development and the community of practice. The methodological approach is then explained, followed by data collected by means of semi-directed individual interviews with the supervisors of the community of practice. The results of the reported practice highlight the contributions of the community of practice to the professional development of its members. (shrink)

Future mobility planning to cope with ongoing environmental challenges such as air pollution has to be anchored in the work of every public authority worldwide. One recent trend that could support public authorities to meet the European Union’s sustainability targets is the creation and sharing of transport and mobility “big” data between public authorities via tools such as crowdsourcing. While the benefits of the use of big data to increase public authorities’ efficiency and effectivity and their citizens’ lives is well (...) understood, examples from the public sector that highlight public authorities’ engagement in such sharing activities is still missing. To date relevant literature has highlighted issues around the capacity of public authorities that hinder shared activities. In this paper we want to raise distrust as a key reason for lack of engagement. Based on comprehensive data collected over the period of 4 years via several workshops and semi-structured interviews with seven public authorities in Europe, we are able to demonstrate that a major obstacle for not providing and sharing data via crowdsourcing for mutual benefit lies primarily in the hands of the public authority’s servants of the middle and high-level management. Our results show firstly, that distrust may emerge toward different referents such as the community, particular individuals, or the technology itself and thus, managerial implications have to be very specific to overcome distrust. Secondly, we show how distrust may spread from one referent to another through negative reciprocity and which, if unchecked may lead to an all-encompassing state that affects the whole sharing economy framework and inhibits potential benefits. (shrink)

Les femmes engagées dans l'Église constituent les piliers de la vie ecclésiale mais restent des sujettes mineures dans cette institution qui ne leur reconnaît pas, dans les faits, un statut d'égalité avec les hommes. Depuis plus de vingt ans, elles revendiquent des transformations : elles veulent participer à la rédaction des discours officiels, obtenir de meilleurs conditions de travail, mettre de l'avant l'usage du langage inclusif dans les liturgies. Ces femmes, qui détiennent dans une proportion déplus en plus importante une (...) formation en théologie, s'efforcent de conscientiser le clergé à la nécessité de développer avec elles des rapports égalitaires qui impliquent un véritable partage des pouvoirs et des responsabilités. Compte tenu du haut niveau de résistance au changement, il faudrait sans doute que ces femmes acceptent de désobéir à l'ordre clérical et qu'elles osent transgresser les règles de fonctionnement sexiste si elles veulent parvenir à mettre en place une ecclésia égalitaire.Although women constitute the pillars in the ongoing life of the Church, their status is not equal to that of men and they play a secondary role in the institution. For at least the last twenty years, women have been demanding changes such as : the participation in the elaboration of official statements, the betterment of working conditions and the use of inclusive language in liturgical celebrations. Many women, who have a theological formation, endeavour to make the clergy realize the necessity of developing relationhips of real equality. This implies a concrete division of power and responsability. Given the degree of resistance in the institutional Church, women may have to accept disobedience to clerical power, thus breaking the rules of a sexist functioning in order to establish an Ecclesia of equality. (shrink)

La 4ème de couverture indique : "Cet ouvrage, qui réunit juristes, sociologues, anthropologue et psychanalyste, se propose de saisir la place du genre en bioéthique à l'heure de questions sociétales liées tant aux progrès de la médecine reproductive qu'aux rôles assignés aux femmes et aux hommes à l'intérieur de la famille ou en dehors de celle-ci. Il s'agit, au travers de regards croisés, d'éclairer le débat du genre au sein de la sphère bioéthique en identifiant, au sein et au-delà des (...) thèmes de la procréation, de la parentalité et du patrimoine, les questions juridiques qui peuvent naître de la rencontre de la bioéthique et du genre. Les sujets sont nombreux, regroupés autour d'interrogations telles que : le genre est-il reçu dans le droit du vivant? Que font les lois bioéthique au genre? Y a-t-il un âge pour procréer? Existe-t-il une égalité entre les femmes et les hommes en termes d'accès aux soins? Assiste-t-on à une désexualisation du couple? Peut-on parler de patrimoine sexuel?... Éventail d'interrogations, diversité des opinions : les meilleurs spécialistes de chaque question abordée y analysent les réponses fournies par le droit en livrant des pistes de réflexion sur le traitement des inégalités ou des différences existant entre hommes et femmes dans l'exercice, parfois l'existence, des droits et libertés qui sont les leurs en ce domaine.". (shrink)

RÉSUMÉCet article est une défense de la position exposée par Nelson Goodman dans Langages de l'art. Goodman affirme que les images fonctionnent dans des systèmes symboliques denses. La différence entre texte et image ne se situe pas là où nous l'aurions spontanément cherchée : dans l'expérience perceptuelle que nous avons des images. Une telle théorie de la dépiction peut sembler iconoclaste, voire complètement fausse, et ce, parce que nous y voyons à tort une explication de la représentation picturale. Elle offre (...) cependant, rapportée à d'autres intuitions philosophiques qui essaiment ailleurs dans l’œuvre de Goodman, une meilleure compréhension du fonctionnement des images.ABSTRACTIn this paper, I draw unexpected conclusions from Nelson Goodman's views on depiction. Faithful to the symbolic turn of aesthetics in the twentieth century, Goodman argues that pictures are as conventional and natural as scripts. Unlike scripts, however, pictures work in dense symbolic systems. The difference between image and script cannot be found where we would have spontaneously looked: in our perceptual experience of pictures. Obviously, the structural approach which is at stake in Languages of Art is iconoclast; we often consider it surprising, or even absolutely misleading, perhaps because we do not connect the analyses Goodman conducts in his essay with the experience we ordinarily have of pictures. I argue that Goodman's position becomes clearer when it is reduced to a much more modest philosophical purpose: to offer a criterion for discrimination between scripts and pictures. Pictures, unlike scripts, are dense. Of course, that does not explain depiction. However, my account of Goodman's view, when connected to intuitions about cognitive processes that have spread elsewhere in his work, sheds light on the way pictures are connected with the objects they depict. (shrink)

Née en 1943 à Alger, Andrée Job-Querzola poursuit des études de lettres à Aix-en-Provence puis à Paris dans les années 1960. Devenue enseignante, elle gravite dans la mouvance féministe et d’extrême gauche et participe activement aux événements de Mai. Marquée par les luttes féministes des années 1970, en particulier celles du MLF, du MLAC, du MFPF, elle souhaite rendre hommage aux femmes de sa génération – « une génération rebelle » qui, selon elle, sonne le glas de « générations (...) de femmes f... (shrink)

La rencontre de Ricœur avec Greimas n’a pas été un événement éphémère, mais une discussion qui s’est étalée sur plus de trente ans. Anne Hénault retrace ici les différentes étapes de ce que Ricœur appelait son “combat amoureux” avec Greimas, et qui illustre à merveille le poème de René Char: “Les loyaux adversaires.” On y retrouve les qualités propres du philosophe dans ses dialogues, le souci de faire avancer son propre raisonnement de façon rigoureuse, mais aussi l’effort pour donner (...) à l’interlocuteur “la chance de son meilleur argument.” Anne Hénault raconte la traversée d’un structuralisme “ennemi” et la conquête d’une “amitié” réciproque exigeante, et fondée sur de véritables convergences intellectuelles. (shrink)

Comprendre le traitement médiatique, les discours de rêve ou de cauchemar qui accompagnent l’intelligence artificielle, suppose une analyse au prisme de la « triade animalité, humanité, machinité », à même de mettre à jour les projections ontologiques humaines à l’endroit des IA et de ce qui fait souvent figure de contraire dans notre imaginaire : les animaux. Le robot comme figure imaginaire y est un vecteur de dévoilement de l’implicite. Les fantasmes et craintes suscitées par les IA, si élevés et (...) subtils puissent-ils paraître d’un point de vue de bipèdes supérieurs, ne sont peut-être « que » de malines réactions animales face à ce qu’on imagine être un prédateur. Il s’agit simplement d’identifier la menace, or bien souvent elle est humaine. Les humains ne sont-ils pas les meilleurs prédateurs pour eux-mêmes? Et pour sortir de la métaphore de l’annihilation des humains par les robots, ne se comportent-ils pas envers les animaux de la même façon que ce qu’ils craignent et condamnent dans leur fantasme d’une machine aveugle, sans capacité de réflexion, d’éthique ou de sentiments? (shrink)

La notion de " qualité de la vie " est dans l'air du temps. Les réflexions qui suivent l'abordent sous l'angle médical. Prenons un exemple. Dans le traitement des maladies chroniques, il ne suffit plus de prouver qu'un schéma thérapeutique nouveau est efficace et dépourvu de toxicité. Il faut prouver qu'à efficacité et toxicité comparables à celles du traitement standard, le nouveau traitement donne aux malades une qualité de vie meilleure. Ainsi l'hypertension artérielle est facilement contrôlée par toutes sortes de (...) médicaments peu toxiques aux doses efficaces, mais leurs effets secondaires sont souvent mal supportés, occasionnant des abandons de traitement. De grands efforts ont été déployés depuis dix ans [ex. 11], avec l'aide de l'industrie pharmaceutique, pour trouver quels schémas thérapeutiques traitent l'H. T. A. de façon techniquement satisfaisante, sans détériorer la qualité de vie. On commencera par observer que faire intervenir des considérations de quantité-qualité de vie pour aider à résoudre un "dilemme" médical n'est pas une nouveauté. Ce qui est relativement nouveau, dans nos sociétés démocratiques, est l'effort fait pour rendre ces considérations explicites, les argumenter publiquement, justifier les choix qu'on est obligé de faire, en raisonnant sur le nombre et la valeur des années de vie "gagnées" selon les stratégies thérapeutiques. Tout le monde n'aime pas ce genre de calcul. Schématiquement, l'aversion pour les arguments du type quantité-qualité de la vie dénote une préférence pour des théories morales d'inspiration déontologique, tandis que le recours à ce type d'argument dénote une préférence pour des théories d'inspiration utilitariste. On suivra d'abord les utilitaristes en définissant l'action bonne, ou la décision éthique, comme celle qui maximise une quantité pondérée par une qualité. On montrera que, s'étant vaillamment lancés sur la voie de la rationalité calculatrice, les théoriciens de la lignée utilitariste ont mis en évidence les paradoxes et apories auxquels elle aboutit, dans le domaine de la santé comme ailleurs. Leurs ardeurs rationnelles en ont été tempérées de scepticisme. On rejoindra alors les tenants de la position déontologique, en posant un principe du caractère "sacré" de la vie humaine, qui exclut absolument le calcul qu'une vie a plus ou moins de valeur qu'une autre. On verra qu'en fait, par compassion ou réalisme, les partisans du respect " absolu " ont toujours subrepticement réintroduit dans la pratique les nuances relatives qu'ils récusent en théorie. Si dans les faits chacun finit par frôler la solution de l'autre, il reste qu'il y a là deux manières différentes dans leur esprit d'affronter des choix difficiles. Cela est important à considérer. En effet les solutions procédurales, qui permettent de ne pas prendre position sur le fond, et d'aboutir néanmoins à des décisions par voie négociée, restent inconfortables si les parties en présence ne comprennent pas leurs désaccords. (shrink)

Si on analyse les stratégies publicitaires de la plateforme Netflix il devient possible de mieux comprendre le modèle de spectateur que celles-ci façonnent. En étudiant la comparaison avec la chaine câblée HBO mais aussi le matériel de la campagne promotionnelle TV Got Better, nous observons les promesses que Netflix adresse à son public potentiel (plénitude, participation, prestige et personnalisation) ainsi que son encouragement des pratiques de visionnement « en rafale ».

On ne peut que se féliciter de la publication de ces deux ouvrages, qui rendent justice à une femme, Andrée Viollis (1870-1950), grand reporter, journaliste très connue dans l’entre-deux-guerres, aujourd’hui tombée dans l’oubli (à la différence d’un de ses contemporains célèbre, Albert Londres). Ces livres ont aussi en commun d’être le fruit savoureux de recherches en histoire contemporaine de deux historiennes dont les travaux ont été remarqués et jugés dignes d’être publiés. L’étude d’Anne...

L'effritement du modèle rationaliste et humaniste de culture, des valeurs de progrès, d'éducation, de raison et d'humanité, constitue depuis une cinquantaine d'années le noyau de l'expérience culturelle occidentale.

C'est par ce titre que Bernard Lepetit, alors secrétaire des Annales, annonçait dans le n° 48-4 de la revue (juillet-août 1993, pp. 997-998) l'ensemble de quatre notes critiques consacrées à l'Histoire des femmes en Occident, dirigée par Georges Duby et Michelle Perrot (Paris, Plon, 1991). Et c'est à cet ensemble que fait référence le texte « Ouverture » du n° 1 de la revue CLIO, Histoire, Femmes et Sociétés (1995, pp. 5-8), lorsqu'est évoquée l'attitude d'un certain nombre de publications d'...

Les années 1960 furent le théâtre de l'un des épisodes les plus brillants de l'histoire de la pensée philosophique en France. Elles s'ouvrirent sur le triomphe public du structuralisme, avec La Pensée sauvage de Lévi-Strauss, se continuèrent par le renouvellement du marxisme proposé par Althusser et de la psychanalyse par Lacan, et s'achevèrent avec une série d'oeuvres comme celles de Foucault, Deleuze, Derrida et Lyotard, qui ont décidé du visage de la philosophie contemporaine. L'héritage de cette période a néanmoins été (...) difficile, suscitant tantôt une fascination mimétique, tantôt un rejet caricatural. Depuis quelques années, les auteurs qui l'ont marquée font individuellement l'objet d'une réception savante plus mesurée et plus profonde, au risque cependant de perdre la dimension collective et transversale qui la caractérisait. Le but de cet ouvrage est de réunir certains des meilleurs spécialistes pour prendre toute la mesure de ce qui a constitué, par son intensité et son ampleur, un "moment philosophique" exceptionnel. Il offre à la fois une traversée de quatre dimensions transversales et une relecture de quatre livres singuliers : La Pensée sauvage de Lévi-Strauss, Lire Le Capital et Pour Marx d'Althusser, les livres de Derrida autour de De la grammatologie, et Discours, Figure de Lyotard. Traversant aussi bien les mathématiques de Bourbaki que la linguistique structurale, l'anthropologie de Lévi-Strauss que la psychanalyse freudienne, le marxisme d'Althusser que celui d'Adorno, le théâtre de Brecht que le cinéma de Godard, ce livre invite à redécouvrir ce moment non pas comme un objet historique à circonscrire, mais comme un mouvement ouvert où se sont décidées certaines des tâches qui nous incombent encore, aujourd'hui. (shrink)

In this paper we discuss three different kinds of disagreement that have been, or could reasonably be, characterized as deep disagreements. Principle level disagreements are disagreements over the truth of epistemic principles. Sub-principle level deep disagreements are disagreements over how to assign content to schematic norms. Finally, framework-level disagreements are holistic disagreements over meaning not truth, that is over how to understand networks of epistemic concepts and the beliefs those concepts compose. Within the context of each of these kinds of (...) disagreement it is not possible for the parties to the dispute to rationally persuade one another through only offering epistemic reasons for their conflicting points of view. However, in spite of the inability to rationally persuade, we explore how it may nevertheless be possible to rationally navigate each of these varieties of deep disagreement. (shrink)

With their landmark architectures, exhibitions and museums of science and technology partake in the spatial inscription of science in twentieth century landscapes. Unlike other beacons of progress, exhibitions and museums of science and technology double up, inside, as material arrangements of objects, visuals and texts aiming to confer meaning onto the modern world. They both embody and seek to order the spectacle of modernity while often being deployed with the aim of promoting particular visions of social and material progress. An (...) approach sensitive to the material, spatial, and experiential dimensions of displaying science and technology suggests that exhibitions and museums were in the twentieth century crucial sites for reflecting upon and promoting particular futures. (shrink)

Dance anthropologists and ethnomusicologists are trained to treat the labels ‘dance’ and ‘music’ with caution, because the terms carry preconceptions that may mask significant aspects of the structured movement/sound systems they study. Yet many talk about ‘the body’ – the medium through which these systems come into being – as something given and ‘true’, without investigating its emic conceptualizations or looking into the implications these may have in terms of how music and dance are experienced. The article investigates the dancing (...) bodies of western ballet dancers and of Tiwi dancers of northern Australia. The latter have an extensive vocabulary for body parts, but no word for ‘body’ as a bounded entity, comparable to the ‘body’ conceptualized by ballet dancers. The article argues that for the Tiwi landscape and human bodies are unavoidably tied together and that the dancers incarnate both land and cosmology. While specific parts have a concrete practical existence, the whole body expands into the landscape so that the landscape becomes flesh. Through the aesthetic transformation of dancing, dancers and land become one, and life is sustained and the land revitalized. (shrink)

Museums are safe spaces for the objects they hold and for the persons that visit them, providing environments that can function in therapeutic ways. Within the wide range of objects, there is enough diversity to help guests discover what similarities they have with others as well as what makes them unique as individuals. Within exhibits, individuals can explore themselves through the reactions they have to particular pieces, through the observation of what holds their attention within the environment, and through the (...) awareness and development of their contemplative mind. Museums can introduce transpersonal information, add information to previous transpersonal experiences, and even promote expanded states of awareness. With direction, guests can use museums to learn about themselves, thus optimizing the therapeutic potentials of these institutions. (shrink)

Two experiments were run to demonstrate the presence of a partial reinforcement extinction effect (PREE) and a partial punishment effect (PPE) 4 weeks after training in a 1-trial/day procedure. In the PREE paradigm, two groups of animals were trained to run a straight alley for food reward; one group was rewarded on every trial (CRF), whereas the other was rewarded on only 50% of the trials (PRF). In the test phase, extinction, no reward was present on any trial. Four weeks (...) after the end of acquisition, and subsequent to 7 days of CRF retraining, PRF animals showed greater resistance to extinction than did their CRF controls. The PPE paradigm resembled the PREE paradigm in all aspects, except that mild electric foot shock, together with the food reward, was used instead of nonreward on 50% of the acquisition trials. In the test phase, all animals were shocked and given a food reward on every trial. Four weeks after the end of acquisition and retraining, the animals with previous experience of shock in acquisition showed greater resistance to punishment than did their controls. (shrink)

This article focuses on the ethical implications of so-called ‘collateral damage’. It develops a moral typology of collateral harm to innocents, which occurs as a side effect of military or quasi-military action. Distinguishing between accidental and incidental collateral damage, it introduces four categories of such damage: negligent, oblivious, knowing and reckless collateral damage. Objecting mainstream versions of the doctrine of double effect, the article argues that in order for any collateral damage to be morally permissible, violent agents must comply with (...) high standards of care. In order for incidental harm to be permissible, an agent must take pains to avoid such harm even at higher cost to him- or herself. It is argued that accidentally but negligently caused collateral damage may be just as difficult to excuse as incidental harm. Only if high precautionary standards of care are met, can unintended harm to innocents – incidental or accidental – be permissible. In practice, such a strong commitment to avoiding harm to civilians may well lead us to question more generally and rethink more radically how violent conflicts ought to be fought, how military violence ought to be used and whether there are better ways of achieving those aims that we think are legitimate than those we are currently using. (shrink)

Many of our ideological, political, moral, religious, aesthetic, scientific beliefs, as well as those concerning everyday life, are controversial; other people do not share them. As a rule, that does not bother us much: we tend to retain our contestable beliefs even if we ascribe no less skill and well-informedness to those who represent other points of view than to ourselves. But is that really reasonable? Shouldn't we often admit that we might be as wrong as others? And if we (...) do, shouldn't this consequently lead us to give up many of our beliefs in favor of agnostic attitudes? Marc Andree Weber argues that in the face of disagreement with equally competent and well-informed interlocutors we should almost always refrain from insisting on our controversial beliefs – with the few exceptions being all the more remarkable. (shrink)

Robert Rosen has proposed several characteristics to distinguish “simple” physical systems (or “mechanisms”) from “complex” systems, such as living systems, which he calls “organisms”. The Memory Evolutive Systems (MES) introduced by the authors in preceding papers are shown to provide a mathematical model, based on category theory, which satisfies his characteristics of organisms, in particular the merger of the Aristotelian causes. Moreover they identify the condition for the emergence of objects and systems of increasing complexity. As an application, the cognitive (...) system of an animal is modeled by the “MES of cat-neurons” obtained by successive complexifications of his neural system, in which the emergence of higher order cognitive processes gives support to Mario Bunge’s “emergentist monism.”. (shrink)

A fallibilist theory of knowledge is employed to make sense of the idea that agents know what they are doing 'without observation' (as on Anscombe's theory of practical knowledge).

The feminist philosopher and social scientist shows how "gendering" has affected the social and natural sciences as she reconciles the long-standing dichotomy between the quantitative and qualitative methods and demonstrates the tandem use of both experimental and intuitive approaches.