A model for the ideal state includes discussions of the nature and application of justice, the role of the philosopher in society, the goals of education, and the effects of art upon character.

The main purpose of Alexander’s book is "to lay a foundation for modes of philosophical thinking and many of the traditional problems of philosophy by an examination of the manner in which ideas are constructed." Toward this end, the book is divided into three parts. The first part deals mainly with language and its constituent questions. The mechanics of communication are presented including a detailed breakdown of its elements and the reasons for its success and failure. With respect to the (...) study of language, Alexander explores such questions as the learning of a language, the study of grammar, the nature of words, and the relation of thought to language. In his section on symbols, the author considers the nature of symbols, the relationship of symbols to their referents, and the distinction between and uses of signs and symbols. The fourth major topic in this section, the concept of meaning, centers around the kinds of referential meaning and the relation of existential variability to class relations. Views mentioned range from Plato to Chomsky, Piaget, and Austin. This first part serves as a backdrop to the more central part dealing with processes of thinking. Analyzed are three basic processes: abstracting, imagining, and generalizing. Three varieties of abstractions: qualities, relations, and functions, are deemed sufficiently important to warrant sustained treatment. Imagining, "the altering of abstractions," is of primary importance in the understanding of the nature of thought. His account of the process of generalizing explicates, among other issues, the concept of universals and their existential status. This section is neatly tied together by an examination of the interrelationships between these three processes in which he appropriately draws upon the major figures of Greek and modern philosophy. Throughout the presentation, the ways in which these processes are expressed linguistically is never lost sight of. The final part of the book, dealing with the nature of rational inquiry, centers upon the concepts of defining, inferring, and systematizing. While the book was designed as an introductory text, its usefulness is certainly not limited to this purpose.—B. G. H. (shrink)

The sentence ὢσπερ γxs22EFρ οxs1F31… xs1F04γουςιν as it stands, seems to be unsatisfactory. The meaning is left too vague. We except some such subject as βουκxs22EFλοι or ποιμxs22EFνες after οxs1F31, and the object of xs1F02γουσιν is placed awkwardly next to that of προσεíοντες. We feel that προσεíοντες goes too closely with xs1F02γουσιν to have anything to do with the article. It may be entirely detached by taking it more or less as a parenthetical remark.

The sentence ὢσπερ γ⋯ρ οἱ… ἄγουςιν as it stands, seems to be unsatisfactory. The meaning is left too vague. We except some such subject as βουκ⋯λοι or ποιμ⋯νες after οἱ, and the object of ἂγουσιν is placed awkwardly next to that of προσεíοντες. We feel that προσεíοντες goes too closely with ἂγουσιν to have anything to do with the article. It may be entirely detached by taking it more or less as a parenthetical remark.

A collection of essays exploring the relationship between Plato and the poet Hesiod. The volume covers a wide variety of thematic angles, brings new and sometimes surprising light to a large range of Platonic dialogues, and represents a major contribution to the study of the reception of archaic poetry in Athens.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Pragmatic Environmentalism: Towards a Rhetoric of Eco-Justice by Shane J. RalstonPiers H.G. Stephens (bio)Pragmatic Environmentalism: Towards a Rhetoric of Eco-Justice Shane J. Ralston. Leicester, UK: Troubadour Publishing Ltd, 2013. Xxxv + 146 pages.But no word could protect the doctrine from critics so blind to the nature of the enquiry that, when Dr. Schiller speaks of ideas ‘working’ well, the only thing they think of is their immediate workings (...) in the physical environment, their enabling us to make money, or gain some similar ‘practical’ advantage. Ideas do work thus, of course, immediately or remotely; but they work indefinitely inside the mental world also.(James, 1978: 267)Thus wrote an exasperated William James in The Meaning of Truth in 1910, attempting to refute the persistent misunderstanding of classical American pragmatism as being some form of reductive and technocratic epistemological capitalism. A century on and the misunderstandings rather depressingly continue in new contexts, most notably environmental philosophy, and we must ask “Why?” I suspect that this question has several interconnected answers: the popular non-philosophical associations of the word “pragmatism”; the mistaken tendency to equate pragmatism with runaway subjectivism; poorly informed impressions of the pragmatist criteria of “success” [End Page 123] and “workability”; and the misguided common assumptions, popularized in early environmental ethics work, that pragmatist schemes have no room for noninstrumental values (Leiss 1972; Rolston 1989; Hargrove 1989). The last of these continues despite scholarly refutations (Weston 1992; Minteer 2001; McDonald 2004; Stephens 2009 and 2012), and it is possible that a deeper reason for this obdurate resistance to pragmatist persuasion may lie in the philosophical history of persuasiveness itself. For as Shane Ralston observes in this book’s introduction, there is an intimate relationship between pragmatism and rhetoric, one which clashed with emergent Platonic ideas of truth during the very birth pangs of Western philosophy and may thus have led both to “a philosophical prejudice that rhetorical persuasion is inferior to philosophical logic” (xiv) and a related awareness that “the democratic spirit of rhetoric and its moorings in commonsense, everyday experience make it especially compatible with pragmatism” (xiv). Thus the mistaken tendency to equate philosophical pragmatism with the crassly opportunistic or the crudely populist, and the persistent failure to register pragmatist philosophy’s subtleties may well both have their roots in antique rivalries—Plato’s contrast of truth to mere popular opinion and his related condemnation of the Sophist rhetoricians. Ralston’s response to this problem is first to sensibly orientate his pragmatism to the philosophically sophisticated end of the spectrum and then employ it to enrich contemporary theory of rhetoric. He then attempts to demonstrate the potential of the new pragmatic rhetoric in a series of studies of particular areas of environ-mentalist contestation.Ralston’s variety of pragmatism is one that tries to largely eschew the generic popular associations of the word, and he notes the sensible distinction between the classical or paleo-pragmatism of Peirce, James, and Dewey as against the contemporary neo-pragmatism of Rorty and others. Though Ralston claims to “combine elements of both classical pragmatism and neo-pragmatism to highlight how pragmatism improves discursive practice” (xvii), in practice the most significant influence on the work appears to be Dewey, and this paleo-pragmatist reviewer was pleased to see that Ralston tries to avoid the tendency to play up the managerialist aspects of pragmatism in favor of “philosophical pragmatism’s other rich resources” such as “its fallibilism, experimentalism, and meliorism” (xxv). The aim of connecting up these pragmatist resources to rhetoric is to show that “a deeply pragmatic rhetoric, once introduced into environmental communication, has the potential to transform the way environmental activists speak about their [End Page 124] methods and goals, moving them toward what I call a rhetoric of eco-justice” (xxx), a rhetoric which can displace the current focus on value theory because it “offers a superior route toward advancing an agenda that preserves the natural environment and promotes ecological justice” (xxxi).In attempting to demonstrate these declared goals, the main body of the book is organized into five chapters. In Chapter 1, Ralston outlines and distinguishes two environmental rhetorics: a rhetoric of control and a... (shrink)

pt. I. The Republic, tr. by H. Davis, with a special introduction by F. Z. Rooker.--pt. II. The Statesman, tr. by G. Burgess.

"We must turn to the Euthydemus if we are to understand both Plato's earlier and his more mature work. Thomas Chance's book is an indispensible tool for penetrating to the sources of Plato's thinking on the nature of philosophy. This is the most impressive treatment of the dialogue so far available to scholars, and the interpretations offered will surely be the starting point for all future discussions."--G. B. Kerferd, Emeritus, University of Manchester "A sensitive and well-informed study of (...) an important and much neglected dialogue."--R. E. Allen, Northwestern University "A sensitive and well-informed study of an important and much neglected dialogue."--R. E. Allen "Chance's book [will be] an indispensable tool for penetrating to the sources of Plato's thinking.... The interpretations offered will surely be the starting point for all future discussions."--George Kerferd. (shrink)

It is notorious that great philosophers are apt to be misunderstood. Controversy rages about their work, and sometimes they are credited with completely contradictory views. Consider the sharply contrasted opinions of Plato's political thought by Sir Karl Popper, on the one hand, and G. C. Field and H. B. Acton on the other.

In "Realism and Reason" Hilary Putnam has offered an apparently strong argument that the position of metaphysical realism provides an incoherent model of the relation of a correct scientific theory to the world. However, although Putnam's attack upon the notion of the "intended" interpretation of a scientific theory is sound, it is shown here that realism may be formulated in such a way that the realist need make no appeal to any "intended" interpretation of such a theory. Consequently, it can (...) be shown that realism is immune to Putnam's criticism and that attempts at reformulating this criticism are not likely to meet with success. (shrink)

The influence of Nazism on German culture was a key concern for many Anglo-American writers, who struggled to reconcile the many contributions of Germany to European civilization, with the barbarity of the new regime. In _German Literature Through Nazi Eyes_, H.G. Atkins gives an account of how the Nazis undertook a re-evaluation of German literature, making it sub-ordinate to their own interests. All reference to Jewish writers and influence was virtually eliminated, and key writers such as Goethe and Lessing were (...) re-interpreted. What was left was a military history that was avowedly militant and propagandist. (shrink)