Authored by an interdisciplinary team of experts, including historians, classicists, philosophers and theologians, this original collection of essays offers the first authoritative analysis of the multifaceted reception of Greek ethics in late antiquity and Byzantium, opening up a hitherto under-explored topic in the history of Greek philosophy. The essays discuss the sophisticated ways in which moral themes and controversies from antiquity were reinvigorated and transformed by later authors to align with their philosophical and religious outlook in each period. Topics examined (...) range from ethics and politics in Neoplatonism and ethos in the context of rhetorical theory and performance to textual exegesis on Aristotelian ethics. The volume will appeal to scholars and students in philosophy, classics, patristic theology, and those working on the history of education and the development of Greek ethics. (shrink)

The reaction to Darwin's Origin of Species varied in many countries according to the roles played by national scientific institutions and traditions and the attitudes of religious and political groups. The contributors to this volume, including M. J. S. Hodge, David Hull, and Roberto Moreno, gathered in 1972 at an international conference on the comparative reception of Darwinism. Their essays look at early pro- and anti-Darwinism arguments, and three additional comparative essays and appendices add a larger perspective. For this paperback (...) edition, Thomas F. Glick has added a new preface commenting on recent research. (shrink)

It is widely accepted that public discourse as we know it is less than ideal from an epistemological point of view. In this paper, we develop an underappreciated aspect of the trouble with public discourse: what we call the Listening Problem. The listening problem is the problem that public discourse has in giving appropriate uptake and reception to ideas and concepts from oppressed groups. Drawing on the work of Jürgen Habermas and Nancy Fraser, we develop an institutional response to the (...) listening problem: the establishment of what we call Receptive Publics, discursive spaces designed to improve listening skills and to give space for counterhegemonic ideas. (shrink)

Investigation into the theme of receptions and influences is one of traditional topics in the historiography of national philosophies. This article analyses the models of reception and influence used by Ukrainian historians of philosophy: the model of “influence without reception” (А. Tykholaz), the model of “studying philosophy” (D. Tschižewskij) and the model of “reception without influence” (V. Horskyi). Resting upon works by J.-L. Viellard-Baron and P. Hadot, the author tried to argue that: а) the place that reception studies occupies in (...) historiography as well as understanding of its phenomenon is traditionally dictated by the perception of the historic-philosophical process, the genre of the historiography of philosophy and specific historiographic attitudes; b) reception is a complex phenomenon, which has totally different configurations and meanings in different periods of the history of philosophy and cannot be put into one formula; c) the application of obvious formulas from the contemporary vision of receptions in separate historical contexts can verify or objection of the originality or even the existence of separate philosophical traditions; d) through the reflection on the phenomenon of reception in all of its complexity it possible to reveal some aspects, research into which notably corrects our perception of the history of philosophy; e) the popular over the past decades idea of the history of philosophy as dialogue among philosophers is a challenge for the historiography, though it can have a positive effect on historic-philosophical research as well as on historic-philosophical discourse in general. Particularly, the research into reception and using dialogue as a regulatory idea can influence the international circulation of ideas and contribute to turning it into “rational dialogue”, promoted by P. Bourdieu. (shrink)

This book presents a historiographical and theorical analysis of how Husserlian Phenomenology arrived and developed in North America. The chapters analyze the different phases of the reception of Edmund Husserl’s thought in the USA and Canada. The volume discusses the authors and universities that played a fundamental role in promoting Husserlian Phenomenology and clarifies their connection with American Philosophy, Pragmatism, and with Analytic Philosophy. Starting from the analysis of how the first American Scholars of Edmund Husserl's thought opened the door (...) to the reception of his texts, the book explores the first encounters between Pragmatism and Husserlian Phenomenology in American Universities. The study focuses, then, on those Scholars who fled from Europe to America, from 1933 onwards, to escape Nazism - Felix Kaufmann, Alfred Schutz, Aron Gurwitsch, Herbert Spiegelberg, Fritz Kaufmann, among the most notable - and illustrates how their teaching provided the very basis for the spreading of Husserlian Phenomenology in North America. The volume examines, then, the action of the 20th Century North-American Husserl Scholars, together with those places, societies, centers, and journals, specifically created to represent the development of the studies devoted to Husserlian Phenomenology in the U.S., with a focus of the Regional Phenomenological Schools. (shrink)

A natural way to think of epistemic virtue is by analogy with an archer. Just as a skilled archer is able to take aim and hit a target, a skilled epistemic agent will aim at truth and, if things go well, get things right. Here we highlight aspects of epistemic virtue that do not fit this model, particularly ways in which epistemic virtues can be non-voluntary and not goal-directed. In doing so, we draw on two important figures in the history (...) of philosophy: the 6th-century Indian Buddhist Buddhaghosa and the 20th-century French philosopher Simone Weil. Despite many differences, both thinkers emphasize the importance of attention in moral and epistemic virtue. Their work highlights ways in which attention that is neither voluntary nor goal-directed can nevertheless play an important role in moral and epistemic life. (shrink)

I argue that psychopathy undermines three common assumptions typically invoked in favor of moderate reasons responsive theories of moral responsibility. First, I propose a theory of psychopathic agency and claim that psychopathic agency suggests that the systems underlying receptivity to reason bifurcate into at least two sub-systems of receptivity. Next, I claim that the bifurcation of systems for receptivity suggests that reactivity is not “all of a piece” but that it too decomposes into at least two subsystems. Lastly, I argue (...) that prior attempts by Fischer and Ravizza to address these concerns contain an appeal to internalism. Since Fischer and Ravizza want their theory to remain agnostic about the nature of reasons for action, this appeal to internalism is problematic for their view. I close by suggesting that if we are to make sense of when and why psychopaths are responsible then a mechanism-based theory of responsibility must be able to explain how different systems of receptivity and reactivity come together to constitute a single mechanism that grounds responsibility ascriptions for action and they must do so without tacitly appealing to implausible forms of internalism about reasons for action. (shrink)

The author analyzes the role and significance of the new scientific area within the Ancient philosophy studies, named Classical Reception Studies. This area manifests itself as a reconceptualization of Antic Studies and therefore is as an interdisciplinary field, which focuses on the study of the receptions of Antiquity. This area is specific in its sphere of interest – not only philosophical heritage of a certain period, but also literary, historical and other sources. Such aspect of classical reception studies are important (...) as it contributes to thorough and fundamental studies of the history of Ukrainian philosophy because the ancient philosophical heritage was at the center of reflections on Ukrainian philosophy from Kievan Rus' to the present day. Therefore, we see the importance of domestic scientific studies devoted to the study of the receptions of antiquity in general and in the history of Ukrainian philosophy in particular. The latter can help to more understand the specifics of the formation and development of the philosophical tradition in Ukraine. Classical reception studies can be a specific historical and philosophical method of research of ancient philosophical heritage, along with other methods such as doxography, rational and historical reconstruction, etc. Its peculiarity lies in the fact that it can incorporate elements of doxography, as well as rational reconstruction or other historical and philosophical methods alone or together The author argues that in the context of classical reception studies, ancient philosophical texts can become a basis for solving contemporary global or local problems and issues of humanity (political, social, cultural, etc.). The potential of ancient texts and fragments (including philosophical ones) is important not only for understanding the past, but also in relation to the developments of society in the present. (shrink)

Possible measures to mitigate climate change require global collective actions whose impacts will be felt by many, if not all. Implementing such actions requires successful communication of the reasons for them, and hence the underlying climate science, to a degree that far exceeds typical scientific issues which do not require large-scale societal response. Empirical studies have identified factors, such as the perceived level of consensus in scientific opinion and the perceived reliability of scientists, that can limit people's trust in science (...) communicators and their subsequent acceptance of climate change claims. Little consideration has been given, however, to recent formal results within philosophy concerning the relationship between truth, the reliability of evidence sources, the coherence of multiple pieces of evidence/testimonies, and the impact of independence between sources of evidence. This study draws on these results to evaluate exactly what has been established in the empirical literature about the factors that bias the public's reception of scientific communications about climate change. (shrink)

According to Alexander of Aphrodisias, our potential intellect is a purely receptive capacity. Alexander also claims that, in order for us to actualise our intellectual potentiality, the intellect needs to abstract what is intelligible from enmattered perceptible objects. Now a problem emerges: How is it possible for a purely receptive capacity to perform such an abstraction? It will be argued that even though Alexander's reaction to this question causes some tension in his theory, the philosophical motivation for it (...) is a sound one. Rather than a calculation of actualities and potentialities, the doctrine of receptivity is supposed to explain how human beings come to grasp universal aspects of reality in an accurate manner. (shrink)

According to several commentators, Kurt Godel's incompleteness discoveries were assimilated promptly and almost without objection by his contemporaries - - a circumstance remarkable enough to call for explanation. Careful examination reveals, however, that there were doubters and critics, as well as defenders and rival claimants to priority. In particular, the reactions of Carnap, Bernays, Zermelo, Post, Finsler, and Russell, among others, are considered in detail. Documentary sources include unpublished correspondence from Godel's Nachlass.

Usually thoughts are not in isolation but in varing degrees have interrelations with each other. With regard to this historical fact as a classist want to explore the reception of a few medieval Arabic texts and writers of Socrates available teachings about politics.

La philosophie d'Henri Bergson fait l'objet d'une réception passionnée au Japon au début des années 1910, mais, étant donné un contexte spiritualiste critiquant la raison, elle est généralement interprétée comme un irrationalisme opposant l'intuition à l'intelligence. Le principal problème de la réception de 1941, à l'occasion de la mort de Bergson, est alors de montrer comment l'intuition en réalité collabore avec l'intelligence. Par l'examen de la notion d' « empirisme intégral », Miki Kiyoshi, qui a développé une philosophie dialectique influencée (...) par Karl Marx et Martin Heidegger, tente d'y apporter une solution en rapprochant l'intuition bergsonienne de l'imagination kantienne. In Japan, Henri Bergson's philosophy was received with passion in the early 1910's, but, given a spiritualist context criticizing reason, it was generally interpreted as an irrationalism opposing intuition and intelligence. The main problem concerning how Bergson's philosophy was received on the occasion of his death in 1941 was therefore to show how in reality intuition collaborates with intelligence. By examining the notion of « integral empiricism », Miki Kiyoshi, who developed a dialectical philosophy influenced by Karl Marx and Martin Heidegger, attempted to solve this problem by showing a close relationship between Bergsonian intuition and Kantian imagination. (shrink)

Erasmus was one of the most widely read and controversial authors of the early modern period, inspiring a broad range of reader reactions. The present volume addresses various aspects of Erasmus's reception, including how the author's name was sometimes used to bolster decidedly "un-Erasmian" ideals.

This paper is about the reception of Ernst Mach by Brentano and his students in Austria. I shall outline the main elements of this reception, starting with Brentano’s evaluation, in his lectures on positivism, of Mach’s theory of sensations. Secondly, I shall comment the early reception of Mach by Brentano’s pupils in Prague. The third part bears on the close relationship that Husserl established between his phenomenology and Mach’s descriptivism. I will then briefly examine Mach’s contribution to the controversy on (...) gestalt qualities. The fifth part bears on Stumpf’s debate with Mach on psychophysical relations and I shall conclude on Husserl’s criticism of Mach’s alleged logical psychologism. (shrink)

The systematic comparison of Avicenna’s Ilāhiyyāt of the Šifā' with Aristotle’s Metaphysics , accomplished for the first time in the present volume, provides a detailed account of Avicenna’s reworking of the epistemological profile and contents of the Metaphysics and a comprehensive investigation of this latter’s transmission in pre-Avicennian Greek and Arabic philosophy.

Although the works of the authors of the Golden Age of Latin Literature play an important formative role for Early Modern philosophers, their influence in Early Modern thought is, nowadays, rarely studied. Trying to bring this topic to light once again and following the seminal works of Kajanto (1979), Proietti (1985) and Akkerman (1985), I will target Spinoza’s Latin sources in order to analyze their place in his philosophy. On those grounds, I will offer an overview of the problems of (...) the reception of classical literature in Early Modernity and then dwell on the particular case of Ovid and Spinoza. The present paper will argue that although Spinoza’s references to Ovid fill a rhetorical purpose as suggested by the existing literature, these mentions have a prior philosophical motivation. That is, the references in the Ethics are not merely illustrative; instead, they indicate that Spinoza acknowledges Ovid’s beliefs about human experiences and deliberately elaborates on Ovid’s view to construct and defend his own theses. To this end, the paper will analyze some citations mapped by Proietti (1985) and add a new one in an attempt to enlarge the list of places and topics that merit further investigation. To conclude, I will point out how the references to Ovid are part of Spinoza’s own defense of the powers of imagination. (shrink)

Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac emphasizes values of receptivity and perceptivity that appear to be mutually reinforcing, critical to an ecological conscience, and cultivatable through concrete and embodied experience. His priorities bear striking similarities to elements of the ethics of care elaborated by feminist philosophers, especially Nel Noddings, who notably recommended receptivity, direct and personal experience, and even shared Leopold’s attentiveness to joy and play as sources of moral motivation. These commonalities are so fundamental that ecofeminists can and should (...) see Leopold as a philosophical ally. The three ecofeminist scholars who have devoted the most concerted attention to Leopold’s work argue that his Land Ethic is not, and does not provide a basis for, an ecofeminist ethic. I dispute the main criticisms of these scholars, and conclude that ecofeminists should attend more often to Leopold’s work, which extends possibilities for excellent praxis. (shrink)

Nous retraçons la réception de Dingler et les transformations qu’a vues son approche dans l’École d’Erlangen autour de Paul Lorenzen où l’on a cherché à faire ressortir et à développer la partie défendable du pragmatisme de Dingler. Le programme « purifié » de ce « constructivisme méthodique » consiste à reconstruire les connaissances scientifiques à partir du savoir-faire sur lequel repose la construction des instruments de mesure.

This article compares and contrasts the reception of Comte’s positivism in the works of William Whewell, John Stuart Mill and Franz Brentano. It is argued that Whewell’s rejection of positivism derives from his endorsement of a constructivist account of the inductive sciences, while Mill and Brentano’s sympathies for positivism are connected to their endorsement of an empiricist account. The mandate of the article is to spell out the chief differences between these two rival accounts. In the last, conclusive section, Whewell’s (...) anti-positivist argument is briefly assessed, and rebutted. (shrink)

This chapter, which examines the work of Rene Descartes and the reception of Cartesianism in Great Britain in the seventeenth century, suggests that Descartes was an undeniably influential figure during this period, and explains that he exposed the faults of the philosophy before him and pointed the way forward. It also highlights the fact that Cartesianism was accepted in the universities after Aristotelianism was significantly affected by innovations in the sciences and university curricula in natural philosophy had to be changed.

In this paper I present a model of receptivity that is composed of ontological and normative dimensions, which I argue answer to the critical-diagnostic and to the possibility-disclosing needs of democratic politics. I distinguish between ‘pre-reflective receptivity,’ understood ontologically as a condition of intelligibility, and ‘reflective receptivity,’ understood normatively as a condition of disclosing new possibilities. Keywords: receptivity; change; possibility; critique; reflective disclosure (Published: 23 December 2011) Citation: Ethics & Global Politics, Vol. 4 , No. 4, 2011, pp. 255-272. DOI: (...) 10.3402/egp.v4i4.14829. (shrink)

The cultivation of receptivity to the mystery of reality is a central feature of many religious and philosophical traditions, both Western and Asian. This paper considers two contemporary accounts of receptivity to mystery – those of David E. Cooper and John Cottingham – and considers them in light of the problem of loss of receptivity. I argue that a person may lose their receptivity to mystery by embracing what I call a scientistic stance, and the paper concludes by offering two (...) possible responses to combating that stance and restoring the receptivity to mystery that it occludes. (shrink)

Open Access: I rely on Nel Noddings’ analysis of receptivity as "an essential component of intellectual work," to argue that receptivity is a virtue of argumentation, practicing the principle of charity excellently for the sake of an author and their philosophical community. The deficiency of receptivity is epitomized by the philosopher who listens to attack. The excess of receptivity is the vice of insufficiently critical acceptance of an author regardless of the merits of an argument.

This study aims to account for the reception of the philosophy of Carl Stumpf since the turn of the twenty-first century and to emphasize the actuality of some of the aspects of his philosophy. The present text is subdivided into several sections, each corresponding to one of the main topics discussed in the recent literature on the work of Stumpf. In the first section, I try to show, using his classification of sciences, that Stumpf's empirical work is driven by a (...) unitary philosophical program. I then examine the ramifications of this program in several areas of philosophy that have been the subject of recent commentaries and publications. I begin with the commentaries on the recent publication of Stumpf's thesis on mathematical axioms, which stress Stumpf's contribution to the philosophy of mathematics and to theory of knowledge, and more specifically to the debate on logical psychologism that Frege and Husserl will address a few years later. I conclude this section by examining the second of two major themes in the work of Stumpf that have been the subject of several recent studies, namely, on the one hand, logic and the nature of states of affairs and, on the other hand, Stumpf's contribution to the mind-body problem and to the topic of relations. The third section is divided into two parts. In the first one, I try to briefly account for the vast literature on Stumpf's contribution to psychology understood broadly enough as to include his work on the psychology of sound, Gestalt psychology, animal psychology and the psychology of child development. I provide, in the second part of this section, a summary of his studies in the area of aesthetics and musicology in general, i.e. his contribution to the history of music and its origins, to ethnomusicology, and to acoustics. Although this study does not aim at being exhaustive, it provides an overview of the important aspects of Stumpf's contribution to philosophy. (shrink)

This 1000-page English-language reference work has been produced with the collaboration of 23 scholars from Europe and North America and is intended as a guide to some of the most important developments in the history of the reception of the Church Fathers in the West, from the Carolingians to the Maurists. Particular emphasis is placed on the history of patristic scholarship which, unlike classical scholarship, has tended to be neglected by historians. However, the reception of patristic doctrines and ideas is (...) also included and patristic scholarship is placed in its doctrinal and cultural context. Articles do not confine themselves to summarising what has been done on a particular topic, but also suggest new approaches and areas of research to be opened up. In order to make this volume useful to graduate students and scholars from non-theological disciplines, full relevant bibliographical information is provided._The volume addresses the following general questions: what is meant by the "Fathers"; the problems of patristic as opposed to Scriptural authority; the types of patristic material available and the problems of attribution and misattribution; the uses made of the Fathers in constituting a theological doctrine and in response to a doctrinal difference; the abuses made of the Fathers, i.e. overly tendentious or polemical uses; the value of the Greek and Latin Fathers; the use made of the Fathers in defining heresy and orthodoxy. The volume is intended to open up a field of studies and is the first-ever work of its kind. This publication has also been published in paperback, please click here_ for details. (shrink)

This paper reads Foucault’s 1975-6 lecture series Society Must Be Defended. It argues that the notion of counter-history developed in these lectures depends on a particular construction of Rome, as that which counter-history counters. Foucault’s version of Rome in turn depends on a surprisingly conventional reading of two monumental histories as ‘the praise of Rome’. Reading Foucault’s work instead with Lucan’s Pharsalia renders visible a counter-history within Rome itself. This reading demonstrates the ways in which reception theory can usefully illuminate (...) and supplement Foucauldian genealogy as a critical-historical method. (shrink)

This paper defends an internalist view of agency. The challenge for an internalist view of agency is to explain how an agent’s all-things-considered judgment has necessary implications for action, a challenge that lies specifically in the possibility of two species of akratic break: between judgment and intention, and between intention and action. I argue that the two breaks are not importantly different: in each case akrasia manifests a single species of irrational self-mistrust. I aim to vindicate internalism by showing how (...) rational agency rests on our capacity for trusting receptivity to the verdict of judgment. To call the relation receptivity is to characterize it as fundamentally passive. To call it trusting receptivity is to ensure that the passivity is not incompatible with agency, since trust retains a crucial degree of control. I argue that the best way to meet the externalist argument from akrasia is to abandon the assumption that the will must be a locus of activity. (shrink)

I rely on Nel Noddings’ analysis of receptivity as "an essential component of intellectual work," to argue that receptivity is a virtue of argumentation, practicing the principle of charity excellently for the sake of an author and their philosophical community. The deficiency of receptivity is epitomized by the philosopher who listens to attack. The excess of receptivity is the vice of insufficiently critical acceptance of an author regardless of the merits of an argument.

This article aims at understanding the North-American reception of Foucault’s Folie et déraison. After showing how American conceptions of social control facilitated the integration of Foucauldian thinking in North-American academia, I examine the ways by which the advocates of anti-psychiatry and the historians of psychiatry read Folie et déraison, which became emblematic for French Theory. I then present various Anglo-American critiques of Folie et déraison and defend the persistence of a “Foucauldian spirit” against the sci-entifization of psychiatry. All this allows (...) for an assessment of the legacy of Folie et déraison in the North American debates. (shrink)

Forewarning -- Merde alors -- Why sex? -- Sensual sucking and sociality -- Force in progress -- Receptivity and being-in -- Staring.

People are often inaccurate in their predictions of performance on a variety of cognitive tasks. We tested whether receptivity to bullshit – the tendency to perceive meaningless statements as profound – would relate to the accuracy of metacognitive judgments on several problem-solving tasks. Individuals who were highly receptive to bullshit were less accurate in their predictions of performance on creative problem-solving tasks, but not on verbal analogy or recall tasks. Further, individuals with high BS receptivity were less able to (...) discriminate between solvable and unsolvable problems when making metacognitive judgments. These findings support the possibility that the tendency to perceive semantic connections where none exist, as indicated by high bullshit receptivity, may lead to inaccurate predictions of performance on tasks that require noticing and utilizing distant semantic connections. (shrink)

This article investigates the early reception of Yu Xin, one of the most important court writers of the sixth century in China. It traces portrayals and evaluations of Yu Xin and his work from the late years of the Northern Zhou (557–581) to the early Tang (618–907) by focusing on four texts of different nature: a preface to the literary collection of Yu Xin dated to 579, his biography in the Zhoushu, and two discourses in historical records that evaluate his (...) achievement as a writer. While the former two texts supply valuable information about Yu’s family background, official career, and social network, the latter two voice their criticism of the man along with their overall negative attitude toward literature of the Southern Dynasties. The perception of Yu Xin as a frustrated and nostalgic poet as highlighted by his Zhoushu biography has played a major role in the interpretation of his writings in later ages, but an examination of a wider range of sources shows that there was more than one way of evaluating his writings in the sixth and seventh centuries. A study of these multiple voices in interpreting Yu Xin and his works reminds us of the vibrancy and complexity of understanding the identities of poets of the medieval period. (shrink)

Receptive Spirit develops the thesis that the notion of self-induced mental activity at the heart of German idealism necessitated a radical rethinking of humans’ dependence on culturally transmitted models of thought, evaluation, and creativity. The chapters of the book examine paradigmatic attempts undertaken by German idealist thinkers to reconcile spontaneous mental activity with receptivity to culturally transmitted models. The book maps the ramifications of this problematic in Kant’s theory of aesthetic experience, Fichte’s and Hegel’s views on the historical character (...) of philosophy, the Fichtean model of philosophical communication, and Friedrich Schlegel’s theory and practice of literary communication and criticism. Drawing on Gadamer and McDowell, I argue that the conceptual framework established by the Idealists remains indispensable for orientation in the contemporary intellectual landscape. (See the PDF file below for a synopsis). (shrink)

Ultraviolet radiation is generally considered to have been discovered by Johann Wilhelm Ritter in 1801. In this article, we study the reception of Ritter’s experiment during the first decade after the event—Ritter’s remaining lifetime. Drawing on the attributional model of discovery, we are interested in whether the German physicists and chemists granted Ritter’s observation the status of a discovery and, if so, of what. Two things are remarkable concerning the early reception, and both have to do more with neglect than (...) with reception. Firstly, Ritter’s observation was sometimes accepted as a fact but, with the exception of C. J. B. Karsten’s theory of invisible light, it played almost no role in the lively debate about the nature of heat and light. We argue that it was the prevalent discourse based on the metaphysics of Stoffe that prevented a broader reception of Ritter’s invisible rays, not the fact that Ritter himself made his findings a part of his Naturphilosophie. Secondly, with the exception of C. E. Wünsch’s experiments on the visual spectrum, there was no experimental examination of the experiment. We argue that theorizing about ontological systems was more common than experimenting, because, given its social and institutional situation, this was the appropriate way of contributing to physics. Consequently, it was less clear in 1810 than in 1801 what, if anything, had been discovered by Ritter.Keywords: Johann Wilhelm Ritter; Carl Johann Bernhard Karsten; Christian Ernst Wünsch; Ultraviolet radiation; Conceptions of heat and light. (shrink)

The period from Kant to Hegel is one of the most intense and rigorous in modern philosophy. The central problem at the heart of it was the development of a new standard of theoretical reflection and of the principle of rationality itself. The essays in this volume, published in 2000, consider both the development of Kant's system of transcendental idealism in the three Critiques, the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, and the Opus Postumum, as well as the reception and transformation (...) of that idealism in the work of Fichte, Schelling and Hegel. (shrink)

This paper focuses on the Argentine philosopher Eugenio Pucciarelli (1907–1995) and his critical reception of phenomenology. It introduces to his contribution to phenomenology in the context of its early reception in Argentina and addresses the following issues: 1) the mission of philosophy, the various ways of accessing its essence, in particular those of Scheler, Dilthey and Husserl, 2) his reception of Husserl as far as the ideals of science and reason are concerned, 3) the crisis of reason 4) his pluralistic (...) conception of reason and time, and finally, to 5) his humanistic stance. I argue that his conception of philosophy, which emphasizes the personal dimension and the social commitment of philosophical practice as well as the relentless search for unshakeable foundations of knowledge as carried out by Husserl, is underpinned by a pluralistic conception of reason, time and culture that confers Pucciarelli’s philosophizing a humanistic bias. Phenomenology as conceived by Pucciarelli becomes thus an active force by embracing multiple perspectives, such that its methodology can be applied to varying contexts and circumstances. Pucciarelli’s commitment to social justice and Latin American culture responds to the attempt to rescue the virtues and freedom of the individual, which ground human dignity. In short, Pucciarelli’s stance reveals a profound pluralistic humanism that does not neglect its militant and critical function, thus evidencing its relevance to the current sociopolitical situation in Latin America. (shrink)

This chapter will explore the reception of Condillac in Argentina from the nineteenth century to the early twentieth century, focusing on two cases. First, the reception by nineteenth-century professors of idéologie (Juan Crisóstomo Lafinur, Juan Manuel Fernández de Agüero, Luis José de la Peña, and Diego Alcorta) that was mediated by the interpretations of Antoine Destutt de Tracy, Pierre Jean Cabanis, and Pierre Laromiguière. Second, the reception in the early twentieth century by José Ingenieros, whose narrative was conditioned by his (...) own political and philosophical agenda. In each case, we can identify different receptions that must be interpreted not only in light of the philosophical concerns of the authors who made them but also in light of the wider cultural and political context in which they emerged. In the first half of the nineteenth century, Condillac was received as a philosopher who integrated the new philosophical canon that would replace the Scholastic canon that had been imposed by the colonial regime. In the early twentieth century, Ingenieros inserted Condillac into a narrative that, starting with Bacon and Locke, culminated in positivism, a current that, in his view, offered the best framework to make Argentina shine in the concert of civilized nations. (shrink)

This volume explores the tremendous influence of Plato's Phaedrus on the philosophical, religious, scientific and literary discussions in the first two millennia of the dialogue's reception history. It will appeal to readers interested in the Ph.

What general conclusions can be drawn about the reception of zymase, its relation to the larger shift from a protoplasm to an enzyme theory of life, and its status as a social phenomenon?The most striking and to me unexpected pattern is the close correlation between attitude toward zymase and professional background. The disbelief of the fermentation technologists, Will, Delbrück, Wehmer, and even Stavenhagen, was as sharp and unanimous as the enthusiasm of the immunologists and enzymologists, Duclaux, Roux, Fernback, and Bertrand, (...) and of Pfeffer, the experimental plant physiologist. Other skeptics—Voit, Kupffer, and Fischer—were conservatives in traditional fields. In all these cases it seems clear that professional commitments and outlook profoundly influenced the reception of zymase.In some cases there is a correlation with a specific earlier statement favoring the protoplasm theory or predicting a fermentation enzyme. Reynolds Green is a striking case of both. In 1893 he stated his belief that life processes in higher plants and fungi were identical, both being mediated by protoplasm.109 Thus he claimed that digestion was not carried out by enzymes, as in higher animals, but by the whole protoplasm, and so too fermentation in yeast: “All the metabolic processes must be carried out in the unicellular organism in the same mass of protoplasm.”110 But Green also insisted that there was no essential difference between “organized” and “unorganized ferments”; enzymes were simply more highly differentiated and specialized forms of primitive protoplasm. He spoke of “the alcoholic ferment” (that is, enzyme), and of intracellular enzymes—very advanced beliefs for 1893. Thus it is understandable why Green saw no reason to doubt his first negative results with yeast juice, and rushed into print. But it is also understandable that he persisted and soon became an outspoken advocate of Buchner's view; like Wroblewski and Pfeffer, he had already accepted the idea of an intracellular fermentation enzyme.The physiological chemists also fit the pattern in a special way. Physiological chemistry is generally regarded as the source of biochemistry; indeed, many early biochemists were trained in physiological chemistry, and imbibed there a progressive interest in enzymes and metabolism. It is not surprising, therefore, that on the whole Neumeister, Madfadyen, Wroblewski, and Loew accepted cell-free fermentation. But what is surprising, and significant, is the diversity of opinion in this group, from Abeles' living protoplasm to Wroblewski's organized array of active proteins. The feelings of the physiological chemists were mixed, and there was enough of the old protoplasm view in Macfadyen's and even Wroblewski's views to allow Buchner to see them as attacks on zymase. The ideas of physiological chemistry were also changing; the idea of protoplasm was already adjusting to the new interest in enzymes in the early 1890's. But in contrast to immunochemistry, the change in physiological chemistry was gradual, uneven, undramatic, and relatively invisible. For the new biochemistry, the tradition of physiological chemistry was the source of traditional conservatism as well as of new ideas of enzymes.In general, then, I claim that it was not experimental facts that determined attitudes toward zymase so much as previous commitments, experience, and expectations. Initially, at least, zymase was less a determinant of opinion than a touchstone of pre-existing opinion. Like a prism, it revealed the spectrum of existing attitudes toward vital phenomena.Also relevant here is the fact that the experimental evidence was entirely ambiguous; the interpretation of Buchner's experiments with antiseptics or dried yeast depended entirely on how far one was willing to stretch the scope of the terms “protoplasm” and “enzyme”. Likewise, how important one judged the instability of zymase to be, or the low level of in vitro activity, depended largely on one's point of view. There was no crucial experiment, no certain proof. Logically zymase could be regarded as protoplasm. A. Fischer did so in 1900;111 Macfadyen was still wavering in 1907;112 and Beijerinck was holding out as late as 1916.113 There were undoubtedly others. Besides the special case of Reynolds Green and the technologists, there are no recorded cases of conversion.But if there was no evidence to convert a dedicated protoplasmist, there was plenty to encourage a dedicated belief in the enzyme theory, and that, I believe, is precisely what happened. The arguments of Buchner et al in support of zymase had the greatest effect not on the protoplasmists but on those who were already predisposed toward the biochemical view. The zymase debate enabled the emerging group of biochemists to recognizethemselves as a group with a community of out-look and objectives; it brought the issue of protoplasm vs. enzyme into the open and gave it a specific and concrete issue on which to turn. The debate sharpened the biochemists' awareness that their point of view was becoming the new mainstream of biochemical thought.All this of course had an important secondary effect on those who opposed the new view, or who were not immediately concerned with it. After the zymase debate, it would have been almost impossible to ignore the new ideas; the dramatic and wide publicity the debate enjoyed would have made it difficult not to take sides. Buchner's successful defense of zymase itself became an important influence on opinion; the new movement had to be looked at with respect. But the primary effect of the debate, I assert, was on those who were already inclined to the new view. The outcome was not a mass conversion of individuals, nor the ejection of one idea by another. The sides probably did not change much; the real change was in the way each side regarded itself and its place in history. The zymase debate may perhaps best be regarded as a process of selection. Buchner's party became aware of itself as the new progressive point of view, while those holding the traditional view could no longer expound it publicly without appearing obstinate or old-fashioned. Thus the way was clear for the gradually wider establishment of the new ideas, especially among the new generation of biochemists. In this specific sense, the acceptance of zymase was a social phenomenon.This way of looking at the zymase debate also illuminates its coincidence with the emergence of biochemistry as a profession. The new professional trappings and organizations were the social manifestation of the new self-awareness gained from the zymase controversy. One of the most important effects on those disposed toward the new view was the awareness of an intellectual community and of the need to give that community social forms. The almost mythical importance of Buchner's “victory” over the old protoplasm theory that later became current is readily understandable. It was a useful ideology for a group anxious to assert the novelty of their approach, a novelty which they in fact felt quite keenly.But if the primary effect of the zymase controversy was on those predisposed to accept zymase, then obviously the success of zymase depended on the fact that change had already begun to occur. Indeed, one of the most striking, and again unexpected, results of this study is the extent to which the importance of enzymes was already recognized in the early 1890's. The new immunology clearly pointed the way. Macfadyen and Hans Buchner were looking for active proteins inside the cell in 1893. Reynolds Green, Wroblewski, and Pfeffer had all anticipated the discovery of a fermentation enzyme. Other discoveries in enzymology in the 1890's pointed the same way.114 Moreover, it is clear from this study that the old protoplams theory was adapting to the new discoveries concerning the importance of enzymes. The sidechains of the old protoplasm molecule were simply reinterpreted as enzymes, as in Wroblewski's theory, for example, or in Paul Ehrlich's extremely influential “sidechain theory” of antibody formation (1897). Despite the later views of Hopkins et al., the old protoplasm and the new enzyme theories were not irreconcilable; a continuity of development had already begun when zymase came so dramatically on the scene. Buchner himself observed that the difference between the two views had become largely verbal; in retrospect we might say, not verbal, but social and historical. The gap between the continuous change in ideas and the contemporary feeling of sharply discontnuous change is a measure of the elusive but real social and historical implications of the zymase debate, of the demise of an old establishment, and the emergence of a new.In retrospect, then, it is clear that a trend was already under way in various quarters when zymase appeared. But it was still a collection of isolated and dispersed events. The zymase controversy made the trend visible and gave it a dramatic unity. The debate influenced those who had already begun to change. It was so effective because things had begun to change and because it coincided with the direction of that trend. (shrink)

Après avoir relevé quelques traces d’une réception de Fichte dans la littérature française du xixe siècle, visant à établir que la référence à Fichte touche un public excédant largement les milieux académiques, on s’attachera à étudier de façon systématique et non historique la réception française de la Doctrine de la Science à cette époque, considérant trois ordres de difficultés, liées 1) au langage (polyglottisme, ironie), 2) à la méthode (déconstruction de l’illusion transcendantale) et 3) au contenu (assimilation à un idéalisme (...) subjectif). Il apparaîtra que cet examen de la réception revient à la chronique d’une non-rencontre. (shrink)

This article presents some overlooked evidence on the reception of John Locke’s writings at Christ Church, Oxford. It is intended to supplement a new article in the History of Universities on the surprisingly positive response to Locke’s Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689) at that bastion of late seventeenth-century high churchmanship. This evidence sheds new light on: the reception of Epicureanism at that college in the 1650s; Locke’s personal connections at Christ Church; book-holdings of Locke’s writings at the early eighteenth-century college; (...) some unnoticed uses of Locke’s writings by members of Christ Church; the European and North American reception of one Christ Church Lockean; and, the changing trajectory of the later eighteenth-century reception of Locke at that college. (shrink)

Nous retraçons la réception de Dingler et les transformations qu’a vues son approche dans l’École d’Erlangen autour de Paul Lorenzen où l’on a cherché à faire ressortir et à développer la partie défendable du pragmatisme de Dingler. Le programme « purifié » de ce « constructivisme méthodique » consiste à reconstruire les connaissances scientifiques à partir du savoir-faire (technique et linguistique) sur lequel repose la construction des instruments de mesure.

The 6th of February 2005 marks the deadline of transposition of the EU Council Directive No. 2003/9/EC (Reception Conditions‘ Directive) into national legislation. This article is the second in a series of articles on transposition of the European Union Asylum Directives in Lithuania and remaining concerns. It analyses the transposition of the Reception Conditions Directive in the country, the impact of the directive‘s provisions on the development of the Lithuanian asylum law and draws attention to the remaining concerns in relation (...) to implementation of this directive in Lithuania. The authors illustrate the remaining concerns with practical and live examples/stories from Lithuania. (shrink)