The Search for the Legacy of the USPHS Syphilis Study at Tuskegee is a collection of essays from experts in a variety of fields seeking to redefine the legacy of the infamous Tuskegee Syphilis Study. The essayists place the legacy of the study within the evolution of racial and ethnic relations in the United States. Contributors include two leading historians on the study, two former United States Surgeons General, and other prominent scholars from a wide range of fields.

Preparing the Next Generation of Oral Historians is an invaluable resource to educators seeking to bring history alive for students at all levels. Filled with insightful reflections on teaching oral history, it offers practical suggestions for educators seeking to create curricula, engage students, gather community support, and meet educational standards. By the close of the book, readers will be able to successfully incorporate oral history projects in their own classrooms.

On 18–19 May 2018, a symposium was held in the Research Institute of Irish and Scottish Studies at the University of Aberdeen to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the death of Ronald W. Hepburn (1927–2008). The speakers at this event discussed Hepburn’s oeuvre from several perspectives. For this book, the collection of the revised versions of their talks has been supplemented by the papers of other scholars who were unable to attend the symposium itself. Thus this volume contains contributions (...) from eighteen notable scholars of different disciplines, ranging from contemporary aesthetics and art theory through to philosophical approaches to religion, education and social anthropology. It also includes a bibliography of Hepburn’s writings. The essays were first published in two special issues of the Journal of Scottish Thought, vols. 10–11 (2018–2019). -/- Ronald William Hepburn was born in Aberdeen on 16 March 1927. He went to Aberdeen Grammar School, then he graduated with an M.A. in Philosophy (1951) and obtained his doctorate from the University of Aberdeen (1955). His tutor at Aberdeen was Donald MacKinnon (1913– 1994), a Scottish philosopher and theologian, the author of A Study in Ethical Theory (1957) and The Problem of Metaphysics (1974). Hepburn taught as Lecturer at the Department of Moral Philosophy at Aberdeen (1956–60), and he was also Visiting Associate Professor of Philosophy at New York University (1959–60). He returned from the United States as Professor of Philosophy at Nottingham University. In 1964, he was appointed as a Chair in Philosophy at the University of Edinburgh and between 1965 and 1968 he was also Stanton Lecturer in the Philosophy of Religion at the University of Cambridge. From 1975 until his retirement in 1996, he held the Professorship of Moral Philosophy at Edinburgh. He died in Edinburgh on 23 December 2008. His philosophical interests ranged from theology and the philosophy of religion through moral philosophy and the philosophy of education to art theory and aesthetics. Notably, Hepburn is widely regarded as the founder of modern environmental and everyday aesthetics as a result of the influence of papers in the 1960s which pioneered a new approach to the aesthetics of the natural world. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:On Secular Governance: Lutheran Perspectives on Contemporary Legal Issues ed. by Ronald W. Duty and Marie A. FailingerElisabeth Rain KincaidOn Secular Governance: Lutheran Perspectives on Contemporary Legal Issues Edited by Ronald W. Duty and Marie A. Failinger grand rapids, mi: eerdmans, 2016. 382 pp. $45.00In editing this collection of essays, Ronald Duty and Marie Failinger describe their goal as seeking "to bring more Lutheran voices (...) to the pressing legal issues" in local and global contexts (1). They point out that in discussions between the fields of religion and law to date, "Jewish, Muslim, Catholic, and Reformed perspectives have largely dominated" (1). In bringing Lutheran perspectives to questions of law and religion, this collection begins an important task of retrieving a theological perspective on law that was integral for the formation of modern legal thought but has been largely absent from contemporary discussions of law and religion.The strength of this collection of essays lies in the breadth of contemporary legal questions addressed and in the diversity of perspectives offered. Since, as Duty and Failinger point out, recent Lutheran scholarship has been relatively silent on questions of law and religion, there is a broad field of issues to explore. This collection avoids too narrowly focusing on any one "hot-button" issue of law and religion, such as questions of religious liberty or relationship between church and state, although these questions are addressed. Rather, it benefits from a truly expansive view of contemporary legal issues and includes essays on issues as diverse as immigration reform, family law, fiduciary duties, military chaplaincy, and water rights in the American Southwest. The collection also shows geographical breadth, and looks beyond the contemporary American and European legal arena to consider how theology could affect law in Nigeria and Rwanda. The volume also benefits from a wide range of theoretical approaches, including contributions from both legal scholars and theologians. In [End Page 211] the dialectic that results as theologians consider law and legal scholars consider theology, we see a performative example of the Lutheran concept of two kingdoms, both coexisting under God's domain.The collection would have benefited from a broader use of theological sources to accompany this admirably broad approach to legal issues. Many, although not all, of the essays, draw only on Martin Luther's understanding of Christian engagement with legal authority. This focus on Luther's somewhat limited legal corpus can result in a slightly repetitive theological approach among the essays. However, this narrow focus on Luther indicates a potential next stage for further development of Lutheran engagement with contemporary legal issues. In the closing essay in the book, "How Should Modern Lutherans Try to Shape Secular Law?," Robert Benne references John Witte's work in tracing how Philipp Melanchthon and the Lutheran jurists developed Luther's original theory of law to "build bridges between the two kingdoms" (332). While this book provides a good starting point for bringing Lutheran perspectives to bear on contemporary legal issues, it also indicates the need for future research to excavate the perspectives of Melanchthon and jurists such as Johannes Eisermann and Johann Oldendorp, along with more modern Lutheran scholars of law and religion, such as Helmut Thielicke, who considered the legacy of Lutheran legal theory in the wake of post-Nazi Germany. Both Lutheran theological approaches to law and legal approaches to religion will undoubtedly be enriched if the editors' project continues, resulting in continued excavation of later Lutheran interpretation and reception of theories of law, which will bring Lutheran theology ever closer to the challenges of contemporary legal issues in the modern nation-state.Elisabeth Rain KincaidUniversity of Notre DameCopyright © 2018 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

In recent years there has been a major revival of interest in the political philosophy of Immanuel Kant. Thinkers have looked to Kant's theories about knowledge, history, the moral self and autonomy, and nature and aesthetics to seek the foundations of their own political philosophy. This volume, written by established authorities on Kant as well as by new scholars in the field, illuminates the ways in which contemporary thinkers differ regarding Kantian philosophy and Kant's legacy to political and ethical theory. (...) The book contains essays by Patrick Riley, Lewis White Beck, Mary Gregor, and Richard L. Velkley that place Kant in the tradition of political philosophy; chapters by Dieter Henrich, Susan Shell, Michael W. Doyle, and Joseph M. Knippenberg that examine Kantian perspectives on history and politics; contributions by William A. Galston, Bernard Yack, William James Booth, and Ronald Beiner that judge the Kantian legacy; and classic discussions by John Rawls, Jürgen Habermas, Charles Taylor, and Hans-Georg Gadamer that present different perspectives on contemporary debates about Kant. (shrink)

Review text: "Ronald W. Langacker is universally acclaimed as one of the founding fathers of the cognitive linguistics movement. His pioneering efforts towards developing a meaning-oriented, usage-based theory of grammar have given cognitive linguistics many of its key concepts, and his theory of Cognitive Grammar is not only one of the cornerstones of cognitive linguistics, it is also a magnificent achievement in its own right." Dirk Geeraerts, January 2009.

Ronald W Hepburn; Art, Truth and the Education of Subjectivity, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 24, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 185–198, https://doi.

Ronald W Hepburn; Art, Truth and the Education of Subjectivity, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 24, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 185–198, https://doi.

Name der Zeitschrift: Cognitive Linguistics Jahrgang: 27 Heft: 4 Seiten: 465-477.

Journal Name: Cognitive Linguistics Issue: Ahead of print.

This dissertation defends an account of linguistic meaning and propositional mental content in terms of linguistic practice. In other words, it clarifies and defends the counterintuitive claim that linguistic communication is prior, rather than posterior, in the order of explanation to the semantic features of thought and talk. The project's point of departure is Robert Brandom's comprehensive recent theory of linguistic practice. Two core theses characterize Brandom's theory. First, meaning and content are to be understood in terms of the norms (...) of inference relating the sentences of a natural language to each other. Second norms of inference are to be explained in terms of certain normative attitudes that speakers take towards each other implicitly in linguistic practice. In the sense of the second explanatory thesis, linguistic practice explains meaning and content qua norms of inference, according to Brandom. ;For the sake of my project I agree with both theses. However, I take issue with Brandom's efforts to substantiate the second, explanatory thesis. The negative parts of my project argue that Brandom's specific account of meaning and content in terms of implicit normative attitudes is in some respects underdeveloped and in other respects problem laden. It therefore needs both elaboration and revision. The positive parts of my project offer an alternative account of meaning and content in terms of implicit non-native attitudes---an account that avoids the shortcomings of Brandom's approach. The heart of this alternative account is the notion of a we-attitude, borrowed from Wilfrid Sellars' theory of moral judgments. I argue that if speakers take such we-attitudes towards the linguistic performances they exchange, they both take certain implicit normative attitudes towards each other and recognize themselves as bound by the corresponding norms. And normative attitudes thus conceived suffice, I argue, to explain norms of inference themselves, hence meaning and content. Central themes of this project are, among other, the objectivity of semantic norms, the possibility to reduce semantic norms to normative attitudes, and the holistic character of meaning. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Narcissism, Empathy and Moral ResponsibilityRonald W. Pies, MD (bio)Professor Fatic’s timely and wide-ranging essay demonstrates how the topic of narcissism has undergone a resurgence of interest in recent decades. This may owe, in part, to the controversial claim that narcissism is on the rise in the United States, at least among American college students (Twenge & Foster, 2010). As I discuss presently, the term “narcissism” is open to many (...) interpretations, and differs somewhat from the specific designation, Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD), as defined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th edition (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). As Fatic rightly notes,Narcissism as a personality structure may or may not be diagnosed as NPD, depending on various criteria, perhaps most importantly on whether the narcissistic person actually encounters functional and emotional difficulties and shows up for diagnosis and evaluation.As Professor Fatic’s essay clearly shows, narcissism (variously defined) has important “ethical ramifications.” Fatic is primarily interested in exploring the relationship between what he calls the narcissist’s “emotional incompetence” and that person’s degree of moral responsibility. To oversimplify Fatic’s complex set of interlinked arguments, Fatic concludes that “emotional incompetence does not in fact reduce the moral responsibility of a narcissist person, whether diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder or not.” Drawing on the moral theories of Philip Pettit and Michael Slote—in particular, Slote’s “sentimentalist ethics” with its emphasis on empathy (Slote, 2004)—Fatic argues that narcissism is both “a moral failure and a psychopathology.” Nevertheless, for Fatic, narcissists remain “fully morally responsible for their insensitivity and interpersonal emotional incompetence.” Why? Because they have the moral duty “to acquire the moral and emotional competence required for the making of moral choices.”Some Philosophical ConcernsAs I understand Fatic’s argument, he is asserting that the narcissist ought to be held responsible for a kind of self-education process that will ameliorate his or her emotional incompetence. Fatic writes,[W]e develop our morality through constant moral education and testing, which we receive both through socialization and through our own efforts later in life, as autonomous human beings. [End Page 173]We are thus responsible for what kind of moral actors we are and are becoming based on our way of life, and have a moral duty to improve our own moral senses and sensibilities by constantly working on the development of virtues.It seems to me that this line of reasoning assumes that all, or most, narcissists possess the capacity to seek and acquire this “moral education.” Perhaps so—but I am not sure Fatic has demonstrated this. It seems at least plausible that, in virtue of the adverse developmental and perhaps even neurological factors that may generate the narcissistic personality (Fan et al., 2011), some narcissists may lack the capacity to modify their psychopathology by means of “moral education.” This leads me to wonder whether Professor Fatic has adequately explored the very heterogeneous nature of narcissism. Indeed, Fatic’s thesis seems to point toward a kind of Platonic “essence” of narcissism, conveyed by his frequent allusion to “the narcissist”—one of whose defining or essential features is said to be a lack of empathy.But, as I will suggest presently, this is at best an oversimplification of narcissism as psychiatrists understand the term. Indeed, there are degrees and varieties of narcissism, differing in their capacity for empathy—which is itself a psychologically complex term. Recent research suggests that “narcissistic personality disorder symptomatology does not reflect a “narcissist” category but rather a continuum of narcissistic pathology” (Aslinger, Manuck, S. Pilkonis, Simms, & Wright, 2018).Furthermore, Professor Fatic’s thesis seems to view “moral responsibility” as a binary construct; i.e., either one possesses, or does not possess, full moral responsibility. But as I have argued elsewhere, moral responsibility may be viewed as lying along a continuum that reflects varying degrees of voluntariness for any given individual (Pies, 2007).Consequently, in my view, any valid assessment of the “the narcissist’s” moral responsibility must consider both the heterogeneity of narcissism and the non-binary (i.e., continuous) nature of moral responsibility.One way of conceptualizing this “two-track” model is... (shrink)

These reflections on faith, reason and certainty have the purpose of engaging again, if not anew, the fundamental intellectual elements of western civilization.

Notes on Humanity delivers a thought provoking view of Western intellectual history, presenting the three primary intellectual attitudes, Faith, Reason, and Certainty, and their historic struggle to define "the ideal of humanity in the Western experience." The questions spawned in this endeavor are the inheritance of Western civilization. The author skillfully traces human engagement with Faith, Reason, and Certainty through an evaluation of "the great works", which remain the visible manifestations of humanity's pilgrimage toward resolution and harmony.

Argues that information, in the animal behaviour or evolutionary context, is correlation/covariation. The alternation of red and green traffic lights is information because it is (quite strictly) correlated with the times when it is safe to drive through the intersection; thus driving in accordance with the lights is adaptive (causative of survival). Daylength is usefully, though less strictly, correlated with the optimal time to breed. Information in the sense of covariance implies what is adaptive; if an animal can infer what (...) the information implies, it increases its chances of survival. (shrink)

First Published in 2000. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The aesthetic appreciation of both art and nature is often, in fact, judged to be more – and less – serious. For instance, both natural objects and art objects can be hastily and unthinkingly perceived, and they can be perceived with full and thoughtful attention. In the case of art, we are better equipped to sift the trivial from the serious appreciation; for the existence of a corpus, and a continuing practice, of criticism of the arts – for all their (...) internal disputatiousness – furnishes us with relevant criteria. In the case of nature, we have far less guidance. Yet it must matter, there too, to distinguish trivial from serious encounters. When we seek to defend areas of “outstanding natural beauty” against depredations, it matters greatly what account we can give of the appreciation of that beauty: how its value can be set alongside competing and vociferously promoted values involved in industry, commerce and urban expansion. If we wish to attach very high value to the appreciation of natural beauty, we must be able to show that more is involved in such appreciation than the pleasant, unfocused enjoyment of a picnic place, or a fleeting and distanced impression of countryside through a touring-coach window, or obligatory visits to standard viewpoints or snapshot-points.That there is much work to be done on this subject is of course due to the comparative neglect of natural beauty in recent and fairly recent aesthetics. (shrink)