My purposes in this paper are to explain the constitutive-regulative distinction as set out by Kant in the Dialectic and Methodology, and to note its reappearance in contemporary philosophy.

This is the first anthology to take a theoretical look at violence against women. Each essay shows how philosophy provides a powerful tool for examining a difficult and deep-rooted social problem. Stanley G. French, Wanda Teays, and Laura M. Purdy, all philosophers, present a familiar phenomenon in a new and striking fashion. The editors employ a two-tiered approach to this vital issue. Contributors consider both interpersonal violence, such as rape and battering; and also systemic violence, such as sexual harassment, pornography, (...) prostitution, and violence in a medical context. The editors have further broadened the discussion to include such cross-cultural issues as rape in war, dowry deaths, female genital mutilation, and international policies on violence against women. Against this wide range of topics, which integrate personal perspectives with the philosophical, the contributors offer powerful analyses of the causes and effects of violence against women, as well as potential policies for effecting change. (shrink)

The subject of this paper is the relationship between factual beliefs and moral beliefs, between is-statements and ought-statements. Hume recognizes that a problem exists concerning this relationship. He states the problem in an oft-quoted passage from his Treatise. In their writings, moral philosophers pass imperceptibly from is-statements to ought-statements; and this change is “of the last consequence. For as this ought, or ought not, expresses some new relation or affirmation, 'tis necessary that it shou'd be observ'd and explain'd; and at (...) the same time that a reason should be given, for what seems altogether inconceivable, how this new relation can be a deduction from others, which are entirely different from it”. (shrink)