In a world where civilians, mostly women and children, remain adversely affected by armed conflict and millions of human beings are at the mercy of state repression, insurgencies, and violence, hum...

The issue of human sexuality has many negative implications in African society. These arose in a number of contexts – legal, religious, cultural and societal – and were significantly divisive. This article examines these responses in terms of critical solidarity, critical engagement and critical distance, and attempts to find a way of considering them in the perspective of achieving justice and solidarity. The focus is on one mainline denomination, the Uniting Presbyterian Church in Southern Africa (UPCSA). Contribution: This article has (...) implications that link subjects within the theological encyclopaedia of History of Christianity, Church Polity, Systematic Theology and Practical Theology, and other disciplines including Social Sciences such as Political Science. (shrink)

In discussing the $1 trillion bailout of the U.S. Financial Institutions, virtually every Member of Congress and almost every government official—including Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and President Obama—has blamed the crisis on the “greed and irresponsibility of Wall Street”. Almost all of the financial executives involved in the crisis, from CEOs to middle managers, are products of our business schools. Additionally, there is a high correlation between the recentunethical behavior of a number of multinational corporations and the number (...) of MBA holders in their top ranks. As a consequence, many critics are convinced that there is something wrong with our business schools. This paper presents the causes and consequences of what ails business school students and graduates today: the toxic teaching of bad management theories. These theories—grounded in the assumptions of economics—include determinism and materialism, the cult of profit maximization and a pessimistic view of human nature as totally self-interested. By teaching these theories, business schools are inculcating values of materialism and greed that create a life-long pursuit of money and status. This makes it all too easy for business managers to choose expediency and short-term profits over ethical behavior. Further, these materialistic values create higher levels of depression, anxiety and psychological disorders as well as make our students less cooperative and more anti-social as individuals long after they leave academia. (shrink)

In the 1940s and 1950s _The Review of Politics_, under the dynamic leadership of Waldemar Gurian, emerged as one of the leading journals of political and social theory in the United States. This volume celebrates that legacy by bringing together classic essays by a remarkable group of American and European émigré intellectuals, among them Jacques Maritain, Hannah Arendt, Josef Pieper, Eric Voegelin, and Yves Simon. For these writers, the emergence of new dictatorial regimes in Germany and Russia and the looming (...) threat of another, even more devastating, European war demanded that one rethink the reigning philosophical perspectives of the time. In their view, the western world had lost sight of its founding principles. Individually and collectively, they maintained that the West could be saved only if its leaders embraced the idea that society should be governed by moral standards and a commitment to human dignity. Since the first issue appeared in 1939, _The Review of Politics_ has influenced generations of political theorists. To complement these essays A. James McAdams has written an introduction that discusses the history of the journal and reflects on the contributions of these influential figures. He underscores the continuing relevance of these essays in assessing contemporary issues. “The essays contained in this volume demonstrate why the _Review of Politics_ is a national treasure. From Jacques Maritain and Yves Simon to Hannah Arendt and Leo Strauss, it has consistently attracted writers of the highest quality to think about the deepest problems of politics and the twentieth century. The themes covered in this collection range from totalitarianism and nihilism to the value of education and the dignity of the individual. Their probity and intelligence show why the _Review of Politics _has remained the premier journal for serious students of political philosophy.” —_Steven B. Smith, Alfred Cowles Professor of Political Science, Yale University _ _ _ “The _Review of Politics_ has been essential reading for students of political philosophy and politics for more than two generations, including among its contributors internationally renowned scholars whose works are both enormously influential and increasingly look to be contemporary expressions of perennial wisdom. To make seminal essays of this remarkable journal easily accessible, with more to come in future volumes, is a great service to students of political science at every level.” —_Timothy Fuller, Lloyd E. Worner Distinguished Service Professor, Colorado College_ _ _. (shrink)

In discussing the $1 trillion bailout of the U.S. Financial Institutions, virtually every Member of Congress and almost every government official—including Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and President Obama—has blamed the crisis on the “greed and irresponsibility of Wall Street”. Almost all of the financial executives involved in the crisis, from CEOs to middle managers, are products of our business schools. Additionally, there is a high correlation between the recentunethical behavior of a number of multinational corporations and the number (...) of MBA holders in their top ranks. As a consequence, many critics are convinced that there is something wrong with our business schools. This paper presents the causes and consequences of what ails business school students and graduates today: the toxic teaching of bad management theories. These theories—grounded in the assumptions of economics—include determinism and materialism, the cult of profit maximization and a pessimistic view of human nature as totally self-interested. By teaching these theories, business schools are inculcating values of materialism and greed that create a life-long pursuit of money and status. This makes it all too easy for business managers to choose expediency and short-term profits over ethical behavior. Further, these materialistic values create higher levels of depression, anxiety and psychological disorders as well as make our students less cooperative and more anti-social as individuals long after they leave academia. (shrink)

ONE might characterize the late twentieth century as a period when men have become oblivious of nature. Not only- is the concept of human nature under attack, but the broader awareness of nature itself, of things that exist by nature as opposed to those that exist through other causes, is no longer part of our mental equipment. The ecological crisis and the near exhaustion of many natural resources bear eloquent witness to this state of affairs. The scientific and industrial (...) revolutions have made us proficient at converting the objects that surround us into artifacts, at "manipulating nature," if you will, but they have dulled our appreciation for the intelligibility of nature in its own right. As an example I would cite the latest theme to attract attention in the philosophy of science, that of scientific revolutions and theory change, which has sought to substitute the notion of progress for that of truth. According to Thomas Kuhn and Larry Laudan, among others, science can no longer be said to be concerned with investigating the truth about the universe in which we live-another way of speaking about the truth of nature. Instead, the goal of science is seen by them to be progress, progress defined in terms of problem-solving effectiveness rather than as an approach to truth. In their view rationality has ceased to have an extrinsic norm; men are rational to the extent that they can solve puzzles or problems, not to the extent that they can understand the world of nature that surrounds them. (shrink)

The human experience is punctuated by times of crisis. Some crises are experienced at a personal level (e.g., the diagnosis of a life-threatening disease), organizational level (e.g., a business facing bankruptcy), and still others are experienced on a societal or global level (e.g., COVID-19 pandemic). Although crises can be deeply troubling and anxiety provoking, they can also serve as an important catalyst for creative action and innovative outcomes. This is because during times of crisis our typical forms of (...) reasoning and action may no longer serve us. It is precisely during such times that new ways of thought, action and leadership are needed. A key question for researchers to consider is:Why and how times of crisis serve as an impetus for creative actions and outcomes?The purpose of this paper is to address this question. I open by briefly discussing the features of a crisis. I then introduce an empirically testable, process model that outlines various pathways, factors, and outcomes associated with different ways people and organizations respond during times of crisis. I close by briefly outlining future directions for creativity theory and research. (shrink)

Philosophical and anthropological explorations of the state of modern culture testify to its crisis nature, connected with a fundamental change in the civilizational type of development. In a society that is transformed from industrial to post-industrial, informational, and global, the whole mechanism of cultural formation undergoes dramatic changes. The exhaustiveness of the technological and technological path of human development, which has come from the times of the European Renaissance, and at the same time the need for a radical reformation (...) of the foundations of the further existence of the global society are becoming apparent. Lack of understanding of the real means of such reforming leads to a total disregard for the possibilities of the mind. And as a consequence, the current crisis of rationalism is a sign of the current socio-cultural situation. (shrink)

Should Justice be blind or should she instead be capable of seeing everything, even the human heart? José M. González García examines how the iconography of Justice evolved over the course of history. Providing an overview of depictions of Justice in various ages and places, the book mainly focuses on "The Blindfold Dispute" that began to develop during Renaissance. While at first the blindfold was perceived as unjust, precisely because it denied Justice the ability to see everything, it transformed just (...) a few years later into a positive symbol of the equality of all individuals before the law. And other depictions were added: supplementary eyes, transparent blindfolds, the double face of Janus, the returns of Astraea and the "Eye of the Law". The book also analyses important historic moments in which the crisis of the Law went along with a search for new forms of representing the gaze of Justice, as reflections on the art of Dürer, Klimt and Kafka show as well as recent developments in political philosophy"--Back cover. (shrink)

In this volume C.A. (Chet) Bowers, whose pioneering work on education and environmental and sustainability issues is widely recognized and respected around the world, brings together a carefully curated selection of his seminal work on the ideological, cultural, and linguistic roots of the ecological crisis; misconceptions underlying modern consciousness; the cultural commons; a critique of technology; and educational reforms to address these pressing concerns. In the World Library of Educationalists, international scholars themselves compile career-long collections of what they judge (...) to be their finest pieces - extracts from books, key articles, salient research findings, major theoretical and/practical contributions - so the world can read them in a single manageable volume. Readers will be able to follow the themes and strands of their work and see their contribution to the development of a field, as well as the development of the field itself. Contributors to the series include : Michael Apple, James A. Banks, Joel Spring, William F. Pinar, Stephen J. Ball, Elliot Eisner, Howard Gardner, John Gilbert, Ivor F. Goodson, Peter Jarvis. (shrink)

These studies touch in various ways the compatibility and, moreover, the complementary significance of the twofold character of demythologizing, viz. elimination of myth as a basis for the transcendence of moral obligation, and liberation of the symbolic potential of the kerygma. With some exceptions the topics dealt with in this series are better known than those in previous ones, having acquired ample diffusion with the increased interest in and acceptance of the seminal works of Buber, Bonhoffer and Nabert. What is (...) missing here is a clear understanding of the relations between myth and transcendental consciousness, a clear sense of why does myth, with all its moral wrappings, come to have such a strong sway—the myth of the return = the return of the myth—on human history. Once this is clear, two forms of moral conscience can be distinguished. One form results, generically and in its acts, from creative projects whereby values can become reality. Another form, a crisis-constituted conscience, is irretrievably lost in "substitute action" whereby all categories flounder, and the impossible suddenly acquires an overwhelming fascination. The first form develops from a principle limiting "le désir d'être" to work, institutions and other involvement in economic, political and cultural life. Conversely, the second form has its roots in a principle of illimitation—pleonaxia—which makes man a stranger on earth, inescapably open both to myth and to kerygma.—A. M. (shrink)

In this book the author explores the shifting philosophical boundaries of modern medical knowledge and practice occasioned by the crisis of quality-of-care, especially in terms of the various humanistic adjustments to the biomedical model.

The book starts with a scandal, that is, Socrates’s mortality as entailed in the Aristotelian syllogism,All men are mortal,Socrates is a man,Therefore, Socrates is mortal. The scandal pertains to the deduction of Socrates’s death from the logical connections of premises, which, according to Braude, renders it “meaningless.” But, what does this scandal have to do with a philosophical defense of intuition in medicine? For Braude, the scandal is emblematic of a crisis in medicine and philosophy—a crisis in which (...) human mortality is severed from its morality. Braude articulates the crisis with the following question:Where, therefore, between the cracks of universal logic and reifying medicine is there a place for the individual patient, for a response to the cry of pain to which medicine responds, or to the voice of injustice upon which moral philosophy is founded? For him, intuition provides a means to answer the question and thereby to resolve the crisis. It serves as “a bridge be .. (shrink)

Philosophers of all times and peoples tried to describe the mystery of magic, each time giving humanity their own images of magical practices, on the one hand, and the attitude to magic from the side of public consciousness, on the other. Turning to the problem of magic even today, in the era of worldview pluralism and the crisis of traditional ideas about the world, turns out to be quite relevant. Magic, which actually originated with humanity itself and (...) passed through centuries and millennia, continues to exist in the consciousness of modern human.Some researchers talk about the onset of a «new magical era» and the formation of a whole subculture of magic followers. Yes, today in the individual and mass consciousness there is a sharp increase in interest in everything mysterious and supernatural: on the pages of newspapers, magazines, and social networks there are many ads from magicians and fortune tellers who promise to fulfill almost any wishes of people for a fee, television channels actively broadcast projects that talk about some magical events and phenomena, and even celebrities in their interviews tell how certain mysterious events happened to them, or how they personally turned to the mystery of magical practices. That is, we can say with confidence that the thinking and behavior of modern man is rightfully considered magical. Therefore, magic is not a relic of the past, but an integral part of the consciousness of a modern people. The aim of the publication is to analyze the influence of magic and magical practices on the consciousness and behavior of modern human. Research methodology. Research methods are comprehensive and based on a philosophical-anthropological and philosophical-cultural analysis of magic as an integral part of human consciousness. Discussion. Magic in the mind of a modern people exists in the form of: something prohibited, anti-social, anti-religious, dangerous and harmful; one’s native achievement of a certain goal or fulfillment of desires; everyday rituals and superstitions, which, although some do not associate the direction with magic, somehow have a strong connection with it.Conclusion. Magic is an integral part of the consciousness of modern human. For some, it is something dangerous, frightening, anti-religious and anti-social, and for some, magic appears to be an excellent means of learning about the surrounding world, a tool for subduing supernatural forces and obtaining certain benefits or fulfilling wishes. One way or another, each of us consciously or subconsciously performs certain magical rituals every day. Magic is so firmly entrenched in human consciousness that some philosophers speak of the onset of a «new magical era», which is associated with the open promotion of magical practices, supernatural forces and phenomena in modern society and the formation of such a phenomenon as a «magical worldview», which will perspective of our further research. (shrink)

Work in the field of health has been distorted over the years, with the emergence of new health systems that have made the delivery of services a real business. As a result, the field has lost not only the motivation with which it originated, but also the human quality of providing health care. It is not new to say that exercise of the medical profession is in crisis. The causes of this predicament can be found in policies and health (...) systems that are poorly imitated, poorly administered, mismanaged, and poorly regulated. However, there is no denying the crisis is also due to the loss of the Hippocratic spirit that gave force and vitality to the medical profession from its beginning. Several aspects of work in health and health care, namely, scientific and technical competence (knowledge and knowhow) and human skills (knowing “how to be”), are examined in this chapter, based on a brief look at the patients and the professionals who serve them. The author goes on to discuss three fields of professional activity where these competencies play out: the Hippocratic tradition, social responsibility, and constructive dialogue. In conclusion, and in light of the above, several initiatives and strategies to humanize health services are suggested. They involve example, communication, accompaniment, correction, purpose, and professionalism. (shrink)

The monograph shows that in the last 50 years theoretical linguistics remains a compendium of mutually contradicting doctrines on multiple levels: the level of general theories of language, the level of its main constituents (the lexicon, syntax, and the lexical-syntactic interface that connects them), and the lower levels of specific linguistic problems (such as lexical polysemy, grammatical meanings, etc.). The contradictions of contemporary linguistic theories are indicative of a deep crisis. Evolutionary-synthetic theory of language is aimed at overcoming this (...) crisis. It implements a multidisciplinary approach that describes the language a) in evolutionary and ontogenetic development and b) in close interaction with other human subsystems: the mental representation of the world, human activity and social interaction. Language is defined as a dual system developing in ontogeny: 'universal sensory sublanguage + ethnically specific functional sublanguage' where the sensory sublanguage is used to describe the 'visible' world (accessible to the senses), and the functional sublanguage is employed to describe the conceivable world ('comprehended by human mind'). Within the framework of the approach presented, many problems are solved: 1) the cognitive (non-verbal) language for representing language meanings; 2) diversity and unity of languages (using the structure alternative to Chomsky's Universal Grammar); 3) the main (original) function of the language; 4) the cognitive language of thought (its basis is the lexical and grammatical meanings of the sensory sublanguage); 5) dual (functionally prototypical) structure of human categories; 6) mechanisms in the early acquisition of lexical and grammatical meanings; 7) the meaning (assignment) of the syntactic structure of a sentence, etc. The book deals with a wide range of issues related to human cognition, glottogenesis and anthropogenesis, universal cognitive structures for the representation of objects, actions and situations, so it will be of interest not only to linguists, but also to psychologists, anthropologists, sociologists, philosophers. (shrink)

Peter Redpath and Gabriel Marcel warn that the West is engulfed in a crisis. From their various philosophical perspectives, they identify the source of the crisis as a distortion of traditional Christian metaphysics of the human person as a free individual capable of pursuing truth and entering into relations of community with others. The distortion is caused by an abstract humanism that rightly denounces individualism, but as an alternative promotes a socialistic collectivism. This essay argues that this distortion (...) is further causing the emergence of a collectivist spirituality which loses the individual, free human person. This spirituality is shown to be particularly manifest in various Catholic approaches to socioeconomics and environmentalism. (shrink)

Anthropology is a significant matter within the church. A person's doctrine of humanity will inevitably shape the way a person thinks about the church, salvation, and in part, God. This dissertation is written out of concern for the potential harm that a faulty anthropology may do to the church. This study is concerned with exposing an approach to leadership within the church that is based on a faulty anthropology. Servant leadership has been hailed as the answer to the leadership (...) crisis that has plagued businesses, political offices, and churches. It is said that the authoritarian, monarchical style of leadership in the twentieth century no longer meets the needs of the current setting. In 1970 Robert K. Greenleaf---the chief advocate of servant leadership---proposed servant leadership as the emerging style that was prepared to address the social unrest of the 1960's and 1970's. He argued that the current leadership style must change---adapt to the emerging needs of the people. Greenleaf developed his ideas on servant leadership in the context of his reading of Hermann Hesse and Albert Camus. The repercussions of Robert K. Greenleaf's anthropology are evident in his view of human transformation. ;This study exposes the philosophical and theological underpinnings of Greenleaf's work on servant leadership as a distortion of the nature of humanity to the point that it leaves the doctrines of sin and salvation bereft of Christian significance. Since many within the church have used Greenleaf in their search for a biblical leadership paradigm, a Christian theological response to Greenleaf's assessment of humanity and human transformation will conclude this study. (shrink)

This article is an amendment to Drengson (2011) that offers examples from fieldwork and reporting of practices influenced by the technocratic paradigm. Specifically (1) Krippner's work with Brazilian shamans and the theft of their tribal knowledge by the biotechnology industry that Krippner refers to as ecopiratism. (2) Hitchcock's field research with indigenous populations in the northwestern Kalahari Desert region of southern Africa and his documented assault of these indigenous peoples by private companies that Hitchcock refers to as developmental genocide. And (...) (3) Walker's summary of Monsanto's patenting of seeds, and her warning of the health and environmental problems associated with genetically modified organisms. These examples offer support for the hypothesis that the eco-crisis is born of conscious agency. Beyond documenting and diagnosing these symptoms of the eco-crisis, this article puts forth the thesis that a transformation of consciousness would change the conditions of our present situation by providing the opportunity for different solutions to be found through the creation of a new mind set to make the necessary decisions for change. Many refer to the emerging field concerned with developing approaches to this transformation of consciousness as ecopsychology that Schroll prefers to call transpersonal ecosophy. (shrink)

This case describes an adolescent in a crisis of a chronic medical condition whose situation is complicated by substance abuse and mental illness. D. Micah Hester provides an analytic approach, teasing apart the multiple layers of medical, developmental, and moral issues at hand and describing possible responses and outcomes. Amy T. Campbell examines existing legal guidelines for adolescent decision making, arguing that greater space exists for clinical discretion in these matters than commonly thought. Cheryl D. Lew discusses the development (...) of agency in adolescent patients, the ideal of autonomous decision making in the context of impairment and chronic illness, and the obligation of healthcare teams to examine an adolescent patient’s decisions in relation to her identity. (shrink)

The function of philosophy may be circumscribed as consisting in ma king a keen analysis of the peculiar nature of the crisis-situation, as it has existed among mell throughout th~ centuries of human history, and as it manifested itself in definite ways at the various stages of this his tory. That is to say, philosophy may be regarded as the discipline which, again and again, will have to determine the authenticity of man's ex istence in the light of the (...) changing conditions of life, i. e., man's chang ing needs and interests. Fundamentally, these needs may be regarded as being of a material, an intellectual, an aesthetical and a spiritual kind. On the grounds of the crisis, which inevitably exists among men on ac count of the controversial nature of their various truth-perspectives, as they are postulated on a personal level, in the sciences, in history, in the fine arts and in theology, man creates and re-creates the goods of civilization and the cultural values. The task of philosophy consists then in making an ever new assessment of man's changing needs, in terests and aspirations on the basis of the specific conflicts and prob lems with which man wrestles at a certain historical stage. It is in this way that the important philosophical systems were constructed, which we still admire to-day. (shrink)

Recognizing the influence crises have in shaping global governance nowadays, the present work explores the possible contribution of human development thinking countering the perverse effects of shock-driven responses to major emergencies. This is done by focusing on contributions by Sen, Dreze, Haq and Stewart related to famines, violent conflict and the idea of human security, analyzed using a selection of four criteria, namely, describing the position of crisis inside human development thinking, issues of modeling and measurement, the stance toward (...) agency, and the actors gathered around the discourse. After strengths and weaknesses are considered, the article suggests a tangential involvement through other human concepts, so human development ideas do not get muddled by the logic of shocks and fulfill the great responsibility of helping us avoid the many shortfalls of a security-obsessed view of humanity. (shrink)

The global environmental crisis and resulting disasters today have threatened life in general, especially human life. According to Fritjof Capra, one feasible solution to this global environmental crisis is to build sustainable human communities based on what he calls ecological literacy. Ecological literacy itself stands for our ability to understand the principles of organization common to all living systems and is used as a guideline for creating sustainable human communities. Capra underlines the need to redesign our communities, including (...) our educational communities, business communities, political communities and all aspects of our daily life, so that the principles of ecology become principles of all our human communities. For Capra, the implementation of such a sustainable society is possible to achieve through the so-called eco-design, which is both scientifically and technically feasible. Nonetheless, the success of the major project to develop a sustainable eco-literate society does not simply depend on the individual awareness of eco-literacy. It also depends on the political will of the government to issue public policies—including legislation—to force all stakeholders to act in accordance with, and based on, ecoliteracy. Keywords: Ecological literacy, ecological principles, sustainable human community, eco-design, sautopoesis dissipative systems, natural capital. Abstrak: Krisis dan bencana lingkungan hidup global telah mengancam kehidupan pada umumnya, termasuk kehidupan manusia. Menurut Fritjof Capra, salah satu solusi untuk mengatasi krisis dan bencana lingkungan hidup global itu adalah dengan membangun masyarakat manusia yang berkelanjutan berdasarkan apa yang disebutnya sebagai melek ekologi, yaitu kemampuan kita untuk memahami prinsip-prinsip pengorganisasi yang berlaku pada semua sistem kehidupan dan menggunakannya sebagai pedoman dalam menciptakan masyarakat yang berkelanjutan. Capra sangat menekankan perlunya merancang ulang komunitas-komunitas kita, termasuk komunitas pendidikan, komunitas bisnis, komunitas politik, dan seluruh kehidupan kita sehari-hari, agar prinsip-prinsip ekologis tersebut diwujudkan sebagai prinsip dari komunitas-komunitas tersebut. Bagi Capra, implementasi dari masyarakat berkelanjutan seperti itu dapat dicapai melalui apa yang disebutnya sebagai rancang bangun ekologis (eco-design) yang secara ilmiah dan teknis sangat layak diterapkan. Hanya saja, keberhasilan proyek besar membangun masyarakat berkelanjutan berdasarkan melek ekologi ini tidak hanya bergantung pada kesadaran moral individu akan melek ekologi di atas. Keberhasilan proyek besar itu juga sangat bergantung pada kemauan politik pemerintah untuk mengeluarkan kebijakan publik—termasuk undang-undang—guna memaksa semua pemangku kepentingan untuk bertindak sesuai dengan dan berdasarkan kesadaran ekologis tadi. Kata-kata Kunci: Melek ekologi, prinsip-prinsip ekologi, masyarakat berkelanjutan, rancang bangun ekologis, sistem autopoesis disipatif, modal alam. (shrink)

Russia’s relations with the European Court of Human Rights since the time of Russia’s accession to the Council of Europe have received a lot of attention on the part of academic scholars, practitioners, and media. Research on the ECtHR became especially important in the context of the twentieth anniversary of Russia’s acceptance of ECtHR jurisdiction that coincided with the unprecedented worsening of relations between Russia and the European countries due to the 2014 Crimea annexation. With voices that consistently advocate Russia’s (...) exit from the CoE, we believe it necessary to examine Russia-ECtHR relations as they are presented in the academic narrative. Drawing mostly on Russian-language sources, we want to highlight the variety of overarching themes and arguments relating to the crisis caused by the 2015 Constitutional Court Decision. We would like to examine various dimensions of this “crisis,” in order to be able to conclude whether Russia’s reaction to the Markin case and cases of non-compliance that followed was indeed part of a broader strategy of “backlash against international courts” we are currently witnessing worldwide. In the conditions when Russia’s exit from the Council of Europe is as likely as ever, the possibility of the “snowball effect” on the part of other member states threatens undermine the very raison d’être of the European human rights protection system. (shrink)

At the Twenty-fifth Congress of the CPSU it was observed that, under the conditions of peaceful coexistence of states with different social systems and the development of relaxation of international tension, "the ideological conflict of the two systems becomes more active, and imperialist propaganda more sophisticated." The most intense ideological struggle is that proceeding in conjunction with discussion of problems of the future of human society. And that is understandable, for prediction is directly associated with the practical activity of human (...) beings. The ideological line of any theory becomes obvious when one discovers the class whose interests are served by the results of the practical activity resulting from predictions arrived at with the aid of this theory. Social prediction cannot be extra-ideological. In turn, ideology cannot be regarded as such if it is incapable of prediction. "An ideologist," wrote V. I. Lenin, "deserves the title of ideologist only when he moves ahead of the spontaneous movement and points the way for it." Prediction offers theoretical justification for the practical interests of one class or another and renders the ideological line of theory obvious. It is precisely for this reason that it is at the focal point of ideological struggle. This struggle breaks out with particular force during periods of crisis, of exacerbation of social contradictions, and at turning points in history, when the objective need to cognize further advance arises. The present epoch, that of transition from capitalism to socialism, is precisely of this nature. (shrink)

This feels like a time of environmental and moral crisis without parallel.... Not only do human beings seem not to believe in anything but, despite exponential advances in information production, we do not appear to know much either. This book is a guide for everyone who feels understandably perplexed. The book considers issues as diverse as: the lure of alternative religions and belief systems; the use of the rhetoric of economics to justify amoral decisionmaking; green politics and genetically-modified crops; (...) new technology's power to preserve the status quo; and the true impetus behind the Human Genome Project. Presenting an explanation of recent findings in science and their relationship with society and politics, the book seeks to give guidance towards responsible political action. Starting from themes developed in the companion volume The Search for Mind, the author attempts to provide intellectual roots for the 'anti-capitalist' or 'anti-globalization' movement and, in particular, treats social protest as a form of knowledge-seeking. The author brings to very topical and controversial concerns some much-needed clarity. Complete with reader-friendly summaries of current thought in the biological, physical, and social sciences, this book is designed primarily for the popular market but will also appeal to those working or studying in these fields. (shrink)

In this wide-ranging and multidisciplinary volume, leading scholars, activists, journalists, and public figures deliberate about the creative and critical potential of public imagination in an era paradoxically marked by intensifying globalization and resurgent nationalism. Divided into five sections, these essays explore the social, political, and cultural role of imagination and civic engagement, offering cogent, ingenious reflections that stand in stark contrast to the often grim rhetoric of our era. Short and succinct, the essays engage with an interconnected ensemble of themes (...) and issues while also providing insights into the specific geographical and social dynamics of each author's national or regional context. Part 1 introduces the reader to theoretical reflections on imagination and the public sphere; Part 2 illustrates dynamics of public imagination in a diverse set of cultural contexts; Part 3 reflects in various ways on the urgent need for a radically transformed public and civic imagination in the face of worldwide ecological crisis; Part 4 suggests new societal possibilities that are related to spiritual as well as politically revolutionary sources of inspiration; Part 5 explores characteristics of present and potentially emerging global society and the existing transnational framework that could provide resources for a more humane global order. Erudite and thought-provoking, On Public Imagination makes a vital contribution to political thought, and is accessible to activists, students, and scholars alike. (shrink)

Introduction Comparative psychology can generally be defined as the branch of psychology that studies the similarities and differences in the behavior of organisms. Formal definitions found in textbooks and encyclopedias disagree whether comparative psychologists restrict their work to the study of animals or include the study of human behavior. This paper offers an opinion on the major problem facing comparative psychology today – where we will find the next generation of comparative psychology students. Something must be done before we lose (...) access to an entire generation of psychology undergraduates. It is not enough to say that comparative psychology is being “absorbed” in other academic units such as “integrative biology”, “integrative study of animal behavior”, “evolutionary psychology”, “comparative cognition”, or “animal cognition.” Indeed, many of these topics are not primarily studied in psychology departments, wherein comparative psychology students have traditionally received joint training in the principles of behavior and comparative analysis, as applied to both humans and other animals. Consider, for example, the difference between comparative psychology and comparative cognition. Comparative cognition includes features of comparative psychology, but they are not identical. Comparative cognition represents a very specific theoretical position whose validity is based on certain suppositions such as the belief (by definition) that the internal cogni... (shrink)

South Africa in which we are living is characterised by unparalleled social and political change and apparently enormous differences of option. However, there is one aspect of our society that most of us would probably agree about and that is the decline of morality in our cities. Apart from the economic and political crisis, and the erosion of the core competence to actually get things done in the municipalities, South Africa is an ailing society with disturbing pathologies in terms (...) of indiscipline, violence, rape, assault, fraud and a failure to accept personal accountability for the high levels of crime, corruption, xenophobic attacks, gender-based violence and disintegration of families. The main aim of this study is to outline the profile of moral decay in the South African urban community and to define the calling of the Church towards moral regeneration. The conclusion arrived at is that there are definite signs of moral degeneration over a wide sphere of human endeavour in South African urban community, and that the church has a particular role to play as a driving agent for moral renewal.Contribution: Whilst there are many postive things brought by urbanisation in our cities, however, moral decay in our South African cities is one of the biggest threats to South Africa’s hard earned, freedom and democracy and merits closer attention. This study in ethics joins the voices of those people who are propagating moral regeneration in our times. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Economy, Society, Tragedy: Moral Reflections in an Age of Crisis and Austerity LOUIS A. RUPRECHT JR. Precisely their tragedies prove that the Greeks were not pessimists... In this sense, I have the right to understand myself as the first tragic philosopher—that is to say, the most extreme antithesis and antipode of a pessimistic philosopher. —Nietzsche, Ecce Homo, “The Birth of Tragedy” Orgiastic religion leads most readily to song (...) and music; ritualistic religion inclines toward the pictorial arts; religions enjoining love favor the development of poetry and music. In all of this, the one important fact for us is the significance of the marked rejection of all distinctively aesthetic devices by those religions which are rational, in our special sense. —Max Weber, The Sociology of Religion tragedy and society The title of this review essay is taken from Max Weber’s posthumous magnum opus, Economy and Society,1 an ambitious and wide-ranging comparative sociological analysis of economic orders, social orders and the normative structures that both emerge from and lend meaning to the intersecting economic, political and religious spheres in which complex human arion 28.2 fall 2020 Kathryn A. Kozaitis, Indebted: An Ethnography of Despair and Resilience in Greece’s Second City (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2021), 248 pages. This book is the fifteenth in Oxford’s important series, “Issues of Globalization: Case Studies in Contemporary Anthropology,” edited by Carla Freeman and Li Zhang. 138 economy, society, tragedy societies take shape. To Weber’s grand and capacious sociological categories, economy and society, I have added a third literary and philosophical term: tragedy. Now, to be sure, Weber thought a great deal about tragedy,2 and was drawn to tragic themes in many of his most salient and influential sociological studies. One need think only of his account of the bureaucratic “routinization” of prophetic charisma in The Sociology of Religion,3 or his depiction of modern humanity’s self-imposed “iron cage” in the rousing final pages of The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism,4 a text to which I will return at the end of this essay.5 But tragedy entails far more than systemic collapse or self-inflicted disaster. In this essay, I want to explore some of the implications of combining close attention to the lived experience of concrete individuals to the highly theoretical, systems-level analysis inspired by such Weberian categories. Put another way, how may Cultural Anthropology, and more specifically Ethnography, deepen such a globally-oriented Sociology? Here, I intend to supplement Weber’s sociological dyad, economy and society, with a conception of tragedy drawn from the cognate social sciences of Comparative Religion and Cultural Anthropology; I will be using Attic Greek tragedy as a benchmark. More specifically, I wish to highlight some of the ways in which the first book-length ethnographic study of the Greek economic crisis may add vital nuance to Weber’s more theoretical, world-systems approach. That book is Kathryn Kozaitis’s Indebted: An Ethnography of Despair and Resilience in Greece’s Second City, an ethnographic study of the lived reality of Greeks experiencing the double -whammy of a sovereign debt crisis and externally imposed austerity regimes in the Greek city of Thessaloniki; the book is the fifteenth to appear inOxford’s “Issues of Globalization: Case Studies in Contemporary Anthropology” series, edited by Carla Freeman and Li Zhang. As Kozaitis demonstrates with sensitivity and eloquence, by zeroing in on the people, rather than the economic policies or the social and administrative structures, Louis A. Ruprecht Jr. 139 certain normative categories and ethical stances become more relevant, many of them implicated in ancient Greek tragedy, and drama more broadly. tragic crises appropriately to a work of cultural ethnography, Kozaitis links the personal to her profession; further still, she weaves her own personal story into the story of the people to whom she is attempting to give voice. This, she notes, constitutes “the auto-ethnography in this ethnography” (4–6). How, then, did this professor of Cultural Anthropology, based in the United States, find her way to Greece’s “second city”? The path was circuitous, and its destination unclear for quite some time. That Kozaitis’s personal... (shrink)

본 연구는 현대 사회의 인간성 위기를 주자의 심론에서 고찰하고자 한다. 인간성 위기의 원인을 주자의 이중적 심에서 찾아보았다. 또한 주자 심의 이중성을 후설이 주장한 의식의 이중성과 비교함으로써 현상학적 접근 방식을 시도하였다. 유학적 관점에서 인간성의 위기는 인간이 인욕에 빠져서 감춰진 도심을 망각했기 때문이라고 할 수 있다. 한편 근대 현상학자인 후설은 인간성의 위기를 심리학적 심에 가려진 초월적 심을 망각한 것에 있다고 보았다. 양자는 인간의 심을 이중성으로 규정한다는 측면에서 형식의 유사성을 보인다. 그리고 인간성의 위기를 주자의 도심과 후설의 초월적 심의 망각에서 찾고 있다는 것에서 내용적인 (...) 유사성을 찾을 수 있다.BR 인간의 심은 주자에서 인심과 도심으로, 후설에서는 심리학적 의식과 초월적 의식의 이중적인 것이다. 주자는 도심을 회복하는 방법으로 격물치지를, 후설은 현상학적 판단중지를 통한 환원을 주장한다. 인간성의 위기가 도심의 망각에서 기인한 것이라면 도심을 찾아서 내면으로 회복하는 것은 비인간화를 막는 방안이 될 수 있을 것이다. 이런 방식으로 인간성 위기의 극복은 현실의 인심에서 내재된 도심으로의 환원에 기대를 가질 수 있을 것이다. (shrink)

We discuss the “axioms of dark ontology” proposed by the US philosopher Levi Bryant. The axioms are analyzed in a context of the historical development of diverse philosophical viewpoints united by the concept of the denial of consciousness. The “deniers” declare the direct conscious experience to be an illusion. As for the philosophical provisions that will not fit into their very limited conceptual straitjacket, they proclaim those inimical to science and therefore subject to elimination from the epistemological discourse altogether. Analyzing (...) the viewpoints of the denialist philosophers, we show their inner contradictions that primarily are related to their inability to apply their assertions about consciousness to their own methods, arguments, and conclusions. We review the historical development of the critique regarding the denialists’ views taken from sometimes very diverse philosophical corners. We show that Bryant’s assertions are not axioms in any logical sense, but rather a scientism manifesto created in response to a technocratic demand for dehumanization. We also show how Bryant’s rejection of the human-centered position of philosophy follows from deconstruction practices undertaken by the structuralists and poststructuralists. To advance his ideas, Bryant imitates Ludwig Wittgenstein’s forms of discourse. He also engages moralizing and sophistry. We show that Bryant’s failure to create a robust, coherent system demonstrates weaknesses in the poststructuralist ideas that his concepts stem from. We conclude that the process that the doctrine of the denial of consciousness becomes mainstream attests, in Heidegger’s terms, the final stage of European nihilism and the crisis of science and philosophy of knowledge. (shrink)

The function of philosophy may be circumscribed as consisting in ma king a keen analysis of the peculiar nature of the crisis-situation, as it has existed among men throughout the centuries of human history, and as it manifested itself in definite ways at the various stages of this his tory. That is to say, philosophy may be regarded as the discipline which, again and again, will have to determine the authenticity of man's ex istence in the light of the (...) changing conditions of life, i. e. , man's chang ing needs and interests. Fundamentally, these needs may be regarded as being of a material, an intellectual, an aesthetical and a spiritual kind. On the grounds of the crisis, which inevitably exists among men on ac count of the controversial nature of their various truth-perspectives, as they are postulated on a personal level, in the sciences, in history, in the fine arts and in theology, man creates and re-creates the goods of civilization and the cultural values. The task of philosophy consists then in making an ever new assessment of man's changing needs, in terests and aspirations on the basis of the specific conflicts and prob lems with which man wrestles at a certain historical stage. It is in this way that the important philosophical systems were constructed, which we still admire to-day. (shrink)

With this study of the phenomenological idealism of Husserl, in all of its dimensions and phases, Giorgio Baratta places himself within the ranks of a new type of student of Husserlian phenomenology. Representatives of this type are R. Boehm, I. Kern, and L. Kelkel among others. They do not feel the need to apologize for Husserl’s conceptual awkwardness, an awkwardness that reflects growth; nor are they overafflicted by Husserl’s sin of idealism, nor embarrassed by his recourse to the bewildering realm (...) of the transcendental. They do not need to profit from claims of close discipleship, or from iconoclastic feats; thus they are able to show us a Husserl who lived in constant struggle with the conceptual issues of his time, and who created perhaps the broadest matrix for the reconciliation of these issues. In Baratta’s work we are told of Husserl’s nationalistic speeches to the troops during World War I; of his search for the identity of Germany during the Weimar years; of his idealistic desires to influence, if only remotely and indirectly, education and politics ; of his preoccupation with the issue of the decline of the West widely discussed after the publication of Spengler’s popular work; of his personal eclipse, with many of his disciples turning away, as a consequence of his idealistic confession; and finally of the ostracism in which he lived during the Nazi years. Against this background, certainly not larger than life, we are given clear view of the major thrusts of Husserl’s effort to preserve human subjectivity and its values by placing it under the influence of classical German idealism. The Scylla and Charybdis of Husserl’s position were: 1) the propensity of his scientific objectivism to become either Platonism or psychologism; 2) the propensity of his philosophical foundation of subjectivity to turn into subjective idealism. The response to these dangers within Husserl’s own system was, on the one hand, an objective idealism in the tradition of Plato and Leibniz and, on the other hand, an honest effort to rescue creative intuition from the realm of the mundane. This surprisingly eclectic response exposed Husserl to attacks from all sides, from positivistic psychologism, from neo-Kantian operationalism and from the more extreme forms of idealism and materialism. Also, because of the vulnerability of this response, the core of Husserl’s eclecticism broke easily down into the Platonic descriptivism of the advocates of Ideenschau and the mundane ontology of the early Heidegger. In two concluding essays, which are as effortlessly insightful as the initial two, transcendental phenomenology is presented by Baratta in the context of the historical justification that Husserl gave it in his mature years. As this historical justification receives further support from an overlapping philosophy of history, phenomenology takes on some bright ideological colors. Husserl’s pages in the Crisis open up a wide panorama of philosophical responsibility: science urgently needs the influence of human goals, and humanity itself cannot remain entrapped in worldly goals without gradually reducing the life of the common man to a state of complete reification. Baratta’s work owes much to Boehm, and Kern and Kelkel, nevertheless it is a work of maturity, surely in possession of the thematic undercurrents of Husserl’s thought which themselves underlie, because of their eclecticism, all the major themes of the main schools of thought today. This work should be read as a contribution to the study of phenomenology and as a further step in our understanding of the predicament of contemporary thought.—A. M. (shrink)

Quantum mechanics has raised in an acute form three problems which go to the heart of man's relationship with nature through experimental science: (r) the public objectivity of science, that is, its value as a universal science for all investigators; (2) the empirical objectivity of scientific objects, that is, man's ability to construct a precise or causal spatio-temporal model of microscopic systems; and finally (3), the formal objectivity of science, that is, its value as an expression of what nature is (...) independently of its being an object of human knowledge. These are three aspects of what is generally called the "crisis of objec tivity" or the "crisis of realism" in modern physics. This crisis is. studied in the light of Werner Heisenberg's work. Heisenberg was one of the architects of quantum mechanics, and we have chosen his writings as the principal source-material for this study. Among physicists of the microscopic domain, no one except perhaps Bohr has expressed himself so abundantly and so profoundly on the philosophy of science as Heisenberg. His writings, both technical and non-technical, show an awareness of the mysterious element in scientific knowledge, far from the facile positivism of Bohr and others of his contemporaries. The mystery of human knowledge and human SUbjectivity is for him an abiding source of wonder. (shrink)

Modern mainstream ethical theories with its overemphasis on autonomy and non-interference have failed to adequately respond to contemporary social problems. A new ethical perspective is very much needed. Thanks to Carol Gilligan's 1982 groundbreaking work, 'In a Different Voice' , we now not only have virtue and communitarian ethicists, but also a group of feminist philosophers, charting a new direction for ethics that tempers modern ethics' obsession with autonomy, contractual rights, and abstract rules. Nel Noddings, in her 'Caring: A Feminine (...) Approach to Ethics and Moral Education', further contributed to this important discussion. In this work, Noddings proposes a new kind of moral ideal. She calls it "caring." Noddings defines "caring," as a direct, felt concern and action from the one-caring toward the well-being of the cared-for. In other words, care is a state of mental engrossment and motivational displacement that impels caring actions for the happiness of the cared-for and it transcends any rule-bound moral judgment. A caring attitude is best manifest in the spontaneous emotive bond of love between a mother and a child. This human relation of unscrutinized maternal love and care should be the model of ethics. Noddings's theory evokes a vigorous debate concerning whether or not the model can withstand rigorous philosophical scrutiny as a stand-alone ethical theory. This paper first discusses the strengths and weaknesses of a pure care ethics. Secondly, it demonstrates why both the Kantian and the Aristotelian attempts are unsatisfactory, and it offers a Confucian solution to the problems of care ethics. It argues that notwithstanding gender-oppressive practices that are at times associated with Confucianism, Confucian ethics of 'ren' (humaneness) is both more compatible with care ethics and is better equipped with conceptual resources than Kantian liberalism or Aristotelian virtue ethics to handle the moral predicament of the postmodern world. The paper demonstrates that care is an inherent element of Confucian 'ren' but that 'ren' is more than Noddings's care. It examines three essential principles that can be extracted from philosophical classical Confucianism: (1) an affectionate and particularistic approach to persons, (2) the mutual conditioning of the two prominent Confucian virtues -- humaneness (ren) and ritual propriety (li), and (3) the inseparability of the familial and the political self. The last section of the paper applies Confucian care ethics to concrete cases such as the geriatric care crisis and the problem of poverty. (shrink)

Crisis, sometimes associated with historically distant times or centrally planned economies, has turned out to be one of the main contemporary issues. Hence different systems like socialism and capitalism become similar in their inability to reply to expectations for a safe, peaceful and abundant life. It means that economic problems are more complex in their nature. Thorough analysis of the roots of different crises should therefore reach deeper than just economic explanations. This is the point where ethical and cultural (...) explanations may be useful because they strive to explore the socio-cultural fabric at its foundations in the hierarchy of values and vision of human beings and society. When it comes to contemporary crisis the problem is twofold: firstly, there is the threat that the crisis will be treated inadequately and not realistically in consequence. Secondly, the roots ofthe crisis may not be diagnosed properly, which may lead to false ‘treatment’. This article is an attempt to highlight the above issues and analyse them in the context ofthe common good approach, which seems to offer valuable potential to understand the difficulties properly and offer a reasonable plan for recovery. (shrink)

In the Club of Rome report Come on! Capitalism, Short-Termism, Population and the Destruction of the Planet (2018) Kant, along with other “old” Enlighteners, is presented as the father of a world-view which led to the destabilisation of the environment in which humanity exists. The authors of the report argue that the “old Enlightenment” with its individualism, faith in the market and a consumerist attitude to nature should be scrapped. I maintain that this assessment of Kant’s philosophy is groundless (...) and that his ideas allow us both to conduct a more profound diagnosis of the crisis and to propose a more solidly founded strategy of overcoming it. First, I sum up the position of the authors concerning the loss of sustainability of development which they attribute to the philosophy of Enlightenment. Next, I outline the history and content of the notion of “sustainable development” and offer an analysis of the sources of progressivist commitment to the conquest of nature which lie outside Modern Times in the idea of the “cultural mandate”. Then I present the Kantian diagnosis of the causes of the crisis which attributes it to humankind’s failure to “mature”. I compare the idea of “the full world” formulated by the authors of the report with the idea of the “the world come of age” and their diagnosis of “capitalism — short-termism — depletion of resources” with the Kantian assessment of the attempts to escape from the predicaments of the present into the past or the future. I draw attention to Kant’s solutions to some of the specific problems indicated in the report. Instead of the strategy of “return of the cultural mandate”, proposed at this time by the authors of the report, the Kant­ian answer to the crisis is a “Copernican turn” and re-direction of the cultivating effort to the inner moral development of the human being. (shrink)

Due to the tremendous progress in technology and the methods used in its application to facilitate and refine human's life, Intelligent Tutoring System was created to contribute in this era. In this study, the Intelligent Tutoring System was adopted as a platform in linking the complex Technological fields for obtaining information smoothly, and highlighting the importance of water issues and in the Gaza strip. In the light of the absence and inability of the formal education system to raise awareness of (...) the water crisis and its consequences on the daily life of the Gazans, the current Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) has been utilized to disseminate knowledge and enhance awareness of water problems. The ITS aims to embrace a new water conservation practices and ensure the sustainability of fresh water. Basically the software of the tutoring system is used to create a program which could be easily used by the public population and specialists in the water field. The resulting program was fed with plenty of information about the current local water status and its related problems which are considerably useful for anyone interested to raise his/her level of knowledge and awareness about the local water status in addition to the researchers by reducing their dependency on human sources. The ITS system was presented to two groups of people: The first one consists of specialized water experts and the other consists of master student enrolled in Institute of Water and Environment in Al-Azhar University in Gaza who are interested in water problems. Both groups were requested to use the final version of the system and give their feedback by filling a questionnaire, and then the averages of the answered questions were measured for each group. It was found that the overall impressions of the users were positive. (shrink)

What is the nature of the social sciences? What kinds of knowledge can they—and should they—hope to create? Are objective viewpoints possible and can universal laws be discovered? Questions like these have been asked with increasing urgency in recent years, as some philosophers and researchers have perceived a "crisis" in the social sciences. Metatheory in Social Science offers many provocative arguments and analyses of basic conceptual frameworks for the study of human behavior. These are offered primarily by practicing researchers (...) and are related to problems in disciplines as diverse as sociology, psychology, psychiatry, anthropology, and philosophy of science. While various points of view are expressed in these nineteen essays, they have in common several themes, including the comparison of social and natural science, the role of knowledge in meeting the demands of society and its pressing problems, and the nature and role of subjectivity in science. Some authors hold that subjectivity cannot be studied scientifically; others argue that it can and must be if progress in knowledge is to be made. The essays demonstrate the philosophical pluralism they discuss and give a wide range of alternative positions on the future of the social and behavioral sciences in a postpositivist intellectual world. (shrink)

The Environmental Uncanny argues that the increasing destitution of our world is the result of a certain forgetfulness: we have forgotten that the basis of our knowledge is not calculative reason, but our participation in the natural world. Offering a unique interdisciplinary perspective on the global environmental crisis - ranging from traditional phenomenology, including substantial discussion of both Merleau-Ponty and Heidegger, to philosophy of biology, to architectural and urban design theory, to landscape photography, this book makes illuminating connections to (...) paint a multifaceted picture. (shrink)

After retirement, older people often find themselves far from their children and grandchildren, and many spend their last years isolated and alone. As traditional concepts of family and social institutions fragment, social networks weaken, leading to an epidemic of loneliness, and substance abuse and suicide in developed countries. In fact, life expectancy in the US has dropped for the past few years, in large part due to a dramatic increase in suicide and drug overdose. None of these social problems is (...) likely to be solved by metformin. They point to a crisis of identity and meaning, an existential crisis. In this context, one might wonder if we are already seeing the effects of tinkering with our lifespan. There are many more conclusions one could draw about the implications of longevity, many of which have been elegantly described in Beyond Therapy: Biotechnology and the Pursuit of Happiness, published by the President’s Council on Bioethics, which I used as a reference for this talk. I hope I have been successful in providing a 10,000-foot view of the questions of efforts to extend human longevity and its implications that will provoke thought and discussion. I would like to end these reflections by turning back to my favorite transhumans. The reason we love superheroes is not for their superior strength or intelligence, but their characters. They use their powers to protect and serve humanity rather than dominate or annihilate it. It is not their gadgetry that makes them great, but how they use it to save the vulnerable. Even as a small child I knew that if everyone acted the way they did, the world would be a better place. The moral of every story was that the “enhancement” humanity needed would not come as the fruit of technology, but of virtue. (shrink)

Part of the epistemological crisis of the twentieth century was caused by empirically establishing that introspection provides little reliable self-knowledge. While we all have full actual selves to which our self-representations do not do full justice, we focus on the formation and existence of a narrative self, and on problematic reliability. We will explore the cognitive neuroscience behind its limitations, including pathological forms of confabulation, the generation of plausible but insufficiently grounded accounts of our actions, and the normal patterns (...) of narrative creation and checking. The evolutionary logic of self-deception may produce adaptive results, particularly in service of the “commitment strategies” that give our species results otherwise unobtainable. It is largely in our close relationships with other human beings, the relationships so well served by these very strategies, that we may find the powerful counterbalancing feedback which may provide positive change and self-transcendence. Nevertheless, we will also warn about a shadow side for which religion can provide both acknowledgment and hope. (shrink)

In this article, I discuss education in a time in the history when the human impact on Earth is massive and pervasive, with devastating consequences on the conditions for life. Within various academic fields, this era is increasingly distinguished as the Anthropocene. The term highlights the new, dominant position of the human species in Earth’s history, but is contentious, hiding as much as it reveals. Humanity is surely not one, but many, participating in a complex web of relations constituted (...) by other species and the material world. Moreover, the Anthropocene is also a time of global corporate capitalism, when the magnitude and the consequences of human activities are unequally distributed among humans and more-than humans alike. The ethical and political dimensions involved in this determine the reflections in this article. Specifically, I examine Wolfgang Klafki’s educational theory as an expression of and a response to the Anthropocene. Klafki is a salient contributor to the rethinking of North European general didactics in the 20th century, in which Bildung, formations of the self, plays a key role. In Klafki’s later works, epochal key problems are integrated in his concept of Bildung, addressing environmental crisis, social inequity, and threats to peace on Earth, in a global outlook that transcends Bildung’s traditionally national scope. At the same time, Klafki’s educational response expresses an anthropocentric outlook, which calls for rethinking. In such a rethinking I suggest to see the mediating element of the common, crucial in Klafki’s Bildung theory, not as limited to human interests but as including concerns for life on Earth, and to conceive of historical situatedness as an aspect of the commonality of Bildung. (shrink)

In this essay Robert Davis provides a critical roadmap, which is also a genealogy, for understanding and examining the history of both the humanities and education in them. It relates appraisal of the so-called “crisis” in contemporary teaching of the humanities to a deeper understanding of crisis as a condition for periodic reassessment and renewal of the humanities that has recurred at a number of key historical conjunctures since the early modern period, most notably at the end of (...) the Thirty Years' War in 1648 and at the coming of industrialization and mass education more than a century later. Davis focuses on the traditionalist defense of the humanities as a route to the humane while also acknowledging the power of the poststructuralist critique of this agenda and its complicity with the moral failures of Western society and imperialism. He concludes the essay by advocating a position “beyond critique” where the humanities and education in them can attain a new universalism and material relevance. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:"And They Sang A New Song":Reading John's Revelation From The Position Of The LambJ.A. Jackson (bio) and Allen H. Redmon (bio)Then one of the elders said to me, "Do not weep. See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scroll and the seven seals." Then I saw between the throne and the four living creatures and among (...) the elders a Lamb standing as if it had been slaughtered.—Revelation 5:5–6In an interview with Markus Müller, René Girard asserts the importance of taking into account the apocalypticism of Christianity. Apocalypse, Girard reminds us, "means revelation: apocalypto means to open up and to show the truth. But it also means absolute violence, so the apocalypse is a violent revelation and a revelation of violence" (Girard 1996). That the Revelation is a violent revelation has been well established. Despite textual evidence that would beg those who approach the text to do just the opposite, readers have fixated on the violence of the Revelation since its inception, finding in it God's final retribution against those who persecute the Church.1 Commentators such as Dennis E. Johnson, William Hendricksen, and George Elden Ladd have produced recent, full-length commentaries that champion the appearance of a Christ in Revelation ready to establish himself as a military champion and exact his revenge on those who persecute him (see, for example, Johnson 2001; Hendricksen 1998; and Ladd 1993). These accounts, and those that follow suit, are blinded by the violent revelation of John's apocalyptic narrative and fail to see the poem's revelation of violence—the other, prophetic half of what Girard rightly contends exists in Christian apocalypse.This error is understandable to some extent. Read in its own light and apart from the Gospel revelation as understood by those familiar with mimetic [End Page 99] theory, one has no hermeneutical principle for recognizing the end to which John is writing. The victims of the text can be ignored in the precise way that all victims are disregarded when the scapegoat mechanism functions properly. Such should not be the case in the Revelation, though, a text in which the scapegoat mechanism is exposed and pushed to its logical conclusions. John offers his reader a glimpse into the way this mechanism will function when all that is left is wall-to-wall violence, when one is left with only two alternatives: succumb to the mechanism and reciprocate its violence, or extricate oneself through nonreciprocation (and potentially die).In the margins of the violent revelation in John's apocalyptic vision, a revelation of violence emerges that can expose humankind's potential to annihilate itself and the mechanism with which it will do so. When read through the lens of mimetic theory, one discovers that John's narrative delivers a revelation of violence, an explicit naming and unmasking of the sacrificial mechanism that can capture for the reader not only the machinations of the sacrificial apparatus but one's own potential participation in it as well. As such, the poem can posit itself as a commandment (a Thou-shall-not-murder) that ultimately refuses the temptation to respond to violence in violence.The fact that John uses the apocalyptic to present this directive should not be surprising. Girard writes: "Only through the mediation of the scapegoat mechanism can violence become its own remedy, and the victimage mechanism can only be triggered by the frenetic paroxysm of the 'crisis.' This means that the violence, having lost its vitality and bite, will paradoxically be more terrible than before its decline. As the whole of humanity makes the vain effort to reinstate its reconciliatory and sacrificial virtues, this violence will without doubt tend to multiply its victims, just as happened in the time of the prophets" (Girard 1978, 195–96). While Girard's commentary on biblical eschatology and apocalypse refers mainly to the scapegoat mechanism as it applies to and is revealed in the Gospel texts, we see the immediacy and the frenzy of the apocalyptic and the ubiquitous violent mimetic appropriations also performed in John's Revelation.2 John captures... (shrink)