‘No-fault unbelief’ can be named the view that there are those who do not believe in God through no moral or intellectual fault of their own. This view opposes a more traditional one, which can be named ‘flawed unbelief’ view, according to which religious unbelief signals a cognitive or moral flaw in the non-believer. Since this charge of mental or moral flaw causes a certain uneasiness, I oppose the former view, i.e. ‘no-fault unbelief’, with a strategy that (...) has nothing to do with the latter. I assume that ‘no-fault unbelief’ is correct and show what consequences follow for both unbelievers and believers. I conclude that the assumption in question is superficially beneficial but deeply detrimental to unbelievers, and by contrast, it is superficially detrimental and deeply beneficial to believers. (shrink)

Several epistemologists (Levi, Harman, Pollock) have recently urged the adoption of what I call a “no-fault” approach to the justification of beliefs. I argue that these views fall prey to objections raised by Alvin Goldman against internalism, specifically: they assume an initial set of regulative principles. It is also suggested that the way to avoid Goldman’s objections is through a psychologistic account of initial warrant.

Several epistemologists (Levi, Harman, Pollock) have recently urged the adoption of what I call a “no-fault” approach to the justification of beliefs. I argue that these views fall prey to objections raised by Alvin Goldman against internalism, specifically: they assume an initial set of regulative principles. It is also suggested that the way to avoid Goldman’s objections is through a psychologistic account of initial warrant.

In the philosophy of religion, ‘no-fault unbelief’ represents the view that a person can fail to believe that God exists through no fault of their own. On the other hand, ‘flawed unbelief’ says a person is always culpable for failing to believe that God exists. In a recent article in Sophia, Roberto Di Ceglie argues that some might find the usual reasons for rejecting ‘no-fault unbelief’ to be offensive. In light of this, he proposes an alternative rejection (...) of ‘no-fault unbelief’ based on the consequences it entails for both non-believers and believers. I argue that Di Ceglie does not do nearly enough to establish these consequences. I conclude that his rejection of ‘no-fault unbelief’ is at best incomplete or at worst false. (shrink)

If I am injured in the course of medical investigation or treatment, I may be eligible to receive compensation for some of the adverse consequences of my injury—at least, if I live in a developed country. In most such countries, there exists some form of state-administered compensation scheme for medical injuries. However, even within the developed world, there is considerable variation in the eligibility criteria for compensation. Different countries would, for example, respond very differently to the following pair of cases...

Artificial intelligence systems advising healthcare professionals will be widely introduced into healthcare settings within the next 5–10 years. This paper considers how this will sit with tort/negligence based legal approaches to compensation for medical error. It argues that the introduction of AI systems will provide an additional argument pointing towards no-fault compensation as the better legal solution to compensation for medical error in modern health care systems. The paper falls into four parts. The first part rehearses the main arguments (...) for and against no-fault compensation. The second explains why it is likely that AI systems will be widely introduced. The third part analyses why it is difficult to fit AI systems into fault-based compensation systems while the final part suggests how no-fault compensation could provide a possible solution to such challenges. (shrink)

Is a Nozickian theory of rights compatible with a no-fault motor insurance scheme? I say, Yes. The argument turns on an explication of the basis on which a Nozickian justifies the prohibition of merely risky activities.

Healthcare reforms in India have been a much-debated issue in the recent past. While the debate has focused mainly on the right to healthcare, another by-product that has evolved out of the debate was the current problem of medical malpractice and the healthcare law. The last decade has seen an increase in the healthcare facilities in the country. This, however, has come with a bulk of medical error cases which the courts have entertained. According to reports, there has been an (...) increase in medical litigation cases by 400% in the last decade. There are about 5.2 million cases of medical error in the country every year. While there exists a standard legal system in the country which entertains such complaints of medical malpractice, the attempt by regulators and medical practitioners should be to reduce these cases. This paper seeks to analyze the extent to which medical malpractice cases affect consumers. It analyzes the existing medical liability system which has mainly evolved through the jurisprudence laid down by the English courts and critiques it. It also looks into the major reasons for such medical mishaps. Authors argue that a “No-Fault” system may give better outcomes. They analyze this by looking at the no-fault liability model implemented in New Zealand. Narratives of no-fault liability being implemented in India have also been used. These are showcased from instances of Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, and Clinical Trial regulations. It is also argued that a by-product of a no-fault liability system is stringent regulations which are used to reduce the possibility of medical mishaps altogether. Lastly, the possible problems of the no-fault liability system are discussed in the paper. (shrink)

The federal regulations that govern biomedical research, most notably those enshrined in the Common Rule, express a protectionist ethos aimed at safeguarding subjects of human experimentation from the potential harms of research participation. In at least one critical way, however, the regulations have always fallen short of this promise: if a subject suffers a research-related injury, then neither the investigator nor the sponsor has any legal obligation under the regulations to care for or compensate the subject. Because very few subjects (...) with research-related injuries can meet the financial or evidentiary requirements associated with a successful legal claim to recover the costs associated with their injuries, most injured subjects must shoulder the burden of those expenses alone. For 40 years, national advisory panels have concluded that this result is out of step with the Common Rule's otherwise protectionist promise. When the Department of Health and Human Services released an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) in 2011, suggesting potential changes to the Common Rule, the time seemed ripe to address research-related injuries. The ANPRM, however, makes no mention of compensation for research-related injuries, and the federal government once again seems poised to stop short of addressing what has arguably become the most longstanding, frequent, and consistent plea for regulatory reform of research: protections for injured subjects. This article asks why, despite decades of federal-level panels recommending no-fault compensation for research-related injuries, the United States has so strongly resisted change. I suggest that a central reason for our current impasse is that, despite consensus among federal advisory committees that there is an obligation to compensate injured subjects, the committees have not coalesced around a moral justification for that duty. Although multiple justifications can support and even strengthen a single ethical obligation, the reverse has occurred in this context. I demonstrate that the committees' articulation of multiple ethical principles – including humanitarianism, professional beneficence, and compensatory justice – results in incongruent obligations that favor different kinds of compensation systems. This outcome, which I call “moral gridlock,” makes it extremely difficult to determine what kind of compensation scheme to implement. Recognizing that each moral argument for compensation creates a slightly different trajectory is, however, an important first step in moving toward a more systematic approach to compensating injured research subjects. (shrink)

While geoengineering may counteract negative effects of anthropogenic climate change, it is clear that most geoengineering options could also have some harmful effects. Moreover, it is predicted that the benefits and harms of geoengineering will be distributed unevenly in different parts of the world and to future generations, which raises serious questions of justice. It has been suggested that a compensation scheme to redress geoengineering harms is needed for geoengineering to be ethically and politically acceptable. Discussions of compensation for geoengineering (...) harms, however, sometimes presume geoengineering has presented new and unique challenges to compensation that cannot be readily accommodated by existing compensation practices. The most explicit formulation of this view was recently presented by Toby Svoboda and Peter J. Irvine, who argued that two forms of uncertainty in geoengineering — namely, ethical uncertainty and scientific uncertainty — make it immensely difficult to devise an ethically and politically satisfactory compensation scheme for geoengineering harms. -/- In this paper, we argue against the view that geoengineering presents new and unique challenges relating to compensation. More specifically, we show that placing these challenges within the broader context of anthropogenic climate change reveals them to be less serious and less specific to geoengineering than some appear to believe. (shrink)

The federal regulations that govern biomedical research, most notably those enshrined in the Common Rule, are a product of their time. Born in the aftermath of wartime atrocities committed by Nazi doctors, and influenced by domestic research scandals like the Willowbrook and Tuskegee studies, the regulations express a protectionist ethos aimed at safeguarding subjects of human experimentation from the potential harms of research participation. Requirements for informed consent, risk minimization, equitable subject selection, and peer review of proposed research rest on (...) the presumption that the research enterprise owes subjects a duty of protection. (shrink)

Eight principles to take responsibility for your life"--Provided by publisher.

In philosophy, a debate can live forever. Nowhere is this more evident than in ethics, a field that is fueled by apparently intractable dilemmas. To promote the wellbeing of many, may we sacrifice the rights of a few? If our actions are predetermined, can we be held responsible for them? Should people be judged on their intentions alone, or also by the consequences of their behavior? Is failing to prevent someone’s death as blameworthy as actively causing it? For generations, questions (...) like these have provoked passionate arguments and counterarguments, but few clear answers. Here, we offer a psychological account of why philosophical dilemmas arise, why they resist resolution, and why scientists should pay attention to them. Building on a family of recent proposals (Cushman & Young, 2009; Greene, 2008; Sinnott- Armstrong, 2008), we argue that dilemmas result from conflict between dissociable psychological processes. When two such processes yield different answers to the same question, that question becomes a “dilemma”. No matter which answer you choose, part of you walks away dissatisfied. This explanation of philosophical dilemmas has an important payoff for psychological research, and we discuss two specific cases in which it has yielded promising results. In each case, social neuroscience has played an important role in distinguishing the psychological processes responsible for producing a dilemma. This, we suggest, is no accident; cognitive neuroscientific methods are particularly well-suited to dissociating independent psychological processes (Henson, 2006). Consequently, philosophers’ dilemmas provide a reliable guide toward productive cognitive neuroscience by identifying the contours of distinct psychological process. The research we review below focuses particularly on moral dilemmas, which is our own area of expertise. The psychological processes that contribute to moral judgment are of interest in their own right, and play a central role in social cognition.. (shrink)

This is a broad survey of the chronology of the rift between continental and analytic philosophy, starting in 1899. Whereas at that time there was no discernible divide, as the twentieth century progresses we can see a gradual parting of the ways in which philosophy was done, culminating in a period of maximum separation in 1945-68, followed by some convergence. There is one substantial historical thesis proposed, and facts are adduced from the chronology to back it up: that the divide (...) was never absolute, never purely geographical, and above all that it was not inevitable, but was largely the product of accidental historical circumstances, of which the most crucial was the flourishing of totalitarianism in Europe and the disruption caused by two world wars. (shrink)

A survey of various candidates shows that there is no defensible moral principle that shows that individuals have an obligation to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.

The Quine-Duhem thesis states that we always have a choice about how praise or blame are distributed in cases of scientific justification. But in many scientific examples, there is simply no room to doubt that a particular hypothesis is responsible for a refutation or established by the observations. Fault Tracing gives a theory of independent justification from different sets of evidence. Using both real and artificial examples, it shows how to play independently established hypotheses against each other to determine (...) whether an arbitrary hypothesis needs to be altered in the light of (apparently) refuting evidence. This is a theory of the functioning of background knowledge in scientific justification, which allows for justification from the evidence independently of values. The book ends by briefly discussing the significance of these results in metaphysics and philosophy. (shrink)

This is a broad survey of the chronology of the rift between continental and analytic philosophy, starting in 1899. Whereas at that time there was no discernible divide, as the twentieth century progresses we can see a gradual parting of the ways in which philosophy was done, culminating in a period of maximum separation in 1945-68, followed by some convergence. There is one substantial historical thesis proposed, and facts are adduced from the chronology to back it up: that the divide (...) was never absolute, never purely geographical, and above all that it was not inevitable, but was largely the product of accidental historical circumstances, of which the most crucial was the flourishing of totalitarianism in Europe and the disruption caused by two world wars. (shrink)

A standard formulation of luck-egalitarianism says that ‘it is [in itself] bad – unjust and unfair – for some to be worse off than others [through no fault or choice of their own]’, where ‘fault or choice’ means substantive responsibility-generating fault or choice. This formulation is ambiguous: one ambiguity concerns the possible existence of a gap between what is true of each worse-off individual and what is true of the group of worse-off individuals, fault or choice-wise, (...) the other concerns the notion of fault. I show that certain ways of resolving these ambiguities lead to counterintuitive results; and that the most plausible way of resolving them leads to a theory of distributive justice in which responsibility plays a role significantly different from that in standard luck-egalitarian thinking. My main conclusion here is that luck-egalitarianism is best formulated as the view that it is [in itself] bad – unjust and unfair – for an individual to be worse off than others if, and only if, her being worse off does not fit the degree to which she is at fault in a not purely prudential sense. (shrink)

Many of the major challenges facing global society are unstructured collective harms (e.g., global warming): collective in the sense that they arise as the result of the actions of, or interactions among, multiple agents, and unstructured in the sense that there is no coordination or intention to cause harm among these agents. But how should we distribute moral responsibility for these harms? In this paper, an answer is proposed to this question. This answer builds on but develops existing proposals by (...) drawing together literatures that speak to different aspects of the question. First, it is argued that the notion of causal contribution needs to be broadened to include the idea of causation as production. Second, it is discussed how the voluntariness and foreseeability conditions are best interpreted in this context. Third, literature on moral taint is drawn to introduce additional objective (external) criteria. (shrink)

This paper tries to explain against the backdrop of the history of German criminal theory why and in which way the fault elements are seen differently in Germany and in Anglo-American countries. It shows how Feuerbach’s psychological model of guilt convinced Feuerbach’s German contemporaries in the 19th century that the suppression of the actual will to violate a criminal prohibition must be the reason for punishment. For such deterrence theory, direct intention is the central criterion of imputation. There is (...) no room for extensions like indirect intention. The resulting gap was filled by representatives of the will theory who created dolus eventualis as a criterion of imputation. The paper then concentrates on the gradual change which dolus eventualis has undergone due to the development of a ‘normative’ concept of guilt, i.e. a perception of guilt as a failure to live up to certain expected standards. It is outlined how the normative concept of guilt has facilitated Welzel’s decision to transplant dolus from the guilt level to the level of definitional elements. Transferring dolus to the definitional level led to a further change from a primarily voluntative to a cognitive content of the notion. It became appropriate to view dolus eventualis as acceptance of the prohibited state of affairs. For reasons of clarification the terms dolus eventualis and recklessness are compared in an annex to the paper. (shrink)

Abstract Contrary to Peter J. Boettke's essay, ?What Went Wrong with Economics??, there is no connection between ?formalism? and the alleged inability of mainstream economists to regard theoretical models as anything other than either depictions of real market economies or bases for criticizing market economies and justifying government intervention. Although Boettke's criticisms of the excesses of formalism are justified, Austrian economists such as Boettke need to justify their view that government interventions into economic affairs are inevitably harmful.

THE ELEMENTARY MORAL DISTINCTION. The ultimate objects of moral assessment are people and their lives. I will call this the "elementary moral distinction." Many today seem to have lost sight of it. How often are we told that we should show respect for other people, only to discover that what we are actually being asked to show respect for is how those other people live? The equation of the two should be resisted. We do not always respect a person by (...) respecting how he lives. Sometimes quite the reverse. If someone is wasting his life but still deserves to be respected, the default way to show him the respect that he deserves is to do something that improves the way he is living- shake him out of it, block his path, change his incentives, shield him from further exploitation, and so forth. Sometimes, of course, there is no action open to us that will yield any improvement in how he lives, while on other occasions the only things we can do are disproportionate. In such cases we have to tolerate his continuing to live as badly he does. But toleration is one thing, and respect is quite another. Toleration is the moral virtue of those who appropriately curb their wish to eliminate what they do not respect. One cannot respect the way someone is living and tolerate it at the same time. (shrink)

The author investigates the necessity of fault as the prerequisite of contractual civil liability. The author makes the conclusion that Lithuanian law, following most of the countries belonging to the civil law tradition and contrary to the common law systems, as well as Vienna convention, UNIDROIT principles, PECL and DCFR, begins with the theory that fault is a requirement for contractual liability. Strict liability in Lithuanian law is the exception of this general rule. Nevertheless, the author argues that (...) the general rule is subject to important exceptions, and the practical importance of these exceptions is as great as the cases falling within the general rule. In case of no agreement of the parties or any provision of law regarding fault as the necessary prerequisite for contractual liability, in Lithuania, similar to France, the distinction between the obligations to produce a given result and the obligations to use reasonable care is essential: according to Article 6.200(4) of the Lithuanian Civil Code (hereinafter – the CC), a party in breach of an obligation to use best efforts is liable for fault. (shrink)

Although the fast-growing literature on restorative justice is extensive, and in some regards repetitive, there is still no consensus as to the nature and extent of applicability of the restorative notion. This article claims that the restorative movement is experiencing a tension between normative abolitionist and pragmatic visions of restorative justice. It proceeds to identify six conceptual fault-lines that characterize this tension. These do not only refer to various definitional positions, but also disagreements that negatively affect both the theoretical (...) and practical development of restorative justice. These tensions also encourage a power-interest battle between different stakeholders within the restorative movement including practitioners, theoreticians, researchers and policy makers. To approach these controversies, there needs to be an acknowledgment of the multidimensional nature of the conceptual problem of restorative justice and the impact it has on its application. The article attempts to get to grips with this problem, and provide a common ground for the future development of restorative justice. (shrink)

Regression testing is applied whenever a code changes, ensuring that the modifications fixed the fault and no other faults are introduced. Due to a large number of test cases to be run, test case prioritization is one of the strategies that allows to run the test cases with the highest fault rate first. The aim of the paper is to present an optimized test case prioritization method inspired by ant colony optimization, test case prioritization–ANT. The criteria used by (...) the optimization algorithm are the number of faults not covered yet by the selected test cases and the sum of severity of the faults. The cost, i.e. time execution, for test cases is considered in the computation of the pheromone deposited on the graph’s edges. The average percentage of fault detected metric, as best selection criterion, is used to uncover maximum faults with the highest severity, and reducing the regression testing time. Several experiments are considered, detailed and discussed, comparing various algorithm parameter’s alternatives. A benchmark project is also used to validate the proposed approach. The obtained results are encouraging, being a cornerstone for new perspectives to be considered. (shrink)

According to the conventional view, causal and moral responsibility have a strict hierarchical relationship. Determining causal responsibility comes first; then we sort through the factors to which we have assigned causal responsibility and determine which, if any, should be assigned moral responsibility too. Moral inquiry accordingly stands not only apart but also above causal inquiry. But I am going to argue that this way of looking at causal and moral responsibility is a mistake. Rather than being separate and independent inquires (...) with different purposes and concerns, I am going to argue that finding causal responsibility actually entails finding moral responsibility even when there is no evidence of what we would call traditional fault. Indeed, I am going to argue we cannot find someone causally responsible without finding them morally responsible too. (shrink)

Relying on evidence from fifteen epigraphic collections and sixty-odd ancient sources as well as discussing a literature of over five hundred titles, the essay’s highly unorthodox conclusions are a case in point of the micrological ideal of achieving novelty on any given subject by way of transcribing and studying first-hand all relevant materials – edited and unedited alike. The paper’s ambition was to shed new light on one of the most intriguing analogies of the whole Aristotelian corpus, namely the comparison (...) between words and pebbles. A review of all material evidence and virtually all extant sources made short work of two related, albeit mutually exclusive, misconception about ancient reckoning boards and their workings: (1) the idea that – for all practical purposes – the abacus’ arrangement mirrored the decimal system, its columns and rows conveniently matching units, tens, hundreds, thousands, etc. (2) the idea that the inscriptions on several surviving counting boards were a nuisance to the extent that, being inconsistent to a fault with the decimal system itself, they made actual calculations harder than they already were (as opposed to making them easier, as one would expect). The paper demonstrated that the first assumption – the « decimal » bias – is simply mistaken and betrays little or no awareness of the epigraphic and archaeological evidence. The paper also demonstrated that the second assumption – the « abacus riddled with complications » bias – simply defeats the purpose of resorting to the abacus in the first place and betrays a poor understanding of its practical vocation which, most assuredly, was not to add to the very problem it was meant to solve. After bulldozing its way through both misunderstandings, the essay focused on the abacus most distinctive features, that is positionality (i.e. the abacus being a positional system through and through) and hybridity (i.e. the abacus’ place value system being monetary in nature and purpose, as opposed to it being abstract and homogeneous). The final result is an interpretation that moves away from the received views by showing that the prologue of the Sophistici elenchi offers no support to the notion that, when Aristotle referred to counters, he was leaning on a kinship of sorts – or any kinship, for that matter – between abstract calculation and speech. Once we turns the pebble’s simile on its head and set it back upon its feet (Aristotle’s pebble analogy is about pebbles, what else?), it becomes clear that it presupposed numeracy all right, but it was not about numeracy itself. Moreover its goal was not to explain why computational and linguistic symbolisms succeed, but to explain how they fail – failure being the whole point; in this particular instance, failure to detect and prevent abusive value shifts affecting words and counters alike. (shrink)

O presente artigo emergiu de uma reflexão sobre os percalços que afligem e chocam os professores, sobretudo no início da carreira, entre os quais se destaca tanto nos estudos quanto nos relatos propalados pelos próprios professores, a violência manifestada dentro e fora das salas de aula. Dada essa constatação e a evidente necessidade de sua superação para além de medidas efêmeras, esta pesquisa traça dois objetivos igualmente relevantes: a) incitar a discussão da violência no momento da formação docente inicial, bem (...) como o surgimento de novos estudos acerca dessa temática no âmbito da pesquisa acadêmica; e b) transgredir a tradição de pesquisas que consistem em recomendar prescrições a serem aplicadas sobre como banir a violência escolar, desconsiderando as peculiaridades de cada contexto. Tais objetivos são provenientes da seguinte questão norteadora: quais estratégias são desenvolvidas nos cursos de licenciatura que visam à preparação do futuro professor para lidar com o fenômeno da violência na escola básica? Intentando responder a essa questão e, portanto, contemplar os objetivos delineados optou-se pela análise de material bibliográfico especializado, sistematicamente selecionado, como procedimento metodológico. Como principal resultado, verificou-se que a discussão da temática da violência escolar na formação inicial é algo ainda escasso na prática e incipiente na esfera da pesquisa. Assim sendo, enfatiza-se a importância do fortalecimento de tal discussão a fim de que, ao ingressarem na carreira docente, futuros professores sintam-se devidamente subsidiados para enfrentarem os desafios cotidianos que venham a se manifestar ao longo do exercício da profissão. (shrink)

Commitment to the truth -- Commitment to what you value -- Commitment to "it's all of us" -- Commitment to stand with you when all -- Hell breaks loose -- Commitment to the faults and failures as well as the opportunities and successes -- Commitment to sound financial principles -- Commitment to helping individuals achieve -- Their potential and be their best -- Commitment to a safe place to work -- Commitment to your word is your bond -- Commitment to (...) a good reputation. (shrink)

This article takes the 2008–2010 financial crisis as a case study to explore the tension between responsibility and accountability in complex crises. I analyze the patterns of attribution and assumption of responsibility of thirty-three bankers in Wall Street, interviewed from fall 2008 to summer 2010. First, I show that responsibility for complex failures cannot be easily attributed or assumed: responsibility becomes diluted within the collective. Actors can only assume collective responsibility, recognizing that they belong to an institution at fault. (...) Second, I show that blaming is a social process that should be examined contextually, relationally, and dynamically. I build on sociological theories to depart from the normative focus of philosophers, and the cognitive focus of psychologists, who have dominated the study of responsibility so far. (shrink)

A guide to personal accountability-the fundamental key to leadership success With the toughest economic downturn in recent history, the issue of accountability has taken center stage. However accountability is often confused with punishment, fault, blame and guilt. In this book, the author argues that the only true accountability is "personal accountability" and the only way to achieve it is to take responsibility for the outcomes of your choices, behaviors and actions. The 85% Solution reveals that to be truly accountable, (...) leaders must accept no less than 85% of the responsibility for the outcomes of your actions; Empower themselves to take the risks and actions you must in order to get what they want; and Show they are willing to answer for the outcomes that result from their choices and actions. Offers a practical guide to personal accountability and reveals how this leads to personal and business success Guides readers to take the risks and actions to reach their goals Contains self-assessments for determining personal accountability index The author is an experienced consultant who works with organizations, teams, and individuals to improve their personal and work lives. (shrink)

Leszek Kołakowski, who was brought up in the climate of Marxist philosophy, has moved away very considerably from the Marxist position of extreme atheism, but he may not be called a convert. Of the two contrasting attitudes which may be assumed in respect of the existential problems, the attitude of the priest and the attitude of the jester, Kołakowski is closer to the latter. The priest, if he is to perform his role well, should take his duties seriously; he should (...) be convinced of the truth of the deity that he serves. In carrying out his office he is expected to be ceremonious, formal and serious. The jester's position is more comfortable. His task is not to conduct a systematic and serious search for the truth: it is more the role of the critic. He is to observe the faults, the nonsenses, and the blunders, unconcerned for the persons at the butt-end of his critique and how they are to extricate themselves from it. The jester need not be a merry clown at all. Perhaps that is why alongside God, the sub-title of Kołakowski's book mentions things that are sad. Kołakowski is fascinated by the figure of Satan, who wants to be taken seriously but in culture, especially in the folk culture is attributed grotesque forms. Only the devil of the jasełka traditional Polish Christmas play makes audiences laugh hilariously, the real devil is deadly serious, since he is eternally thirsting for the truth and for love. Kołakowski is not pleased with his role of jester. But neither would he be any use as a priest. He has no gospel of his own which he could pass on to other people. He is trapped between two absurdities, which he briefly formulates after Pascal as: „The basic tenets of faith... are absurd, and yet the world image which excludes those tenets is even more absurd". (shrink)