Robert Nola has argued that anti-rationalist interpretations of science fail to adequately explain the process of science, since objective reasons can be causal factors in belief formation. While I agree with Nola that objective reasons can be a cause of belief, in this paper I present a version of the strong programme in the sociology of knowledge, the Interests Thesis, and argue that the Interests Thesis provides a plausible explanation of an episode in the history of ape-language research. Specifically, (...) I examine Terrace, Petitto, Sandess, & Bever illegitimate comparison of the signing of their chimpanzee, Nim, with data from human early childhood language development, and argue that Terrace et al.’s interests played a causal role in determining their sceptical beliefs concerning ape linguistic abilities. However, I go on to argue that Terrace et al.’s interests are not the only causal factors in determining their beliefs: objective reasons, associated with the institution of new methodologies, were also causally determinative of Terrace et al.’s sceptical beliefs. Consequently, I argue that belief formation in science is a multi-factorial affair wherein both interests and objective reasons have causal roles. I finish the paper with two conjectures concerning the proper locus of scientific rationality. (shrink)

In this book it is argued that this picture of Feyerabend is false.

There is a long tradition of arguing that design and science are importantly different. One such argument is that the separation of science and design is an implication that can be drawn from the Simon–Kroes model of the nature of technical artifacts. This paper argues that the Simon–Kroes model does not imply a radical separation between science and design: if we accept the Simon–Kroes model of the nature of technical artifacts and their production, then we must also accept that all (...) the sciences also produce technical artifacts, and in importantly similar ways. Moreover, the placing of both science and design in a naturalist framework reinforces this conclusion and opens up new vistas for synergetic cross-disciplinary discussion of design and methodology. (shrink)

We examine the claim that design is demarcated from science by having wicked problems while science does not and argue that it is wrong. We examine each of the ten features Rittel and Weber hold to be characteristic of wicked problems and show that they derive from three general sources common to science and design: agent finitude, system complexity and problem normativity, and play analogous roles in each. This provides the basis for a common core cognitive process to design and (...) science. Underlying our arguments is a shift to a strategic problem-solving conception of method in both disciplines that opens up new opportunities for synergetic cross-disciplinary research and practice. (shrink)

: The purpose of this paper and its sister paper (Farrell and Hooker, b) is to present, evaluate and elaborate a proposed new model for the process of scientific development: self-directed anticipative learning (SDAL). The vehicle for its evaluation is a new analysis of a well-known historical episode: the development of ape-language research. In this first paper we outline five prominent features of SDAL that will need to be realized in applying SDAL to science: 1) interactive exploration of possibility space; (...) 2) self-directedness; 3) localization of success and error; 4) Synergistic increase in learning capacity; and 5) continuity of SDAL process across scientific change. In this paper we examine the first three features of SDAL in relation to the early history of ape-language research. We show that this history is readily explicated as a self-directed, ever-finer, delineation of possibility space that enables the localization of both success and error. Paper II examines the last two features against this history. (shrink)

: The purpose of this paper and its sister paper I (Farrell and Hooker, a) is to present, evaluate and elaborate a proposed new model for the process of scientific development: self-directed anticipative learning. The vehicle for its evaluation is a new analysis of a well-known historical episode: the development of ape language research. Paper I examined the basic features of SDAL in relation to the early history of ape-language research. In this second paper we examine the reconceptualization of ape-language (...) research following what many conceived to be Terrace's refutation of ape-language. We show that the apparent 'revolution' in our understanding of ape linguistic capacities was not based upon 'revolutionary' research different in kind from 'normal' research. The same processes of self-directed interactive exploration of possibility space, that enables a homing-in upon both error and success, is present in all phases of productive science. Moreover, conceiving science as an SDAL process explains how scientists learn how to learn about their research domain. (shrink)

John Preston has claimed that we must understand Paul Feyerabend's later, post-1970, philosophy in terms of a disappointed Popperianism: that Feyerabend became a sceptical, relativistic, literal anarchist because of his perception of the failure of Popper's philosophy. I argue that this claim cannot be supported and trace the development of Feyerabend's philosophy in terms of a commitment to the central Popperian themes of criticism and critical explanatory progress. This commitment led Feyerabend to reject Popper's specific methodology in favour of a (...) pluralistic methodology, but the commitment to the central values of criticism and critical explanatory progress remained . Moreover, methodological pluralism does not imply scepticism, relativism, or literal anarchism. Feyerabend was not a disappointed Popperian, but, in many respects, a die-hard pluralistic Popperian. (shrink)

Kripke and putnam have argued that metaphysical necessity is truth in all possible worlds, Hence is a kind of logica necessity; it is this claim I argue against. My argument proceeds by way of my considering and elaborating an example to show that although 'gold has atomic number 79' be counted a metaphysically necessary truth, There is a possible world in which it is false; it turns out to be for all I show here at most a physical necessity, True (...) in all those worlds structurally similar to the actual world. (shrink)

My early promise to answer Dummett's criticisms has been kept: both general criticisms of Goodman's constructional method and particular criticisms of specific aspects of the system developed in SA have been met. The general conclusion has to be that Dummett in his review, and in his elaborations in his two later articles, is not a reliable guide to SA itself, or to its significance. Those whom I hypothesized as having left their copies of SA unread on the basis of Dummett's (...) unfavourable judgment should now, even if belatedly, read them. (shrink)

When the U.S. conducts warfare, elements of a force are drawn from different services and work together as a single team to accomplish an assigned mission. To achieve such unified action, it is necessary that the doctrines governing the actions of members of specific services be both consistent with and subservient to joint Doctrine. Because warfighting today increasingly involves not only live forces but also automated systems, unified action requires that information technology that is used in joint warfare must be (...) aligned with joint doctrine. It requires also that the separate information systems used by the different elements of a joint force must be interoperable, in the sense that data and information that is generated by each element must be usable (understandable, processable) by all the other elements that need them. Currently, such interoperability is impeded by multiple inconsistencies among the different data and software standards used by warfighters. We describe here the on-going project of creating a Joint Doctrine Ontology (JDO), which uses joint doctrine to provide shared computer-accessible content valid for any field of military endeavor, organization, and information system. JDO addresses the two previously mentioned requirements of unified action by providing a widely applicable benchmark for use by developers of information systems that will both guarantee alignment with joint doctrine and support interoperability. (shrink)

Surgical devices are often marketed before there is good evidence of their safety and effectiveness. Our paper discusses the ethical issues associated with the early marketing and use of new surgical devices from the perspectives of the six groups most concerned. Health Canada, which is responsible for licensing new surgical devices, should amend their requirements to include rigorous clinical trials that provide data on effectiveness and safety for each new product before it is marketed. Industry should comply with all Health (...) Canada requirements to obtain licenses for new products. Until Health Canada requires effectiveness and safety data, industry should cooperate with physicians in appropriate studies before releasing new products and should make balanced presentations of all the available evidence. Surgeons should, before using a new surgical device, assess the evidence on its effectiveness and safety and ensure they are properly trained and competent in using the device. Surgeons should provide their patients with an evaluation of the available evidence and inform them about possible complications and the surgeon's level of experience with the new device. Patients, who should be given an honest evaluation of the available evidence, possible complications, and the surgeon's experience, should be encouraged to evaluate the evidence and information to their own satisfaction to ensure that fully informed consent is given. Health institutions, responsible for regulating practice within their walls, should review new devices for safety, effectiveness, and economic impacts, before allowing their use. They should also limit the use of new surgical devices to surgeons trained and competent in the new technology. Professional societies should provide guidance on the early adoption of new surgical devices and technologies. We urge all those involved in the development, licensing, and use of new surgical devices to aim for higher ethical standards to protect the health and safety of patients requiring surgery. The lowest acceptable ethical standard would require device manufacturers to provide surgeons with accurate and timely information on the efficacy and safety of their products, allowing surgeons and patients to evaluate the evidence (and the significance of information not yet available) before surgery. (shrink)

Offers philosophical and psychological reflections on cruelty and tenderness. The Cudgel and the Caress explores the enduring significance of tenderness and cruelty in a range of works across philosophy, psychoanalysis, and literature. Divided into two parts, the book initially focuses on tenderness, with David Farrell Krell delivering original readings of Homer’s Iliad, Sophocles’s Antigone, and writings by Hölderlin, Hegel, Freud, and Derrida that deal with the importance of tenderness and the tragic consequences of its absence. Part One concludes with an (...) extended reading of Robert Musil’s Man Without Qualities, in which Krell analyzes the tender relationship between Ulrich and Agathe. In Part Two, Krell begins by examining Otto Rank’s Birth Trauma, which reflects on the tenderness of gestation in the womb and the cruel necessity of birth. He then turns to an examination of cruelty in general, focusing on Derrida’s challenge to contemporary psychoanalysis, his opposition between Kant and Nietzsche, and his analysis (and indictment) of the death penalty. Groundbreaking and insightful, the book provides a rare philosophical treatment of subjects vital to the world we live in. David Farrell Krell is Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at DePaul University and Brauer Distinguished Visiting Professor of German Studies at Brown University. (shrink)

Gascoigne, Robert A quick rollcall of Australian political life demonstrates a remarkable presence of Catholics in leadership positions, including the Governor-General, Sir Peter Cosgrove; the Prime Minister, Tony Abbott; the Leader of the Federal Opposition, Bill Shorten; the two immediate past premiers of New South Wales, Barry O'Farrell and Kristina Keneally; the previous Governor of New South Wales, Dame Marie Bashir; and the Lord Mayor of the City of Sydney, Clover Moore; among others. Indeed, in the immediate past Federal (...) Labor Cabinet, there were three members from just one Catholic school, St Patrick's Christian Brothers College, Strathfield, Sydney, just as there are four old boys of Jesuit colleges in the current Coalition Cabinet. It is noteworthy that there have been relatively few attempts in public commentary and debate to draw attention to this strong cross-party presence. I believe that this is essentially because it is clear that these Catholic political leaders do not represent any kind of ecclesial or communal political bloc, but are manifestly divergent in their political stances and allegiances. Previous linkages between Catholic religious identity and political allegiance have now become obsolete. Our current situation has positive aspects demonstrating a willingness by many Australian Catholics to take up political responsibilities within a context of political pluralism against a background of democratic consensus. Yet it also raises a number of questions about ecclesial identity and formation: What is the political - and ethical - presence and character of the Catholic ecclesial community in Australia, given the considerable divergence of political stances? To what extent does Catholic social teaching function as an agreed resource and inspiration? What is the character of shared membership of the church in the context of vigorously contested and divergent political allegiances? (shrink)

One of the many virtues of Martin Seel’s Aesthetics of Appearing is that it lays its cards on the table at the very outset. The final three chapters consist in a series of complex digressions from the main discussion: one on the aesthetic significance of ‘resonating’(p. 139), one organized around the metaphysics of pictures, and one charged with defending the implausible claim that the artistic representation of violence is uniquely capable of revealing ‘what is violent about violence’ (p. 191). But (...) the thesis of the book and its main arguments are stated in the preface, preceding even the acknowledgements. Seel writes, ‘[t]his book makes the proposal of having aesthetics begin not with concepts of being‐so or semblance but with a concept of appearing’ (p. xi). This might initially seem opaque, as though reducing aesthetics to a subtlety involving the meaning of the Greek word phainomai, but Seel immediately clarifies the stance that he wishes to advance. Seel’s position is that aesthetics is distinguished by attention to the indeterminable particularity of sensory experience; aesthetics so considered comprises the philosophy of art as well as non‐art experience; aesthetic experience is a legitimate mode of world‐encounter by virtue of its immediacy or ‘presence’ (p. xi)(Gegenwart – i.e., a contrary of ‘past’, rather than of ‘absence’); and because the presence of our experience reveals the presence of our lives, aesthetic experience constitutes an important form of self‐knowledge. The subsequent chapters are devoted to explicating this position in extraordinary detail. Seel’s position depends on a somewhat implicit account of subjectivity. In this account, what we fundamentally perceive, conditioned by conceptual activity but transcending any possible determinate content, is a ‘play’ of sensuous qualities (p. 47). Since it is ‘unfettered’ (p. 51) by theoretical interest, this form of perception is far qualitatively richer than our more structured experiences: here one is ‘able to perceive.... (shrink)

Troubadour of truth, by R. E. Brennan.--Reflections on necessity and contingency, by Jacques Maritain.--Intellectual cognition, by Rudolf Allers.--The problem of truth, J. K. Ryan.--The ontolgical roots of Thomism, by Hilary Carpeuter.--The role of habitus in the Thomistic metaphysics of potency and act, by V. J. Bourke.--The nature of the angels, by J. O. Riedl.--The dilemma of being and unity, by A. C. Pegis.--Prudence, the incommunicable wisdom, by C. J. O'Neil.--A question about law, by M. J. Adler.--The economic philosophy of Aquinas, (...) by J. A. Ryan.--Beyond the crisis of liberalism, by Y. R. Simon.--The fate of representative government, by Walter Farrell.--The Thomistic concept of education, by R. J. Slavin.--The perennial theme of beauty, by Immanuel Chapman.--Epilogue, by H. T. Schwartz.--Bibliography (p.[363]-419). (shrink)

Utilitarianism, the great reforming philosophy of the nineteenth century, has today acquired the reputation for being a crassly calculating, impersonal philosophy unfit to serve as a guide to moral conduct. Yet what may disqualify utilitarianism as a personal philosophy makes it an eminently suitable guide for public officials in the pursuit of their professional responsibilities. Robert E. Goodin, a philosopher with many books on political theory, public policy and applied ethics to his credit, defends utilitarianism against its critics and (...) shows how it can be applied most effectively over a wide range of public policies. In discussions of such issues as paternalism, social welfare policy, international ethics, nuclear armaments, and international responses to the environment crisis, he demonstrates what a flexible tool his brand of utilitarianism can be in confronting the dilemmas of public policy in the real world. (shrink)

The United States Army’s Future Combat Systems Project, which aims to manufacture a “robot army” to be ready for deployment by 2012, is only the latest and most dramatic example of military interest in the use of artificially intelligent systems in modern warfare. This paper considers the ethics of a decision to send artificially intelligent robots into war, by asking who we should hold responsible when an autonomous weapon system is involved in an atrocity of the sort that would normally (...) be described as a war crime. A number of possible loci of responsibility for robot war crimes are canvassed; the persons who designed or programmed the system, the commanding officer who ordered its use, the machine itself. I argue that in fact none of these are ultimately satisfactory. Yet it is a necessary condition for fighting a just war, under the principle of jus in bellum, that someone can be justly held responsible for deaths that occur in the course of the war. As this condition cannot be met in relation to deaths caused by an autonomous weapon system it would therefore be unethical to deploy such systems in warfare. (shrink)

Introduction : kith, kin, and family / Sally Haslanger and Charlotte Witt Adoption and its progeny : rethinking family law, gender, and sexual difference / Drucilla Cornell Open adoption is not for everyone / Anita L. Allen Methods of adoption : eliminating genetic privilege / Jacqueline Stevens Several steps behind : gay and lesbian adoption / Sarah Tobias A child of one’s own : property, progeny, and adoption / Janet Farrell Smith Family resemblances : adoption, personal identity, and genetic essentialism (...) / Charlotte Witt Being adopted and being a philosopher : exploring identity and the "desire to know" differently / Kimberly Leighton Real othering : the metaphysics of maternity in children’s literature / Shelley Park Accidents and contingencies of love / Songsuk Hahn ; comments by Harry Frankfurt Abuse and neglect, foster drift, and the adoption alternative / Elizabeth Bartholet Feminism, race, and adoption policy / Dorothy Roberts Racial randomization / Hawley Fogg-Davis You Mixed?: racial identity without racial biology / Sally Haslanger. (shrink)

Robert Alexy develops his influential theory of legal reasoning exploring the nature of legal argumentation and its relation to practical reasoning. In doing so he sheds light on fundamental questions of law and rationality, which are as crucial to practising lawyers and law students as they are to scholars of legal theory.

Nozick argues, in “Anarchy, State, and Utopia”, correctly I think, that we can go from an equal distribution of wealth to an unequal one through just means. Nozick then asks: If people voluntarily move from a just distribution of wealth, D1, to a different distribution, D2, “isn’t D2 also just?” While Nozick thinks the new distribution of wealth, D2, is just, I think that it is at least possible to go from a just state of affairs to an un-just state (...) of affairs by just means. I then argue that any unequal distribution of wealth can not maximize the good derived from wealth. Therefore, on the basis of plausible utilitarian ideas, any distribution of wealth that isn’t at least roughly equal is un-just, even it was arrived at by just means from aa equal and just distribution of wealth. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain (...) in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

At the heart of this book is the age-old question of how law and morality are related. The legal positivist, insisting on the separation of the two, explicates the concept of law independently of morality. The author challenges this view, arguing that there are, first, conceptually necessary connections between law and morality and, second, normative reasons for including moral elements in the concept of law. While the conceptual argument alone is too limited to establish a sufficiently strong connection between law (...) and morality, and the normative argument alone fails to address the nature of law, the two arguments together support a nonpositivistic concept of law, toppling legal positivism qua comprehensive theory of law. (shrink)

This book analyses the general structure of constitutional rights reasoning under the German Basic Law. It deals with a wide range of problems common to all systems of constitutional rights review. In an extended introduction the translator argues for its applicability to the British Constitution, with particular reference to the Human Rights Act 1998.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Preface: Virtual Entities in ScienceRobert Harlander, Jean-Philippe Martinez, Friedrich Steinle, and Adrian WüthrichIt is not only since the sudden increase of online communication due to the COVID-19 situation that the concept of the “virtual” has made its way into everyday language. In this context, it mostly denotes a digital substitute for a real object or process. Virtual reality is perhaps the best-known term in this respect. With these digital (...) connotations, “virtuality” has also been used in science and research: Chemists use virtual laboratories, biologists do virtual scanning of molecular structures, and geologists engage in virtual field trips. But the concept of the virtual has a much longer tradition, dating back to long before the dawn of the digital age. Virtual images and virtual displacements were introduced in classical physics already in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, respectively. They represent auxiliary objects or processes without instantiation, with the purpose of efficiently describing specific physical systems. In today’s physics, the term “virtual” is mostly associated with the quantum world, first and foremost with the “virtual particle” of quantum field theory. It has become such an integral part of modern high energy physics that its ontological character may be considered to go beyond the purely auxiliary, which is typically associated with the virtual. [End Page 263]In other disciplines, however, use of the term virtual without a digital connotation is much rarer. While concepts like “virtual adrenaline” show up in physiological research around 1940s, and Charles Darwin, in a private note in January 1840,1 spoke of “virtual change” in the context of embryology, these examples seem to be singular occurrences of entities that were explicitly called “virtual.” The basic idea behind the terminology of the virtual, however, might be much more common, even outside of physics. The “invisible hand” in economics, or the “vital force” in biology, for instance, may carry aspects of a virtual entity, even if they have not been referred to that way.These different observations raise several questions about the status of virtual entities in science. What has led scientists to call one entity “virtual” and not another? Do all virtual entities in science have the same roots and meet the same characteristics? Are they more than auxiliary objects or processes? Why does physics seem to occupy a specific position with respect to the use of the notion of virtuality? These are some points that led us to discuss virtual entities in science during a workshop, out of which grew the present collection. We invited contributions that addressed the historical formation and philosophical interpretation of concepts of virtual entities in physics and other disciplines—in whatever terms they may come. The main goal of the workshop was to bring to the fore similarities and differences in the meanings and functions of these concepts, so as to be able to precisely characterize why certain entities are considered virtual in specific contexts, why a different terminology was often used in each individual case, and in what sense the virtual entities relate to the real world.The organization of the workshop was part of our project “The formation and development of the concept of virtual particles,” a subproject of the Research Unit “The Epistemology of the Large Hadron Collider,” funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) and Der Wissenschaftsfonds (FWF). The workshop took place online on four consecutive Fridays in March 2021. It brought together contributors who discussed the role of the concept of the virtual in theoretical as well as experimental activities, and investigated into the origins of the terminology of the virtual as it was applied to the various disciplines of natural science. Dealing with historical, philosophical, but also methodological questions, the presentations covered a wide time range, from the Middle Ages to the present day. While physics naturally emerged as the dominant field, natural philosophy, computer science and biology were also addressed. The papers in this volume were contributed by participants in this workshop and approach the subject from different angles. [End Page 264]First, Friedrich Steinle provides us with an introductory piece that reflects on the specific meaning of the use of the term ‘virtual’ in science. He highlights and... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Publics, Counterpublics, and the Promise of DemocracyMelanie Loehwing and Jeff MotterTheories of publics and counterpublics remain as contested as the issues, identities, and politics they serve. Across the disciplinary spectrum, scholars turn to publics and counterpublics to help elucidate problems of inclusion and exclusion, projects of social justice, and the waning promise of democratic politics. Such work often enters the scholarly conversation at the points of contestation famously introduced (...) by Jürgen Habermas and Nancy Fraser: publics or counterpublics? While Fraser's influence in rhetorical studies usefully prompts us to think about challenges to dominant discourse, the particular sense in which democracy undergirds projects about publics lingers as a question in need of exploration and clarification. Many take Fraser's intervention as a corrective to the politically insufficient Habermasian theory found in The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (1991). We argue, however, for a return to the original point of theoretical contention in an effort to specify the different normative commitments of the two perspectives and reevaluate the role each envisions for rhetoric as a potentially democratic praxis.Many critics concur with Fraser in describing the normative commitments of the Habermasian theory of the public sphere as idealized or exclusionary, and as such, "the problem is not only that Habermas idealizes the bourgeois public sphere but also that he fails to examine other, nonliberal, [End Page 220] nonbourgeois, competing public spheres. Or rather, it is precisely because he fails to examine these other public spheres that he ends up idealizing the bourgeois public sphere" (Fraser 1997, 74). However, this position relies on a reading of Habermas that focuses on the particular historical examples he investigates, rather than the democratic potential he extends from such historical practices, however deficient critics may judge them to be. Nevertheless, the intervention initiated by Fraser and elaborated by rhetorical scholars compels us to consider in what ways advancing a normative justification of democracy grounded in specific historical practices asks markedly different questions than pursuing a realist project of scrutinizing "actually existing" political formations.Further, the role of rhetoric in rejuvenated democratic politics stands as an important component of public and counterpublic sphere scholarship, though little work beyond that of Robert Asen and Daniel Brouwer has been done to articulate the senses of rhetoric embraced by the two perspectives, or their compatibility with contemporary understandings of rhetoric as social praxis that constitutes the communities, ideologies, and citizenship of those it serves (Asen 2003; Asen and Brouwer 2003; Asen 2004; Brouwer 2006). It is our contention that while Fraser's vein of counterpublic scholarship asks how existing and future publics can be treated democratically, Habermasian public sphere theory inquires into the means by which publics create democracy, and this essay represents a first attempt at delineating the implications of adopting one perspective over the other.To do so, we begin by discussing Habermas's initial assessment of the shifts in political culture that lead to the reconstitution of publicity and authority in the bourgeois public sphere, as well as Fraser's critique of the Habermasian vision of the public sphere and the subsequent development of counterpublic scholarship. A comparison between the two allows us to consider what kind of function each imagines rhetoric to serve in the creation and maintenance of democratic culture. Moreover, the juxtaposition of these two theoretical perspectives prompts us to specify precisely what we refer to when we speak of rhetorical democracy and its relationship to public spheres, and we offer in the final section a preliminary discussion of how the specific problematic of publics and counterpublics sheds light on the broadly relevant theme of the intersections between democratic politics and rhetorical culture.Before proceeding, however, we want to note the long and troubled relationship scholars of rhetoric have had with Habermas's work. Given his sociological training and identifications with social scientific [End Page 221] disciplines, as well as his stated goal of extending the Enlightenment project (Habermas 1990), it should not come as much of a surprise that many rhetoricians find little reason to comb his vast writings for resources (though for notable exceptions to this tendency, see Goodnight 1992; Farrell 1993; Goodnight and Hingstman 1997; Hauser 1999... (shrink)

"Daimon Life is life-enchancing. To read it is to become richer in word." –John Llewelyn Disclosure of Martin Heidegger’s complicity with the National Socialist regime in 1933-34 has provoked virulent debate about the relationship between his politics and his philosophy. Did Heidegger’s philosophy exhibit a kind of organicism readily transformed into ideological "blood and soil"? Or, rather, did his support of the Nazis betray a fundamental lack of loyalty to living things? David Farrell Krell traces Heidegger’s political authoritarianism to his (...) failure to develop a constructive "life-philosophy"—his phobic reactions to other forms of being. Krell details Heidegger’s opposition to Lebensphilosophie as expressed in Being and Time, in an important but little-known lecture course on theoretical biology given in 1929–30 called "The Basic Concepts of Metaphysics," and in a recently published key text, Contributions to Philosophy, written in 1936–38. Although Heidegger’s attempt to think through the problems of life, sexual reproduction, behavior, environment, and the ecosystem ultimately failed, Krell contends that his methods of thinking nonetheless pose important tasks for our own thought. Drawing on and away from Heidegger, Krell expands on the topics of life, death, sexuality, and spirit as these are treated by Freud, Nietzsche, Derrida, and Irigaray. Daimon Life addresses issues central to contemporary philosophies of politics, gender, ecology, and theoretical biology. (shrink)

Originally published under the title: Tsong Khapa's Speech of gold in the Essence of true eloquence.