I explore the possibility and rationality of interpersonal mechanisms of doxastic self-control, that is, ways in which individuals can make use of other people in order to get themselves to stick to their beliefs. I look, in particular, at two ways in which people can make interpersonal epistemic commitments, and thereby willingly undertake accountability to others, in order to get themselves to maintain their beliefs in the face of anticipated “epistemic temptations”. The first way is through the avowal of belief, (...) and the second is through the establishment of collective belief. I argue that both of these forms of interpersonal epistemic commitment can function as effective tools for doxastic self-control, and, moreover, that the control they facilitate should not be dismissed as irrational from an epistemic perspective. (shrink)

David Eso and Kay Burns edition of philosopher Leo Ferraris previously unpublished 1973 manuscript brings to light a long forgotten satirical work, which, in an age of fake news, possesses renewed relevance. The editors contextualize The Earth is Flat! for the reader with a scholarly introduction and a humorous Forewarning. Author, Leo Ferrari, draws on his extensive knowledge of classical thought and its key figures to present a history of ideas that is sometimes accurate, sometimes speculative. Speculative or alternative aspects (...) of this history support his Flat Earth theme, as do a number of scientific experiments outlined, which the reader is encouraged to try. He traces the conflict between Globularist and Planoterrestrial beliefs from antiquity to his contemporary moment of the early 1970s, marked by space exploration. Later chapters chart the activities and philosophies of the Flat Earth Society of Canada, including Ferraris experience on the lecture circuit and in media platforms. The authors method is to blur the line between seriousness and humour and to show that intellectual work can also be good fun. He uses the idea of a spinning, spherical planet to symbolically represent the alienating effects of technological modernity. (shrink)

Maude's excellent translation of Tolstoy's treatise on the emotionalist theory of art was the first unexpurgated version of the work to appear in any language. More than ninety years later this work remains, as Vincent Tomas observed, "one of the most rigorous attacks on formalism and on the doctrine of art for art's sake ever written". Tomas' Introduction makes this the edition of choice for students of aesthetics and anyone with philosophical interests.

Warm regards are exchanged between old friends who are seriously bent on changing the world, not merely analyzing it. Mutual appreciation is evident, as is some tension. Herbert Marcuse’s militant critique of US war-making, waste-making, and poverty is taking Europe by storm. Leo Löwenthal tips his hat with subtle irony and humor to Marcuse’s 1967 triumphs as a public intellectual and political theorist. Activist students give Marcuse great credit because other Frankfurt theorists like Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno have remained (...) aloof from this protest. Löwenthal remains more skeptical than Marcuse about the goals of the student movement, which seem to him too ideological and insufficiently radical. (shrink)

This concise and accessible introduction to Strauss's thought provides, for wider audience, a bridge to his more complex theoretical work. Editor Pangle has gathered five of Strauss's previously unpublished lectures and five hard-to-find published writings and has arranged them so as to demonstrate the systematic progression of the major themes that underlay Strauss's mature work. "[These essays] display the incomparable insight and remarkable range of knowledge that set Strauss's works apart from any other twentieth-century philosopher's."—Charles R. Kesler, National Review.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BUDDHISM AND MIMETIC THEORY: A RESPONSE TO CHRISTOPHER IVES Leo D. Lefebure Fordham University ChristopherIves offers avery clearandthoughtful exploration ofthe relation between Dharma and Destruction. His discussion helps us to understand the historical relation between institutions and violence in various Buddhist traditions. His overview of the historical record is quite compelling, offering us an important counterpoint and corrective to the widespread images of Buddhist peacemakers in the popular media. (...) From the beginning, the Buddhist tradition has had a mixed record in its understanding and practice of the first moral precept, nonviolence. The encounter between Buddhist perspectives and mimetic theory poses interesting challenges for both partners to the discussion. Mimetic theory offers Buddhists an analysis ofthe construction ofdesire and the self that in many ways complements traditional Buddhist perspectives. It also offers a naming ofthe mechanisms of violence in the formation of societies that may be helpful for Buddhists' social analyses. Buddhism for its part offers mimetic theory a centuries-old tradition of reflection on the role of desire in the construction of an illusory self as well as a body of practical wisdom on non-violence that, even if it has not always been put into practice, challenges and instructs the human community today. The popular images of Buddhist peacemakers are, after all, deeply rooted in the early Buddhist tradition and powerfully represented by contemporary figures such as the Dalai Lama, Mahaghosananda (the Patriarch of Cambodian Buddhism and Thich Nhat Hanh (a Vietnamese Zen Buddhist leader who has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize). 176Leo D. Lefebure I approach this discussion not as a professional scholar of Buddhism but as a Christian theologian who has been involved in Buddhist-Christian dialogue and who is interested in both Buddhism and mimetic theory, as well as in the relations between these two trajectories today. One model for further discussion would be to take the historical data that Ives has set forth and then apply mimetic theory, asking to what degree mimetic theory can illumine the dynamics and developments of Buddhist history. Using Bernard Lonergan's image of the scissors, which Charles Heflingmentionedin his discussion inthis conference, this approach would cast Buddhism in the role of providing the lower blade of the scissors, the data to be understood, and mimetic theory would provide the upper blade of the scissors, the analytic concepts to understand the data and to make judgments and decisions. In this method, Buddhism would be relatively passive and mimetic theory would be more active. I am sure that there is ample material in Buddhist history that lends itselfto mimetic analysis (one can think ofthe traditional treatment ofthe so-called "outcasts" in Japanese society). One could, as James Alison noted in his opening address, go on endlessly, even obsessively applyingmimetic concepts to different areas of human experience. I am not sure this qualifies as true dialogue, however. It risks continuing the older Orientalist assumption that only Western concepts are capable of understanding Asia's experience and that Asians themselves have relatively little to contribute.1 For a true dialogue, the voices ofboth traditions must play a rather more active role. Both traditions can furnish material for both the upper and the lower blades of the scissors. In Lonergan's terminology, we aremovingbeyondinterpretation, which seeks understanding, and beyond history, which for Lonergan asks what is going forward in history, to the distinct functional specialization of dialectic (Lonergan 125?30). This discipline reflects upon the underlying values at work in historical processes and the assumptions behind these values. In this inquiry we ask about the status of differences of perspective: to what degree are they complementary and where are they contradictory? I would like to organize the discussion between Buddhist perspectives and mimetic theory around the three central points of mimetic theory, which René Girard himself has described as his three most important discoveries: (1) the mimetic construction of desire as the source of human identity, (2) the surrogate victim mechanism as the central dynamic of 1 On Orientalism, see Edward W. Said, Orientalism (New York: Vintage Books, 1979). A Response to Christopher Ives177 primal religion and culture, and (3) biblical revelation as the unique, unparalleled unmasking of the surrogate victim mechanism... (shrink)